Faba Bean Processing: Thermal and Non-Thermal Processing on Chemical, Antinutritional Factors, and Pharmacological Properties.

The food industry, academia, food technologists, and consumers have become more interested in using faba bean seeds in the formulation of new products because of their nutritional content, accessibility, low costs, environmental advantages, and beneficial impacts on health. In this review, a systematic and up-to-date report on faba bean seeds' antinutrients and bioactive and processing techniques is comprehensively presented. The chemical composition, including the oil composition and carbohydrate constituents, is discussed. Factors influencing the reduction of antinutrients and improvement of bioactive compounds, including processing techniques, are discussed. Thermal treatments (cooking, autoclaving, extrusion, microwaving, high-pressure processing, irradiation) and non-thermal treatments (soaking, germination, extraction, fermentation, and enzymatic treatment) are identified as methods to reduce the levels of antinutrients in faba bean seeds. Appropriate processing methods can reduce the antinutritional factors and enrich the bioactive components, which is useful for the seeds' efficient utilization in developing functional foods. As a result, this evaluation focuses on the technologies that are employed to reduce the amounts of toxins in faba bean seeds. Additionally, a comparison of these methods is performed in terms of their advantages, disadvantages, viability, pharmacological activity, and potential for improvement using emerging technologies. Future research is expected in this area to fill the knowledge gap in exploiting the nutritional and health benefits of faba bean seeds and increase the utilization of faba bean seeds for different applications.

MALDI-MS imaging for the study of tissue pharmacodynamics and toxicodynamics.

Pharmacodynamics and toxicodynamics are the study of the biochemical and physiological effects of therapeutic agents and toxicants and their mechanisms of action. MALDI-MS imaging offers great potential for the study of pharmaco/toxicodynamic responses in tissue owing is its ability to study multiple biomarkers simultaneously in a label-free manner. Here, existing examples of such studies examining anticancer drugs and topically applied treatments are described. Examination of the literature shows that the use of MS imaging in pharmaco/toxicodynamic studies is in fact quite low. The reasons for this are discussed and potential developments in the methodology that might lead to its further use are described.