•Medicinal plants are frequently contaminated with toxigenic fungi.•Mycotoxin contamination in medicinal plants has been reported from various countries.•Increase in use of medicinal plants may lead ...to an increase in intake of mycotoxins.•Mycotoxins can contribute to adverse human health problems.•The review covers natural occurrences of mycotoxins in medicinal plants and products.
Medicinal plants are widely used as home remedies and raw materials for the pharmaceutical industries. Herbal remedies are used in the prevention, treatment and cure of disorders and diseases since ancient times. However, use of medicinal herbs may not meet the requirements of quality, safety and efficacy. During harvesting, handling, storage and distribution, medicinal plants are subjected to contamination by various fungi, which may be responsible for spoilage and production of mycotoxins. The increasing consumption of medicinal plants has made their use a public health problem due to the lack of effective surveillance of the use, efficacy, toxicity and quality of these natural products. The increase in use of medicinal plants may lead to an increase in the intake of mycotoxins therefore contamination of medicinal plants with mycotoxins can contribute to adverse human health problems and therefore represents a special hazard. Numerous natural occurrences of mycotoxins in medicinal plants and traditional herbal medicines have been reported from various countries including Spain, China, Germany, India, Turkey and from Middle East as well. This review discusses the important mycotoxins and their natural occurrences in medicinal plants and their products.
Six new organotin(IV) complexes, Bu2SnL (1), Me2SnL (2), Me3SnL (3), Bu3SnL (4), Ph3SnL (5) and (n-Oct2SnL (6) have been synthesized from the reaction of ...4-((5-chloro-2-hydroxyphenyl)ethylideneamino)methyl)cyclohexanecarboxylic acid (HL) with the corresponding diorganotin(IV) dichloride/oxide or triorganotin(IV) chloride.All the synthesized compounds were structurally characterized by elemental analysis, FT-IR, multinuclear NMR (1H and 13C) spectroscopies and powder X-ray diffraction analysis. The results of spectroscopic studies support coordination of oxygen donor site of the ligand with the tin atom of di andtriorgnaotin(IV) moieties. Currently, a vaccine for leishmaniasis remains unavailable, and the existing antimonial-based drugs are accompanied by significant and adverse side effects. The synthesized compounds were screened for antileishmanial activity against promastigotes form of leishmania tropica. Highest activity was shown by compound 2 with an IC50 value of 1.17 ± 0.01 µg/mL, as compared to amphotericin B with IC50 value of 0.71 ± 0.01 µg/mL The synthesized compounds were also subjected to interaction studies with single-stranded DNA (SS-DNA). Among these compounds, Compound 2 demonstrated the most substantial binding affinity, exhibiting a binding constant of 2.7x103 M−1. Furthermore, the compounds also showed excellent antioxidant potential with percentage radical scavenging value in the range of 87–95% and IC50 46.92, 72.10, 46.33 Μg/mL for compounds 1, 5 and 6respectively. The complexes revealed significant toxicity with comparable LD50(6.26 μg/mL), (6.79 μg/mL), (5.67 μg/mL)and (5.80 μg/mL)for complex 2, 3,5 and standard drug respectively. Similarly, the complexes also showed significance antifungal and antibacterial activity.
Introduction. This study determines the incidence of common viral and helminth coinfections with malaria in the tertiary care hospital set up in southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Materials and ...Methods. The multidimensional research included malaria patients admitted to different hospitals of district Kohat during January and December 2021. Stool samples and blood were assembled from the patients. Giemsa-stained microscopy-positive samples were processed by the immunochromatography technique (ICT) to identify Plasmodium species. Common viral infections such as viral hepatitis (A, B, and C), HIV, and dengue (DENV) were analyzed by ICT kits while SARS-CoV-2 was confirmed through real-time PCR. Furthermore, the intestinal helminths were identified using the Kato-Katz thick smear method. Results. Among 1278 patients, 548 were diagnosed with malaria, 412 (75.2%) were positive for P. vivax infection, 115 (21%) for P. falciparum, and 21 (3.8%) for mixed malaria infection (P. vivax/P. falciparum), with a higher incidence among males (65.2%) than females (34.8%). Coinfection with helminths was positive in 215 (39.3%) malaria patients. The most common infections were caused by the Ascaris lumbricoides species (42.6%) followed by Enterobius vermicularis (31.7%) and hookworm. A total of 24.6% of malaria-positive cases were also coinfected with different viruses with higher frequencies of confection for HAV (8.2%) and DENV (6.2%), respectively. The patients revealed higher incidence of coinfections with P. falciparum (57%) as compared with P. vivax (39.2%) and mixed infections (3.7%). Conclusion. This study demonstrated that the study population exhibited a significant incidence of coinfections with intestinal helminth and viral malaria.
