The fumonisins producing fungi,
spp., are ubiquitous in nature and contaminate several food matrices that pose detrimental health hazards on humans as well as on animals. This has necessitated ...profound research for the control and management of the toxins to guarantee better health of consumers. This review highlights the chemistry and biosynthesis process of the fumonisins, their occurrence, effect on agriculture and food, along with their associated health issues. In addition, the focus has been put on the detection and management of fumonisins to ensure safe and healthy food. The main focus of the review is to provide insights to the readers regarding their health-associated food consumption and possible outbreaks. Furthermore, the consumers' knowledge and an attempt will ensure food safety and security and the farmers' knowledge for healthy agricultural practices, processing, and management, important to reduce the mycotoxin outbreaks due to fumonisins.
Aflatoxins produced by the
Aspergillus
species are highly toxic, carcinogenic, and cause severe contamination to food sources, leading to serious health consequences. Contaminations by aflatoxins ...have been reported in food and feed, such as groundnuts, millet, sesame seeds, maize, wheat, rice, fig, spices and cocoa due to fungal infection during pre- and post-harvest conditions. Besides these food products, commercial products like peanut butter, cooking oil and cosmetics have also been reported to be contaminated by aflatoxins. Even a low concentration of aflatoxins is hazardous for human and livestock. The identification and quantification of aflatoxins in food and feed is a major challenge to guarantee food safety. Therefore, developing feasible, sensitive and robust analytical methods is paramount for the identification and quantification of aflatoxins present in low concentrations in food and feed. There are various chromatographic and sensor-based methods used for the detection of aflatoxins. The current review provides insight into the sources of contamination, occurrence, detection techniques, and masked mycotoxin, in addition to management strategies of aflatoxins to ensure food safety and security.
Mycotoxins represent an assorted range of secondary fungal metabolites that extensively occur in numerous food and feed ingredients at any stage during pre- and post-harvest conditions. Zearalenone ...(ZEN), a mycotoxin categorized as a xenoestrogen poses structural similarity with natural estrogens that enables its binding to the estrogen receptors leading to hormonal misbalance and numerous reproductive diseases. ZEN is mainly found in crops belonging to temperate regions, primarily in maize and other cereal crops that form an important part of various food and feed. Because of the significant adverse effects of ZEN on both human and animal, there is an alarming need for effective detection, mitigation, and management strategies to assure food and feed safety and security. The present review tends to provide an updated overview of the different sources, occurrence and biosynthetic mechanisms of ZEN in various food and feed. It also provides insight to its harmful effects on human health and agriculture along with its effective detection, management, and control strategies.
The mycotoxin patulin is primarily produced as a secondary metabolite by numerous fungal species and predominantly by Aspergillus, Byssochlamys, and Penicillium species. It is generally associated ...with fungal infected food materials. Penicillium expansum is considered the only fungal species liable for patulin contamination in pome fruits, especially in apples and apple-based products. This toxin in food poses serious health concerns and economic threat, which has aroused the need to adopt effective detection and mitigation strategies. Understanding its origin sources and biosynthetic mechanism stands essential for efficiently designing a management strategy against this fungal contamination. This review aims to present an updated outline of the sources of patulin occurrence in different foods and their biosynthetic mechanisms. It further provides information regarding the detrimental effects of patulin on human and agriculture as well as its effective detection, management, and control strategies.
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•Patulin is mainly produced by Aspergillus, Byssochlamys, and Penicillium species.•Patulin contaminates pome fruits, especially apples and apple-based products.•Patulin contaminated products have serious human health impacts.•Management strategies are required for the safety and security of food.
Nanotechnology is indisputably a scientific technique that offers the prospect of new therapies, and hope, for the treatment of malignant illnesses. It is a novel technology that offers new ...approaches for the diagnosis and management of diverse diseases. Although the discovery of Quantum dots (QD) nano-transporters has already led to a few positive developments, QD nano-transporters are still at their initial stage, though have yet proven valuable to society. The excertion of QD indicates conversion in natural imaging along with photograph have established incredible suitability in bio-imaging, new drug development, targeted gene deliverance, biosensing, photodynamic treatment as well as diagnosis. The present review aimed to confer the significance of QD in diagnosis as well as in management of cancer. This review aims to impart fundamental insight as well as conception of QD its merits, properties, utilization as well as mode of action. This review highlight of different designing schemes of QD like hydrothermal, drop-casting, ultrasonic, solvothermal, spin-coating, atomic layer desorption, layer by layer, polymethylmethacrylate aided-transfer, electrochemical, ion beam sputtering deposition. Moreover, we have elaborated on the diverse researches related to cytotoxic examination to reveal that QDs are harmless. Concisely, the present review summarizes the fabrication schemes, current research and utilization of QD in cancer treatment.
