Molecular Characterization of Bacterial Isolates from Soil Samples and Evaluation of their Antibacterial Potential against MDRS

Some soil microbes, with their diverse inhabitance, biologically active metabolites, and endospore formation, gave them characteristic predominance and recognition among other microbial communities. The present study collected ten soil samples from green land, agricultural and marshy soil sites of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. After culturing on described media, the bacterial isolates were identified through phenotypic, biochemical and phylogenetic analysis. Our phylogenetic analysis revealed three bacterial isolates, A6S7, A1S6, and A1S10, showing 99% nucleotides sequence similarity with Brevibacillus formosus, Bacillus Subtilis and Paenibacillus dendritiformis. The crude extract was prepared from bacterial isolates to assess the anti-bacterial potential against various targeted multidrug-resistant strains (MDRS), including Acinetobacter baumannii (ATCC 19606), Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) (BAA-1683), Klebsiella pneumoniae (ATCC 13883), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (BAA-2108), Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC 292013), Escherichia coli (ATCC25922) and Salmonella typhi (ATCC 14028). Our analysis revealed that all bacterial extracts possess activity against Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria at a concentration of 5 mg/mL, efficiently restricting the growth of E. coli compared with positive control ciprofloxacin. The study concluded that the identified species have the potential to produce antimicrobial compounds which can be used to control different microbial infections, especially MDRS. Moreover, the analysis of the bacterial extracts through GC-MS indicated the presence of different antimicrobial compounds such as propanoic acid, oxalic acid, phenol and hexadecanoic acid.     

Three New Acrylic Acid Derivatives from Achillea mellifolium as Potential Inhibitors of Urease from Jack Bean and α-Glucosidase from Saccharomyces cerevisiae

(1) Background: Achillea mellifolium belongs to a highly reputed family of medicinal plants, with plant extract being used as medicine in indigenous system. However, limited data is available regarding the exploitation of the medicinal potential of isolated pure compounds from this family; (2) Methods: A whole plant extract was partitioned into fractions and on the basis of biological activity, an ethyl acetate fraction was selected for isolation of pure compounds. Isolated compounds were characterized using different spectroscopic techniques. The compounds isolated from this study were tested for their medicinal potential using in-vitro enzyme assay, coupled with in-silico studies; (3) Results: Three new acrylic acid derivatives (1–3) have been isolated from the ethyl acetate fraction of Achillea mellifolium. The characterization of these compounds (1–3) was carried out using UV/Vis, FT-IR, 1D and 2D-NMR spectroscopy (¹H-NMR, ¹³C-NMR, HMBC, NOESY) and mass spectrometry. These acrylic acid derivatives were further evaluated for their enzyme inhibition potential against urease from jack bean and α glucosidase from Saccharomyces cerevisiae, using both in-silico and in-vitro approaches. In-vitro studies showed that compound 3 has the highest inhibition against urease enzyme (IC₅₀ =10.46 ± 0.03 μΜ), followed by compound 1 and compound 2 with percent inhibition and IC₅₀ value of 16.87 ± 0.02 c and 13.71 ± 0.07 μΜ, respectively, compared to the standard (thiourea-IC₅₀ = 21.5 ± 0.01 μΜ). The investigated IC₅₀ value of compound 3 against the urease enzyme is two times lower compared to thiourea, suggesting that this compound is twice as active compared to the standard drug. On the other hand, all three compounds (1–3) revealed mild inhibition potential against α-glucosidase. In-silico molecular docking studies, in combination with MD simulations and free energy, calculations were also performed to rationalize their time evolved mode of interaction inside the active pocket. Binding energies were computed using a MMPBSA approach, and the role of individual residues to overall binding of the inhibitors inside the active pockets were also computed; (4) Conclusions: Together, these studies confirm the inhibitory potential of isolated acrylic acid derivatives against both urease and α-glucosidase enzymes; however, their inhibition potential is better for urease enzyme even when compared to the standard.     

Facile,eco-friendly,one-pot protocol for the synthesis of indole-imidazole derivatives catalyzed by amino acids

An efficient, convenient green approach for the synthesis of indole-based 2,4,5-trisubstituted and 1,2,4,5-tetrasubstituted imidazoles by multicomponent reaction of substituted 2-arylindole-3-carbaldehydes, benzil, substituted anilines, and ammonium acetate using catalytic amino acid (glycine) in ethanol is described. Several amino acids have also been evaluated as organic catalysts for these reactions. The structures of the compounds have been established on the basis of infrared, mass, and ¹H NMR spectral data. The mild reaction conditions, inexpensive/economical reagents, and good yield show the usefulness of this approach.     

Synthesis and characterization of polyaniline-polyvinyl chloride blends doped with sulfamic acid in aqueous tetrahydrofuran

The temperature dependence of direct current (dc) conductivity was studied for various samples of polyaniline-polyvinylchloride (PANI-PVC) blended films. Polyaniline was doped with different concentrations of sulfamic acid in aqueous tetrahydrofuran (THF) and the blended films were prepared by varying the amount of doped PANI relative to a fixed amount of PVC. The dc conductivity of PANI-PVC blended films was measured to determine the effect of sulfamic acid (dopant) in the temperature range (300–400K). The mechanism of conduction is explained by a two-phase model. In order to evaluate the effect of the dopant, conductivity-derived parameters such as the pre-exponential factor (σ _o) and the activation energy (ΔE) were calculated. The structural changes of polyaniline-PVC blended films were characterized by FTIR spectroscopy that explores information about the suitability of the dopant in the chemical doping process.     

