Characteristics of Central American brocket deer resting sites in a tropical mountain cloud forest in eastern Mexico

The Central American brocket deer is a vulnerable species. Geographically isolated populations have been affected by poaching and habitat fragmentation, leading to local extinctions. It is therefore important to understand this species’ habitat characteristics, particularly of resting sites, which play a crucial role in survival and fitness. We describe the characteristics and distribution patterns of Central American brocket deer resting sites at the microhabitat and landscape scales in San Bartolo Tutotepec, Hidalgo, México. We conducted eight bimonthly field surveys between November 2017 and March 2019, consisting of 32 transects of 500 m length to search for fecal pellets, footprints, scrapes, and browsed plants. At each resting site we identified, we measured canopy closure, horizontal thermal cover, protection from predators for fawns and adults, escape routes, slope from the ground, presence of scrapes, cumulative importance value of the edible plant species, and distance from the resting site to the nearest water resource to characterize the site at the microhabitat scale. At the landscape scale, we identified the type of biotope, elevation, aspect, and slope. We compared all of these parameters from resting sites with a paired randomly selected site to serve as a control. We performed a multiple logistic regression to identify the parameters associated with the resting sites and a point pattern analysis to describe their distribution. We characterized 43 resting sites and their corresponding control plots. At the microhabitat scale, resting sites were associated with higher vertical thermal cover, more concealment cover, more escape routes, more edible plant species, higher slope from the ground, and closer distance to water resources. At the landscape scale, resting sites were associated with beech forest, oak forest, secondary forest, and ravine biotopes and negatively associated with pine forest, houses, and roads. Resting sites had an aggregated spatial pattern from 0 to 900 m, but their distribution was completely random at larger scales. Our study revealed that Central American brocket deer selected places with specific characteristics to rest, at both microhabitat and landscape scales. We therefore suggest that existing habitat be increased by reforesting with native species—particularly Mexican beech forest and oak forest—to improve the deer’s conservation status in the study area.

A comprehensive investigation on chemical diversity and efficacy of different parts of Ligusticum chuanxiong

Ligusticum chuanxiong Hort. (CX) is a medicinal and edible plant with a wide range of constituents of biological interest. Since the biomass of the non-medicinal parts of CX is huge,...

Ethanol Extract of Brassica Rapa Attenuate the Complete Freund’s Adjuvant-Induced Inflammation in Rats

Turnip is an ancient edible plant belongs to family Braaicacaceae. Traditionally it is used for the treatment of various disorders such as diabetes, hepatotoxicity, ulcer, and anti-inflammatory activity. Therefore the current investigation was attempted to investigate the anti-inflammatory activity of Brassica rapa root extract against complete fluids adjuvant induced inflammation in experimental animals. The Ethanol extract of Brassica rapa was prepared by a hot extraction procedure and phytochemical analysis of different extract was done by different chemical tests. Daily oral treatment of indomethacin, and extract for twenty-one days after three days of CFA administration significantly decrease the paw volume, hepatic biomarkers as well as ameliorated the level of a hematological parameter such as hemoglobin, RBC, WBC, ESR and bodyweight of experimental animals. From the result of the current investigation, it can be concluded that the Brassica rapa extract possesses anti-inflammatory activity. Further study is required to explore the mechanism responsible for its anti-inflammatory activity.

In Vitro Immuno-Modulatory Potentials of Purslane (Portulaca oleracea L.) Polysaccharides with a Chemical Selenylation

