Research Publications (Food Safety)

Fungal fatty acid (FA) synthase and desaturase enzymes are essential for the growth and virulence of human fungal pathogens. These enzymes are structurally distinct from their mammalian counterparts, making them attractive targets for antifungal development. However, there has been little progress in identifying chemotypes that target fungal FA biosynthesis. To accomplish this, we applied a whole-cell-based method known as Target Abundance-based FItness Screening using Candida albicans.

In all organisms, splicing occurs through the formation of spliceosome complexes, and splicing auxiliary factors are essential during splicing. U2AF65 is a crucial splicing cofactor, and the two typical RNA-recognition motifs at its center recognize and bind the polypyrimidine sequence located between the intron branch site and the 3′-splice site.

Due to the biomagnifying effect in the food chains, heavy metals will cause serious harm to the food produced in paddy soil, and then threaten human health. The remediation of soil heavy metals by the addition of amendments is a common method. However, the combination of the two amendments has been less studied and its effect is unknown.

by Ali Bahrami Rad, Conner Galloway, Daniel Treiman, Joel Xue, Qiao Li, Reza Sameni, Dave Albert, Gari D. Clifford

Background

Endophytic bacteria play potentially important roles in the processes of plant adaptation to the environment. Understanding the composition and dynamics of endophytic bacterial communities under heavy metal (HM) stress can reveal their impacts on host development and stress tolerance. In this study, we investigated root endophytic bacterial communities of different rice cultivars grown in a cadmium (Cd)-contaminated paddy field.

Author(s): Xulu Chang, Meiru Kang, Yihao Shen, Lili Yun, Guokun Yang, Lei Zhu, Xiaolin Meng, Jianxin Zhang, Xi Su

Author(s): Yanling Li, Weiping Chen, Yang Yang, Tianqi Wang, Yating Dai

Author(s): Mohammad Al-Harahsheh, Sanad Altarawneh, Mohammad Al-Omari, Mohammednoor Altarawneh, Sam Kingman, Chris Dodds

Abstract

The development of antiviral agents with an original structure and noticeable effect is always in great need. Natural products are important lead compounds in the development of new pesticides. Crocin-1 and crocin-2 were effectively isolated from Gardeniae fructus and found to have higher anti-tobacco mosaic virus (TMV) activity levels than ribavirin.

Rice is a major staple food in China where farmland soil has widespread cadmium (Cd) and arsenic (As) contamination. To provide appropriate rice cultivars to guide rice production in Cd and As co-contaminated paddy soils, the factors affecting Cd and As concentrations in rice require clarification. A pot experiment was conducted to investigate Cd and As translocation and accumulation in different tissues of rice cultivars for understanding the Cd and As variations in rice.

Author(s): Aijing Bi, Zhen Guo, Guocui Yang, Youfang Huang, Zhimin Yin, Lan Luo

Modern industry advances through time with the change in living conditions as more chemicals are used and released into the environment. This causes severe pollution problems, especially of heavy metals including lead (Pb(II)). Pb(II) is continuously released by different industries into the environment, and it leads to certain diseases such as anemia and kidney malfunction.

Both soil heavy metals and the influencing factors are related to spatial location and are spatially heterogeneous. However, the global linear regression model assumes the regression coefficients to be spatially stationary throughout the study region and is unable to account for the spatially varying relationships between soil heavy metals and influencing factors.

Arsenic (As) bioavailability in the rice rhizosphere is influenced by many microbial interactions, particularly by metal-transforming functional groups at the root-soil interface. This study was conducted to examine As-transforming microbes and As-speciation in the rice rhizosphere compartments, in response to two different water management practices (continuous and intermittently flooded), established on fields with high to low soil-As concentration.

In this research, the removal of cadmium(II) ions (Cd) from wastewater using zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnONp) and carbonized sawdust composite was examined. ZnONp were synthesized by precipitation using sodium hydroxide (NaOH) and zinc nitrate tetrahydrate as precursors, while carbonized sawdust was produced from sawdust obtained from a nearby wood plant.

Author(s): Quan-Ying Wang, Nai-Wen Hu, Hong-Wen Yu, Qi-Rong Wang, Yu-Xin Liu, Jing Yue, Bo Hu

Author(s): Zhijie Yang, Yuqin He, Haifang Wang, Qiong Zhang

by Matthieu Faron, Pierre Blanchard, Laureen Ribassin-Majed, Jean-Pierre Pignon, Stefan Michiels, Gwénaël Le Teuff

Introduction

Cadmium (Cd) ranks seventh on the list of most significant potential threats to human health based on its suspected toxicity and the possibility of exposure to it. It has been reported that some bacterial exopolysaccharides (EPSs) have the ability to bind heavy metal ions. We therefore investigated the capacity of eight EPS-producing lactobacilli to adsorb Cd in the present study, and Lactiplantibacillus plantarum BGAN8 was chosen as the best candidate.

In recent years, with industrial pollution and the application of agricultural fertilizers with high cadmium (Cd) content, soil Cd pollution has become increasingly serious. A large amount of Cd is discharged into the environment, greatly endangering the stability of the ecological environment and human health. The use of microorganisms to induce Cd precipitation and mineralization is an important bioremediation method.

In this study, limonin derivatives were used to design new anti-inflammatory compounds with high pharmacological activity and low toxicity. A total of 23 new limonin derivatives were discovered, synthesized, and screened for their anti-inflammatory activity against lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-treated RAW 264.7 cells. Of them, compound f4 was found to be the most active, with a higher efficiency compared with limonin and celecoxib.

Letters in Applied Microbiology, Accepted Article. Cadmium (Cd) is considered a toxic heavy metal, nevertheless, its toxicity fluctuates for different organisms. Cadmium-tolerant bacteria (CdtB) are a diverse and non-phylogenetically related. Because of their ecological importance these bacteria become particularly relevant when pollution occurs and where human health is impacted.

Author(s): Rili Hao, Yang Jiang, Feng Li, Dongxiao Sun-Waterhouse, Dapeng Li

Rice remains a major staple food source for the rapidly growing world population. However, regular occurrences of carcinogenic arsenic (As) minerals in waterlogged paddy topsoil pose a great threat to rice production and consumers across the globe. Although As contamination in rice has been well recognized over the past two decades, no suitable rice germplasm had been identified to exploit in adaptive breeding programs.