Agriculture is the source of food for both humans and animals. With the growing population demands, agricultural production needs to be scaled up where nanotechnology can play a significant role. The ...use of nanotechnology in agriculture can manage plant disease and growth for better and quality output. Therefore, this review focuses on the use of various nanoparticles for detection of nutrients and contaminants, nanosensors for monitoring the environmental stresses and crop conditions as well as the use of nanotechnology for plant pathogen detection and crop protection. In addition, the delivery of plant growth regulators and agrichemicals like nanopesticides and nanofertilizers to the plants along with the delivery of DNA for targeted genetic engineering and production of genetically modified (GM) crops are discussed briefly. Further, the future concerns regarding the use of nanoparticles and their possible toxicity, impact on the agriculture and ecosystem needs to be assessed along with the assessment of the nanoparticles and GM crops on the environment and human health.
Low penetration efficiency and retention time are the main therapeutic concerns that make it difficult for most of the drugs to be delivered to the intraocular tissues. These challenging issues are ...often related to those drugs, which have low or poor solubility and low permeability. The goal of this study was designed to develop nanostructured lipid carriers (NLCs) loaded with itraconazole (ITZ) with the objective of enhancing topical ocular permeation and thereby improving clinical efficacy.
ITZ-loaded NLCs were fabricated by a high-speed homogenization technique using surfactant (Poloxamer 407), and lipids (stearic acid and oleic acid). Optimization of formulations was performed by 3 level factorial design and the selected formulation (F6) was evaluated by differential scanning calorimetry and transmission electron microscopy. Antifungal activity was assessed by measuring the zone of inhibition and irritation potential using the HET-CAM test.
The independent variables (lipid ratio-X1 and percentage of emulsifier-X2) have a positive impact on percentage entrapment efficiency (Y2) and percentage release (Y3) but have a negative impact on particle size (Y1). Based on the better entrapment efficiency (94.65%), optimum particle size (150.67 nm), and percentage cumulative drug release (68.67%), batch F6 was selected for further evaluation. Electron microscopic images revealed that the prepared particles are spherical and have nano size. Antifungal studies demonstrated enhancement in the zone of inhibition by formulation F6 as compared to a commercial eye drop. The non-irritancy of optimized formulation (F6) was confirmed with a zero score.
In summary, the optimized NLCs seem to be a potent carrier for the effective delivery of itraconazole in ocular therapy.
Background: Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) is a common sleep-related breathing disorder, is characterized by recurrent collapse or blockage of the pharynx during sleep that causes intermittent ...cessation of airflow and a hallmark snoring gasping pattern. When OSA occurs in pregnancy, it is independently associated with increased risk of gestational hypertension, preeclampsia, gestational diabetes and possibly fetal growth restriction and other adverse neonatal outcomes. In particular, OSA affects sleep quality and duration of sleep in pregnant women. The aim was to study the risk of Obstructive Sleep Apnea in pregnant females in different trimester. Methods: The study consists of a non-experimental, quantitative and cross sectional research design. A total of 60 pregnant females were included in the study and conducted at maternity clinic. Results: By analyzing data we found that females in 3rd trimester shows symptoms of compromised breathing and thus are at high risk of developing OSA followed by 2nd trimester. Conclusions: Our study shows that breathing limitation starts from 2nd trimester onwards, so, we conclude that starting breathing exercises early in antenatal period would be beneficial for the expecting mothers. The study concludes that there is high risk of obstructive sleep apnea in 3rd trimester of the pregnancy. Keywords: Obstructive sleep apnea, Pregnant females
Development of polymeric micelles for the management of allergic conjunctivitis to overcome the limitations of topical installation, such as poor patient compliance, poor stromal permeability, and ...significant adverse effects, increase precorneal residence time and efficacy, and also control the release of drug at the target site.
The investigation was aimed at developing a polymeric micellar system of Azelastine HCl for Ocular Delivery.
Drug loaded micelles of tri-block copolymers Pf 127 were prepared by Thin Film hydration method. The polymeric micelles formulations (F1 to F9) were assessed for entrapment efficiency, micelle size, in vitro permeation, ex vivo transcorneal permeation, in vivo Ocular Irritation, and Histology.
Optimized micelles formulation (F3), with the lowest micelle size of 92 nm, least polydispersity value of 0.135, highest entrapment efficiency of 95.30 ± 0.17%, and a cumulative drug permeation of 84.12 ± 1.26% in 8h, was selected to develop pH-sensitive micelles loaded carbopol in situ gel. The optimized in situ gel (G4) proved to be superior in its ex vivo transcorneal permeation when compared with Market Preparation and pure drug suspension, exhibiting 43.35 ± 1.48% Permeation with zero-order kinetics (r2 = 0.9944) across goat cornea. Transmission Electron microscopy revealed spherical polymeric micelles trapped in the gel matrix. A series of experiments showed hydration capability, non-irritancy, and histologically safe gel formulation that had appropriate handling characteristics.
A controlled release pH-sensitive ocular formulation capable of carrying the drug to the anterior section of the eye via topical delivery was successfully developed for the treatment of allergic conjunctivitis.
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