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Aims@#Paddy straw is known to have lignocellulosic materials such as cellulose and hemicellulose which can be readily converted into fermentable sugar for production of bioethanol via simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (SSF). In order to produce ethanol competently, the degradation of biomass by cellulase and highly ethanol-producing microorganism in fermentation process are necessarily needed. However, there is lacking in cellulose degrading organism in producing adequate amount of lignocellulosic enzyme. Therefore, the screening and selection for the best fungi to hydrolyze the lignocellulosic materials as well as forming consortium between two species of fungi has become the main focus. @*Methodology and results@#Thirteen strains of fast-growing fungi were tested qualitatively for cellulase (congo red staining) and polyphenol oxidase (Bavendamm test). All tested strains displayed lignocellulolytic fungi characteristics. The selection was narrowed down by quantitative assay on endoglucanase, exoglucanase, β-glucosidase and xylanase and the highest cellulases enzyme producer were Trichoderma asperellum B1581 (3.93 U/mL endoglucanase; 2.37 U/mL exoglucanase; 3.00 IU/mL β-glucosidase; 54.87 U/mL xylanase), followed by Aspergillus niger B2484 (5.60 U/mL endoglucanase; 1.08 U/mL exoglucanase; 1.57 IU/mL β-glucosidase; 56.85 U/mL xylanase). In compatibility test, both T. asperellum B1581 and A. niger B2484 were inoculated on the same Petri dish for 4 days and the interaction showed by the two species was mutual intermingling. @*Conclusions, significance and impact of study@#Both T. asperellum B1581 and A. niger B2484 produced the highest cellulase enzyme. Since both strains can co-exist and produce enzymes that complete each other, a fungal consortium was suggested to increase the yield of sugars in saccharification process.
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Using reversed-phase high performance liquid chromatography, nine ginsenosides were simultaneously separated on an UltimateC₁₈ column with high-resolution and high purity of each chromatographic peak. Adopting the QAMS quality evaluation model for traditional Chinese medicines, ginsenoside Rb₁ was used as the internal reference substance, and the relative correction factors (RCFs) and the relative retention values (RTRs) of ginsenosides Rg₁, Re, Rf, Rb₁, Rc, Rb₂, Rb₃, Rd and 20 (S)-ginsenoside Rg₃ to ginsenoside Rb₁ were calculated individually. Through a series of methodology evaluations, and positioned by the red ginseng reference chromatograph and RTVs, nine ginsenosides in red ginseng were simultaneously assayed only by quantitative determined ginsenoside Rb₁.
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BACKGROUND: Currently used techniques for quantitation of HBsAg often yield discordant results; therefore, development of quantitation techniques that can detect HBsAg with high accuracy has become very important. Recent advances have led to the development of several HBsAg detection systems. Here, we evaluated the performance of 3 newly developed detection systems, which can detect HBsAg both qualitatively and quantitavely, and determined the concordance among their results. METHODS: Four hundred and thirty two samples assigned to 4 groups-patient group, dilution group, weakly reactive group, and linearity group- were subjected to qualitative and quantitative detection of HBsAg by using the 3 systems developed by 3 major manufacturers; Abbott Architect, Roche E170 and Siemens Centaur XP. RESULTS: The results for the qualitative analyses were closely concordant among the three systems (98.3%) for all 432 samples. In 123 samples that were determined as HBsAg-negative, E170 (76%) distributed frequently at the upper half level (0.5-1.0) of negative reference range, compared with Architect (11%) and Centaur XP (22%). In particular, in 65 samples that were diluted from the strongly positive samples to obtain weakly positive samples, the average index values obtained using Architect (3.6 S/CO), E170 (4.2 COI) and Centaur XP (11.4 index value) differed significantly (P<0.0001). In the antiviral treatment group and the post-liver transplantation group, no inconsistency was observed among the results of the qualitative and quantitative assays. In the 18-fold serially diluted samples, no linearity was observed. CONCLUSIONS: Because of the possibility of false-positive detection in the HBsAg-negative samples, regular management of equipment and appropriate selection of reagents are very important. In weakly positive samples, quantitative assay has not to be replaced for qualitative assay. Therefore, the qualitative assays should be used for screening the samples, whereas the quantitative assays should be used for monitoring the Hepatitis B virus (HBV) load in the samples determined as HBsAg-positive. The qualitative index value should not be interpreted as a quantitative measure of HBV load.