Intelligent and Smart Packaging

Urgent need of increased food production and availability are crucial in humankind future. A key aspect concerns the food preservation, wherein packaging is a main aspect. Packaging is still in a primitive form, utilized as a way to separate food from environmental conditions, not considering the inside situation. Improvement of packaging means less cost, more food available, and waste decrease. Several solutions are emerging to face this challenge. They are focused on three aspects: the antimicrobial agent; the packaging material; and the technological implication in the final production of packaging. Biotechnology is expected to play a central role in the future food to solve central points, as retain integrity and actively prevent food spoilage. In this phase, several projects are moving, still waiting to converge in adequate products. The galaxy of smart packaging is rapidly moving and increasing in researches. This phase represents a chaotic period of several proposals production and tentative in solving the food preservative problems, using new technologies and advanced techniques, like nanotechnology. Waiting the collapse into a central paradigm, it is interesting and useful to follow the scenario of researches on smart packaging based on natural products here reported

Das Management des Zinsrisikos bei Banken

Gegenstand der hier vorgestellten Arbeit ist die Untersuchung des Management-Prozesses des Zinsrisikos. Die Prozesse werden einzeln betrachtet und bewertet. Das Hauptaugenmerk liegt auf der Messung des Zinsrisikos. In diesem Management-Prozess werden die am häufigsten in der bankbetrieblichen Literatur vorkommenden Instrumente erläutert und an einfachen Beispielen dargestellt. Nach den Beispielen werden die jeweiligen Vor- und Nachteile ermittelt. Die technische Komponente als integratives Element des Zinsrisiko-Managements wird im Anschluss kurz besprochen

Emerging Insect-Borne Diseases of Agricultural, Medical and Veterinary Importance

Current migrations, due to several causes, but mainly consequence of climate changes, are causing several problems in Southern Europe. Some migrations are evident and attract attention immediately; others are silent, but still important, like several ones involving agriculture and livestock. In the future, a number of products employed in pest control may lose their efficacy. Pesticide resistance should be considered an increasing problem, and more environmental-friendly control approaches against arthropod pests are urgently needed. Two examples from the South of Italy clearly explain the kind of arising alerts and the complex network involving abiotic and biotic causes. The first case is the growing number of blue-tongue disease outbreaks, vectored by Culicoides sp. The second case is the alarm concerning the olive trees epidemic disease in Apulia, due to the bacterium Xylella fastidiosa. The development of new pest control methods is required in order to minimize negative effects of currently marketed synthetic pesticides. In this scenario, natural product research can afford solutions as part of an integrated pest control system. Preliminary results concerning the use of neem, Azadirachta indica, in control of insect vectors are discussed

Phytochemical Techniques in Complex Botanicals. The XXI Century Analytical Challenge

We experimented in natural products a long period of reductionism and simplification to avoid any complexity as a boring and tedious disturb, coupled with countless attempts to adapt plants to the inappropriate role of biofactories of selected substances. However nowadays new approaches are radically changing the natural substances utilizations. Among several others, two factors were determinant: the appearance of a plethora of successful new products and the revival request for Mother Nature's gifts. To be validated the new products are urgently asking for science and technology support. In this paper we will examine some items concerning the analytical aspects of botanicals, using as target the determination of compositions of raw materials and as main tool the HPTLC, High Performance Thin Layer Chromatography, fingerprint approach. Practical examples of HPTLC analyses, derived from applications on market products, are here reported and discussed in order to present an information about the benefits of HPTLC and when it is useful to use it, including limits and crisscross with other analytical tools

Professor Philippe Rasoanaivo Unveiling the ethnopharmacological potential of the flora of Madagascar: in memory of Philippe Rasoanaivo

