No abstract

Hydroxylated polyphenols, also called flavonoids, are richly present in vegetables, fruits, cereals, nuts, herbs, seeds, stems, and flowers of numerous plants. They possess numerous medicinal properties such as antioxidant, anti-cancer, anti-microbial, neuroprotective, and anti-inflammation. Studies show that flavonoids activate antioxidant pathways that render an anti-inflammatory effect. They inhibit the secretions of enzymes such as lysozymes and β-glucuronidase and inhibit the secretion of arachidonic acid, which reduces inflammatory reactions. Flavonoids such as quercetin, genistein, apigenin, kaempferol, and epigallocatechin 3-gallate modulate the expression and activation of a cytokine such as interleukin-1beta (IL-1β), Tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and interleukin-8 (IL-8); regulate the gene expression of many pro-inflammatory molecules such s nuclear factor kappa-light chain enhancer of activated B cells (NF-κB), activator protein-1 (AP-1), intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM), vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 (VCAM), and E-selectins; and also inhibits inducible nitric oxide (NO) synthase, cyclooxygenase-2, and lipoxygenase, which are pro-inflammatory enzymes. Understanding the anti-inflammatory action of flavonoids provides better treatment options, including coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-induced inflammation, inflammatory bowel disease, obstructive pulmonary disorder, arthritis, Alzheimer’s disease, cardiovascular disease, atherosclerosis, and cancer. This review highlights the sources, biochemical activities, and role of flavonoids in enhancing human health.

No abstract

This study stresses the need for efficient water treatment plants in healthcare settings as a public health measure to minimize spread of multidrug-resistant bacteria into the environment.

The utility of rhamnolipids in industry is currently limited due to the high constraints in its economic production. In this scenario, the novel utility of sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS) as carbon source could serve as promising cost-effective strategy. Screening of effective SDS biodegraders led to the isolation of Pseudomonas aeruginosa S15 capable of concomitant SDS degradation and biosurfactant synthesis. SDS-based rhamnolipid production was proved on SDS minimal agar plates using cetyl trimethylammonium bromide-methylene blue method and optimised in SDS-based minimal salt (SBS) medium. SDS proved to be an ideal carbon source for rhamnolipid synthesis with a high substrate to product conversion rate yielding 6.9 g/l of rhamnolipids from 1 g/l SDS in 5 days. Fast atom bombardment mass spectroscopy analysis of the purified biosurfactant proved the presence of mono- and di-rhamnolipids, viz., Rha-C(10)-C(10), Rha-C(10)-C(12) and Rha-Rha-C(10)-C(10) with surface active properties. The secreted rhamnolipids were not utilised by S15 as a carbon source, but it caused a dispersion of bacterial biofilms in SBS medium. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on bioconversion of synthetic detergent to biodetergent. This SDS-based novel methodology presents a more economised mode of rhamnolipid synthesis utilising SDS as sole carbon source.

bWe report the annotated genome sequence of two clinical isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolated from Kerala, India.

ᰔRegion of difference 1 (RD1) was first described by Mahairas et al. (4) as a region that is present in all virulent laboratory and clinical strains of Mycobacterium bovis and Mycobacterium tuberculosis. This region comprises nine genes (Rv3871 to Rv3879c) and spans a 9.5-kb region. In M. bovis BCG, RD1 deletion completely removes seven genes (Rv3872 to Rv3878) and truncates two others (Rv3871 and Rv3879c) (3). Recently Rao et al. (5) reported the total absence of RD1 in clinical isolates from India. Since this region has genes that are important in immunogenicity (ESAT6 and CFP10 genes) and RD1 deletion mutants of M. tuberculosis have been found to be less virulent (3), it was important to study this region in other Indian isolates. In this study, we analyzed 120 M. tuberculosis isolates from different parts of Kerala and 23 other isolates, 14 from west India and 9 from north India (mainly from Mumbai and Agra). All these isolates were characterized by biochemical analysis and IS6110 restriction fragment length polymorphism typing. The IS6110 copy number ranged from 0 to 15, with the majority (70%) representing the "low-copy-number" group. The presence of the RD1 region was checked with three sets of primers. The locations of the primers on the H37Rv genome and the sizes of the expected amplicon and the reference are indicated in Fig. 1.Among the isolates from Kerala, esxB and esxA were conserved in all the isolates (120/120) and Rv3871 and Rv3872 were present in all except 2 (118/120). Rv3878, being present in only 107 of the 120 isolates, was the least conserved among the three regions. In the other 23 isolates, we found that esxA and esxB were present in all but 1 and that the Rv3878 region was present in 20 isolates. But the Rv3871 and Rv3872 genes were present only in seven isolates.Thus, PCR analysis revealed that the entire RD1 region is not absent in field strains from India. Our earlier study on the identification of the moaA3 gene had shown that the RD1 region is present in isolates from Kerala (6). In the other report, Rao et al. (5) had used two sets of primers, one spanning the entire RD1 (9.8-kb) region and the other for amplification of Rv3878. The amplification of the 9.5-kb RD1 region by routine PCR is technically demanding, and truncation of the genes or any mutation at the primer binding site would eliminate the PCR product. But Rv3878 should have been amplified, as our study shows that this gene is reasonably well represented in the isolates from different parts of the country. As all the 30 strains tested by Rao et al. came from a hospital in

No abstract