Natural ink production and printability studies for smart food packaging

Versatile smart packages provide information on the freshness of the content and help protect the content from microorganisms. In this sense, in this study both natural antimicrobial properties and pH sensitive natural dyes were obtained from red beet. Inks were prepared and printed using this dye and their suitability for smart packaging was investigated. For this purpose, red beet was cut into small sizes and mixed separately in ethanol and water (1:2) at 200 rpm. The betaine dye was taken up in solvent. These solvents were removed with evaporator and precipitated with centrifugation and dried in a vacuum oven. The chemical structure of the obtained dye was illuminated by Attenuated Total Reflection-Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR). The color character was determined by UV spectroscopy. Pink colored natural ink was produced by using ink varnish with carboxymethyl cellulose polymer and solid dye. Screen printing was made with this ink and the color, gloss, and lightfastness characters of prints were examined. Antimicrobial effects of the obtained prints were measured against Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli. Mordanting studies were performed with (KAl[SO₄]₂.12H₂O) and change in color character was measured. The prints produced using the red beet extract have a yellow-orange color in the basic state; in acid cases it was determined to have a pink-purple color. In addition, it has been found that the ink prints obtained from red beet have antimicrobial properties against bacteria. Results prove that produced samples have good antimicrobial, pH indicator, and printability properties. This colorant can be used in smart food packaging.     

Hierarchically SrTiO3@TiO2@Fe2O3 nanorod heterostructures for enhanced photoelectrochemical water splitting

In this particular work, the fabrication of SrTiO₃@TiO₂@ Fe₂O₃ nanorod heterostructure has been demonstrated via hydrothermal growth of SrTiO₃ cubic on the rutile TiO₂ nanorod as a template and later sensitized with Fe₂O₃ for photocatalytic solar hydrogen production in a tandem photoelectrochemical cell and dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) module. The photocatalytic solar hydrogen production of this heterostructure was optimized by controlling the amount of Sr and Fe on the surface of photocatalyst. The details of the influencing parameters on the physicochemical and photoelectrochemical properties are discussed. It was found that the morphology and quality of the fabricated materials were greatly manipulated by the concentration of Sr and Fe. The optimized 0.025 M SrTiO₃@TiO₂@ Fe₂O₃ heterostructure exhibited a higher photoconversion efficiency with a long electron lifetime, low charge transfer resistance and large donor density at the electrode and electrolyte interface. This composite has significantly improved the photocatalytic hydrogen production, yielding 716 μmol/cm² of maximum accumulative hydrogen. These results show that morphology rendering and manipulation of energy band alignment is crucial in creating efficient heterojunctions for excellent contributions in photocatalytic applications.     

A Comparative Study of Non-Viral Gene Delivery Techniques to Human Adipose-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cell

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) hold tremendous potential for therapeutic use in stem cell-based gene therapy. Ex vivo genetic modification of MSCs with beneficial genes of interest is a prerequisite for successful use of stem cell-based therapeutic applications. However, genetic manipulation of MSCs is challenging because they are resistant to commonly used methods to introduce exogenous DNA or RNA. Herein we compared the effectiveness of several techniques (classic calcium phosphate precipitation, cationic polymer, and standard electroporation) with that of microporation technology to introduce the plasmid encoding for angiopoietin-1 (ANGPT-1) and enhanced green fluorescent protein (eGFP) into human adipose-derived MSCs (hAD-MSCs). The microporation technique had a higher transfection efficiency, with up to 50% of the viable hAD-MSCs being transfected, compared to the other transfection techniques, for which less than 1% of cells were positive for eGFP expression following transfection. The capability of cells to proliferate and differentiate into three major lineages (chondrocytes, adipocytes, and osteocytes) was found to be independent of the technique used for transfection. These results show that the microporation technique is superior to the others in terms of its ability to transfect hAD-MSCs without affecting their proliferation and differentiation capabilities. Therefore, this study provides a foundation for the selection of techniques when using ex vivo gene manipulation for cell-based gene therapy with MSCs as the vehicle for gene delivery.     

