Emerging cold plasma treatment on rice grains: A mini review.

Future demand of rice is projected to increase with the increase of global population. However, the presence of bacteria, insects, and fungi has resulted in various changes in the physical and chemical characteristics of rice grain. To make it worse, the overuse of post-harvest chemicals (fungicide and pesticide) has caused possible risks to human health through either occupational or non-occupational exposure. For the last few years, cold plasma has been developed as an alternative non-thermal emerging technology for rice grains treatment due to its ability to inactivate or decontaminate pathogens without causing thermal damage and free of any harmful residues. Therefore, this review describes the operational mechanism of cold plasma treatment technology on rice grains, existing reactor system designs, and parameters influenced by the treatment technology (reactor design parameters and treatment process parameters). Possible advanced investigation on future reactor design modification as well as standard operating range of influenced parameters were suggested for improved efficiency and effectiveness of cold plasma treatment.

Bio-corrosion behavior and mechanical characteristics of magnesium-titania-hydroxyapatite nanocomposites coated by magnesium-oxide flakes and silicon for use as resorbable bone fixation material.

This study was aimed to improve of the corrosion resistance and mechanical properties of Mg/15TiO2/5HA nanocomposite by silicon and magnesium oxide coatings prepared using a powder metallurgy method. The phase evolution, chemical composition, microstructure and mechanical properties of uncoated and coated samples were characterized. Electrochemical and immersion tests used to investigate the in vitro corrosion behavior of the fabricated samples. The adhesion strength of ~36MPa for MgO and ~32MPa for Si/MgO coatings to substrate was measured by adhesion test. Fabrication a homogenous double layer coating with uniform thicknesses consisting micro-sized particles of Si as outer layer and flake-like particles of MgO as the inner layer on the surface of Mg/15TiO2/5HA nanocomposite caused the corrosion resistance and ductility increased whereas the ultimate compressive stress decreased. However, after immersion in SBF solution, Si/MgO-coated sample indicates the best mechanical properties compared to those of the uncoated and MgO-coated samples. The increase of cell viability percentage of the normal human osteoblast (NHOst) cells indicates the improvement in biocompatibility of Mg/15TiO2/5HA nanocomposite by Si/MgO coating.