Effect of Bentonite Addition to Pedro Ximénez White Grape Musts before Their Fermentation with Selected Yeasts on the Major Volatile Compounds and Polyols of Wines and Tentative Relationships with the Sensorial Evaluation

In this work, we study the effect of bentonite addition to the grape must before alcoholic fermentation on the chemical composition and sensorial profile of the obtained wines. Fermentations were carried out with two Saccharomyces cerevisiae commercial active dry yeasts treated or not with bentonite and were compared with a control wine obtained by spontaneous fermentation (using the grape must microbiota). Several significant effects on the chemical and sensorial attributes were established by statistical treatments. The selection by multiple variable analysis of seven volatile molecules (ethyl acetate; methanol; 1-propanol; isobutanol; 2-methyl-1-butanol; 3-metyl-1-butanol and 2-phenylethanol) provided several footprints that provide an easy visualization of bentonite effects on wine volatile compounds. A Principal Component Analysis carried out with all the compounds quantified by Gas-Chromatography revealed that the first two Principal Components explain 60.15 and 25.91%, respectively, of the total variance and established five groups that match with the five wines analyzed. Lastly, predictive models at p ≤ 0.05 level for the attributes sight, smell and taste were obtained by Partial Least Squared regression analysis of selected chemical variables.     

Chronic Treatment with Melatonin Improves Hippocampal Neurogenesis in the Aged Brain and Under Neurodegeneration

Adult hippocampal neurogenesis is altered during aging and under different neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases. Melatonin shows neurogenic and neuroprotective properties during aging and neuropathological conditions. In this study, we evaluated the effects of chronic treatment with melatonin on different markers of neurodegeneration and hippocampal neurogenesis using immunohistochemistry in the aged and neurodegenerative brains of SAMP8 mice, which is an animal model of accelerated senescence that mimics aging-related Alzheimer’s pathology. Neurodegenerative processes observed in the brains of aged SAMP8 mice at 10 months of age include the presence of damaged neurons, disorganization in the layers of the brain cortex, alterations in neural processes and the length of neuronal prolongations and β-amyloid accumulation in the cortex and hippocampus. This neurodegeneration may be associated with neurogenic responses in the hippocampal dentate gyrus of these mice, since we observed a neurogenic niche of neural stem and progenitor/precursors cells in the hippocampus of SAMP8 mice. However, hippocampal neurogenesis seems to be compromised due to alterations in the cell survival, migration and/or neuronal maturation of neural precursor cells due to the neurodegeneration levels in these mice. Chronic treatment with melatonin for 9 months decreased these neurodegenerative processes and the neurodegeneration-induced neurogenic response. Noticeably, melatonin also induced recovery in the functionality of adult hippocampal neurogenesis in aged SAMP8 mice.     

Comparison of Two Bovine Commercial Xenografts in the Regeneration of Critical Cranial Defects

Autologous bone is the gold standard in regeneration processes. However, there is an endless search for alternative materials in bone regeneration. Xenografts can act as bone substitutes given the difficulty of obtaining bone tissue from patients and before the limitations in the availability of homologous tissue donors. Bone neoformation was studied in critical-size defects created in the parietal bone of 40 adult male Wistar rats, implanted with xenografts composed of particulate bovine hydroxyapatite (HA) and with blocks of bovine hydroxyapatite (HA) and Collagen, which introduces crystallinity to the materials. The Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) analysis demonstrated the carbonate and phosphate groups of the hydroxyapatite and the amide groups of the collagen structure, while the thermal transitions for HA and HA/collagen composites established mainly dehydration endothermal processes, which increased (from 79 °C to 83 °C) for F2 due to the collagen presence. The xenograft’s X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) analysis also revealed the bovine HA crystalline structure, with a prominent peak centered at 32°. We observed macroporosity and mesoporosity in the xenografts from the morphology studies with heterogeneous distribution. The two xenografts induced neoformation in defects of critical size. Histological, histochemical, and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analyses were performed 30, 60, and 90 days after implantation. The empty defects showed signs of neoformation lower than 30% in the three periods, while the defects implanted with the material showed partial regeneration. InterOss Collagen material temporarily induced osteon formation during the healing process. The results presented here are promising for bone regeneration, demonstrating a beneficial impact in the biomedical field.     

Kribbellichelins A and B,Two New Antibiotics from Kribbella sp. CA-293567 with Activity against Several Human Pathogens

Current needs in finding new antibiotics against emerging multidrug-resistant superbugs are pushing the scientific community into coming back to Nature for the discovery of novel active structures. Recently, a survey of halophilic actinomyectes from saline substrates of El Saladar del Margen, in the Cúllar-Baza depression (Granada, Spain), led us to the isolation and identification of 108 strains from the rhizosphere of the endemic plant Limonium majus. Evaluation of the potential of these strains to produce new anti-infective agents against superbug pathogens was performed through fermentation in 10 different culture media using an OSMAC approach and assessment of the antibacterial and antifungal properties of their acetone extracts. The study allowed the isolation of two novel antibiotic compounds, kribbellichelin A (1) and B (2), along with the known metabolites sandramycin (3), coproporphyrin III (4), and kribelloside C (5) from a bioassay-guided fractionation of scaled-up active extracts of the Kribbella sp. CA-293567 strain. The structures of the new molecules were elucidated by ESI-qTOF-MS/MS, 1D and 2D NMR, and Marfey’s analysis for the determination of the absolute configuration of their amino acid residues. Compounds 1–3 and 5 were assayed against a panel of relevant antibiotic-resistant pathogenic strains and evaluated for cytotoxicity versus the human hepatoma cell line HepG2 (ATCC HB-8065). Kribbellichelins A (1) and B (2) showed antimicrobial activity versus Candida albicans ATCC-64124, weak potency against Acinetobacter baumannii MB-5973 and Pseudomonas aeruginosa MB-5919, and an atypical dose-dependent concentration profile against Aspergillus fumigatus ATCC-46645. Sandramycin (3) confirmed previously reported excellent growth inhibition activity against MRSA MB-5393 but also presented clear antifungal activity against C. albicans ATCC-64124 and A. fumigatus ATCC-46645 associated with lower cytotoxicity observed in HepG2, whereas Kribelloside C (5) displayed high antifungal activity only against A. fumigatus ATCC-46645. Herein, we describe the processes followed for the isolation, structure elucidation, and potency evaluation of these two new active compounds against a panel of human pathogens as well as, for the first time, the characterization of the antifungal activities of sandramycin (3).     

