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Jatropha curcas is a drought resistant, perennial plant that grows even in the marginal and poor soil. Raising Jatropha is easy. It keeps producing seeds for many years. In the recent years, Jatropha has become famous primarily for the production of biodiesel; besides this it has several medicinal applications, too. Most parts of this plant are used for the treatment of various human and veterinary ailments. The white latex serves as a disinfectant in mouth infections in children. The latex of Jatropha contains alkaloids including Jatrophine, Jatropham and curcain with anti-cancerous properties. It is also used externally against skin diseases, piles and sores among the domestic livestock. The leaves contain apigenin, vitexin and isovitexin etc. which along with other factors enable them to be used against malaria, rheumatic and muscular pains. Antibiotic activity of Jatropha has been observed against organisms including Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli. There are some chemical compounds including curcin (an alkaloid) in its seeds that make it unfit for common human consumption. The roots are known to contain an antidote against snake venom. The root extract also helps to check bleeding from gums. The soap prepared from Jatropha oil is efficient against buttons. Many of these traditional medicinal properties of Jatropha curcas need to be investigated in depth for the marketable therapeutic products vis-à-vis the toxicological effects thereof. This mini review aims at providing brief biological significance of this plant along with its up-to-date therapeutic applications and risk factors.

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Bioengineered nanoconjugates have enormous potential as a multifunctional platform for biomedical applications. conjugation between biotic and abiotic materials enables formulation of nanoconjugates with enhanced physico-chemical properties, increased stability and ability to overcome the inherent shortcomings of individual materials. in this study, we report the preparation and biophysical characterization of an antibacterial system formulated by functionalizing reduced graphene oxide (rGo) with an antimicrobial peptide via covalent as well as non-covalent interaction mechanisms. environmentally benign synthesis approach was adopted for the formation of rGo, using L-ascorbic acid as a reducing agent. covalently conjugated peptide-graphitic conjugate displayed improved antibacterial efficacy against Escherichia coli with considerably low cytotoxic activity towards erythrocytes in comparison to self-assembled conjugate and rGo alone. the studies described herein are highly significant in the field of biomaterials and aims to open new avenues of research focusing on a plethora of applications as a prospective non-toxic substitute to conventional antibacterial approaches. Graphene-based materials like graphite, graphene oxide (GO) and rGO (reduced graphene oxide) have been explored for numerous biomedical applications ranging from diagnostics to delivery of therapeutics owing to their inimitable physiochemical characteristics, renewability and economical raw material procurement 1,2. Amongst these, oxygen-rich GO exhibits far ranging applications owing to occurrence of epoxide, hydroxyl, and carboxylic moieties in its structure. In comparison to GO, rGO lacks sufficient reaction sites and functional groups that limit its applicability 3. Although, rGO has been reportedly used in construction of sensors, but it has not been explored much for its therapeutic efficacy 4,5. Thermal annealing along with application of reducing agents are used to eliminate functional groups usually present on GO to produce rGO 6,7. Over the last few years many methods for preparation of rGO have been reported but most of them are time consuming, use toxic reagents and produce a low yield 8. In order to reduce the harmful effects of these reducing agents' efforts are being focussed on using naturally derived agents which are non-toxic. Therefore, it is necessary to opt for environment friendly reducing agents like L-ascorbic acid which give a better yield as compared to the conventional reducing agents 9,10. Although reduction of GO by application of L-ascorbic acid has been reported previously, but functionalizing it with biomolecules like peptides has not been reported earlier 11. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are essential components of the innate immune system 12. They are widely distributed amongst a wide variety of life forms ranging from microorganisms to humans. AMPs display antibacterial function by interacting with the surface of the cell membrane thereby causing disintegration of lipid bilayer present on the bacterial structure ...

Key Points• KPT-9274, via its protein target NAMPT, diminishes NAD 1 levels and cellular respiration, leading to cell death.• Orally bioavailable KPT-9274 exhibits targetspecific activity in cell lines and patientderived xenograft models of AML. Treatment options for acute myeloid leukemia (AML) remain extremely limited and associated with significant toxicity. Nicotinamide phosphoribosyltransferase (NAMPT) is involved in the generation of NAD 1 and a potential therapeutic target in AML. We evaluated the effect of KPT-9274, a p21-activated kinase 4/NAMPT inhibitor that possesses a unique NAMPT-binding profile based on in silico modeling compared with earlier compounds pursued against this target. KPT-9274 elicited loss of mitochondrial respiration and glycolysis and induced apoptosis in AML subtypes independent of mutations and genomic abnormalities. These actions occurred mainly through the depletion of NAD 1 , whereas genetic knockdown of p21-activated kinase 4 did not induce cytotoxicity in AML cell lines or influence the cytotoxic effect of KPT-9274. KPT-9274 exposure reduced colony formation, increased blast differentiation, and diminished the frequency of leukemia-initiating cells from primary AML samples; KPT-9274 was minimally cytotoxic toward normal hematopoietic or immune cells. In addition, KPT-9274 improved overall survival in vivo in 2 different mouse models of AML and reduced tumor development in a patient-derived xenograft model of AML.Overall, KPT-9274 exhibited broad preclinical activity across a variety of AML subtypes and warrants further investigation as a potential therapeutic agent for AML.

Graphene oxide-silver nanocomposite (GO-Ag) was fabricated via the sonochemical method, which shows unique physiochemical properties. Graphene oxide (GO) and silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) were synthesized by modified Hummer's and Chemical reduction methods, respectively. The synthesized nanocomposite was characterized using powder X-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy. The surface morphology of synthesized nanoparticles was studied using scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy. The thermoluminescence property of the nanocomposite was analyzed by irradiating the samples in gamma radiation at 1 kGy. Electrochemical reversibility of the GO-Ag nanocomposite was examined by cyclic voltammetry. The photocatalytic application of the nanocomposite was studied using degradation of methylene blue dye. Results reveal that doping of AgNPs on the GO surface not only improves its dye degradation property but also enhances its thermoluminescence property. This knowledge will be helpful in determining the antibacterial property of the GO-Ag nanocomposite in the future.

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