Trends and advances in pre- and post-harvest processing of linseed oil for quality food and health products.

Linseed is an ancient crop used for diverse purposes since the beginning of civilization. In recent times, linseed has emerged as a superfood due to its high content of health-promoting omega-3 fatty acids and other bioactive compounds. Among primary health effects, it has potential to manage hypertension, diabetes, osteoporosis, atherosclerosis, cancer, arthritis, neurological, cardiovascular diseases including blood cholesterol levels, constipation, diarrhea, and autoimmune disorders etc. due to the presence of omega-3 fatty acid, lignans, high dietary fibers, and proteins, whereas, secondary health effects comprise of relieving from various skin disorders. Due to these health-beneficial properties, interest in linseed oil necessitates the intensification of research efforts on various aspects. These include cultivation technology, varietal and genetic improvement, post-harvest processing, profiling of nutrients and bioactive compounds, pre-clinical and clinical studies, etc. The present review discussed the advances in linseed research including pre- and post-harvest processing. However, focus on the bioactive compounds present in linseed oil and their health effects are also presented. Linseed cultivation, pre- and post-harvest processing aspects are covered including climatic, edaphic, agronomic factors, type of cultivar and storage conditions etc, which impact the overall oil yield and its nutritional quality. Various emerging applications of linseed oil in functional food, nutraceutical, pharmaceutical, and cosmeceutical preparations were also presented in detail. Further, recommendations were made on linseed oil research in the field of genetics, breeding germplasm resources and genome editing for exploring its full applications as a nutrition and health product.

Cloning and comparative modeling identifies a highly stress tolerant Cu/Zn cytosolic super oxide dismutase 2 from a drought tolerant maize inbred line.

Plants have a complex system of stress response that deals with different types of stresses. Maize (Zea mays L.), one of the most important crops grown throughout the world, across a range of agro-ecological environments, employs complex mechanisms of gene regulation in response to drought stress. HKI 335 is a tropical maize inbred line showing remarkable adaptation to drought stress. Abiotic stresses, like drought, trigger the production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) due to the incomplete reduction or excitation of molecular oxygen, eventually leading to cell damage. Superoxide dismutase (SOD, EC 1.15.1.1) is a metalloenzyme that acts as the first line of defense against ROS. We cloned the Sod2 gene from HKI 335 inbred line and analyzed its protein through detailed in silico characterization. Our comparative modeling revealed that at the level of tertiary structure, the HKI 335 SOD2 protein is highly similar to Potentilla atrosanguinea SOD2, which had been previously identified as highly thermostable SOD that can tolerate autoclaving as well as sub-zero temperatures. We performed phylogenetic analysis, estimated physicochemical properties, post-translational modifications, protein-protein interactions, and domain composition of this SOD2. The phylogenetic analysis showed that orthologous sequences of SOD from different species were clustered into two clusters. Secondary structure prediction indicates that SOD2 is a soluble protein and no transmembrane domains have been found. Most of the beta sheets have RSA value greater than 2. The Ramachandran plot from PDBsum revealed that most of the residues fall in the highly favored region. It was estimated that the value of the instability index was less than 40, the value of the aliphatic index was extremely high and the GRAVY value lies between -2 and +2. We could identify only one phosphorylation site, located at position 20 with a score of 0.692. Overall, the unique stress-tolerant properties of the HKI 335 SOD2, may be one of the reasons contributing to the high drought tolerance trait exhibited by HKI 335 maize inbred line. Further research may reveal more insights into the drought adaptation mechanism in maize and the eventual deployment of the trait in maize hybrids.

Sustaining Protein Nutrition Through Plant-Based Foods.

Proteins are essential components of the human diet. Dietary proteins could be derived from animals and plants. Animal protein, although higher in demand, is generally considered less environmentally sustainable. Therefore, a gradual transition from animal- to plant-based protein food may be desirable to maintain environmental stability, ethical reasons, food affordability, greater food safety, fulfilling higher consumer demand, and combating of protein-energy malnutrition. Due to these reasons, plant-based proteins are steadily gaining popularity, and this upward trend is expected to continue for the next few decades. Plant proteins are a good source of many essential amino acids, vital macronutrients, and are sufficient to achieve complete protein nutrition. The main goal of this review is to provide an overview of plant-based protein that helps sustain a better life for humans and the nutritional quality of plant proteins. Therefore, the present review comprehensively explores the nutritional quality of the plant proteins, their cost-effective extraction and processing technologies, impacts on nutrition, different food wastes as an alternative source of plant protein, and their environmental impact. Furthermore, it focuses on the emerging technologies for improving plant proteins' bioavailability, digestibility, and organoleptic properties, and highlights the aforementioned technological challenges for future research work.