To determine the incidence of antimicrobial-resistant emerging pathogens, Clostridium difficile, and its associated risk factors in tertiary care setups of Pakistan. This cross-sectional prospective ...study was conducted from January 2019 to December 2020, to determine the prevalence and antimicrobial resistance patterns of C. difficile strains isolated from 450 stool specimens of patients suffering from diarrhea hospitalized in tertiary care hospitals in Peshawar, Pakistan. The stool samples of the patients were processed for culture and detection of toxin A and toxin B by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and tpi PCR. The drug sensitivity test was performed for antibiotics including ampicillin, cefixime, cefepime, amoxicillin, nalidixic acid, sulpha/TMP (SXT), chloramphenicol, metronidazole, vancomycin, ciprofloxacin, levofloxacin, and imipenem. Of 450 stool specimens, 108 (24%) were positive for C. difficile by stool culture, whereas 115 (25.5%) were only positive for C. difficile toxins based on ELISA and PCR (128 (28.6%). Of 108, 90.7% (n = 98) isolates were resistant to one antibiotic, and 90 (83.4%) were resistant to three or more antimicrobials. The highest resistance rates were found against penicillin (83.3%) followed by amoxicillin (70%), nalidixic acid (61%), and metronidazole (38%), and the lowest resistance was found against vancomycin (6.4%) and imipenem (3.7%). CDI was statistically significantly correlated with increased age, use of antibiotics, abdominal surgeries, use of proton pump inhibitors and H2a, and presence of comorbidities. The high frequency of C. difficile in Peshawar, Pakistan, indicates that CDI is an important nosocomial infection in different hospitals. The results will be helpful for clinicians to redesign control and therapeutic strategies in hospitals.
Ticks pose a major threat to cattle health and production in Pakistan because they transmit pathogens of diseases like Babesiosis and Theileriosis.
spp., found across Africa, Asia, and Europe, are ...especially problematic. This study explored biocontrol of
spp. using spore-free fungal culture filtrates collected from dairy farm soil in Kohat, Pakistan. Three fungal species of the genera Alternaria, Aspergillus, and Penicillium were isolated, and their filtrates were tested against tick adults and larvae. Filtrate concentrations were prepared at different strengths. Data were taken after the exposure of adults and larvae ticks to various concentrations of the fungal filtrates. Results indicated that at 100% concentration, all fungal filtrates induced 100% mortality in adults and larvae. Decreasing filtrate concentration lowered tick mortality. The lowest concentration caused the least mortality. The effect was time- and dose-dependent. In conclusion, spore-free fungal culture filtrates can provide biocontrol of
spp. in a time- and concentration-dependent manner. Further research should explore the active compounds causing mortality and optimal application methods. The process outlined here provides a natural biocontrol alternative to chemical pesticides to reduce tick infestations and associated cattle diseases in Pakistan.
Proper management and control measurements are needed to stop the spread of highly pathogenic E. coli isolates that cause urinary tract infections (UTI) by developing new antibacterial agents to ...ensure the safety of public health. Therefore, the present investigations were used to achieve the synthesis of iron oxide nanoparticles (IONPs) via a simple coprecipitation method using ferric nitrates Fe (NO3)3 as the precursor and hydrazine solution as the precipitator and to explore the antibacterial activity against eradicating Uropathogenic Escherichia coli (E. coli). The synthesized IONPs were further studied using a UV–vis spectrophotometer, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and scanning electron microscopic (SEM) analysis. The maximum surface plasmon resonance peak was observed as absorption at 320 nm in a colloidal solution to validate the synthesis of IONPs. The FT-IR analysis was used to identify different photoactive functional groups that were responsible for the reduction of Fe (NO3)3 to IONPs. The crystalline nature of synthesized IONPs was revealed by XRD patterns with an average particle size ranging as 29 nm. The SEM image was employed to recognize the irregular morphology of synthesized nanoparticles. Moreover, significant antibacterial activity was observed at 1 mg/mL stock solution but after (125, 250, and 500 μg/mL) dilution, the synthesized IONPs showed moderate activity and became inactive at lower concentrations. The morphological and biochemical tests were used to confirm the presence of E. coli in the samples. Furthermore, the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bacterial concentration (MBC) were carried out to determine the inhibitory concentrations for the isolated bacteria. The isolated E. coli were also subjected to antibiotic sensitivity testing that showed high resistance to antibiotics such as penicillin and amoxicillin. Thus, the findings of this study were to use IONPs against antibiotic resistance that has been developed in an inappropriate way.
