Effects of Rhodiola rosea supplementation on mental performance,physical capacity,and oxidative stress biomarkers in healthy men

Purpose： The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of chronic Rhodiola rosea （R. rosea） supplementation on mental and physical performance, as well as hormonal and oxidative stress biomarkers. Methods： Twenty-six healthy male students received either R. rosea extract （600 mg/day; RR） or placebo （PL） in a randomized double-blind trial. Prior to supplementation （Term I） and following 4 weeks of supplementation （Term II）, the students underwent psychomotor tests for simple and choice reaction time, included in the Vienna Test System. Also, the subjects performed VO2peak test. Blood samples were obtained before and after the test to measure the hormonal profile （cortisol, testosterone, and growth hormone）, as well as the biomarkers of oxidative stress （lipid hydroperoxides, total antioxidant capacity, and superoxide dismutase） and muscle damage （creatine kinase）. Results： R. rosea ingestion shortened reaction time and total response time. Moreover, a greater relative increase in the number of correct responses was observed in RR group as compared to the PL group. No changes in endurance exercise capacity and hormonal profile were observed after R. rosea ingestion. R. rosea ingestion raised plasma total antioxidant capacity. It did not, however, affect other measured parameters. Conclusion： Chronic R. rosea ingestion does not affect physical performance, but can improve the results of some psychomotor tests （simple and choice reaction time） in young, healthy, and physically active men. The improvements in mental performance, however, at least in our study, seem not to be related to changes in cortisol release or antioxidant activity of R. rosea extract. Thus, the specific mechanisms responsible for these effects still need to be elucidated.2018 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Shanghai University of Sport. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license. （http：//creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/）.

Reaction path synthesis methodology for waste minimization

It is a key step for reducing waste generation in chemical processes to design op-timal reaction paths. In this paper, methods of waste minimization for reaction path synthesis problems are proposed to realize eco-industrial production mode with minimum waste emission. A new conception of simple stoichiometric reaction is presented for reaction path synthesis problem. All simple stoichiometric reactions can be obtained by mathematical transformation for atom matrix of a reaction system. Based on the conception, a two-tier optimization method for complex reaction path synthesis problems is addressed. The first step is to determine the eco-nomic optimal overall reactions, and the second step to decompose each overall reaction into several sub-reactions and find out the best thermodynamic feasible reaction path. Further, a method of reaction path synthesis with waste closed-cycle is proposed based on simple stoichiometric reactions for achieving zero waste emission to poly-generation problem of multi-products. Case studies show that the proposed methods can efficiently solve practical re-action path synthesis problems.