1,720,955 research outputs found
Microwave-assisted extraction and medicinal mushrooms: an innovative and promising technique with significant applicative implications
No full textThere are an increasing number of nutraceutical and mycotherapeutic products in which mushrooms are included as active ingredients due to their content of multiple bioactive compounds responsible for
innumerable medicinal and health-promoting properties. Medicinal mushrooms can be used as either whole carpophore powder or extract, or as a combination of both. Nowadays, both research and production processes
must adhere to the principles of Green Chemistry, whose keystones include optimizing energy and resource consumption, as well as minimizing the use and/or generation of hazardous substances and wastes. Therefore,
especially with a view to a standardized, high-quality industrial production, it is essential to adopt efficient
extraction techniques both in terms of yield and quality of the obtained product, and in terms of cost and environmental sustainability. One of the currently most innovative and promising techniques for obtaining
metabolites from plant matrices is the microwave-assisted extraction (MAE) (1), but to date only a few studies report its application to mushrooms (2, 3, 4, 5). We therefore carried out an investigation comparing MAE
with other techniques, innovative or traditional, in terms of both efficiency and effect on antibacterial and antidiabetic activity of medicinal mushrooms extracts. This study provides evidences that MAE is consistently advantageous compared to other methods in that it allows a higher extraction yield and/or a significant
reduction in the required time and solvent volumes, as well as in some cases an enhancement of the bioactivity of the extract. These results are promising both for more in-depth research into the activities of medicinal
mushrooms and their bioactive metabolites, and for a potential future industrial application of MAE to obtain high-quality nutraceutical and mycotherapeutic formulations with a view to improved sustainability and cost reduction
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
Hypoglycemic properties of Leccinum scabrum - An in vitro study on α-glucosidase and α-amylase inhibition activity
No full textMushrooms have been demonstrated to produce multiple beneficial effects on human nutrition and health due to a variety of constituents and bioactive compounds they are rich in [1-3]. Among the Boletaceae family, Leccinum scabrum (Bull.) Gray, or “birch bolete”, is recently arousing the interest of researchers, proving to be an attractive species from
a nutritional and medicinal point of view. This mycorrhizal, edible mushroom is mainly distributed in deciduous woods of Central Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, where is highly valued in gastronomy. It exhibits notable nutritional value and content of health-promoting compounds, and recent investigations have pointed out its antimicrobial, antioxidant, and cytotoxic properties on cancer cells [4-6]. In light of these interesting findings and since there are still only a few studies on the medicinal properties of L. scabrum, a survey was undertaken to evaluate its possible
hypoglycemic effect. Basidiomes powder was extracted using a range of green solvents with different polarity and employing the innovative microwave-assisted extraction (MAE) technique [7]. The obtained extracts were assayed to evaluate their in vitro inhibitory activity on the two main enzymes involved in the carbohydrate digestion process, and thus related to blood glucose levels: α-glucosidase and α-amylase [8,9]. All samples were evaluated for their possible cytotoxic effect on human cells viability,
carrying out an in vitro assay on HepG2 cells. In all experiments L. scabrum resulted to be highly effective against α-glucosidase and milder on α-amylase, in which case the half-maximal inhibitory concentration could not be determined. In the former case, the ethyl acetate extract showed the
most potent bioactivity, with an IC50 value significantly lower than the reference compound 1-deoxynojirimycin (DNJ). No cytotoxicity on hepatic cells was detected for almost all the assayed extracts. The ethyl acetate extract was further processed by fractionation and subsequent GCMS
analysis to characterize its composition. In addition, high-resolution mass
spectrometry (HRMS) was also performed to determine non-volatile metabolites as well. The results of this research demonstrate how L. scabrum, a mushroom popular in culinary context, exhibits important medicinal properties and has great pharmacological potential for the treatment of type 2 diabetes
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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