Obtaining Butter Oil Triacylglycerols Free from β-Carotene and α-Tocopherol via Activated Carbon Adsorption and Alumina-Column Chromatography Treatments

It is difficult to remove β-carotene from oils with alumina-column chromatography, because β-carotene is even less-polar than triacylglycerols (TAGs) are. The objective of this study was to obtain butter oil TAGs free from β-carotene and antioxidants via sequential treatments with activated carbon (AC) adsorption and alumina column chromatography. The AC used was prepared from waste apricots. The effects of AC dosages, temperatures and time courses on β-carotene adsorption were studied. The Langmuir and Freundlich isotherms were used to describe the adsorption of β-carotene onto AC, and it was found to be more consistent with the Freundlich isotherm with a higher R ² value (0.9784). Adsorption kinetics of β-carotene was analyzed by pseudo-first order and pseudo-second order models. The pseudo-second order model was found to explain the kinetics of β-carotene adsorption more effectively (R ² = 0.9882). The highest β-carotene reduction was achieved (from 31.9 to 1.84 mg/kg) at an AC dosage of 10 wt%, temperature of 50 °C, and adsorption time of 240 min. A considerable amount of α-tocopherol was also adsorbed during the AC treatment. Remaining portions of α-tocopherol were completely removed with alumina adsorption chromatography. The method described may be used for purification of vegetable oil TAGs, which will be used as model compounds in model oxidation studies.     

SPME-GC-MS detection of volatile compounds in apricot varieties

Aroma compounds of the eight Malatya apricot cultivars, six cultivars grown in the same breeding conditions from different locations and one hybrid cultivar were determined using SPME-GC-MS technique. In general, total concentration (sum of identified and unidentified peaks) of aroma compounds in Malatya apricot cultivars were lower than those others. Total concentration of aroma compounds were found to be in the range of 514 and 6232 μg/kg fresh weight. The main volatiles of apricot cultivars were aldehydes, alcohols, acetates, esters, terpenes and acids. Among these compounds; ethanol, hexanal, hexyl acetate, (Z)-3-hexenyl acetate, (E)-2-hexenyl acetate, 1-hexanol, (Z)-3-hexenol and (E)-2-hexen-1-ol, were present in all cultivars studied at certain levels.     

Primary and Secondary Proteolysis in Eleven Turkish Cheese Varieties

Levels of proteolysis of 75 samples belonging to 11 Turkish cheese varieties, including Civil, Canak, Dil, Divle Tulum, Ezine, Hellim, Malatya, Mihalic, Orgu, Urfa, and Van Otlu, were comparatively studied. The cheeses were mainly produced using traditional methods; however, some varieties were industrially produced. Chemical composition and the levels of soluble nitrogen fractions of the cheeses varied depending on the cheese variety. Gel electrophoresis of the cheeses showed that the samples presented different gel patterns with α_s1-casein being extensively degraded in many cheeses; whereas the hydrolysis of α_s1-casein in Malatya and Hellim was observed to be limited. Peptide profiles by RP-HPLC of the water-soluble fractions were largely different for many of the samples, but some similarities were visualized. Multivariate analysis of the RP-HPLC data grouped the cheeses according to their peptide profiles. The results suggested that each variety of cheese had different levels of proteolysis. The manufacturing technique and ripening conditions employed have played a determinative role on the proteolytic patterns of the cheeses analyzed.     

Analysis of phytohormones and phosphate solubilization in Photorhabdus spp.

Bacteria of the genus Photorhabdus are nematodes (Heterorhabditidae) symbiont and highly entomopathogenic in nature. Present study was concerned to investigate the effects of Photorhabdus temperata M1021 and Photorhabdus luminescens TT01 on plant morphology and physiology (‘Dongjin-beyo’ and ‘waitoc’). A significant (p<0.05) increase in the plant growth attributes including total plant length, root length, biomass, and chlorophyll contents were observed after treatment with culture extracts. Moreover indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) production by respective bacteria was confirmed by GCMS analysis. IAA production through tryptophan independent pathway was confirmed in P. temperata M1021 and P. luminescens TT01. Phosphate solubilization capability was also investigated by growing them on pikovskaya (PVK) agar as well as on PVK liquid medium with pH 7 at 28±2°C for 14 days. IAA production and phosphate solubilization capability of these bacteria could be the potential factors for plant growth promotion.     

