Analysis of Volatile Components of Jasmine and Jasmine Tea during Scenting Process

Jasmine tea is widely loved by the public because of its unique and pleasant aroma and taste. The new scenting process is different from the traditional scenting process, because the new scenting process has a thin pile height to reduce the high temperature and prolong the scenting time. We qualified and quantified volatiles in jasmine and jasmine tea during the scenting process by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) with a headspace solid-phase microextraction (HS-SPME). There were 71 and 78 effective volatiles in jasmine and jasmine tea, respectively, including 24 terpenes, 9 alcohols, 24 esters, 6 hydrocarbons, 1 ketone, 3 aldehydes, 2 nitrogen compounds, and 2 oxygen-containing compounds in jasmine; 29 terpenes, 6 alcohols, 28 esters, 8 nitrogen compounds, 1 aldehyde, and 6 other compounds in jasmine tea. The amounts of terpenes, esters, alcohols, nitrogen compounds, and hydrocarbons in jasmine and tea rose and then fell. The amount of oxygenated compounds of tea in the new scenting process first rose and then fell, while it showed a continuous upward trend during the traditional process. The amount of volatiles in jasmine and tea produced by the new scenting process were higher than that of the traditional scenting process at the same time. This study indicated that jasmine tea produced by the new scenting process had better volatile quality, which can provide proof for the new scenting process.

Bioinformatics and Computer Simulation approaches to the discovery and analysis of Bioactive Peptides

The traditional process of separating and purifying bioactive peptides is laborious and time-consuming. Using a traditional process to identify is difficult, and there is a lack of fast and accurate activity evaluation methods. How to extract bioactive peptides quickly and efficiently is still the focus of bioactive peptides research. In order to improve the present situation of the research, bioinformatics techniques and peptidome methods are widely used in this field. At the same time, bioactive peptides have their own specific pharmacokinetic characteristics, so computer simulation methods have incomparable advantages in studying the pharmacokinetics and pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic correlation models of bioactive peptides. The purpose of this review is to summarize the combined applications of bioinformatics and computer simulation methods in the study of bioactive peptides, with focuses on the role of bioinformatics in simulating the selection of enzymatic hydrolysis and precursor proteins, activity prediction, molecular docking, physicochemical properties, and molecular dynamics. Our review shows that new bioactive peptide molecular sequences with high activity can be obtained by computer-aided design. The significance of the pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic correlation model in the study of bioactive peptides is emphasized. Finally, some problems and future development potential of bioactive peptides binding new technologies are prospected.

Statistics Decomposition and Monitoring in Original Variable Space

The traditional process monitoring method first projects the measured process data into the principle component subspace (PCS) and the residual subspace (RS), then calculates $$\mathrm T^2$$ T 2 and $$\mathrm SPE$$ S P E statistics to detect the abnormality. However, the abnormality by these two statistics are detected from the principle components of the process. Principle components actually have no specific physical meaning, and do not contribute directly to identify the fault variable and its root cause. Researchers have proposed many methods to identify the fault variable accurately based on the projection space. The most popular is contribution plot which measures the contribution of each process variable to the principal element (Wang et al. 2017; Luo et al. 2017; Liu and Chen 2014). Moreover, in order to determine the control limits of the two statistics, their probability distributions should be estimated or assumed as specific one. The fault identification by statistics is not intuitive enough to directly reflect the role and trend of each variable when the process changes.

Microstructure and Lamellae Phase of Raw Natural Rubber via Spontaneous Coagulation Assisted by Sugars

Natural rubber (NR) as a renewable biopolymer is often produced by acid coagulation of fresh natural latex collected from Hevea brasiliensis. However, this traditional process is facing a huge economic and environmental challenge. Compared with the acid coagulation, spontaneous or microorganism coagulation is an ecofriendly way to obtain NR with excellent performance. To clarify the influence of different sugars on NR quality, several sugars were used to assist the coagulation process. Influence of different sugars on microstructure and cold crystallization were examined by 1H NMR, DSC, etc. The results indicated that sugars exhibit different biological activity on terminal components of fresh field latex and can influence the resultant molecular structure and basic properties. Brown sugar exhibits higher metabolic activity and is inclined to decompose the protein and phospholipids crosslinking compared with other sugars. The larger molecular weight of sugar molecule is beneficial for the formation of the stable α lamellae phase and higher overall degree of crystallization.

