Microalgae as a new source of neuroprotective compounds

Although neurodegenerative diseases (NDD) mostly occur in aged people, its onset can also be triggered by excessive accumulation of metal ions, particularly copper, iron and calcium in the brain which leads to the development of Alzheimer‟s disease (AD). AD affects cognitive function in the elderly people. Therefore, there is an urgent need to search and identify new sources of anti-AD drugs from natural sources, because available drugs are aggressive and have side-effects. According to a neurotoxicology study, chelating or capturing those metals is a therapeutic solution. Interestingly, marine microalgae (MMA) are rich in several bioactive compounds with neuroprotective, anti-inflammatory and others. Recently, MMA have been featured in neuronal-related diseases. This research shows bioactive compounds produced by different microalgae as a source of neuroprotective agents, in terms of copper (Cu2+CA), iron (Fe2+CA) and calcium chelating activities (Ca2+CA). Hence, nine different microalgae were procured from Necton S.A, Portugal. Three different food graded solvents namely ethyl acetate, ethanol and water were used for extraction. The ethanolic extract of Porphyridium sp. and Skeletonema costatum were the most significantly bioactive with an IC50 of 1.44 mg/mL and 1.95 mg/mL for Cu2+CA, 0.942 mg/mL and 0.883 mg/mL for Fe2+CA and 0.832 mg/mL and 1.02 mg/mL for Ca2+CA respectively. The active crude extracts were further partitioned into hexane, dichloromethane, ethyl acetate and an aqueous alcoholic by liquid-liquid extraction (LLE). Hexane fractions of Porphyridium sp. and S. costatum presented high metal chelating activity with an IC50 of 0.461 mg/mL and 0.361 mg/mL for Cu2+CA, 0.292 mg/mL and 0.263 mg/mL for Fe2+CA and 0.451 mg/mL and 0.181 mg/mL for Ca2+CA respectively. In order to identify the compounds possibly responsible for the activity, the hexane fractions were analyzed by GC-MS. About 19 and 22 of compounds were in Porphyridium sp. and S. costatum identified, respectively, belonging to 4 classes of metabolites: fatty acids, sterols, alcohols and ethers. The most abundant compounds detected were long chain fatty acids and alcohols including t etrahydropyranyl ether of citronellol and 3,7,11,15-tetramethyl-2-hexadecen-1-ol. The analyzed species exhibited neuroprotective activities in a concentration dependent. Their metal chelating activities proves their potential for future application as natural remedies for Alzheimer‟s disease

Microalgae as potential sources of bioactive compounds for functional foods and pharmaceuticals

Microalgae are an untapped source of bioactive compounds with various biotechnological applications. Several species are industrially produced and commercialized for the feed or cosmetic industries, however, other applications in the functional food and pharmaceutical markets can be foreseen. In this study, nine industrial/commercial species were evaluated for in vitro antioxidant, calcium-chelating, anti-tumoral, and anti-inflammatory activities. The most promising extracts were fractionated yielding several promising fractions namely, of Tetraselmis striata CTP4 with anti-inflammatory activity (99.0 ± 0.8% reduction in TNF-α production in LPS stimulated human macrophages at 50 µg/mL), of Phaeodactylum Tricornutum with cytotoxicity towards cancerous cell lines (IC50 = 22.3 ± 1.8 µg/mL and 27.5 ± 1.6 µg/mL for THP-1 and HepG2, respectively) and of Porphyridium sp. and Skeletonema sp. with good chelating activity for iron, copper and calcium (IC50 = 0.047, 0.272, 0.0663 mg/mL and IC50 = 0.055, 0.240, 0.0850 mg/mL, respectively). These fractions were chemically characterized by GC–MS after derivatization and in all, fatty acids at various degrees of unsaturation were the most abundant compounds. Some of the species under study proved to be potentially valuable sources of antioxidant, metal chelators, anti-tumoral and anti-inflammatory compounds with possible application in the functional food and pharmaceutical industries.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Methane emission management in a dual-fuel engine exhaust using Pd and Ni hydroxyapatite catalysts

© 2017 Elsevier Ltd While dual-fuel engines reduce transportation costs and CO 2 emissions by using alternative energy sources e.g. natural gas, the exhaust streams often contain quantities of emissions that exceed limits and therefore require removal. Pd- and Ni-hydroxyapatite (HAP) catalysts were prepared using a soft-templating method and tested in the dry reforming of methane (DRM) in a fixed bed reactor that simulates an exhaust from a diesel-natural gas dual-fuel engine. XRD revealed the characteristic HAP crystal structure of all the prepared materials. The HAP phase was further confirmed by TEM, which also showed the presence of submicron sized particles. The BET surface areas of HAP prepared using a single surfactant was 27.7 m 2  g −1 and increased to 84.9 m 2  g −1 when mixed surfactants were used. Active metals were added to HAP using either incipient wetness impregnation, ion-exchange or solid dispersion. All the catalysts tested were active in DRM with the optimal samples converting over 85% of methane at 650 °C

Mechanical, pH and Thermal Stability of Mesoporous Hydroxyapatite

The stability of mesoporous hydroxyapatite (HAP) powder was studied following treatments of ultrasound, pH and heating. HAP was found to be mechanically stable up to (and including) 1 h continuous ultrasonic treatment in water. The HAP structure was also stable to pH, evidenced by practically identical XRD and FTIR spectra over the pH range 2–12. The surface area increased progressively with increasing acidity, reaching a maximum of 121.9 m 2 g −1 at pH 2, while alkaline conditions decreased the surface area to a minimum of 55.4 m 2 g −1 at pH 12. Heating in air had a significant influence on the structural and morphological properties of HAP, which underwent dehydroxylation to form oxyhydroxyapatite (OHAP) at temperatures ≥ 650 °C, and β-tricalcium phosphate (β-TCP) ≥750 °C. The surface area decreased at elevated temperatures due to agglomeration of HAP crystals by sintering, which was associated with an increased particle size