The soluble polysaccharides from a non-conventional and edible plant purslane (Portulaca oleracea L.), namely PSPO, were prepared by the water extraction and ethanol precipitation methods in this study. The obtained PSPO were selenylated using the Na2SeO3-HNO3 method to successfully prepare two selenylated products, namely SePSPO-1 and SePSPO-2, with different selenylation extents. The assay results confirmed that SePSPO-1 and SePSPO-2 had respective Se contents of 753.8 and 1325.1 mg/kg, while PSPO only contained Se element about 80.6 mg/kg. The results demonstrated that SePSPO-1 and SePSPO-2 had higher immune modulation than PSPO (p < 0.05), when using the two immune cells (murine splenocytes and RAW 264.7 macrophages) as two cell models. Specifically, SePSPO-1 and SePSPO-2 were more active than PSPO in the macrophages, resulting in higher cell proliferation, greater macrophage phagocytosis, and higher secretion of the immune-related three cytokines, including tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and IL-1β. Meanwhile, SePSPO-1 and SePSPO-2 were more potent than PSPO in the concanavalin A- or lipopolysaccharide-stimulated splenocytes in cell proliferation, or more able than PSPO in the splenocytes to promote interferon-γ secretion but suppress IL-4 secretion, or more capable of enhancing the ratio of T-helper (CD4+) cells to T-cytotoxic (CD8+) cells for the T lymphocytes than PSPO. Overall, the higher selenylation extent of the selenylated PSPO mostly caused higher immune modulation in the model cells, while a higher polysaccharide dose consistently led to the greater regulation effect. Thus, it is concluded that the employed chemical selenylation could be used in the chemical modification of purslane or other plant polysaccharides, when aiming to endow the polysaccharides with higher immuno-modulatory effect on the two immune cells.

Strategies of Elicitation to Enhance Bioactive Compound Content in Edible Plant Sprouts: A Bibliometric Study

Vegetable sprouts are a food source that presents high content of bioactive compounds which can also be enhanced through elicitation mechanisms. To better understand the scientific production and research trends on this topic, a bibliometric analysis by means of the Web of Science database was carried out. The results showed significant growth in research on the elicitation of edible plants sprouts. The three most productive journals were the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, followed by Food Chemistry and LWT-Food Science and Technology. The co-occurrence of keyword analysis of the different authors showed that the main research topics in this domain were ‘germination’, ‘antioxidant activity’, ‘sprouts’, ‘glucosinolates’ and ‘phenolics‘. The countries with the highest number of scientific publications were China, followed by India and USA. The productivity patterns of the authors conformed to Lotka’s law. This study provides an overview of research on elicitation to enrich bioactive compounds in sprouts, and the need to review and update the trends on this subject.

Chemical Composition, Antibacterial, Enzyme-Inhibitory, and Anti-Inflammatory Activities of Essential Oil from Hedychiumpuerense Rhizome

Hedychium puerense, a perennial rhizomatous herb, is used as an ornamental, medicinal, and edible plant in Yunnan Province, China. Essential oils from Hedychium plants are widely used in perfumes and traditional medicine, but there are no studies on the constituents and bioactivities of H. puerense essential oil (EO). Therefore, this study was designed to explore the chemical composition, antibacterial, enzyme-inhibitory, and anti-inflammatory activities of H. puerense rhizome EO. The gas chromatography with flame ionization or mass selective detection (GC-FID/MS) results indicated that H. puerense EO was mainly composed of linalool (26.5%), β-pinene (18.6%), γ-terpinene (12.1%), terpinen-4-ol (7.7%), α-pinene (5.8%), sabinene (4.9%), E-nerolidol (4.1%), and p-cymene (3.6%). For biological activities, H. puerense EO displayed broad-spectrum antibacterial properties against Enterococcus faecalis, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus aureus, Proteus vulgaris, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Escherichia coli with diameter of inhibition zone (DIZ) values ranging from 7.44 to 10.30 mm, a minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) of 3.13–6.25 mg/m), and a minimal bactericidal concentration (MBC) of 3.13–12.50 mg/mL. Moreover, the EO significantly inhibited acetylcholinesterase (AChE) (IC50 = 0.94 ± 0.02 mg/mL) and butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) (IC50 = 1.32 ± 0.06 mg/mL) activities, and exhibited a moderate inhibitory effect on α-glucosidase (IC50 = 5.42 ± 0.32 mg/mL) and tyrosinase (IC50 = 3.23 ± 0.21 mg/mL). Furthermore, the EO significantly suppressed the secretion of the pro-inflammatory mediator, nitric oxide (NO) (99.23 ± 0.26%), cytokines tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) (97.14 ± 0.11%), and interleukin-6 (IL-6) (82.42 ± 0.16%) in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated RAW264.7 cells at 250 μg/mL without cytotoxicity. Hence, H. puerense EO can be considered a bioactive, natural product that has great potential for utilization in the fields of food, cosmetics, and pharmaceutics.