Native and modified starches are important raw materials used in the industry. Gelatinization and rheological properties of starch are primary physicochemical properties to determine its ...applications. Starch gelatinization refers to a process that starch loses the native order and crystalline structure of the granules and becomes amorphous. Key rheological properties of starch include pasting property, viscosity of starch paste, and rheological features of starch gel. In this review, gelatinization and rheological properties of native starches from different botanical sources are compared and impacts of other ingredients, including sugars, salts, and lipids, on the properties are summarized. The review also covers current understandings of the gelatinization and rheological properties of modified starches with different structures. The information provided will be useful for the applications of starch in the industry as well as fundamental research in this field.
Protoplasmic astrocytes are critically important to energy metabolism in the CNS. Our current understanding of the metabolic interactions between neurons and glia is based on studies using cultured ...cells, from which mainly inferential conclusions have been drawn as to the relative roles of neurons and glia in brain metabolism. In this study, we used functional genomics to establish the relative compartmentalization of neuronal and astrocytic metabolic pathways in the adult brain. To this end, fluorescence-activated cell sorting was used to directly isolate neurons and protoplasmic astrocytes from the cortex of adult mice. Microarray analysis showed that astrocytes and neurons each express transcripts predicting individual self-sufficiency in both glycolysis and oxidative metabolism. Surprisingly, most enzymes in the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle were expressed at higher relative levels in astrocytes than in neurons. Mass spectrometric analysis of the TCA cycle intermediates confirmed that freshly isolated adult astrocytes maintained an active TCA cycle, whereas immuno-electron microscopy revealed that fine astrocytic processes encompassing synapses contained a higher density of mitochondria than surrounding cells. These observations indicate that astrocytes exhibit robust oxidative metabolism in the intact adult brain and suggest a prominent contribution of astrocytic metabolism to functional brain imaging, including BOLD (blood-oxygen level-dependent) functional magnetic resonance imaging signals.
Defining the microanatomic differences between the human brain and that of other mammals is key to understanding its unique computational power. Although much effort has been devoted to comparative ...studies of neurons, astrocytes have received far less attention. We report here that protoplasmic astrocytes in human neocortex are 2.6-fold larger in diameter and extend 10-fold more GFAP (glial fibrillary acidic protein)-positive primary processes than their rodent counterparts. In cortical slices prepared from acutely resected surgical tissue, protoplasmic astrocytes propagate Ca(2+) waves with a speed of 36 microm/s, approximately fourfold faster than rodent. Human astrocytes also transiently increase cystosolic Ca(2+) in response to glutamatergic and purinergic receptor agonists. The human neocortex also harbors several anatomically defined subclasses of astrocytes not represented in rodents. These include a population of astrocytes that reside in layers 5-6 and extend long fibers characterized by regularly spaced varicosities. Another specialized type of astrocyte, the interlaminar astrocyte, abundantly populates the superficial cortical layers and extends long processes without varicosities to cortical layers 3 and 4. Human fibrous astrocytes resemble their rodent counterpart but are larger in diameter. Thus, human cortical astrocytes are both larger, and structurally both more complex and more diverse, than those of rodents. On this basis, we posit that this astrocytic complexity has permitted the increased functional competence of the adult human brain.
► Corn oil, soy lecithin, and free fatty acids reduced starch enzymatic hydrolysis. ► Corn oil as well as other lipids was proven to form helical-complexes with amylose. ► Starch pasting properties ...and gel formation were affected by the added lipids.
This study aimed to understand effects of lipids, including corn oil (CO), soy lecithin (SL), palmitic acid (PA), stearic acid (SA), oleic acid (OA), and linoleic acid (LA), on the enzymatic hydrolysis and physical properties of normal corn (NCS), tapioca (TPS), waxy corn (WCS), and high-amylose corn (HA7) starch, and to elucidate mechanisms of interactions between the starches and lipids. After cooking with the lipids (10%, w/w, dsb), NCS, TPS, and HA7 showed significant decreases in enzymatic hydrolysis, and their DSC thermograms displayed amylose–lipid-complex dissociation peaks except with the CO. 13C NMR spectra of amylodextrin with CO showed downfield changes in the chemical shifts of carbons 1 and 4 of the anhydroglucose unit, indicating helical complex formation. Generally, free fatty acids (FFAs) reduced, but SL increased the peak viscosities of starches. FFAs and SL decreased, but CO increased the gel strength of NCS. These lipids displayed little impacts on the enzymatic hydrolysis and physical properties of WCS because it lacked amylose.
This paper examines whether the identity of the individual audit partners provides informational value to capital market participants beyond the value provided by the identity of the audit firms. ...Using data from Taiwan, where firms are mandated to disclose the names of the engagement partners, we find a positive association between the partner's quality and the client firm's earnings response coefficient. We also find a positive market reaction when a firm replaces a lower quality partner with a higher quality one. Moreover, we find evidence that firms audited by higher quality partners experience smaller initial public offering (IPO) underpricing and are able to obtain better debt contract terms. Overall, these results suggest that the quality of engagement partners matters to capital market participants.
Purpose
The Chang Gung Research Database (CGRD), the largest multi‐institutional electronic medical records (EMR) collection in Taiwan, provides good access for researchers to efficiently use the ...standardized patient‐level data. This study evaluates the capacity and representativeness of the CGRD to promote secondary use of EMR data for clinical research with more accurate estimates.