The Roles of Religion and Spirituality in Recovery from Mental Illness

Recovery from mental illness is a deeply personal process unique to each individual, involving the strengthening of the person's sense of meaning and purpose, personal identity, and well-being. Many persons in recovery indicate that religion and spirituality are important resources for dealing with mental health difficulties. Yet religion and spirituality can also play negative roles in recovery by exacerbating self-blame, guilt, and a sense of abandonment, as well as promoting a view that mental illness signifies spiritual failure. While a number of quantitative studies have identified a positive link between religion/spirituality and mental health outcomes for people with serious mental illness, fewer of those studies have looked at recovery as process than outcome, and little is known about the relationship of religiousness and spirituality to self-stigma among mental health clients.This research investigates the association of religiousness and spirituality to proxies (i.e., variables that are used to represent unobservable constructs of interest) of both psychosocial well-being and self-stigma among mental health clients through bivariate and multivariate analyses. In this study, recovery is understood as process; religiousness is defined as self-identification with an institutionalized religion; and spirituality is framed as perception of self as religious or spiritual without identifying with any special religion. This study is a secondary analysis of data collected by the Center for Self-Help Research in Berkeley, California, between 1996 and 2000, on a sample of 673 new users of self-help and community mental health agencies in the San Francisco Bay Area (Segal, Hardiman, & Hodges, 2002). Results show that both religiousness and spirituality were significantly associated with proxies of both psychosocial well-being and self-stigma, after accounting for clients' demographic, clinical, and agency characteristics. The unique contributions of this study are that it: (1) shows that both religiousness and spirituality are associated with proxies of self-stigma, i.e., increased social distance and prejudiced attitude toward psychiatric patients; (2) demonstrates that the relationship between religiousness and self-stigma among mental health clients is non-linear; (3) emphasizes the proper use of statistical methods including assumption checking and adjustment for multiple testing; and (4) introduces a visual recovery narrative (model) as an aid to understanding the concept of recovery. The implications of this study for social work practice, research, and education include: (1) the possibility that the currently accepted polarized view of negative religiousness versus positive spirituality may not hold; (2) the call for training and education of social workers in religion and spirituality; (3) the need for long-term qualitative and quantitative studies to investigate the process of recovery; and (4) the importance of incorporating assumption checking and adjustment for multiple testing into social work research

The Roles of Religion and Spirituality in Recovery from Mental Illness

Recovery from mental illness is a deeply personal process unique to each individual, involving the strengthening of the person's sense of meaning and purpose, personal identity, and well-being. Many persons in recovery indicate that religion and spirituality are important resources for dealing with mental health difficulties. Yet religion and spirituality can also play negative roles in recovery by exacerbating self-blame, guilt, and a sense of abandonment, as well as promoting a view that mental illness signifies spiritual failure. While a number of quantitative studies have identified a positive link between religion/spirituality and mental health outcomes for people with serious mental illness, fewer of those studies have looked at recovery as process than outcome, and little is known about the relationship of religiousness and spirituality to self-stigma among mental health clients. This research investigates the association of religiousness and spirituality to proxies (i.e., variables that are used to represent unobservable constructs of interest) of both psychosocial well-being and self-stigma among mental health clients through bivariate and multivariate analyses. In this study, recovery is understood as process; religiousness is defined as self-identification with an institutionalized religion; and spirituality is framed as perception of self as religious or spiritual without identifying with any special religion. This study is a secondary analysis of data collected by the Center for Self-Help Research in Berkeley, California, between 1996 and 2000, on a sample of 673 new users of self-help and community mental health agencies in the San Francisco Bay Area (Segal, Hardiman, & Hodges, 2002). Results show that both religiousness and spirituality were significantly associated with proxies of both psychosocial well-being and self-stigma, after accounting for clients' demographic, clinical, and agency characteristics. The unique contributions of this study are that it: (1) shows that both religiousness and spirituality are associated with proxies of self-stigma, i.e., increased social distance and prejudiced attitude toward psychiatric patients; (2) demonstrates that the relationship between religiousness and self-stigma among mental health clients is non-linear; (3) emphasizes the proper use of statistical methods including assumption checking and adjustment for multiple testing; and (4) introduces a visual recovery narrative (model) as an aid to understanding the concept of recovery. The implications of this study for social work practice, research, and education include: (1) the possibility that the currently accepted polarized view of negative religiousness versus positive spirituality may not hold; (2) the call for training and education of social workers in religion and spirituality; (3) the need for long-term qualitative and quantitative studies to investigate the process of recovery; and (4) the importance of incorporating assumption checking and adjustment for multiple testing into social work research

Quality and Display Life of Carnation Blooms After Storage in Controlled Atmospheres

Report Summary: The quality of carnation blooms stored in 1/2 or 1 percent oxygen atmospheres was better after 4 to 5 weeks of storage than that of blooms held in air. Low-oxygen atmospheres reduced the incidence of decay in storage. However, the low-oxygen atmosphere in storage was only slightly effective in prolonging the display life. The addition of carbon dioxide to the low-oxygen atmospheres did not increase the storage life of the blooms. Carnation blooms held at 32° F. for 4 to 5 weeks developed petal injury. This injury was greatly reduced at 36°. Respiration rates during storage were reduced in low-oxygen atmospheres, but comparable increase in post-storage life of the blooms was not obtained