Lygodium flexuosum extract down regulates the expression of proinflammatory cytokines in CCl_4 -induced hepatotoxicity

Objective:To examine the downregulalion of proinflammatory cytokines in a time dependant manner on carbon tetrachloride induced toxicity in experimental animals.Methods:CCl4（150μL/100 g） was dissolved in com oil（1:1 v/v%） and administered orally,GroupⅠwas treated as normal control and received corn oil on 8th day.GroupⅡwas toxic control and was given a single dose of CCl4 on 8th days.GroupⅢwas treated with Lygodium flexuosum（L.flexuosum） n-hexane extract（200 mg/kg） for 8 days and on 8th day a single dose of CCl4 was received.GroupⅣ（negative contnil） received L.flexuosiim n-hexane extract（200 mg/kg） alone for 8 days.Results:Treatment with n-hexane extract prior to the administration of CCl4 significantly prevented an increase in serum AST,ALT,LDH activity and lipid peroxidation and prevented the depletion of glutathione （GSH）.Rats treated with L.flexuosum had reduced mRNA levels of TGF-β1,TNF-αand IL-1βgenes in liver of CCl4 intoxicated rats when compared to CCl4 control as evidenced by RT-PCR. Conclusions:The data suggest that L.flexuosum,a widely available fem,significantly reduces CCl4 induced acute hepatotoxicily by down-regulating the expression of pro-inflammatory cytokines in rats.

Molecular cloning and characterization of fruit specific promoter from <i>Cucumis sativus</i>L.

The isolation and characterization of fruit specific promoters are critical for the manipulation of nutritional value and agronomic quality of fruits by genetic engineering and also opened a new era in edible vaccine technology. Expansins are proteins that induce loosening of individual plant cells by disrupting the non-covalent interactions between cellulose and hemicellulose microfibrils and hence have role in growth programs including fruit ripening. We report the identification of an expansin gene (CsExp) from Cucumis sativus that exhibits high levels of mRNA abundance and is specifically expressed in ripened fruit. The promoter region of CsExp also contains elements responsible for its fruit specific expression. Transient expression studies of the CsExp promoter were conducted with particle bombardment, followed by GUS histochemical assay and real time PCR. CaMV35S promoter was used as the positive control in all these experiments. Clear fruit specificity was observed for CsExp promoter in all the experiments. Thus CsExp promoter from Cucumber is a good candidate to target expression of the foreign genes to engineer fruit specific traits.

Prospects for discriminating Zingiberaceae species in India using DNA barcodes

We evaluated nine plastid （matK, rbcL, rpoCl, rpoB, rp136-rpsS, ndhJ, trnL-F, tmrnH-psbA, accD） and two nuclear （ITS and ITS2） barcode loci in family Zingiberaceae by analyzing 60 accessions of 20 species belonging to seven genera from India. Bidirectional sequences were recovered for every plastid locus by direct sequencing of polymerase chain reaction （PCR） amplicons in all the accessions tested. However, only 35 （58%） and 4o accessions （66~） yielded ITS and ITS2 sequences, respectively, by direct sequencing. In different bioinformatics analyses, matK and rbcL consistently resolved 15 species （75%） into monophyletic groups and five species into two para- phyletic groups. The 173 ITS sequences, including 138 cloned sequences from 23 accessions, discriminated only 12 species （6o%）, and the remaining species were entered into three paraphyletic groups. Phylogenetic and genealogic analyses of plastid and ITS sequences imply the possible occurrence ofnatural hybridizations in the evolutionary past in giving rise to species paraphyly and intragenomic ITS heterogeneity in the species tested. The results support using matK and rbcL loci for barcoding Zingiberaceae members and highlight the poor utility of iTS and the highly regarded ITS2 in barcoding this family, and also caution against proposing ITS loci for barcoding taxa based on limited sampling.

Synthetic biology for sustainable food ingredients production:recent trends

Problems with food security result from increased population,global warming,and decrease in cultivable land.With the advancements in synthetic biology,microbial synthesis of food is considered to be an efficient alternate approach that could permit quick food biosynthesis in an eco-friendly method.Furthermore,synthetic biology can be assumed to the synthesis of healthy or specially designed food components like proteins,lipids,amino acids and vitamins and widen the consumption of feedstocks,thus offering possible resolutions to high-quality food synthesis.This review describes the impact of synthetic biology for the microbial synthesis of various food ingredients production.