Tea polyphenols (TP) are the main components in tea. Studies in vitro have shown they have significant biological activity; however, the results are inconsistent with experiments in vivo. For the low bioavailability, most TP are thought to remain in the gut and metabolized by intestinal bacteria. In the gut, the unabsorbed TP are metabolized to a variety of derivative products by intestinal flora, which may accumulate to exert beneficial effects. Numerous studies have shown that TP can inhibit obesity and its related metabolism disorders effectively. Meanwhile, it has demonstrated that TP and their derivatives may modulate intestinal micro-ecology. The understanding of the interaction between TP and intestinal microbiota will allow us to better evaluate the contribution of microbial metabolites of TP to anti-obesity activity. This review showed implications for the use of TP as functional food with potential therapeutic utility against obesity by modulating intestinal microbiota, contributing to the improvement of human health.

The bacterial communities and predominating species during the fermentation of wax gourd were investigated by using 16S rDNA clone library technology combined with a quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) method. At the beginning of wax gourd pickling, Acinetobacter spp. were the predominant bacteria (~10 7 cells/mL). During the next 5-20 days of fermentation, the predominating bacteria were Weissella spp. (~10 7 -10 8 cells/mL). Lactobacillus spp. were a significant portion (~10 6 cells/mL) of the bacterial flora only at day 10 of the fermentation. At days 15 and 20 of fermentation, W. paramesenteroides was the main species (~10 7 cells/mL), identified by using qRT-PCR. Lactic, citric and acetic acids levels were low at the beginning of fermentation and increased significantly (P < 0.05). The increase in lactic acid to 0.33 g/L at day 20 was likely to have occurred because of the sudden increase in W. paramesenteroides and Weissella spp. 5 days earlier. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONSThe microorganisms play an important role in the processing and preservation of pickled vegetable foods. The predominant species and its organic acids concentration in the fermentation process of pickled wax gourd were investigated using the 16S rDNA clone library technology combined with quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. This method can provide quicker information about the bacterial communities involved in traditional wax gourd fermentation and data regarding flavor formation of pickled vegetables. The formation of organic acids and antimicrobial activity by specific types of lactic acid bacteria may facilitate linking the microbial ecosystem of pickled wax gourd to quality control. It can also provide the microbial and theory identification for quality control of pickled wax gourd processing.

With the improvement of social living standards, pregnant women have higher and higher requirements for health and medical personnel. As the main body of medical service personnel, the service objects of midwives are increasing rapidly, while the existing working conditions and abilities of midwives are difficult to meet the growing medical needs of pregnant women. In order to improve the imbalance between supply and demand between limited medical resources and patients’ medical treatment, this paper proposed to use PDCA model to educate and train midwives in order to improve their professional ability and work efficiency. Based on the analysis of the structure and functional principle of PDCA model, according to the working requirements of midwives, PDCA model was used to provide midwives with scientific teaching plan, implementation scheme, inspection requirements, and result evaluation methods. In order to test the effect of the application of this model, a group of hospitalized pregnant women were selected as samples and randomly divided into control group and observation group. Through comparative experiments, the effectiveness of PDCA model in midwife education and training was verified. The experimental results showed that the scores of midwife and patient satisfaction, theory and operation skills in the observation group were higher than those in the control group. Compared with the conventional nursing mode, the use of PDCA cycle mode to educate and train midwives had not only effectively improved the theoretical knowledge and professional skills of nurses, but also significantly improved the nursing and delivery monitoring ability of pregnant women. This study has certain reference and guiding significance for clinical medicine and other related application fields.