Tameness of Pseudovariety Joins Involving \sf R{\sf R}

In this paper, we establish several decidability results for pseudovariety joins of the form \sf Vú\sf W{\sf V}\vee{\sf W} , where \sf V{\sf V} is a subpseudovariety of \sf J{\sf J} or the pseudovariety \sf R{\sf R} . Here, \sf J{\sf J} (resp. \sf R{\sf R} ) denotes the pseudovariety of all J{\cal J} -trivial (resp. ?{\cal R} -trivial) semigroups. In particular, we show that the pseudovariety \sf Vú\sf W{\sf V}\vee{\sf W} is (completely) κ-tame when \sf V{\sf V} is a subpseudovariety of \sf J{\sf J} with decidable κ-word problem and \sf W{\sf W} is (completely) κ-tame. Moreover, if \sf W{\sf W} is a κ-tame pseudovariety which satisfies the pseudoidentity x₁ ⋯ x_ry^ω+1zt^ω = x₁ ⋯ x_ryzt^ω, then we prove that \sf Rú\sf W{\sf R}\vee{\sf W} is also κ-tame. In particular the joins \sf Rú\sf Ab{\sf R}\vee{\sf Ab} , \sf Rú\sf G{\sf R}\vee{\sf G} , \sf Rú\sf OCR{\sf R}\vee{\sf OCR} , and \sf Rú\sf CR{\sf R}\vee{\sf CR} are decidable.     

Vibrational overtone spectroscopy of saturated hydrocarbons dissolved in liquefied Ar, Kr, Xe, and N2

This article presents a collection of vibrational overtone spectra of hydrocarbons in cryogenic solutions. Vibrational overtone spectra of ethane and propane dissolved in liquid argon and n-butane and isobutane dissolved in liquid krypton were recorded between 5000 and 14,000 cm(-1). Spectral regions for the first four overtones were measured using a Fourier transform spectrophotometer. The fifth overtone (Deltaupsilon = 6) spectra were recorded with a double beam (pump-probe) thermal lens technique using concentrations as low as 10-3 mole fraction. We obtained the C-H (Deltaupsilon = 6) spectra of (a) liquid ethane at 100 K and ethane in solutions in liquid Ar at 92 K and liquid N2 at 85 K, (b) liquid propane at 148 K and propane in liquid Ar at 93 K, (c) n-butane in liquid Kr at 129 K, (d) n-pentane in liquid Xe at 160 K, and (e) isobutane liquid at 135 K and isobutane in liquid Kr at 130 K. Local-mode parameters were calculated for primary, secondary, and tertiary C-H oscillators in solution and compared with gas-phase local-mode parameters. The peak frequency shift (Deltaomega) from gas phase to solution is explained by the change in harmonic frequency and anharmonicity in solution with respect to the gas-phase values. The bandwidth (Deltaomega1/2) of the (Deltaupsilon = 6) C-H absorption bands of ethane in solution can be explained in terms of collisions with the solvent molecules.     

Weighted weak semivalues

We introduce two new value solutions: weak semivalues and weighted weak semivalues. They are subfamilies of probabilistic values, and they appear by adding the axioms of balanced contributions and weighted balanced contributions respectively. We show that the effect of the introduction of these axioms is the appearance of consistency in the beliefs of players about the game. Received: March 1998/revised version: October 1998     

Information-theoretical complexity for the hydrogenic abstraction reaction

In this work, we have investigated the complexity of the hydrogenic abstraction reaction by means of information functionals such as disequilibrium (D), exponential entropy (L), Fisher information (I), power entropy (J) and joint information-theoretic measures, i.e. the I–D, D–L and I–J planes and the Fisher–Shannon and López–Mancini–Calbet (LMC) shape complexities. The analysis of the information-theoretical functionals of the one-particle density was computed in position (r) and momentum (p) space. The analysis revealed that all of the chemically significant regions can be identified from the information functionals and most of the information-theoretical planes, i.e. the reactant/product regions (R/P), the transition state (TS), including those that are not present in the energy profile such as the bond cleavage energy region (BCER), and the bond breaking/forming regions (B–B/F). The analysis of the complexities shows that, in position as well as in the joint space, the energy profile of the abstraction reaction bears the same information-theoretical features as the LMC and FS measures. We discuss why most of the chemical features of interest, namely the BCER and B–B/F, are lost in the energy profile and that they are only revealed when particular information-theoretical aspects of localizability (L or J), uniformity (D) and disorder (I) are considered.