Bacterial spores in spices and dried herbs: The risks for processed food

Production and world consumption of spices are constantly increasing. Although the antimicrobial properties of some spices are well documented, their use in the agri-food industry is also responsible for microbial contamination and spoilage. Bacterial spores introduced by spices can withstand different preparation processes, particularly thermal treatments, leading to food alterations during storage. This review brings together data from the literature about the prevalence and concentrations of spore-forming bacteria in all commercially available spices. The sporeformers found in spices belong mainly to the genera Bacillus and Clostridium. Such contaminations are very common and sometimes reach high levels, as in pepper and turmeric. Bacillus licheniformis and Bacillus cereus are the most frequently detected species. Studying the harvesting, processing, and storage procedures for spices provides elements to explain why high prevalence and concentrations are observed. Spices are mostly produced in developing countries on small farms using traditional production methods. Spices become contaminated by bacterial spores in two main ways: by contact with soil during harvesting or drying, as for pepper, or by cross-contamination during the water-cooking step, as for turmeric. From these observations, we propose some recommendations. Different methods that can be used to eliminate bacterial spores from spices are presented indicating their efficiency and the limitations of their use.     

Investigation the correlation between chemical structure and swelling,thermal and flocculation properties of carboxymethylcellulose hydrogels

Hydrophilic polymer networks (hydrogels) based on sodium carboxymethylcellulose (NaCMC) and polycarboxylic acids (oxalic, succinic, citric and adipic) as cross-linking agents are synthesized by esterification reaction; one series of NaCMC hydrogels cross-linked with citric acid is prepared with acrylamide and acrylic acid (Aam/Aac) copolymers using the design of semi-interpenetrating polymer networks (semi-IPN), in order to increase their potential application for flocculation purposes. The Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) of hydrogels confirms the esterification reaction between NaCMC and cross-linking agents. Results of swelling measurements show that citric acid in the amount of 15 wt% gives the hydrogels with the best absorption capacity. The results of Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and Thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) show no significant difference in thermal properties of neat and semi-interpenetrating NaCMC hydrogels. The amorphous nature of hydrogels is confirmed by X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD). The results of flocculation study show that combination of NaCMC network and Aam/Aac copolymer with initial mass ratio of 10/90 creates a theoretical platform for the production of flocculant which could show high efficacy in purifying of water dominated by positively charged particles.     

Physicochemical and technological properties of beef burger as influenced by the addition of pea fibre

This study aimed to evaluate the physicochemical characteristics and sensory attributes of beef burgers with the addition of pea fibre as a partial substitute of meat or fat. Three formulations were prepared: control (CON) – similar to the commercial formulation; fibre/less meat (FLM)—5% meat reduction and addition of 1% pea fibre; fibre/less fat (FLF)—7% fat reduction and addition of 1% pea fibre. Non-significant differences were obtained for pH, colour parameters (L* and b*), texture profile, cooking loss and size reduction among formulations. Moreover, sensory analysis with consumers of beef burgers did not indicate differences among the formulations for all the analysed attributes. Therefore, pea fibre is a promising partial replacer for meat and fat in beef burgers due to the preservation of technological parameters and sensory acceptance.     

State-space ARIMA for supply-chain forecasting

ARIMA is seldom used in supply chains in practice. There are several reasons, not the least of which is the small sample size of available data, which restricts the usage of the model. Keeping in mind this restriction, we discuss in this paper a state-space ARIMA model with a single source of error and show how it can be efficiently used in the supply-chain context, especially in cases when only two seasonal cycles of data are available. We propose a new order selection algorithm for the model and compare its performance with the conventional ARIMA on real data. We show that the proposed model performs well in terms of both accuracy and computational time in comparison with other ARIMA implementations, which makes it efficient in the supply-chain context.     

Biodegradability Study of the Biosurfactant Contained in a Crude Extract from Corn Steep Water

Over the last few years, the global biosurfactant market has raised due to the increasing awareness among consumers, for the use of biological or bio-based products. Because of their composition, it can be speculated that these are more biocompatible and more biodegradable than their chemical homologous. However, at the moment, no studies exist in the literature about the biodegradability of biosurfactants. In this work, a biosurfactant contained in a crude extract, obtained from a corn wet-milling industry stream that ferments spontaneously in the presence of lactic acid bacteria, was subjected to a biodegradation study, without addition of external microbial biomass, under different conditions of temperature (5–45 °C), biodegradation time (15–55 days), and pH (5–7). For that, a Box–Behnken factorial design was applied, which allowed to predict the percentage of biodegradation for the biosurfactant contained in the crude extract, between the range of the independent variables selected in the study, obtaining biodegradation values between 3 and 80%. The percentage of biodegradation for the biosurfactant was calculated based on the increase in the surface tension of samples of the crude extract. Furthermore, it was also possible to predict the variation in t_1/2 for the biosurfactant (time to achieve the 50% of biodegradation) under different conditions.     

Synthetic Peroxides Promote Apoptosis of Cancer Cells by Inhibiting P-Glycoprotein ABCB5

This article discloses a new horizon for the application of peroxides in medical chemistry. Stable cyclic peroxides are demonstrated to have cytotoxic activity against cancer cells; in addition a mechanism of cytotoxic action is proposed. Synthetic bridged 1,2,4,5-tetraoxanes and ozonides were effective against HepG2 cancer cells and some ozonides selectively targeted liver cancer cells (the selectivity indexes for compounds 11 b and 12 a are 8 and 5, respectively). In some cases, tetraoxanes and ozonides were more selective than paclitaxel, artemisinin, and artesunic acid. Annexin V flow-cytometry analysis revealed that the active ozonides 22 a and 23 a induced cell death of HepG2 by apoptosis. Further study showed that compounds 22 a and 23 a exhibited a strong inhibitory effect on P-glycoprotein (P-gp/ABCB5)-overexpressing HepG2 cancer cells. ABCB5 is a key player in the multidrug-resistant phenotype of liver cancer. Peroxides failed to demonstrate a direct correlation between oxidative potential and their biological activity. To our knowledge this is the first time that peroxide diastereoisomers have been found to show stereospecific antimalarial action against the chloroquine-sensitive 3D7 strain of Plasmodium falciparum. Stereoisomeric ozonide 12 b is 11 times more active than stereoisomeric ozonide 12 a (IC₅₀=5.81 vs 65.18 μm ). Current findings mean that ozonides merit further investigation as potential therapeutic agents for drug-resistant hepatocellular carcinoma.