Publications by authors named "R Berzins"

The current research is devoted to integrating naturally renewable cardanol derivatives into one-component silyl-terminated-polyether-based prepolymer systems to improve climatic resistance and obtain materials with versatile mechanical properties that could be significant to various sectors of the economy. Various cardanol-type products are used in industries that require high climatic resistance, and thus combining cardanol with commercially available silyl-terminated polyether prepolymers would improve its material climatic resistance, maintaining its market and application value as well as improving material sustainability. The results obtained in this work show that depending on how the cardanol prepolymer Ultra Lite 513 is modified, it is possible to increase the elasticity (670%) or tensile strength (104%) of the material as well as significantly increase the climatic resistance of the material, thus improving the quality and sustainability of the adhesive compared to existing silyl-terminated-prepolymer-based adhesives on the market.

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Article Synopsis
  • Birch outer bark extract (BBE) contains beneficial compounds like betulin and lupeol but suffers from low water solubility, making it hard for the body to absorb effectively.
  • * The study developed an oleogel through a special method to improve the absorption of BBE, showing significant increases in bioavailability with 42-80 times better results for betulin and lupeol in Wistar rats.
  • * The oleogel was safe for repeated use over 7 days and didn't show toxicity in major organs, although lupeol was found in some tissues while betulin and betulinic acid were not detected in organs like the heart and liver.
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Structuring liquid oils into oleogels using natural and abundant biomass components as gelling agents is of great significance in fields such as foods, pharmaceuticals, and cosmetics. In this work, a more energy-efficient and technologically simpler approach for directly preparing birch outer bark extract particles containing oleogel was used. This method involves introducing birch outer bark extract particles into the oil phase directly from the extract solution, combining both the evaporation of solution and gel formation.

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The aim of the study was to obtain untreated and treated betulin colloidal particles and assess their effect on the viability, morphology, proliferation and cytokine secretion of human dermal fibroblasts. To improve bioavailability, betulin treatment was performed by an antisolvent precipitation technique. The average particle size after treatment in the aqueous dispersion decreased from 552.

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The current research is devoted to the research of potential catalysts for the two-component silyl-terminated prepolymer/epoxy resin system. The catalyst system must catalyze the prepolymer of the opposite component while not curing the prepolymer in the component in which the catalyst is located. Mechanical and rheological characterization of the adhesive was performed.

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