Supercritical CO2 Extraction as a Tool to Isolate Anti-Inflammatory Sesquiterpene Lactones from Cichorium intybus L. Roots

Cichorium intybus L. or chicory plants are a natural source of health-promoting compounds in the form of supplements such as inulin, as well as other bioactive compounds such as sesquiterpene lactones (SLs). After inulin extraction, chicory roots are considered waste, with most SLs not being harnessed. We developed and optimized a new strategy for SL extraction that can contribute to the conversion of chicory root waste into valuable products to be used in human health-promoting applications. In our work, rich fractions of SLs were recovered from chicory roots using supercritical CO₂. A response surface methodology was used to optimize the process parameters (pressure, temperature, flow rate, and co-solvent percentage) for the extraction performance. The best operating conditions were achieved at 350 bar, 40 °C, and 10% EtOH as a co-solvent in a 15 g/min flow rate for 120 min. The extraction with supercritical CO₂ revealed to be more selective for the SLs than the conventional solid–liquid extraction with ethyl acetate. In our work, 1.68% mass and a 0.09% sesquiterpenes yield extraction were obtained, including the recovery of two sesquiterpene lactones (8-deoxylactucin and 11β,13-dihydro-8-deoxylactucin), which, to the best of our knowledge, are not commercially available. A mixture of the abovementioned compounds were tested at different concentrations for their toxic profile and anti-inflammatory potential towards a human calcineurin/NFAT orthologue pathway in a yeast model, the calcineurin/Crz1 pathway. The SFE extract obtained, rich in SLs, yielded results of inhibition of 61.74 ± 6.87% with 50 µg/mL, and the purified fraction containing 8-deoxylactucin and 11β,13-dihydro-8-deoxylactucin inhibited the activation of the reporter gene up to 53.38 ± 3.9% at 10 µg/mL. The potential activity of the purified fraction was also validated by the ability to inhibit Crz1 nuclear translocation and accumulation. These results reveal a possible exploitable green technology to recover potential anti-inflammatory compounds from chicory roots waste after inulin extraction.     

Limit distribution of the number of solutions of a system of random Boolean equations with a linear part

We prove two theorems on the Poisson limit distribution of the number of solutions of an a priori consistent system of nonlinear random Boolean equations with stochastically independent coefficients. In particular, we assume that this system contains a linear part. Translated from Ukrainskii Matematicheskii Zhurnal, Vol. 50, No. 9, pp. 1214–1226, September, 1998.     

Photodissociation of hydrogen halide molecules on free ice nanoparticles

Photodissociation of water clusters doped with HX(X=Br,Cl), molecules has been studied in a molecular beam experiment. The HX(H2O)n clusters are dissociated with 193 nm laser pulses, and the H fragments are ionized at 243.07 nm and their time-of-flight distributions are measured. Experiments with deuterated species DBr(H2O)n and HBr(D2O)n suggest that the photodissociation signal originates from the presence of the HX molecule on the water cluster, but does not come directly from a photolysis of the HX molecule. The H fragment is proposed to originate from the hydronium molecule H3O. Possible mechanisms of the H3O production are discussed. Experimental evidence suggests that acidic dissociation takes place in the cluster, but the H3O+ ion remains rather immobile.     

Photophysical properties and photodynamic activity of 13,15-N-methoxy-cycloimide chlorin p6 methyl ester in micellar surfactant solutions

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A distribution of the number of ℓ-steps in a random binary sequence subject to some constraints

There are investigated the joint distribution of random variables _kn(₁),..., _kn(_s), and distributions of some functionals of _kn(), for n. Here _kn(), 1ln–1 is the number of -steps in a binary sequence (b.s.), selected randomly and equiprobably from the totality of all n-dimensional b.s. that have a prescribed number of ones and k 1-steps. By an -step of a b.s. we understand a configuration of the form 1...0, where the ellipsis stands for an ( –1)-dimensional b.s.Translated from Ukrainskii Matematicheskii Zhurnal, Vol. 43, No. 9, pp. 1186–1193, September, 1991.     

Coordination compounds based on CAPh type ligand: synthesis,structural characteristics and luminescence properties of tetrakis-complexes CsLnL4 with dimethylbenzoylamidophosphate

Searching for prospective luminescent materials, the series of new lanthanide coordination compounds CsLnL₄ (Ln = La, Pr, Nd, Sm – Er, and Yb; L^? = {C₆H₅CONPO(OCH₃)₂}^-) was synthesized. X-ray diffraction studies of CsNdL₄ and CsYbL₄ have been performed establishing polymeric structures of the tetrakis-complexes built from [LnL₄]^? anions and cesium cations functioning as linkers. The IR, absorption, emission, excitation spectra, and decay time measurements at 298 and 77 K, as well as thermal gravimetric analyses, were used to characterize the complexes.     

Derivatization of a rigid meso-substituted heptamethine cyanine dye

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