scholarly journals A Review of DietaryZiziphus jujubaFruit (Jujube): Developing Health Food Supplements for Brain Protection

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jianping Chen ◽  
Xiaoyan Liu ◽  
Zhonggui Li ◽  
Airong Qi ◽  
Ping Yao ◽  
...  

The fruits ofZiziphus jujuba, known as jujube or Chinese date, are being consumed all around the world because of their health benefits, as both food and herbal medicine. Traditionally, one of the main functions of jujube, as described in herbal medicine, is to benefit our brain by calming down the mind and improving quality of sleep. Here, the activities of jujubes on nervous system are summarized and discussed. Jujube possesses neuroprotective activities, including protecting neuronal cells against neurotoxin stress, stimulating neuronal differentiation, increasing expression of neurotrophic factors, and promoting memory and learning. Flavonoid, cAMP, and jujuboside could be the potential bioactive ingredients to account for the aforesaid biological activities. These findings imply that jujube is a potential candidate for development of health supplements for prevention and/or treatment of neurological diseases.

Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 1441
Author(s):  
Yangpeng Lu ◽  
Yanan Jia ◽  
Zihan Xue ◽  
Nannan Li ◽  
Junyu Liu ◽  
...  

Inonotus obliquus (Chaga mushroom) is a kind of medicine and health food widely used by folk in China, Russia, Korea, and some occidental countries. Among the extracts from Inonotus obliquus, Inonotus obliquus polysaccharide (IOPS) is supposed to be one of the major bioactive components in Inonotus obliquus, which possesses antitumor, antioxidant, anti-virus, hypoglycemic, and hypolipidemic activities. In this review, the current advancements on extraction, purification, structural characteristics, and biological activities of IOPS were summarized. This review can provide significant insight into the IOPS bioactivities as their in vitro and in vivo data were summarized, and some possible mechanisms were listed. Furthermore, applications of IOPS were reviewed and discussed; IOPS might be a potential candidate for the treatment of cancers and type 2 diabetes. Besides, new perspectives for the future work of IOPS were also proposed.


Molecules ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Siwen Yang ◽  
Yuhan Meng ◽  
Jingmin Yan ◽  
Na Wang ◽  
Zhujun Xue ◽  
...  

Despite the edible fungus Amillariella mellea possessing a variety of biological activities, its effects on diabetes are still unclear. Polysaccharides are the main bioactive ingredients. In order to destroy the cell wall to obtain more polysaccharides, we used NaOH solution to extract Amillariella mellea fruiting bodies. The alkali extraction (AAMP) was identified as a polysaccharide-enriched fraction. Using type 2 diabetic rats induced by co-treatment of a high fat diet (HFD) and dexamethasone (DEX), we evaluated the hypoglycemic effects of AAMP. The results showed that oral administration of a high dose of AAMP markedly lowered fasting blood glucose, improving glucose intolerance and insulin resistance. AAMP also enhanced the level of LPL and the expressions of two critical lipases ATGL and HSL, leading to a decrease of serum triglyceride. In addition, AAMP specifically suppressed the expression of SREBP-1c, resulting in AAMP observably inhibiting lipid accumulation in the liver. These findings demonstrated that the improvement of AAMP on HFD/DEX-induced insulin resistance was correlated with its regulation of lipid metabolism. Our results indicated that AAMP could be a novel natural drug or health food used for the treatment of diabetes.


Molecules ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (11) ◽  
pp. 3396
Author(s):  
Ying Wang ◽  
Junlong Li ◽  
Ning Li

The genus Curculigo, as a folk herbal medicine, has been used for many years in China, treating impotence, limb limpness, and arthritis of the lumbar and knee joints. The last systematic review of the genus Curculigo was written in 2013, scientifically categorizing the phytochemistry and biological activities. Hitherto, the original compounds and their pharmacological activities were presented as the development of this genus, but there is not an updated review. To conclude the progression of the genus Curculigo, we collected the new literature published from 2013 to 2021 in PubMed, Web of Science, Google Scholar databases, and the Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure. The novel chlorophenolic glucosides, curculigine, phenolic glycosides, orcinosides and polysaccharides were isolated from Curculigo. The new analyzing methods were established to control the quality of Curculigo as a herbal medicine. In addition, the pharmacological effects of Curculigo focused on anti-diabetes, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, osteoporosis, antioxidation, etc. The antitumor and neuroprotective activities were newly explored in recent years. The application of herbal medicine was gradually developed in scientific methods. The medicinal value of the genus Curculigo needs to further investigate its pharmacological mechanisms. This new review offers more insights into the exploitation of the pharmacological value of the genus Curculigo.


2012 ◽  
Vol 7 (6) ◽  
pp. 1934578X1200700 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammed Mosihuzzaman

It is generally accepted by all concerned that modern pharmaceuticals will remain out of reach of many people and ‘health for all’ may only be realized by the use of adequately assessed herbal products. Mankind has been using herbal medicine for healing right from the beginning of human civilization. With the advent of ‘modern medicine’ herbal products have been looked down upon, especially by western societies. Yet, in recent times, use of herbal medicine for heathcare has increased steadily all over the world. However, serious concerns are being realized regarding the safety, claimed efficacy and quality of herbal products used as herbal medicine, nutraceuticals, health food and cosmetics. Although herbal products are generally considered safe due to their age-old usage, significant side effects have been reported for many herbal products, including herbal medicine. Accidental contamination and intentional adulteration are considered as primary reasons for the side effects. The historical perspective and the philosophy of herbal medical practice along with its present status in the light of present day science have been reviewed and included in the present article. Assurance of safety by identification of contaminants and assessment of toxicity has been outlined. Assessment of claimed efficacy of herbal medicine is difficult due to its holistic approach. Practical ways of assessing efficacy of herbal medicine by adapting the methodologies used for modern pharmaceutical are described. The maintenance of standard of herbal medicine has been stressed and pragmatic approaches of assuring quality of herbal medicine by using modern tools of fingerprinting the chemical profile of herbal medicine are discussed. As much of the traditional herbal medical knowledge is scattered around the world at the family and community levels, and more so in the indigeneous people, the knowledge base is continuously being lost and so needs immediate documentation. Difficulties in documentation due to concerns of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) have been highlighted.


Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (13) ◽  
pp. 2084
Author(s):  
Mingkun Li ◽  
Heping Li ◽  
Hongli Liu ◽  
Zhiming Zou ◽  
Chaoyu Xie

The development of natural biomass materials with excellent properties is an attractive way to improve the application range of natural polysaccharides. Bagasse Xylan (BX) is a natural polysaccharide with various biological activities, such as antitumor, antioxidant, etc. Its physic-chemical and biological properties can be improved by functionalization. For this purpose, a novel glycidyl metharcylate/phytic acid based on a BX composite derivative was synthesized by a free radical polymerization technique with glycidyl metharcylate (GMA; GMABX) and further esterification with phytic acid (PA; GMABX-PA) in ionic liquid. The effects of the reaction conditions (i.e., temperature, time, initiator concentration, catalyst concentration, GMA concentration, PA concentration, mass of ionic liquid) on grafting rate(G), conversion rate(C) and degree of substitution(DS) are discussed. The structure of the composite material structure was confirmed by FTIR, 1H NMR and XRD. SEM confirmed the particle morphology of the composite derivative. The thermal stability of GMABX-PA was determined by TG-DTG. Molecular docking was further performed to study the combination mode of the GMABX-PA into the active site of two lung cancer proteins (5XNV, 2EB2) and a blood cancer protein (2M6N). In addition, tumor cell proliferation inhibition assays for BX, GMABX-PA were carried out using the 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetraz -olium bromide (MTT) method. The results showed that various reaction conditions exhibited favorable gradient curves, and that a maximum G of 56% for the graft copolymerization and a maximum DS of 0.267 can be achieved. The thermal stability was significantly improved, as demonstrated by the fact that there was still 60% residual at 800 °C. The molecular docking software generated satisfactory results with regard to the evaluated binding energy and combining sites. The inhibition ratio of GMABX-PA on NCI-H460 (lung cancer cells) reached 29.68% ± 4.45%, which is five times higher than that of BX. Therefore, the material was shown to be a potential candidate for biomedical applications as well as for use as a heat resistant material.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 387-398
Author(s):  
Sylvia O. OGOANAH ◽  
Uzoamaka N. NGWOKE ◽  
Edokpolor O. OHANMU ◽  
Pascal C. OKOYE ◽  
Beckley IKHAJIAGBE

The study investigated the enhancement of soil quality of an oil-polluted ultisol using livestock wastes. Top soil (0 - 10 cm) was obtained as a pooled sample and polluted with spent lubricating oil at 10% w/w. The soil was subsequently amended with sun-dried goat (GT), rabbit (RB), and poultry (PG) dung at 10% w/w on dry weight basis both in singles, double-mixed, and triple-mixed combinations. Twelve weeks after treatment application, results showed that there was a 93.9% decrease (p<0.05) in bacterial colony count in the oil-polluted soil compared to the control. Penicillium notatum and Aspergillus niger as well as Bacillus sp. and Proteus sp. were the prominent fungal and bacterial species identified respectively. The most abundant plant in the soil seed bank was Panicum maximum with 10.4% abundance and this showed possible involvement of the plant in remediation of oil-pollution. The total hydrocarbon content of the oil-polluted soil was 9984.0 mg/kg, compared to 3170.6 mg/kg when amended with RB+GT, implying 76.77% remediation efficiency. Among several trials employed in this study, the combination of rabbit and goat wastes proved to be more effective in reducing the total hydrocarbon content of oil-polluted soil and therefore, is recommended as a potential candidate for application in the bioremediation of such soil.


PEDIATRICS ◽  
1956 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 509-510
Author(s):  

THE Committee on Nutrition has been designated by the Executive Board of the American Academy of Pediatrics to serve in a consultative capacity in determining the suitability of advertisements of nutritional products in the official publications of the Academy. Understanding between industry and the medical profession will be fostered by a readily available statement of the basis upon which judgment of advertisements of nutritional products will be made. Assurance can be given that this will be applied objectively, fairly and with sympathetic understanding of the position of industry. It is hoped that thereby this statement can assume the status of a Code of Ethics and Etiquette in the promotion of products intended for maintenance of optimal nutrition or treatment of disorders of nutrition in infancy, childhood and adolescence. The Committee on Nutrition will remain receptive to counsel from all sources, and sensitive to the implications of its own statements and actions. The following principles will be continuously re-examined in the light of experience and pertinent evidence. Good Advertising Good advertising serves the interest of both merchant and consumer. Good advertising begins with a reliable product. Good advertising achieves a pleasant informative memory of the product and its usefulness in the mind of the consumer. In short, this implies an honest product, truthfully and artistically advertised. Honesty is the best cornerstone upon which to build the type of promotion that will serve the mutual interest of industry, the consumer, and the medical profession. Quality of the Product Proof of quality of the product must at all times be available to those who must evaluate promotional material. This applies to foods and to individual ingredients such as vitamins, minerals, amino acids, fatty acids, etc.


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