Determination of phenolic compounds by MALDI–TOF and essential oil composition by GC–MS during three development stages of Origanum majorana L.

This study aimed to investigate the effect of the maturation process of sweet marjoram (Origanum majorana L.) on essential oil composition, the phenolic profile of ethanolic extract and their antioxidant capacities. The essential oil composition was studied at three stages of maturity by GC–MS. Thirty compounds were detected representing 100% of the total essential oil. p‐Menth‐1‐en‐4‐ol was the major compound (37.15–76.94%) followed by cyclohexanol‐3,3,5 trimethyl (5.41–15.99%) and α‐terpineol (0.94–11.34%). During the maturation process, an accumulation of oxygenated monoterpenes was observed. The phenolic composition was studied using matrix‐assisted laser desorption/ionization time of flight. The analysis showed the presence of short flavonoid monomers at all stages of maturation. The antioxidant capacity of ethanolic extracts and essential oils was evaluated using the DPPH assay, iron chelating power and reducing power assay. The highest phenolic content and antioxidant capacity were found at flowering stage. These findings on essential oil composition, phenolic profile and antioxidant capacity of O. majorana at three different stages of development provide more information on how these secondary metabolites are accumulated.     

Cytotoxic effect and electrophysiological activity of S-irniine, a synthesised isomer of the natural R-irniine, on human MRC-5 fibroblasts

Numerous original alkaloids are present in tubers of Arisarum vulgare Targ. a species belonging to the Araceae family known in Morocco for its toxicity. Some previous works deal with the activity of these natural compounds as R-irniine. As the enantioselective total synthesis of irniine has been realised, the R- and S-forms were obtained and this last one could be tested. Thus, a study of the cytotoxicity and the electrophysiological activity of S-irniine was carried out on human MRC-5 fibroblasts. A cytotoxic effect of S-irniine at 40 microg/mL was detected on MRC-5 fibroblasts. An electrophysiological study was also carried out on the MRC-5 cells by using the patch-clamp technique and no effect of this compound at this concentration on the outward potassium current of MRC-5 fibroblasts was observed. Thus, this study showed, as it was for R-irniine, that the cytotoxicity of S-irniine was not explained by an effect on the potassium currents.     

On <Emphasis Type="Italic">β</Emphasis>-Matrix Models with Singular Potential

A β-matrix model with singular potential is described. A global asymptotic of the density of eigenvalues or the statistical density is obtained by using the equilibrium measure method. The large n-limit density of eigenvalues generalizes Wigner’s semicircle law.     

Negative Definite Functions on the Space of Infinite Hermitian Matrices

In this paper we investigate a Lévy–Khinchin type integral formula of negative definite functions defined over the Olshanski spherical pair of infinite hermitian matrices.     

Enzymatic detoxification of jojoba meal and effect of the resulting meal on food intake in rats

When defatted jojoba meal is used as animal food, it causes food-intake reduction and growth retardation. Detoxification procedures by chemical, microbiological, and solvent extraction methods are reported by several authors. Here we report a successful detoxification of jojoba meal using enzymes. We establish reaction conditions that yield new meal which has the same nutritional qualities in proteins as the original meal. The enzymatic reaction gives rise to one major compound to which the structure of an amide is assigned on the basis of IR, 1H and 13C NMR spectra. The effect of the resulting jojoba meal on the food intake in rats is checked. In contrast, the detoxified meal containing the amide derivatives shows no toxicological activity since rats receiving oral administration of the obtained meal show normal growth. Thus, it is expected that this meal could be used as an animal feed ingredient.     

Motives of quadric bundles

This article is about motives of quadric bundles. In the case of odd dimensional fibers and where the basis is of dimension two we give an explicit relative Chow–Künneth decomposition. This relative Chow–Künneth decomposition shows that the motive of the quadric bundle is isomorphic to the direct sum of Tate twists of the motive of the base and of the Prym motive of a double cover of the discriminant. In particular this is a refinement with \({\mathbb{Q}}\)—coefficients of a result of Beauville concerning the cohomology and the Chow groups of an odd dimensional quadric bundle over \({\mathbb{P}^{2}}\). This relative Chow–Künneth decomposition induces an absolute Chow–Künneth decomposition which satisfies parts of Murre’s conjectures. This article is a generalization of an article of Nagel and Saito on conic bundles (Nagel and Saito in Int Math Res Not IMRN 16, 2978–3001, 2009).     

A novel strange attractor with a stretched loop

This short paper introduces a new 3D strange attractor topologically different from any other known chaotic attractors. The intentionally constructed model of three autonomous first-order differential equations derives from the coupling-induced complexity of the well-established 2D Lotka?CVolterra oscillator. Its chaotification process via an anti-equilibrium feedback allows the exploration of a new domain of dynamical behavior including chaotic patterns. To focus a rapid presentation, a fixed set of parameters is selected linked to the widest range of dynamics. Indeed, the new system leads to a chaotic attractor exhibiting a double scroll bridged by a loop. It mutates to a single scroll with a very stretched loop by the variation of one parameter. Indexes of stability of the equilibrium points corresponding to the two typical strange attractors are also investigated. To encompass the global behavior of the new low-dimensional dissipative dynamical model, diagrams of bifurcation displaying chaotic bubbles and windows of periodic oscillations are computed. Besides, the dominant exponent of the Lyapunov spectrum is positive reporting the chaotic nature of the system. Eventually, the novel chaotic model is suitable for digital signal encryption in the field of communication with a rich set of keys.     

Faber polynomials, Cayley-Hamilton equation and Newton symmetric functions

We give an explicit formula for the Faber polynomials and for generalized Faber polynomials introduced by H. Airault and J. Ren in [H. Airault, J. Ren, An algebra of differential operators and generating functions on the set of univalent functions, Bull. Sci. Math. 126 (5) (2002) 343-367]. We introduce a new family of polynomials related to the Faber polynomials of the second kind. This allows us to give a generalized Cayley-Hamilton equation.     

A remark on the range of elementary operators

Let L(H) denote the algebra of all bounded linear operators on a separable infinite dimensional complex Hilbert space H into itself. Given A ∈ L(H), we define the elementary operator Δ _A : L(H) → L(H) by Δ _A (X) = AXA − X. In this paper we study the class of operators A ∈ L(H) which have the following property: ATA = T implies AT*A = T* for all trace class operators T ∈ C ₁(H). Such operators are termed generalized quasi-adjoints. The main result is the equivalence between this character and the fact that the ultraweak closure of the range of Δ _A is closed under taking adjoints. We give a characterization and some basic results concerning generalized quasi-adjoints operators.     

Evaporation of Electrolyte during SVET Measurements: The Scale of the Problem and the Solutions

The objective of this work is to investigate the scale of the effect of spontaneous solution evaporation during SVET (Scanning Vibrating Electrode Technique) measurements and demonstrate how it biases the final results. When SVET maps are continuously acquired for more than several hours, the measured currents are smaller than expected. This is attributed to solvent (typically water) evaporation which leads to an increase in solution conductivity over time. If this is not considered when converting the measured potential differences into the local current densities, the SVET results display currents smaller than the true ones. Here, this effect is studied with a platinum disk electrode as source of a constant current and a model corroding system consisting of the AA2024/CFRP galvanic couple. Corrective actions are proposed to mitigate the problem, either in the experimental set‐up or as numerical correction.