Effect of Traditional Process Methods on the Physicochemical and Functional Properties of a Traditional Food Salt (Nikkih) Obtained from Waste Biomass Peels of Musa paradisiaca and Musa acuminate

In Cameroon, agrofood waste biomass such as peels of Musa paradisiaca and Musa acuminate is being valorized using various traditional processing methods to produce a traditional functional food salt, potash, locally called nikkih. Nikkih has been reported to have varying physicochemical and functional properties, which negatively affect the quality and stability of food prepared using it. This work aims at evaluating the effect of traditional process methods on the physicochemical and functional properties of nikkih produced from these peels in view of the optimization of the process. The peels were preprocessed using two methods: boiling at 90oC before drying and direct drying of raw samples. All samples were dried and combusted to ash at varying temperatures of 250oC, 300o C, and 350oC and times of 30 min, 60 min, and 90 min. The ash obtained was dissolved in varied volumes of water, filtered to obtain the nikkih. Yellow achu soup was prepared through the dry gum method using water and read palm oil, with nikkih as emulsifier. The physicochemical and functional properties of nikkih on yellow achu soup were evaluated using standard methods. The ash yield ranged from 10.62 ± 0.12% to 7.10 ± 0.05%, with the raw samples combusted at 3000C and 2500C having the highest and lowest values respectively. The pH of nikkih ranged from 10.95 ± 0 to 12.01 ± 0.056 while potash content ranged from 32.45 ± 0.905% to 72.29 ± 1.31%, with the highest and lowest values obtained from the raw sample combusted at 2500C and the boiled samples combusted at 3500C respectively. Alkaline content ranged from 61.7 ± 0.141% to 52.8 ± 0.141%, with boiled M. acuminate combusted at 3500C having the highest value and the lowest from raw M. paradisiaca combusted at 2500C. The foaming capacity and foam stability ranged from 6.9 ± 0.01% to 16.07 ± 2.51% and from 3.20 ± 0.07% to 11.205 ± 2.39% for M. acuminate and M. paradisiaca respectively. The emulsification index ranged from 85.62 ± 0.09% to 86.67 ± 1.141% after 24 hrs and from 26.0 ± 0.94% to 27.02 ± 2.390% after 48 hrs, with the highest value from the raw M. acuminate combusted at 350oC and the lowest from that combusted at 3000C. The potash source, pretreatment method, combustion conditions, and dilution factors all had an effect on the physicochemical and functional properties of nikkih.

A method of forming a spacecraft adapter layout to meet the requirements of dynamic compatibility by topological and parametric optimization methods

At present, the developers of launch vehicles impose a requirement for dynamic compatibility of the spacecraft with the launch vehicle, which consists in limiting the lower boundary of the first transverse and first longitudinal fundamental (primary) frequencies of the natural vibrations of the spacecraft fitted with an adapter of relatively rigid base. One of the tasks that must be solved in order to meet this requirement is the development of the spacecraft adapter layout. The traditional process of designing the adapter consists in developing its design on the basis of analogues and carrying out verification analysis with subsequent refinement of the design to meet the strength and stiffness requirements. However, this approach takes a lot of time and is not adaptable to constant changes in the input data at the initial design stage. The article presents a technique allowing the adapter layout to be quickly designed. The layout is determined to a greater extent by calculations using the topological and parametric optimization methods. The application of the developed technique is shown on the example of the development of an adapter for a promising spacecraft. It should be applied in the early stages of design. The results obtained by the method should be used as input data and recommendations for the design of the adapter.

Application of Threaded System, Rice Husk Ash Addition, Filtering, and Geomembrane to Increase Salt Production in Ambulu Village, Cirebon

Salt farmers in Indonesia generally carry out simple land processing to produce NaCl levels below 90% and productivity below 80 tons/ha. Several separate efforts have been made to increase the quantity and quality of salt in traditional salt production systems. This work examines the threaded system, additive addition, and geomembrane to increase salt production in Ambulu Village, Cirebon, West Java, Indonesia. The result showed that the quality of salt increases compared to the traditional process. The quality of the salt can be improved. The traditional method of observation contains 91% NaCl. Using a combination of Threaded applications and additives increases the NaCl content by up to 94%. Adding Geomembrane technology from the two previous technologies resulted in salt with a NaCl content of 96%. At the same time, the amount of salt production from Indonesia has also increased to 155 tons/ha, compared to the traditional method, which is 80-90 tons/ha.

Research on a New Process of Agile Turn with Engine Reignition Based on Optimal Control

A new process of agile turn with engine reignition is proposed in this paper. Compared with the traditional process, this process includes deceleration phase, larger angle manoeuvre phase, and engine reignition phase. Firstly, the paper describes the new process of agile turn. Then, several constraints in this process are described. Considering all these constraints and assumptions, a new dynamic model including two-stage engine and deceleration parachute is established. Then, the optimal control laws are designed and the timing point determination of the secondary engine ignition is discussed. By using Pontryagin principle, the optimal control laws for each actuator are derived. In terms of determining the optimal timing point of the secondary engine ignition, the paper gives the process of proof. Finally, several numerical simulations are given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the method proposed in this paper. According to all these numerical simulations, it is obvious that the new process of agile turn proposed in this paper is better than traditional process especially in having a smaller turning radius, a shorter turning time, and a high terminal velocity.