1,721,269 research outputs found
Methods to improve the viability and stability of probiotics
No full textProbiotic functional foods face high technological demands since probiotics, live microorganisms which when administered in adequate amounts confer a health benefit on the host, have to retain their viability during all the production steps and even in the Gastrointestinal [“GI”] tract of the consumer. The aim of industrial probiotic production is to produce in an affordable manner high-quality, safe end-products with long enough shelf-life. For the food industry an easy formulation of probiotic preparations into products is of concern. Thus, probiotic preparations are usually provided as highly concentrated Direct Vat Inoculation [“DVI”] products, which can be directly used at the probiotic food production site. For the successful production of high-quality probiotic products a good knowledge on the strain-specific characteristics is necessary. Viability losses of probiotic microbes unavoidably occur during their processing and formulation steps, but with a strong know-how of the production strain these losses can be minimized. A common feature for most probiotic strains is that they are specialized in living in the human or animal GI tract, which makes them well adapted to that special environment but poorly adapted to other environments. Microbes that survive and thrive in the GI tract can be difficult to propagate and down-stream process in both small and large scale. Typical problems in probiotic technology are difficulties in obtaining high cell concentrations during growth, and retaining viability during down-stream processing, formulation and in the end product
Probiotic functional foods
No full textTraditionally probiotics have been added into fermented dairy products. This is due to the fact that dairy-based matrices are good carriers for probiotic bacteria. Currently, probiotics are available for consumers in an increasing variety of foods, especially non-dairy applications. All food matrices have unique characteristics that can either support the viability of probiotics or be detrimental to it. In food applications the factors that need to be considered include raw materials and additives, the process itself, final product and its properties, storage conditions and shelf-life. In fermented milks, several factors such as pH, organic acids, starter microbes, and potential presence of flavouring compounds and various additives (including preservatives) affect the viability of probiotic bacteria. Processing, storage conditions and shelf-lives of fermented milk products vary considerably and all these factors have an impact on the viability and stability of probiotics added into the product. Similarly to dairy-based matrices, cereal-based food matrices may be quite good supporters of probiotic viability and stability. Milk and many cereals have been shown to contain components (e.g. protein, fat, or fibre) that can protect the viability of added microbes. In shelf-stable beverages one of the most important factors affecting probiotic viability is the pH of the product, where values below 4 are typically detrimental to most probiotic strains. Some vegetable-based probiotic applications exist, although these are few in number compared to fruit-based applications
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe 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
Full text link“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
Full text linkWe 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
Full text linkWe 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
- …