ENVIRONMENTALLY CONSCIOUS HOIST SCHEDULING FOR ELECTROPLATING FACILITIES

Hoist scheduling in electroplating operations has long been considered a key factor for improving the production rate. It has recently been recognized that hoist scheduling can also play an important role in waste minimization. In this work, a new hoist scheduling method is introduced for simultaneously achieving both the economic and environmental goals. A two-step dynamic optimization algorithm is introduced for identifying an optimal hoist schedule that can minimize the quantity and toxicity of wastewater streams from an electroplating line without loss of production rate. To improve computational efficiency, an engineering approach is adopted to reduce the number of binary decision variables in the optimization problem. An application to an actual electroplating process shows a significant reduction of both chemical and water consumption, which equates to a simultaneous realization of wastewater reduction and increase of profits.     

An overview of smart packaging technologies for monitoring safety and quality of meat and meat products

The food packaging sector has experienced much development since its inception. In the past few decades, innovations in packaging sector have led to the development of smart packaging (SP) systems that carve a niche in a highly competitive food industry. SP systems have great potential for improving the shelf‐life, and safety of food products apart from their basic roles of protecting the products against unwanted biological, chemical, and physical damage and keeping them clean. Indicators and sensors, SP components, are used for real‐time monitoring of meat quality and subsequently inform the retailers and consumers about the freshness, microbiological, temperature, and shelf life status of the products. Barcodes and radio‐frequency identification tags are employed in meat packaging for real‐time information about the authenticity, and traceability of the products in the supply chain. Recently, innovations in SP technologies resulted in fast, sensitive, and effective detection, sensing, and record keeping of freshness, microbiological, and shelf life status of meat and meat products. The SP system shows promise for extensive utilization in the meat industry in response to the consumer appreciation for safe, and quality meat products, as well as their waste reduction notions. This paper gives an updated overview of ongoing scientific research, and recent technological advances that offer the perspectives of developing smart meat packaging systems that are capable of monitoring the physical, microbial, and chemical changes of the package contents from producer to the point of sale and even beyond, and remediating potential adverse reactions.     

Hybrid Petri-nets for modelling and performance evaluation of supply chains

Modelling and analysis of complex and co-ordinated supply chains is a crucial task due to its inherent complexity and uncertainty. Therefore, the current research direction is to devise an efficient modelling technique that maps the dynamics of a real life supply chain and assists industrial practitioners in evaluating and comparing their network with other competing networks. Here an effective modelling technique, the hybrid Petri-net, is proposed to efficiently handle the dynamic behaviour of the supply chain. This modelling methodology embeds two enticing features, i.e. cost and batch sizes, in deterministic and stochastic Petri-net for the modelling and performance evaluation of supply chain networks. The model is subsequently used for risk management to investigate the issues of supply chain vulnerability and risk that has become a major research subject in recent years. In the test bed, a simple productive supply chain and an industrial supply chain are modelled with fundamental inventory replenishment policy. Subsequently, its performance is evaluated along with the identification and assessment of risk factors using analytical and simulation techniques respectively. Thus, this paper presents a complete package for industrial practitioners to model, evaluate performance and manage risky events in a supply chain.     

Intelligent Data Fusion for Smart IoT Environment: A Survey

Wireless Personal Communications - Efficient data collection and communication are key tasks in smart IoT environment consisting of a large number of devices. Here imprecise data are generated due...     

The potential integral for a polynomial distribution over a curved triangular domain

An expression is derived for the potential at an arbitrary point due to a general polynomial distribution of source over a curved triangular domain. The expression is important for the numerical solution of electromagnetic field problems and generalizes the cases of linear and uniform distributions solved previously.     

Giant cutaneous horn: a patient report

A large cutaneous horn was excised from the left side of the nose and cheek of a 68-year-old woman. Reconstruction was performed with a split-thickness skin graft. Histologically the lesion represented squamous cell carcinoma. The nature of malignant degeneration in cutaneous horns is discussed.