Objective: To report presence of Leishmania major in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa of Pakistan, where cutaneous leishmaniasis(CL) is endemic and was thought to be caused by Leishmania tropica only. Methods: ...Biopsy samples from 432 CL suspected patients were collected from 3 southern districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa during years 2011–2016. Microscopy on Giemsa stained slides were done followed by amplification of the ribosomal internal transcribed spacer 1 gene. Results: Leishmania amastigotes were detected by microscopy in 308 of 432 samples(71.3%) while 374 out of 432 samples(86.6%) were positive by ribosomal internal transcribed spacer 1 PCR. Subsequent restriction fragment length polymorphism confirmed Leishmania tropica in 351 and Leishmania major in 6 biopsy samples. Conclusions: This study is the first molecular characterization of Leishmania species in southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It confirmed the previous assumptions that anthroponotic CL is the major CL form present in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Furthermore, this is the first report of Leishmania major from a classical anthroponotic CL endemic focus identified in rural areas of Kohat district in southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Dengue is a vector-borne disease caused by dengue virus. According to the recent report of CDC that one-third population of the world are at high risk with Dengue fever. The prevalence of the dengue ...hemorrhagic fever was found more in tropical and sub-tropical regions of the world.
Aedes
mosquitoes was reported as the main cause of transmission of dengue virus. So the current study was planned to characterize the virus in
Aedes
mosquitoes collected from different area of Pakistan. In current investigation,
Aedes
mosquitoes and larvae were trapped under conducive conditions which are counted as 495
Aedes
mosquitoes and 260
Aedes
larvae. First of all, adult mosquitoes were identified morphologically under microscopy, counted as 73.3%
Ae. aegypti
and 26.7%
Ae. albopictus
. Finally, reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction analyses that only 4 adults of
Aedes
mosquitoes and 10
Aedes
larvae as naturally infected with dengue virus with possible source
Ae. aegypti
. This study basically uncovered the presence of virus in different species of mosquitoes in southern regions of Pakistan. The present study will also give us an insight for vector control programs of dengue virus in the affected area.
Medicinal plants are used worldwide to treat a variety of ailments. Due to the provenance of medicinal plants, they are subjected to contamination by moulds, which may be responsible for spoilage and ...production of mycotoxins. The investigation was designed to throw light on mycological and mycotoxicological status of some medicinal plants from Pakistan and the result showed 30 % and 26.7 % samples were contaminated with aflatoxins and ochratoxin A, respectively. Mould contamination was present in 90 % samples, of which 70 % exceeded the permissible limits. Opium poppy, licorice root, and Indian rennet were most contaminated samples. The predominant moulds found were Aspergillus flavus, Aspergillus niger, Aspergillus parasiticus, and Penicillium spp. and 31 % of the 47 isolates tested were found to be toxigenic. The findings indicate that the contamination in the medicinal plants may contribute to adverse human health problems. This information would prove helpful for regulatory agencies to establish limits for these contaminants in medicinal plants and will explore ways for export of herbal products to countries where more stringent permissible limits of mycotoxins exist. The study is first of its kind in the country reporting natural occurrence of mycotoxins in medicinal plants in Pakistan.
•Medicinal plant samples were analyzed for mycotoxin and mould contamination.•Natural occurrence of aflatoxins and ochratoxin A was detected in the samples.•Exceeding levels of mould contamination mainly Aspergillus and Penicillium were shown.•Contamination might be due to poor storage, transport, and handling conditions.•Isolated fungal spp. revealed toxigenic potential after culturing on synthetic media.
Background. The IL-12/IFN-γ axis pathways play a vital role in the control of intracellular pathogens such as Salmonella typhi. Objective. The study is aimed at using whole exome sequencing (WES) to ...screen out genetic defects in IL-12/IFN-γ axis in patients with recurrent typhoid fever. Methods. WES using next-generation sequencing was performed on a single patient diagnosed with recurrent typhoid fever. Following alignment and variant calling, exomes were screened for mutations in 25 genes that are involved in the IL-12/IFN-γ axis pathway. Each variant was assessed by using various bioinformatics mutational analysis tools such as SIFT, Polyphen2, LRT, MutationTaster, and MutationAssessor. Results. Out of 25 possible variations in the IL-12/IFN-γ axis genes, only 2 probable disease-causing mutations were identified. These variations were rare and include mutations in IL23R and ZNFX I. Other pathogenic mutations were found, but they were not considered likely to cause disease based on various mutation predictors. Conclusion. Applying WES to the patient with recurrent typhoid fever detects variants that are not much important as other genes in the IL-12/IFN-γ axis. Results of the current study suggest that a large population sizes would be needed to examine the functional relevance of IL-12/IFN-γ axis genes with recurrent typhoid fever.
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