Publications by authors named "Yifa Zhou"

Natural polysaccharides attract scientists and industries' interest with diverse applications in biomaterials, immune regulation, gut microbiota regulation, food additives, and more. Nevertheless, the absence of standardized purity criteria created significant challenges in characterizing polysaccharides, leading to varied and complicated structures, and impeding progress in research and development. Consequently, it is essential to obtain samples that adhere to high-level and unified purity standards for effective polysaccharide research.

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Human gut Bacteroides and Parabacteroides species play crucial roles in human health and are known for their capacity to utilize diverse polysaccharides. Understanding how these bacteria utilize medicinal polysaccharides is foundational for developing polysaccharides-based prebiotics and drugs. Here, we systematically mapped the utilization profiles of 20 different medicinal polysaccharides by 28 human gut Bacteroides and Parabacteroides species.

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The β-1,6-glucans from Lentinus edodes have a variety of biological activities. However, the research on extraction and separation of β-1,6-glucans from L. edodes is limited and the yield is low.

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Article Synopsis
  • Ginsenosides are natural compounds with sugary rings, and understanding their structure is important for improving their use in drug development.
  • In a study using ob/ob mice, researchers found that reducing the number of sugar molecules on ginsenosides increased their effectiveness in lowering lipid levels, while the aglycon form showed little effect.
  • The study revealed that ginsenosides rely on the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) to influence lipid metabolism, and decreasing sugar content enhanced their binding to GR, suggesting a unique mechanism for their action.*
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This study investigated the structural composition and antioxidant properties of pectic polysaccharides extracted from (Thunb.) Roth. Pectins, which belong to a complex category of acidic polysaccharides, possess a wide range of biological effects stemming from their distinctive structural domains.

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Article Synopsis
  • An alkali-soluble β-glucan (AHEP-A-b) was isolated from fruiting bodies and analyzed for its structure and antioxidant properties.
  • Structural analysis revealed that AHEP-A-b consists of (1→6)-linked-D-β-glucopyran residues with branched side chains, showcasing a degree of polymerization between 2 to 8.
  • The antioxidant activity of AHEP-A-b was confirmed through various radical scavenging assays, establishing a basis for future research on polysaccharides.
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An imbalance in the macrophage phenotype is closely related to various inflammatory diseases. Here, we discovered that gypenoside LXXV (GP-75), a type of saponin from , can reprogram M1-like macrophages into M2-like ones. On a mechanistic level, GP-75 inhibits NF-κB-COX2 signaling by targeting the glucocorticoid receptor (GR).

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Raffinose family oligosaccharides (RFOs) have diverse structures and exhibit various biological activities. When using RFOs as prebiotics, their structures need to be identified. If we first knew whether an RFO was classical or non-classical, structural identification would become much easier.

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Purpose: Conventional oral formulations for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) treatment are less than satisfactory, due to the poor controllability of drug release and lack of specificity to the inflammation sites in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. To overcome these limitations, we developed a multiple carbohydrate-based nanosystem with pH/ROS dual responsibility and charge-mediated targeting ability for IBD-specific drug delivery.

Methods: In view of the overproduction of ROS and overexpression of cationic proteins in the inflammatory colon, the designed nanosystem was composed of oxidation-sensitive cyclodextrin (OX-CD), chitosan (CS) and pectin (AHP).

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Glycoside hydrolases (GHs) are industrially important enzymes that hydrolyze glycosidic bonds in glycoconjugates. In this study, we found a GH3 β-glucosidase (CcBgl3B) from Cellulosimicrobium cellulans sp. 21 was able to selectively hydrolyze the β-1,6-glucosidic bond linked glucose of ginsenosides.

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Background: Meyer polysaccharides exhibit various biological functions, like antagonizing galectin-3-mediated cell adhesion and migration. Galectin-8 (Gal-8), with its linker-joined - and -terminal carbohydrate recognition domains (CRDs), is also crucial to these biological processes, and thus plays a role in various pathological disorders. Yet the effect of ginseng-derived polysaccharides in modulating Gal-8 function has remained unclear.