Methods
The National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) which covers over 99.9% of the Taiwanese population served as the comparator in this study. We compare the data components of the CGRD with the NHIRD, including records for health care facilities, patients, diagnoses, drugs, and procedures. Using the chi‐square test, we compared the distributions of age categories and sex of patients, and the rates of their health conditions between NHIRD and CGRD based on the year 2015.
Results
The CGRD contains more clinical information such as pathological and laboratory results than the NHIRD. The CGRD includes 6.1% of outpatients and 10.2% of hospitalized patients from the NHIRD. We found the CGRD includes more elderly outpatients (23.5% vs 12.5%) and pediatric inpatients (19.7% vs 14.4%) compared with the NHIRD. We found patients' sex distributions were similar between CGRD and NHIRD, but coverage rates of severe conditions, such as cancer, were higher than other health conditions in CGRD.
Conclusions
The CGRD could serve as the basis for accurate estimates in medical studies. However, researchers should pay special attention to selection biases since patients' characteristics from CGRD differ from those of the national database.
Macronutrients in Corn and Human Nutrition Ai, Yongfeng; Jane, Jay‐lin
Comprehensive reviews in food science and food safety,
20/May , Letnik:
15, Številka:
3
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
As the leading cereal crop in the world, corn (Zea mays L.) plays a significant role in human foods. The focus of this review is on the structures, properties, bioavailability, and health benefits of ...macronutrients in corn, including its starch, nonstarch polysaccharides, protein, and lipids. With a large number of naturally existent mutants, corn and corn‐based food ingredients with varying macronutrient compositions and different chemical structures and physical properties are commercially available. The corn varieties that have attracted the most interest in human nutrition include high‐amylose, high‐protein, and high‐oil corn. Chemical compositions and molecular structures of starch, nonstarch polysaccharides, protein, and lipids from different corn varieties are comprehensively reviewed here and related to their physical properties, bioavailability, and physiological effects on human health. Particular emphasis is placed upon the impacts of high‐amylose corn flour/starch on postprandial glycemic/insulinemic responses, insulin sensitivity, satiety/appetite, lipid metabolism/obesity, colon health, and mineral absorption. The information presented in this article will be useful for the utilization of corn and the development of corn‐based food ingredients to prepare nutritious food products to improve human health.
Taiwan's National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) exemplifies a population-level data source for generating real-world evidence to support clinical decisions and health care policy-making. ...Like with all claims databases, there have been some validity concerns of studies using the NHIRD, such as the accuracy of diagnosis codes and issues around unmeasured confounders. Endeavors to validate diagnosed codes or to develop methodologic approaches to address unmeasured confounders have largely increased the reliability of NHIRD studies. Recently, Taiwan's Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) established a Health and Welfare Data Center (HWDC), a data repository site that centralizes the NHIRD and about 70 other health-related databases for data management and analyses. To strengthen the protection of data privacy, investigators are required to conduct on-site analysis at an HWDC through remote connection to MOHW servers. Although the tight regulation of this on-site analysis has led to inconvenience for analysts and has increased time and costs required for research, the HWDC has created opportunities for enriched dimensions of study by linking across the NHIRD and other databases. In the near future, researchers will have greater opportunity to distill knowledge from the NHIRD linked to hospital-based electronic medical records databases containing unstructured patient-level information by using artificial intelligence techniques, including machine learning and natural language processes. We believe that NHIRD with multiple data sources could represent a powerful research engine with enriched dimensions and could serve as a guiding light for real-world evidence-based medicine in Taiwan.
Preconditioning is an endogenous mechanism in which a nonlethal exposure increases cellular resistance to subsequent additional severe injury. Here we show that connexin 43 (Cx43) plays a key role in ...protection afforded by preconditioning. Cx43 null mice were insensitive to hypoxic preconditioning, whereas wild-type littermate mice exhibited a significant reduction in infarct volume after occlusion of the middle cerebral artery. In cultures, Cx43-deficient cells responded to preconditioning only after exogenous expression of Cx43, and protection was attenuated by small interference RNA or by channel blockers. Our observations indicate that preconditioning reduced degradation of Cx43, resulting in a marked increase in the number of plasma membrane Cx43 hemichannels. Consequently, efflux of ATP through hemichannels led to accumulation of its catabolic product adenosine, a potent neuroprotective agent. Thus, adaptive modulation of Cx43 can offset environmental stress by adenosine-mediated elevation of cellular resistance.
Starch granule morphology differs markedly among plant species. However, the mechanisms controlling starch granule morphology have not been elucidated. Rice (Oryza sativa) endosperm produces ...characteristic compound-type granules containing dozens of polyhedral starch granules within an amyloplast. Some other cereal species produce simple-type granules, in which only one starch granule is present per amyloplast. A double mutant rice deficient in the starch synthase (SS) genes SSIIIa and SSIVb (ss3a ss4b) produced spherical starch granules, whereas the parental single mutants produced polyhedral starch granules similar to the wild type. The ss3a ss4b amyloplasts contained compound-type starch granules during early developmental stages, and spherical granules were separated from each other during subsequent amyloplast development and seed dehydration. Analysis of glucan chain length distribution identified overlapping roles for SSIIIa and SSIVb in amylopectin chain synthesis, with a degree of polymerization of 42 or greater. Confocal fluorescence microscopy and immunoelectron microscopy of wild-type developing rice seeds revealed that the majority of SSIVb was localized between starch granules. Therefore, we propose that SSIIIa and SSIVb have crucial roles in determining starch granule morphology and in maintaining the amyloplast envelope structure. We present a model of spherical starch granule production.
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