Garlic is a health promoter that has important bioactive compounds. The bioactive extraction is an important step in the analysis of constituents present in plant preparations. The purpose of this study is to optimize the extraction with the best proportion of solvents to obtain total phenolic compounds (TPC) and thiosulfinates (TS) from dried garlic powder, and evaluate the antioxidant activities of the optimized extracts. A statistical mixture simplex axial design was used to evaluate the effect of solvents (water, ethanol, and acetone), as well as mixtures of these solvents, after two ultrasound extraction cycles of 15 min. Results showed that solvent mixtures with a high portion of water and pure water were efficient for TPC and TS recovery through this extraction procedure. According to the regression model computed, the most significant solvent mixtures to obtain high TPC and TS recovery from dried garlic powder are, respectively, the binary mixture with 75% water and 25% acetone and pure water. These optimized extracts presented oxygen radical absorbance capacity. Pure water was better for total antioxidant capacity, and the binary mixture of water–acetone (75:25) was better for DPPH scavenging activity. These optimized extracts can be used for industrial and research applications.

Pogostemon cablin (Blanco) Benth. is an aromatic species popularly known as patchouli. The essential oil rich in patchoulol extracted from leaves is used by the pharmaceutical industries. The objective was to investigate the effects of shade nets and shading intensities on P. cablin growth, anatomy, chemical composition and essential oil content. The experiment was conducted with two types of shade nets (black and Aluminet), three light intensities (30, 50, and 70% shading) and full sun. The different light intensities influenced the growth and the essential oil yield, and chemical composition. Patchouli plants grown in an environment with shading showed higher values for the leaf, stem, root ant total dry weights compared to full sun. At 50% of shading, Aluminet provided gain in stem and total dry weights. Aluminet and black net at 50 and 70% of shading enhance essential oil yield. Patchoulol and pogostol contents were higher under full sun, and, black net and Aluminet at 50% shading. The environment for patchouli cultivation can be improved by use shade nets, especially with Aluminet at 50% of shading.

No abstract

Recebido em 16/1/13; aceito em 8/5/13; publicado na web em 10/6/13 PRODUCTION OF CONCENTRATED FATTY ACIDS BY HYDROLYSIS OF VEGETABLE OILS CATALYZED BY PLANT LIPASE. The aim of this work was to verify the ability of enzymatic crude extract from dormant castor bean seeds to yield concentrated fatty acids by hydrolysis of polyunsaturated vegetable oils such as corn and sunflower. The enzymatic extract exhibited higher activity towards corn oil, which was selected for further studies to determine optimum hydrolysis conditions by factorial design. Maximum hydrolysis percentage (≈84%) was reached at 60% wt. oil:buffer acetate 100 mM pH 4.5, 33 °C and 5.0% wt. of crude extract after 70 min of reaction. These results suggest that the use of low-cost lipase from castor bean seeds has potential for oil hydrolysis.Keywords: oil hydrolysis; factorial design; plant lipase. [1][2][3] Estes números referem-se apenas à produção dos principais óleos e gorduras como soja, algodão, amendoim, girassol, colza, gergelim, milho, oliva, palma, coco, linhaça e mamona, e as gorduras de fonte animal como manteiga, sebo e peixe. 3 A modificação química destes óleos e gorduras mediada por catalisadores químicos é normalmente realizada em elevadas temperaturas e pressão (250 °C e 50 atm). Geralmente, estes processos fornecem produtos de composição química mista e/ou contaminada devido à ocorrência de reações indesejáveis como oxidação, desidratação e interesterificação que requerem etapas posteriores de purificação. Neste contexto, a modificação de óleos e gorduras catalisada por lipases vem se apresentando como uma alternativa atrativa para a indústria, principalmente quando são consideradas algumas das vantagens desta rota como maior rendimento do processo, menor consumo de energia, redução do teor de resíduos e introdução de rotas mais acessíveis de produção. [4][5][6][7][8][9][10] Lipases (glicerol éster hidrolases -E.C. 3.1.1.3) são enzimas que catalisam a hidrólise de ligações éster de óleos e gorduras com diferentes especificidades e podem, em meio orgânico, catalisar uma variedade de reações, como esterificação, interesterificação, transesterificação e aminólise. As lipases têm sido amplamente empregadas na produção de fármacos, emulsificantes, alimentos, perfumaria, diagnósticos médicos, compostos opticamente ativos, polímeros, aromas e fragrâncias, modificações de lipídeos para a produção de biodiesel e lipídeos estruturados e no pré-tratamento de efluentes com elevado teor de lipídeos gerados pelas indústrias de alimentos. [11][12][13][14][15] Essas enzimas encontram-se largamente distribuídas na natureza em tecidos animais e vegetais e biomassa microbiana. [11][12][13][14][15][16] Dentre elas, as lipases microbianas são as mais utilizadas industrialmente. 6,12,13 Por outro lado, as lipases vegetais apresentam algumas vantagens em relação às lipases microbianas e animais como ampla disponibilidade, baixo custo e elevada especificidade. 14-16 As principais fontes de lipases vegetais são o látex de frutos do gênero Carica como baba...

No abstract

Porophyllum ruderale (Jacq.) Cass is a medicinal plant of the family Asteraceae, originally from South America and widely distributed in Brazil. It is popularly known as “couvinha”, “arnica-paulista”, “picão-branco”, among other names. It is used in folk medicine for the treatment of bruises and it has few studies regarding its chemical and agronomic aspects. Due to its medicinal uses, the scarcity of scientific documents, as well as the lack of systematic works regarding this species, this study aimed to systematize the studies of the species Porophyllum ruderale. Scopus and Web of Science (WOS) databases were used, 34 and 21 articles were found, respectively. The articles were gathered in the bibliography manager EndNote and the duplicates were excluded, resulting in 37 documents in total. Those documents with title and abstract according to the theme (Porophyllum ruderale species) were selected. The information contained in the articles was tabulated, such as: author, year, title, objective, other species studied, use, part studied, methodology and conclusion. This result points the need for further studies with this species in other areas such as: earth and planetary sciences, chemistry, medicine, pharmacology, toxicology and pharmaceuticals, biochemistry, genetics and molecular biology. From this study, new lines of research in the area of medicinal plants can be carried out, once it was verified that this species is considered as toxic and widely used for the treatment of bruises instead of arnica (Arnica montana L. - Asteraceae).

No abstract

Anxiety participates in the body's natural defense, however, it can be pathological, when symptoms start to interfere in the individual's routine, causing loss of quality of life. Essential oils (EOs) are secondary metabolites with numerous pharmacological and biological activities, where we can highlight anxiolytic activity. Thus, the objective was to carry out a systematic review of the last 9 years in the large area of ​​pharmacology and toxicology, and to verify which EOs have anxiolytic activity, which tests were performed and the possible mechanisms involved. A bibliographic review with a qualitative and quantitative nature was carried out, using the Scopus database, where original studies were published, published between January 2010 and August 10, 2019, of the pre-clinical and clinical trial type that present results referring to anxiolytic activity of EOs, excluding those studies that did not understand the area of ​​pharmacology and / or toxicology. At the end of this analysis, of the 71 papers found, 18 were selected to compose this review. This review made it possible to visualize the panorama of preclinical and clinical studies for assessing anxiety with the use of OEs in the last 9 years, pointing out that in addition to the EO of Lavandula angustifolia, other EOs can also be promising, such as the EOs obtained from species of the genus Citrus. However, there is a scarcity of clinical studies to prove the efficacy and safety of the use of these EOs in the treatment of anxiety, which allows the opening of research in this area for the development and launch of new natural anxiolytics.