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Galectin-3 (Gal-3) is unique in the galectin family, due to the presence of a long N-terminal tail (NT) arising from its conserved carbohydrate recognition domain (CRD). Although functional significance of the NT has remained elusive, our previous studies demonstrated the importance of NT prolines to Gal-3 function. Here, we show that during the time Gal-3 stands in solution for three or more days, Gal-3 NT undergoes a slow, intra-molecular, time-dependent conformational/dynamical change associated with proline cis-trans isomerization.

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Endo-1,4-β-galactanase is an indispensable tool for preparing prebiotic β-galacto-oligosaccharides (β-GOS) from pectic galactan resources. In the present study, a novel endo-1,4-β-galactanase (PoβGal53) belonging to glycoside hydrolase family 53 from Penicillium oxalicum sp. 68 was cloned and expressed in Pichia pastoris GS115.

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Ginsenosides are bioactive components of Panax ginseng with many functions such as anti-aging, anti-oxidation, anti-inflammatory, anti-fatigue, and anti-tumor. Ginsenosides are categorized into dammarane, oleanene, and ocotillol type tricyclic triterpenoids based on the aglycon structure. Based on the sugar moiety linked to C-3, C-20, and C-6, C-20, dammarane type was divided into protopanaxadiol (PPD) and protopanaxatriol (PPT).

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Polysaccharides, key components present in , can be divided into those derived from fruiting bodies, mycelium, and fermentation broth based on their source. The structure of fruiting body-derived polysaccharides has been fully characterized. However, the structure of mycelium-derived polysaccharides remains to be elucidated.

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Influenza virus is prone to seasonal spread and widespread outbreaks, which pose important challenges to public health security. Therefore, it is important to effectively prevent and treat influenza virus infection. Schisandra polysaccharide (SPJ) is a polysaccharide derived from the fruit of Schisandra chinensis (Turcz.

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Linear β-manno-oligosaccharides (l-β-MOS) are widely used to investigate oligo- and poly-saccharide structures and mannanolytic enzyme activities. l-β-MOS are also being used as prebiotic agents with potential bio-active properties. In this study, we developed an efficient protocol to prepare a series of l-β-MOS by hydrolyzing cassia gum (CG) using mannanolytic enzymes (endo-1,4-β-mannanase, α-galactosidases and β-glucosidases).

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Background: Pectins are a class of acidic polysaccharides with complex structures. Different pectin molecules are composed of different domains, which have an important impact on their biological activity.

Objective: This study aimed to determine the structural features and the antioxidant activities of the pectic polysaccharides isolated from L.

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Autophagy is a vital physiological process that maintains intracellular homeostasis by removing damaged organelles and senescent or misfolded molecules. However, excessive autophagy results in cell death and apoptosis, which will lead to a variety of diseases. Galectins are a type of animal lectin that binds to β-galactosides and can bind to the cell surface or extracellular matrix glycans, affecting a variety of immune processes in vivo and being linked to the development of many diseases.

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Even though sp. is widely used in functional foods around the world, the content and structure of its oligosaccharides remain unclear. Here, we isolated a mixture of oligosaccharides from Kom.

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Commercially-supplied potato galactan (PG) is widely used as a model polysaccharide in various bioactivity studies. However, results using this galactan are not always consistent with the stated composition. Here, we assessed its composition by fractionating this commercial PG and purified its primary components: PG-A, PG-B and PG-Cp with weight-averaged molecular weights of 430, 93, and 11.

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Background: The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causes non-symptomatic infection, mild influenza-like symptoms to pneumonia, severe acute respiratory distress syndrome, and even death, reflecting different clinical symptoms of viral infection. However, the mechanism of its pathogenicity remains unclear. Host-specific traits have a breakthrough significance for studying the pathogenicity of SARS-CoV-2.

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Panax ginseng C. A. Meyer (ginseng), a traditional Chinese herb, is usually used to improve health and increase anti-aging activity for human.

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