Autoclave treatment of the classical scrapie agent US No. 13-7 and experimental inoculation to susceptible VRQ/ARQ sheep via the oral route results in decreased transmission efficiency

Scrapie, a prion disease of sheep, is highly resistant to conventional deactivation. Numerous methods to deactivate scrapie have been tested in laboratory animal models, and adequate autoclave treatment can reduce or remove the infectivity of some classical scrapie strains depending on the heating parameters used. In this study, we autoclaved brain homogenate from a sheep with US scrapie strain 13–7 for 30 minutes at 121°C. Genetically susceptible VRQ/ARQ sheep were orally inoculated with 3 grams of the autoclaved brain homogenate. For comparison, a second group of sheep was inoculated with a non-autoclaved brain homogenate. Rectal biopsies were used to assess antemortem scrapie disease progression throughout the study. Five out of ten (5/10) sheep that received autoclaved inoculum ultimately developed scrapie after an experimental endpoint of 72 months. These sheep had a mean incubation period of 26.99 months. Two out of five (2/5) positive sheep had detectable PrPSc in antemortem rectal biopsies, and two (2/5) other sheep had PrPSc in postmortem rectal tissue. A single sheep (1/5) was positive for scrapie in the CNS, small intestine, and retropharyngeal lymph node but had negative rectal tissue. All of the sheep (10/10) that received non-autoclaved inoculum developed scrapie with a mean incubation period of 20.2 months and had positive rectal biopsies at the earliest timepoint (14.7 months post-inoculation). These results demonstrate that sheep are orally susceptible to US derived classical scrapie strain 13–7 after autoclave treatment at 121°C for 30 minutes. Differences in incubation periods and time interval to first positive rectal biopsies indicate a partial reduction in infectivity titers for the autoclaved inoculum group.

Application of Autoclave Treatment for Development of a Natural Wheat Bran Antioxidant Ingredient

The study evaluated the effect of autoclaving as a hydrothermal treatment on the quality and bioactivity of wheat bran (WB) with the objective of producing a natural ingredient with enhanced healthy properties. Nutritional, antioxidant, techno-functional and sensorial parameters were studied, and temperatures of 100, 115 and 130 °C were explored. Of these, 130 °C was found to be the best treatment, resulting in an ingredient with high storage stability, antioxidant properties, a four-fold increase in the concentration of free ferulic acid (compared with non-treated WB), and increased content of apigenin-6-C-arabinoside-8-C-hexoside, a flavonoid with reported antioxidant and antifungal properties. On the other hand, the autoclave treatment enhanced water absorption capacity and reduced WB pasting viscosity, mainly at higher temperature (130 °C), which would allow incorporation of the treated WB in liquid matrices such as juices, soups or milkshakes, among others. Although the glycemic index (GI) of the autoclaved samples increased, the use of intermediate particle size of 106 to 300 µm could contribute to the reduction of the glycemic load.

Autoclave treatment of cakes after pressure oxidation leaching of chalcopyrite concentrates

The existing technologies for copper-porphyry ores enrichment, located in deposits in the Urals of Russia, allow the production of chalcopyrite concentrates of the following composition, %: 21.5 Cu, 24.5 Fe, 26.5 S, 0.4 Pb, 17.6 SiO2, 1.8 CaO, 2–6 Au (ppm), 20– 40 Ag (ppm). A conventional technology for processing such concentrates includes autogenous smelting, matte desulfurization and blister copper refining. Pressure oxidation leaching (POX) is considered the most promising alternative technology for chalcopyrite concentrate processing. The POX of concentrates originated from Mikheevskii GOK allow the production a cake of the following chemical composition, %: 56–65 Fe2O3, 25–30 SiO2, 2.7 Ca, 0.3–1.0 Cu, 2–7 S, 0.6–0.8 Pb, 4–12 Au (ppm), 40–80 Ag (ppm); mass loss was 37–45 %. A standard method of cake cyaniding provides satisfactory indicators of precious metal extraction, but it requires a cumbersome area to be arranged for their processing and offers no solution for residue disposal. In this regard, this paper investigates the method of subsequent cake processing using autoclave treatment (AT) for iron removal. The study shows how the following parameters affect the results of this process: t = 110÷210 °C, H2SO4 = 15÷60 g/dm3, τ = 45÷ ÷120 min. A statistic description of the AT operation is developed. Recommended AT conditions (t = 110 °C, H2SO4 = 60 g/dm3, τ = 60÷100 min) allow to obtain the POX cake yield reduced to 30–35 % of the source material with the following composition, %: 28–33 Fe2O3, 47–53 SiO2, 2–5 Ca, 0.6–2.0 Cu, 0.8–1.5 Pb, 2–8 S. At the same time, the content of precious metals in the cake reaches 12–16 Au (ppm) and 80–120 Ag (ppm). Options for using AT products are proposed.

Effect of different heat treatment on alkylresorcinol contents of wheat bran

The influence of different heat treatment levels on the contents of alkylresorcinol and homologues (ARs) was evaluated using wheat bran from two different wheat cultivars. The ARs in the wheat bran were destroyed by all heat treatments investigated in this study (oven treatment, microwave treatment, autoclave treatment, and extrusion treatment). The results showed that the loss rate of ARs by different heat treatment was oven treatment > autoclave treatment > extrusion treatment > microwave treatment, indicating that microwave treatment was more suitable for stabilizing wheat bran than the other three heat treatments. Both temperature and time of heat treatment had effects on the ARs of wheat bran. Higher temperatures and longer times of the treatment resulted in higher loss rates of ARs of wheat bran. The thermal stability of ARs homologues was different between wheat varieties, which may result from the variance of their structure and other components in wheat bran.

Pressure Leaching of Chalcopyrite Concentrate: Iron Removal from Leaching Residues

Autoclave oxidative leaching is one of the most promising hydrometallurgical approaches for copper suplhide materials processing. In previous studies [2–4], the possibility of an efficient autoclave treatment of chalcopyrite concentrate was confirmed. The concentrate has the following chemical composition, %: 21.5 Cu, 0.1 Zn, 26.5 S, 24.5 Fe, 0.05 Pb, 0.04 Ni, 16.2 SiO2 [1]. At high temperature conditions (190–200 °C; 4–6 bar) in sulfuric-acid media during 100–120 min about 98% Cu was extracted. A leaching residue after POX (POX-cake) contained the following compounds, %: 55 Fe2O3, 40 SiO2, 4 MeS2/MeS. Current paper presents the results on purification of POX-cakes from iron by autoclave treatment. Futher ways for by-products (SiO2-cake and FeSO4-solution) processing are sugested.