Fully Automated Three-Dimensional Column-Switching SPE–FIA–HPLC System for the Characterization of Lipids by a Single Injection: Part I. Instrumental Design and Chemometric Approach to Assess the Effect of Experimental Settings on the Response of ELSD

This article presents the first application of fully automated three‐dimensional (3D) column‐switching SPE–FIA–HPLC system for the characterization of lipids by a single injection. The whole system was designed and set up by modifying Agilent 1200 Series HPLC system in our laboratory. By using this system, a complete separation profile of the oil samples was achieved in a very short time period by using single injections. This approach was applied on vegetable oils which contains a large number of relatively high‐class lipid components, such as TG, FFA, sterols, tocopherols, DG, ester and MG. In this part of the study, we focused on the optimization of evaporative light scattering detector (ELSD) by using an experimental design and RSM. Three experimental parameters were chosen as an independent variables which are the flow rate of mobile phase, nebulization temperature and evaporation temperature. A multivariate five level experimental design was used to establish a quadratic model as a functional relationship between the response values and independent variables. The optimal values of parameters were found to be a flow rate of 1.25 mL min^?1, nebulization temperature of 80 °C, and evaporation temperature of 40 °C. Regression analysis with an R² values indicated as a satisfactory correlation between the experimental and predicted values. ANOVA test results were also illustrate that the models can be successfully used to predict the optimum parameters of ELSD. Thus, the proposed system is suitable for a large number of applications including research and development of new quality control and characterization methods for vegetable oils.     

Acid Precipitation versus Solvent Extraction: Two Techniques Leading to Different Lactone/Acidic Sophorolipid Ratios

Sophorolipids (SL) prepared from biotransformation of refined bleached deodorized (RBD) palm olein by Starmerella bombicola (ATCC 22214) occur as a mixture of homologs. Characterization of SL was performed using high-performance liquid chromatography with electrospray ionization mass spectrometry detection (HPLC-ESI-MS) under negative ion mode. Two different purification methods were compared: precipitation and solvent extraction. SL purified by precipitation and solvent extraction consisted of five major homologs with m/z values of 687, 645, 689, 705, and 661. The fractions of lactone and acidic SL via precipitation were 70.24 ± 1.4% and 29.76 ± 1.4%, respectively. SL isolated by solvent extraction contained 44.78 ± 1.9% lactone and 55.22 ± 1.9% acidic SL. Therefore, the purification method strongly impacted the composition of the SL products.     

Fabrication of hydroxyapatite blended cyclic type polylactic acid and poly (ε-caprolactone) tissue engineering scaffold

The ultimate goal of tissue engineering serves to repair, restore damaged tissue or organ due to accident or disease. In this research, we are aimed at investigating the feasibility of processing cyclic type polylactic acid (PDLLA)/poly(ε-caprolactone) (PCL)/hydroxyapatite (HA) biomaterial into tissue engineering scaffold (TES) with variable mechanical properties, well interconnected pore architecture, and controlled hydrophilicity. For this, an in-house built bone scaffold 3D printing (BS3P) system was applied to two biomaterials, namely PDLLA-PCL and HA-PCL. These two biomaterials were produced by optimizing the robotic control system. Morphological investigation by scanning electron microscope (SEM) revealed both TES formed by new materials able to show honeycomb-like architectures, excellent fusion at the filament junctions, high uniformity, complete interconnectivity, and controlled channel characteristics of the TES. Compression tests align with the typical behavior of a porous material undergoing deformation. In vitro cell culture study and confocal laser microscopy (CLM) showed enhanced cell adhesion, proliferation, and extracellular matrix (ECM) formation. The results demonstrated the eligibility of the BS3P system to produce TES, and the suitability of the new biomaterial scaffolds in enhancing cell biocompatibility.