International Centre for Brewing Science, Division of Food Science, The University of Nottingham, Sutton Bonington Campus, Loughborough, Leicestershire, LE12 5RD, UK.
Published: October 2020
AI Article Synopsis
Article Abstract
Accurate quantification of the carbohydrate content of biomass is crucial for many bio-refining processes. The most commonly followed protocol is typically a modification of the NREL-based assay (specifically designed for carbohydrate analysis from lignocellulosic biomass). However, this NREL protocol was revealed to be excessively thermochemically harsh for seaweed biomass. This can result in erroneously low total sugar quantification as the reaction severity can degrade a proportion of the liberated sugars to decomposition products such as furans. Here we describe an optimization of the total acid hydrolysis protocol for accurate quantification of the carbohydrate content of seaweeds. Different species of seaweed can be accurately evaluated for their carbohydrate contents by following this optimized method.
Department of Medicine, Molecular Immunity Unit, Cambridge Institute of Therapeutic Immunology and Infectious Diseases, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
Zebrafish larvae are used to model the pathogenesis of multiple bacteria. This transparent model offers the unique advantage of allowing quantification of fluorescent bacterial burdens (fluorescent pixel counts [FPC]) by facile microscopical methods, replacing enumeration of bacteria using time-intensive plating of lysates on bacteriological media. Accurate FPC measurements require laborious manual image processing to mark the outside borders of the animals so as to delineate the bacteria inside the animals from those in the culture medium that they are in.
Background: Inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) is widely used for the accurate measurement of minerals. However, its application to serum essential mineral measurement has not been fully evaluated. The present study aimed to assess the performance of ICP-MS for serum minerals by comparing its measurements to those obtained using standard quantification methods.
Christopher S. Bond Life Sciences Center, Division of Biological Sciences, Interdisciplinary Plant Group, University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri 65211, USA
Amino acids in maize can exist in both a free and protein-bound state. While most amino acids are part of a protein backbone, a small percentage of them remain free and play important biological roles, serving as signaling molecules, nitrogen transporters, osmolytes, and precursors for multiple primary and secondary metabolites. Their levels vary widely especially in maize leaves, depending on the developmental stage and in response to environmental conditions.
Christopher S. Bond Life Sciences Center, Division of Biological Sciences, Interdisciplinary Plant Group, University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri 65211, USA
Amino acid analysis is a vital part of analytical biochemistry. The increasing demand for low nitrogen fertilization and for plant-based diets with balanced amino acid levels and composition have made it crucial to develop reliable, fast, and affordable methods for analyzing amino acids in plants. As maize accounts for 43% of global cereal production, improving the amino acid composition of its kernels (i.
Top-down mass spectrometry (MS) enables comprehensive characterization of modified proteins and nucleic acids and, when native electrospray ionization (ESI) is used, binding site mapping of their complexes with native or therapeutic ligands. However, the high complexity of top-down MS spectra poses a serious challenge to both manual and automated data interpretation, even when the protein, RNA, or DNA sequence and the type of modification or the ligand are known. Here, we introduce FAST MS, a user-friendly software that identifies, assigns and relatively quantifies signals of molecular and fragment ions in MS and MS/MS spectra of biopolymers with known sequence and provides a toolbox for statistical analysis.