Professor Philippe Rasoanaivo, University of Antananarivo, Madagascar, died on Wednesday, 13 July 2016 from a heart attack, at the age of 70. Professor Rasoanaivo was well known as one of the most distinguished African phytochemists, as also recognised by several international prizes. He won the 2015 Olusegun Obasanjo Prize for using traditional medicine to improve the efficacy of existing drugs for brain disorders and also treating sexual dysfunction among men. He had just been awarded the Prize at the last General Assembly meeting in Kasane, Botswana, in June 2016. Professor Rasoanaivo authored several books and more than 150 international research articles, including some recently published in Natural Product Research. Professor Rasoanaivo developed a unique mixture of scientific knowledge dedicated to the utilisation of endemic plants for ethnobotanical, economic, medicinal and social uses. He wanted to learn everything that was necessary to understand and study the extraordinary flora of his country, obtaining this information to help its people. Throughout his life, countless examples of his remarkableness can easily be found. He was an excellent botanist and, living in a country well known for an exceptional endemic flora, he was able to find and collect many species, and show the world their importance. He was a great ethnopharmacologist, learning the popular uses of plants from the people of his country, and using this information to start a scientific validation of their efficacy. He was a modern researcher: in times of fragmented research, he was able to perform the full range of research on natural products, from chemistry to applied pharmacology. He was successful and organised director of the Institut Malgache de Recherches Appliquées, promoting the cultivation of crops of economic importance. In this obituary, we have provided a synthesis of his important scientific achievements and human qualities, since we had the privilege of working with him and he was able to teach us what modern ethnopharmacology is

Analysis of Multi-ingredient Food Supplements by Fingerprint HPTLC Approach

The increase of import/export of every kind of herbal products calls urgently for adequate controls. Analysis of herbal food supplement (botanicals) is a difficult task, like in the composition determination of a multi-ingredient product, where several botanical drugs were used. Actually, this is an important argument in consideration of health security. The authors reported the results of an analytical approach based on HPTLC (high performance thin layer chromatography) fingerprints comparison and tailored to determine the composition of marketed multi-ingredient botanicals. The method gave positive data in case of the presence of 3-5 species, whereas difficulties were recorded when the number of plants is increased

hptlc fingerprint analysis of plant staminal cells products

Utilization of natural products is radically changing. Changes were mainly due to the outcome in the market of a plethora of new food supplements, and in particular those generally named botanicals for their common plant origin. The validation of these novel products needs powerful analytical devices tailored for the study of herbal extracts in order to assess composition and face their natural complexity as a resource. The last item is important and crucial for the capacity and utility of the analytical results that means that each product should be analyzed with the right approach. Having in mind these arguments, we selected HPTLC as useful tool for the analysis of products based on plant staminal (stem) cells. Nowadays these products, generally named bud-derivatives, are waiting scientific validation to obtain their own place into food supplements regulation, after gained that in the market. Our analyses, based on HPTLC fingerprints, were able to show bud-derivatives complex compositions that resulted very similar, but also in part different, to those of the corresponding leaf hydro-alcoholic extract

Evaluation of symptoms and palatability in healthy volunteers after ingestion of an iced dessert by using different flavours

It is well-known that digestion has a pivotal role in maintaining a state of wellbeing. The influence of certain foods and some herbal drugs has been ascertained. Epidemiological data show that the Mediterranean diet, with a high consumption of fresh vegetables and fruit, mainly citrus, has a beneficial effect and plays a protective gastrointestinal role. Previously, we assessed the influence on the eventual occurrence of symptoms during digestion of an iced dessert containing a mixture of digestive plant extracts, citrus juices and liquors, showing that its ingestion supports and maintains a good digestive process. Taking into consideration that sensory properties of food may also influence digestion, we also evaluated the palatability of the product. In order to evaluate the effect of different tastes on the digestive processes, we performed a further similar evaluation with two new flavours. The ingestion of these iced desserts at the end of the meal does not cause significant gastrointestinal symptoms. Moreover, palatability median score shows a good appreciation of the products. Therefore, the combination of digestive herbs, citrus juice and liquors in different flavours gives rise to a product with a positive mix of good palatability, favourable acceptance and herbal constituents, able to support and maintain a good digestive condition. Copyright © by BIOLIFE, s.a.s

Neem Tree (Azadirachta indica A. Juss) as Source of Bioinsectides

The aim of the reported studies is check the possibility of developing a new domestic insecticide using neem cake as raw material, in particular against biting mosquitos present in urban areas