Filtration of Natural Derivatives as MAO Inhibitors by Virtual Screening: A Potential Lead for Neurodegenerative Disorders.

AIM: The purpose of the current study was to explore the virtual library for the screening against Monoamine oxidase (MAO) isoforms. An in-house library of natural based ligands was docked within the active sites of MAO isoforms and their in vitro study was also conducted. OBJECTIVE: The prime objective of the current study was to screen and validate the natural-based derivatives for MAO inhibitory action with the least adverse effects and get molecular aspects about further structural modifications on the most active leads. BACKGROUND: The importance of MAOs in controlling the activity of the central nervous system has been extensively studied. Our goal in this work is to identify a prospective natural lead molecule that has a stronger affinity for the MAO enzyme in order to produce a more effective natural candidate for a neurological agent. RESULTS: In order to get insight into how different categories of natural compounds interact with the targeted protein, we virtually screened the numerous natural compound categories in the current study. Rhamnetin, quercetin, piperine, eugenol, and umbelliferone showed the highest dock scores in the case of MAO-B, with scores of -10.57, -9.938, -9.445, and 7.821, respectively. For MAO-A, umbelliferone, curcumin, caffeic acid, and quercetin, the corresponding dock scores were -8.001, -7.941, -7.357, and -6.658. Additionally, an in vitro MAO inhibitory experiment was utilized to assess the top-ranked compounds with the best docking scores. The most potent Human Monoamine oxidase (hMAO-A) inhibitor, with an IC50 of 10.98±0.006 M and a selectivity index (SI) of 0.607, was discovered to be the compound umbelliferone. Rhamnetin, the lead chemical, has demonstrated hMAO-B activity with a value of 10.32±0.044 M (SI value of 3.096). CONCLUSION: These natural potential ligands have been found remarkable to the standard compounds against MAO-A and MAO-B, and they could be used as a lead chemical in the development of novel therapeutic candidates. The in silico screening results and in vitro hMAO inhibitory efficacy exhibited strong correlations.

Extraction of structurally intact and well-stabilized rice bran oil bodies as natural pre-emulsified O/W emulsions and investigation of their rheological properties and components interaction.

The isolated plant oil bodies (OBs) have shown promising applications as natural pre-emulsified O/W emulsions. Rice bran OBs can be used as a new type plant-based resource with superior fatty acids composition and abundant γ-oryzanol. This paper investigated the method of extracting structurally intact and stable rice bran OBs. Due to the adequate steric hindrance and electrostatic repulsion effects, rice bran OBs extracted by NaHCO3 medium had smaller particle size, better physical stability, and natural structure. The protein profile of NaHCO3-extracted rice bran OBs showed oleosin-L and oleosin-H, while exogenous proteins in PBS and enzyme-assisted- extracted rice bran OBs could interact with interfacial proteins through hydrophobic forces to aggregate adjacent OBs, further remodeling the OBs interface. It was also found that the small-sized rice bran OBs could adsorb on the interface of the larger-sized rice bran OBs like Pickering stabilizers. Rice bran OBs exhibited pseudoplastic fluids characteristic, but underwent a transition from solid-like to liquid-like behavior depending on the extraction method. The disorder of NaHCO3-extracted rice bran OBs protein molecules increased their surface hydrophobicity. The random coil structure favored more proteins adsorption at the interface of rice bran OBs extracted by PBS. Enzyme-assisted extraction of rice bran OBs had the highest content of ß-sheet structure, which facilitated the stretching and aggregation of protein spatial structure. It was also confirmed the hydrogen bonding and hydrophobic interaction between the triacylglycerol or phospholipid and proteins molecules, and the membrane compositions of rice bran OBs differed between extraction methods.

Advanced Material-Oriented Biomass Precise Reconstruction: A Review on Porous Carbon with Inherited Natural Structure and Created Artificial Structure by Post-Treatment.

Manufacturing of porous carbon with biomass resources is intensively investigated in recent decades. The diversity of biomass species and great variety of processing methods enable the structural richness of porous carbon as well as their wide applications. This review specifically focuses on the structure of biomass-derived porous carbon either inherited from natural biomass or created by post-treatment. The intrinsic structure of plant biomass is briefly introduced and the utilization of the unique structures at different length-scales is discussed. In term of post-treatment, the structural features of activated carbon by traditional physical and chemical activation are summarized and compared in a wide spectrum of biomass species, statistical analysis is performed to evaluate the effectiveness of different activation methods in creating specific pore structures. The similar pore structure of biomass-derived carbon and coal-derived carbon suggests a promising replacement with more sustainable biomass resources in producing porous carbon. In summary, using biomass as porous carbon precursor endows the flexibility of using its naturally patterned microstructure and the tunability of controlled pore-creation by post-treatment.

Sustainable biomass-based hierarchical porous carbon for energy storage: A novel route to maintain electrochemically attractive natural structure of precursor.

The development of sustainable and renewable energy storage devices with low cost and environment friendly features is an extremely urgent issue that needs to be solved. Herein, low-cost and sustainable biomass chitin, possessing natural fibrous, O/N-enriched and porous structure, was employed as a porous carbon (PC) precursor. However, a huge challenge in PC preparation is to maintain the natural electrochemically attractive structure of chitin while obtaining highly porous structure. In this study, by utilizing the molten protecting effect and micropore-creating ability of CuCl2 2H2O, the obtained PCs maintain the natural structure, achieve high yield (46%), and simultaneously develop hierarchical pores with a specific surface area range of 1635-2381 m2 g-1, a tunable micropore volume ratio range of 63.5-96.8%, and high surface O/N contents (N: 3.1-9.0 wt% and O: 10.5-12.8 wt%). Benefiting from these excellent properties, optimized PC achieves a high specific capacitance of 286 F g-1 at 0.5 A g-1 and a remarkably high rate capability of 88% at 10 A g-1; moreover, it even exhibits a rate capability of 80% at an ultrahigh current density of 50 A g-1. The optimized PC-based supercapacitor assembled in Na2SO4 electrolyte shows a high energy density of 15.41 W h kg-1 at 0.19 kW kg-1 and achieves 76% energy density retention when the power density increased tenfold. Thus, this study presents a new way to fully utilize biomass, especially with electrochemically attractive natural structure, for developing advanced energy storage devices.

On Boundaries

The exchange of information between natural entities is made through boundaries, this begs for a systematic study of them which so far has been lacking. Here, such study is provided, thus it begins by establishing a general conceptualization of boundary, which has been stated in a previous paper by the author, followed by the identification of some kind of boundaries. Thus, interface, limit, border and some of its kinds, and barrier are identified and conceptualized. Then, a partial study of some of the conceptualized boundaries is provided trying to analyze them as much as possible. Finally, a general discussion on the existence and importance of boundaries is given remarking the generality and robustness of the concept of boundary and its different kinds, hence its utility in science and technology is appreciated.

El intercambio de información entre entes naturales se produce a través de los boundaries [límites], este hecho reclama un estudio sistemático de ellos, lo cual hasta el momento no se ha realizado. En el presente trabajo, establecemos el concepto general de boundary, para luego identificar ciertos tipos de boundaries como interface, límite, borde y algunos de sus tipos, y barrera son identificados y conceptualizados. Luego realizamos un estudio parcial de algunos de los boundaries conceptualizados, tratando de analizarlos lo más posible. Finalmente, se da una discusión general sobre la existencia e importancia de los boundaries remarcando la generalidad y robustez del concepto de boundary y sus diferentes tipos, de aquí su utilidad en la ciencia y la tecnología es posible de apreciarse. Por último se comenta sobre su perspectiva en ciencia y tecnología.