Multi-element Exposure and Cognitive Function in Rural Elderly Chinese.

To investigate the relationship between selenium (Se) based multi-element combined exposure and cognitive function in rural elderly individuals, a cross-sectional study was conducted. The study involved 416 older adults aged 60 and above, residing in four different areas of Enshi county, China, with varying soil Se levels. Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) was employed to measure the concentrations of Se, copper (Cu), iron (Fe), zinc (Zn), calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), cadmium (Cd), arsenic (As), and lead (Pb) in whole blood.

Blood Selenium and Serum Glutathione Peroxidase Levels Were Associated with Serum β-Amyloid in Older Adults.

Background: Studies have established the association between blood β-amyloid (Aβ) levels and Alzheimer's disease, but population-based studies concerning the association between selenium (Se) and Aβ levels in blood samples are very limited. Therefore, we explored the association in an elderly population with Se status and serum Aβ measures.

Methods: A cross-sectional study on 469 elderly individuals from four rural counties with diverse soil Se levels was carried out.

A Novel Human Activity Recognition and Prediction in Smart Home Based on Interaction.

Smart Homes are generally considered the final solution for living problem, especially for the health care of the elderly and disabled, power saving, etc. Human activity recognition in smart homes is the key to achieving home automation, which enables the smart services to automatically run according to the human mind. Recent research has made a lot of progress in this field; however, most of them can only recognize default activities, which is probably not needed by smart homes services.

Determination of Trace Rhodamine B in Chili Oil by Deep Eutectic Solvent Extraction and an Ultra High-Performance Liquid Chromatograph Equipped with a Fluorescence Detector.

Rhodamine B was forbidden in food by law because of its carcinogenic properties to humans. However, due to its low cost, it was often used to dope chili oil by some counterfeiters to improve its natural color. However, it was difficult to quantify rhodamine B in chili oil due to its complex substrates and high viscosity.

High-specificity quantification method for almond-by-products, based on differential proteomic analysis.

A highly specific competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) protocol has been developed to identify and classify almond products based on differential proteomic analysis. We applied two-dimensional electrophoresis to compare the differences between almond and apricot kernels to search for almond-specific proteins. The amino acid of apricot Pru-1 was sequenced and aligned to almond Pru-1.

Conserved metabolic steps for sporopollenin precursor formation in tobacco and rice.

The development of pollen wall with proper sporopollenin deposition is essential for pollen viability and male fertility in flowering plants. Sporopollenin is a complex biopolymer synthesized from fatty acid and phenolic derivatives. Recent investigations in Arabidopsis have identified a number of anther-specific genes involved in the production of fatty-acyl monomers potentially required for exine formation.

CYP93G2 is a flavanone 2-hydroxylase required for C-glycosylflavone biosynthesis in rice.

C-Glycosylflavones are ubiquitous in the plant kingdom, and many of them have beneficial effects on human health. They are a special group of flavonoid glycosides in which the sugars are C-linked to the flavone skeleton. It has been long presumed that C-glycosylflavones have a different biosynthetic origin from O-glycosylflavonoids.

Molecular dissection of the pathogen-inducible 3-deoxyanthocyanidin biosynthesis pathway in sorghum.

3-Deoxyanthocyanidins are the unique phytoalexins synthesized by sorghum in response to fungal inoculation. They are structurally related to anthocyanins but the final steps of their pathogen-inducible biosynthesis are not fully understood. We have identified new flavonoid structural genes from the recently completed sorghum BTx623 genome sequence.

Direct trapping of acrylamide as a key mechanism for niacin's inhibitory activity in carcinogenic acrylamide formation.

The inhibitory mechanism of niacin, which was found in our previous study to effectively reduce acrylamide (AA) formation in both chemical models and fried potato strips, was investigated in the present study. Maillard chemical models containing the amino acid asparagine and glucose with or without niacin were closely examined by liquid chromatography/tandem mass spectrometry. Comparison of the chemical profiles revealed two additional peaks in models where niacin was present together with the AA precursors, which thus suggests the formation of compounds from reactions between niacin and other chemical species in the model systems.

Identification of flavone phytoalexins and a pathogen-inducible flavone synthase II gene (SbFNSII) in sorghum.

Following inoculation with the anthracnose pathogen Colletotrichum sublineolum, seedlings of the sorghum resistant cultivar SC748-5 showed more rapid and elevated accumulation of luteolin than the susceptible cultivar BTx623. On the other hand, apigenin was the major flavone detected in infected BTx623 seedlings. Luteolin was demonstrated to show stronger inhibition of spore germination of C.