Urease inhibition and anti-leishmanial assay of substituted benzoylguanidines and their copper(II) complexes

A series of N,N',N'-trisubstituted guanidines (1-6) and their copper(II) complexes, [κ(2)(O,N)-C(6)H(5)CONHC(NHC(6)H(4)Cl)NR](2)Cu(ii) (R = iso-propyl (1a), n-butyl (2a), sec-butyl (3a), tert-butyl (4a), benzyl (5a), and para-tolyl (6a)) were synthesized and characterized using elemental analysis, FTIR and NMR spectroscopy. DFT studies were used to assess the location of the protons in the free ligands. However, calculations have shown that, in all cases, hydrogen bonding from either N-H group gives conformations that are very similar in energy. Single crystal XRD studies were used to characterize ligands 1 and 4 and the related complexes 1a and 4a. The structures reveal that these complexes are mononuclear in the solid state and that copper adopts a regular square planar geometry. In both metallic species, the N, N', N'-trisubstituted guanidine ligands chelate the Cu(II) atom using the oxygen and one nitrogen. The synthesized compounds were investigated for urease inhibition using thiourea as a standard drug. Most complexes exhibit a better activity than the respective guanidines and compound 1a was found to be the most active with IC(50) = 9.83 ± 0.07 μM (the IC(50) for thiourea is 21.0 ± 0.1 μM). The species were also screened for their anti-leishmanial activity. However, all of the compounds were devoid of any significant activity.     

Gold nano-popcorn-based targeted diagnosis, nanotherapy treatment, and in situ monitoring of photothermal therapy response of prostate cancer cells using surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy

Prostate cancer is the second leading cause of cancer-related death among the American male population, and the cost of treating prostate cancer patients is about $10 billion/year in the United States. Current treatments are mostly ineffective against advanced-stage prostate cancer and are often associated with severe side effects. Driven by these factors, we report a multifunctional, nanotechnology-driven, gold nano-popcorn-based surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) assay for targeted sensing, nanotherapy treatment, and in situ monitoring of photothermal nanotherapy response during the therapy process. Our experimental data show that, in the presence of LNCaP human prostate cancer cells, multifunctional popcorn-shaped gold nanoparticles form several hot spots and provide a significant enhancement of the Raman signal intensity by several orders of magnitude (2.5 × 10(9)). As a result, it can recognize human prostate cancer cells at the 50-cells level. Our results indicate that the localized heating that occurs during near-infrared irradiation can cause irreparable cellular damage to the prostate cancer cells. Our in situ time-dependent results demonstrate for the first time that, by monitoring SERS intensity changes, one can monitor photothermal nanotherapy response during the therapy process. Possible mechanisms and operating principles of our SERS assay are discussed. Ultimately, this nanotechnology-driven assay could have enormous potential applications in rapid, on-site targeted sensing, nanotherapy treatment, and monitoring of the nanotherapy process, which are critical to providing effective treatment of cancer.     

Direct oxidation of methane to oxygenates over heteropolyanions

Partial oxidation of methane to formaldehyde and methanol was studied at atmospheric pressure in the temperature range of 700-750 °C using heteropolycompound catalysts （NH4）6HSiMo11FeO40, （NH4）4PMo11FeO39, and H4PMo11VO40, which were prepared and characterized by various analysis techniques such as infrared, visible UV, XRD and DTA. O2 or N2O was used as the oxidizing agent, and the principal products of the reaction were CH3OH, CH2O, CO, CO2, and water. The conversion and the selectivity of products depend strongly on the reaction temperature, the nature of oxidizing agent, and the composition of catalyst.     

Peptide structural analysis using continuous Ar cluster and C60 ion beams

A novel application of time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) with continuous Ar cluster beams to peptide analysis was investigated. In order to evaluate peptide structures, it is necessary to detect fragment ions related to multiple neighbouring amino acid residues. It is, however, difficult to detect these using conventional ToF-SIMS primary ion beams such as Bi cluster beams. Recently, C₆₀ and Ar cluster ion beams have been introduced to ToF-SIMS as primary ion beams and are expected to generate larger secondary ions than conventional ones. In this study, two sets of model peptides have been studied: (des-Tyr)-Leu-enkephalin and (des-Tyr)-Met-enkephalin (molecular weights are approximately 400 Da), and [Asn¹ Val⁵]-angiotensin II and [Val⁵]-angiotensin I (molecular weights are approximately 1,000 Da) in order to evaluate the usefulness of the large cluster ion beams for peptide structural analysis. As a result, by using the Ar cluster beams, peptide molecular ions and large fragment ions, which are not easily detected using conventional ToF-SIMS primary ion beams such as Bi₃ ⁺, are clearly detected. Since the large fragment ions indicating amino acid sequences of the peptides are detected by the large cluster beams, it is suggested that the Ar cluster and C₆₀ ion beams are useful for peptide structural analysis.