In silico proteolysis and analysis of bioactive peptides from sequences of fatty acid desaturase 3 (FAD3) of flaxseed protein.

Flaxseed (Linum usitatissimum), commonly known as linseed is an oilseed crop, emerging as an important and functional ingredient of food and has been paid more attention due to its nutritional value as well as beneficial effects. It is mainly rich in is α-linolenic acid (ALA, omega-3 fatty acid), fibres and lignans that have potential health benefits in reducing cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, osteoporosis, atherosclerosis, cancer, arthritis, neurological and autoimmune disorders. Due to its richness in omega-3 fatty acid, a group of enzymes known as fatty acid desaturases (FADs) mainly introduce double bonds into fatty acids' (FAs) hydrocarbon chains that produce unsaturated fatty acids. Fatty acid desaturase 3 (FAD3), the commonest microsomal enzyme of omega-3 fatty acid, synthesizes linolenic acid (C18:3) from linoleic acid located in endoplasmic reticulum (ER) facing towards the cytosol. The emerging field of bioinformatics and large number of databases of bioactive peptides, helps in providing time-saving and efficient method for identification of potential bioactivities of any protein. In this study, 10 unique sequences of FAD3 from flaxseed protein have been used for in silico proteolysis and releasing of various bioactive peptides using three plant proteases, namely ficin, papain and stem bromelain, that are evaluated with the help of BIOPEP database. Overall, 20 biological activities were identified from these proteins. The results showed that FAD3 protein is a potential source of peptides with angiotensin-I-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitory and dipeptidyl peptidase-IV (DPP-IV) activities, and also various parameters such as ∑A, ∑B, AE, W, BE, V and DHt were also calculated. Furthermore, PeptideRanker have been used for screening of novel promising bioactive peptides. Various bioinformatics tools also used to study protein's physicochemical properties, peptide's score, toxicity, allergenicity aggregation, water solubility, and drug likeliness. The present work suggests that flaxseed protein can be a good source of bioactive peptides for the synthesis of good quality and quantity of oil, and in silico method helps in investigating and production of functional peptides.

PlantPepDB: A manually curated plant peptide database.

Plants produce an array of peptides as part of their innate defense mechanism against pathogens. The potential use of these peptides for various therapeutic purposes is increasing per diem. In order to excel in this research, the community requires web repositories that provide reliable and accurate information about these phyto-peptides. This work is an attempt to bridge the gaps in plant-based peptide research. PlantPepDB is a manually curated database that consists of 3848 plant-derived peptides among which 2821 are experimentally validated at the protein level, 458 have experimental evidence at the transcript level, 530 are predicted and only 39 peptides are inferred from homology. Incorporation of physicochemical properties and tertiary structure into PlantPepDB will help the users to study the therapeutic potential of a peptide, thus, debuts as a powerful resource for therapeutic research. Different options like Simple, Advanced, PhysicoChem and AA composition search along with browsing utilities are provided in the database for the users to execute dynamic search and retrieve the desired data. Interestingly, many peptides that were considered to possess only a single property were found to exhibit multiple properties after careful curation and merging the duplicate data that was collected from published literature and already available databases. Overall, PlantPepDB is the first database comprising detailed analysis and comprehensive information of phyto-peptides from a broad functional range which will be useful for peptide-based applied research. PlantPepDB is freely available at http://www.nipgr.ac.in/PlantPepDB/.

A review on the antagonist Ebola: A prophylactic approach.

Ebola virus (EBOV), a member of Filoviridae virus family under the genus Ebolavirus, has emerged as a dangerous and potential threat to human health globally. It causes a severe and deadly hemorrhagic fever in humans and other mammals, called Ebola Virus Disease (EVD). In recent outbreaks of EVD, there has been loss of large numbers of individual's life. Therefore, EBOV has attracted researchers and increased interests in developing new models for virus evolution, and therapies. The EBOV interacts with the immune system of the host which led to understand how the virus functions and effects immune system behaviour. This article presents an exhaustive review on Ebola research which includes EVD illness, symptoms, transmission patterns, patho-physiology conditions, development of antiviral agents and vaccines, resilient health system, dynamics and mathematical model of EBOV, challenges and prospects for future studies.