Antioxidant And Anti-Mycotoxin Activities, And Cytotoxicity Properties In Vitro Of Propolis Extracts

Abstract: The present study aims to determine the antioxidant activity and cytotoxic activity of propolis and evaluate the anti-mycotoxin activity of different propolis extracts. The three extracts of propolis (ethyl acetate, ethanol (75%), and water) were subjected to testing of the antioxidant potential, and total phenolic and flavonoid contents. determination of the cytotoxicity activity by standard cell culture method against colon and liver and the ability of propolis extracts to control aflatoxin (AF) production. The results revealed that the highest value of antioxidant activities was found for propolis ethyl acetate extract with an average % inhibition of 63.42%. the highest amount of propolis's total phenolic and flavonoid contents using ethyl acetate extract were 149.5 µg gallic acid equivalent/mg extract and 218.1 µg quercetin equivalent/mg extract, respectively. The three propolis extracts affect liver and colon human cell cancer. Ethyl acetate extract of propolis showed the lowest IC50 with the highest anti-cancer activity on the liver cancer cell line. In comparison, water extract showed the lowest IC50 with the greatest anticancer activity on the colon cancer cell line (50 and 54 µg/ml, respectively). Using different concentrations of propolis to reduce AF levels led to the complete disappearance of AF production at 100, 200, and 400 mg/ml concentrations of Ethyl acetate extract against AF production. In conclusion, these obtained findings indicated that propolis extracts exhibited substantial antioxidant and anti-cancer activities

Factors associated with early growth in Egyptian infants: implications for addressing the dual burden of malnutrition.

Optimal nutrition is critical to the attainment of healthy growth, human capital and sustainable development. In Egypt, infants and young children face overlapping forms of malnutrition, including micronutrient deficiencies, stunting and overweight. Yet, in this setting, little is known about the factors associated with growth during the first year of life. A rise in stunting in Lower Egypt from 2005 to 2008 prompted this implementation research study, which followed a longitudinal cohort of infants from birth to 1 year of age within the context of a USAID-funded maternal and child health integrated programme. We sought to determine if growth patterns and factors related to early growth differed in Lower and Upper Egypt, and examined the relationship between weight loss and subsequent stunting at 12 months of age. Growth patterns revealed that length-for-age z-score (LAZ) decreased and weight-for-length z-score (WLZ) increased from 6 to 12 months of age in both regions. One-quarter of infants were stunted and nearly one-third were overweight by 12 months of age in lower Egypt. Minimum dietary diversity was significantly associated with WLZ in Lower Egypt (β = 0.22, P \u3c 0.05), but not in Upper Egypt. Diarrhoea, fever and programme exposure were not associated with any growth outcome. Weight loss during any period was associated with a twofold likelihood of stunting at 12 months in Lower Egypt, but not Upper Egypt. In countries, like Egypt, facing the nutrition transition, infant and young child nutrition programmes need to address both stunting and overweight through improving dietary quality and reducing reliance on energy-dense foods

Factors associated with early growth in Egyptian infants: implications for addressing the dual burden of malnutrition

Optimal nutrition is critical to the attainment of healthy growth, human capital and sustainable development. In Egypt, infants and young children face overlapping forms of malnutrition, including micronutrient deficiencies, stunting and overweight. Yet, in this setting, little is known about the factors associated with growth during the first year of life. A rise in stunting in Lower Egypt from 2005 to 2008 prompted this implementation research study, which followed a longitudinal cohort of infants from birth to 1 year of age within the context of a USAID-funded maternal and child health integrated programme. We sought to determine if growth patterns and factors related to early growth differed in Lower and Upper Egypt, and examined the relationship between weight loss and subsequent stunting at 12 months of age. Growth patterns revealed that length-for-age z-score (LAZ) decreased and weight-for-length z-score (WLZ) increased from 6 to 12 months of age in both regions. One-quarter of infants were stunted and nearly one-third were overweight by 12 months of age in lower Egypt. Minimum dietary diversity was significantly associated with WLZ in Lower Egypt (β = 0.22, P < 0.05), but not in Upper Egypt. Diarrhoea, fever and programme exposure were not associated with any growth outcome. Weight loss during any period was associated with a twofold likelihood of stunting at 12 months in Lower Egypt, but not Upper Egypt. In countries, like Egypt, facing the nutrition transition, infant and young child nutrition programmes need to address both stunting and overweight through improving dietary quality and reducing reliance on energy-dense foods

Traditional breeding

This chapter describes traditional strategies used by breeding programs around the world, and how they have resulted in improved citrus varieties. The first part examines scion breeding objectives and the advantages/disadvantages of important techniques including somatic mutants, nucellar selection, diploid and polyploid hybridization, and mutation breeding. Seedlessness remains an enormous challenge for breeders and the available methods are discussed within the context of having to simultaneously maintain or improve a host of other critical traits. The second part describes the main steps leading to the release of improved rootstocks. The importance of hybridization with citrus relatives to introgress useful genes both in scions and rootstocks breeding programs is also emphasized. New diseases and increasing consumer expectations present additional challenges for breeding programs and more efficient phenotyping and molecular markers are required

Ploidy manipulation and citrus breeding, genetics and genomics

Polyploidy appears to have played a limited role in citrus germplasm evolution. However, today, ploidy manipulation is an important component of citrus breeding strategies. For varieties, the main objective is to develop triploid seedless varieties. For rootstock, the aim is to cumulate interesting traits in tetraploid hybrids and to improve adaptation to biotic and abiotic stresses. In this chapter we make a review of the recent knowledge acquired on the natural mechanisms of citrus polyploidization, and teraploid meiosis. Chromosome doubling of nucellar cells is frequent in apomictic citrus and results in tetraploid seedling production. Unreduced gametes are also frequently produced, mainly by second division restitution for ovules. First division restitution was described for pollen as well as alternative mechanisms for both ovules and pollen. Tetraploid plants display tetrasomic to disomic segregations in relation with their genome structure (autoteraploid versus allotetraploid) and the divergence of the parental species. The implications of the origin of diploid gametes, on the genetic diversity of polyploid progenies, are discussed. The biotechnological tools (haplo-methods, chromosome doubling by chemichal treatments, somatic hybridization and cytogenetic/molecular tools for polyploid genome studies) to optimize ploidy manipulation are presented. The interest of haploids and polyploid genotypes for basic genetic and genomic studies is discussed. The following research area are reviewed: haploids and doubled haploid for genome sequencing and haplotyping, centromere mapping from unreduced gametes, marker-trait association study in polyploids, phenome and gene expression in polyploids with a special focus on polyploidy and adaptation. Finally, we give an overview of the recent advances of concrete polyploid citrus breeding programs in China, Florida and the Mediterranean Basin