Use of Indian Date and Vitamin B-3 to Reduce Blood Pressure and to Raise HDL-Cholesterol

Background: Coronary artery disease is a complex syndrome to get initiation from formation of atherosclerotic plaques in systemic circulation to cardiac arrhythmia causing morbidity/mortality. This study was conducted to compare hypolipidemic effects of Niacin and Indian date (Jujuba) in hyperlipidemic patients. Methods: Study was conducted from July 2015 to December 2015 at National Hospital Lahore-Pakistan. Sixty participants were enrolled of both gender male and female patients age range from 25 to 60 years. Consent was taken from all patients. They were divided in two groups. Group-I was advised to take 2 grams Niacin in divided doses for the period of two months. Group-II was advised to take 500 grams of fruit Jujube daily for the period of two months. All patients’ systolic and diastolic blood pressure was noted. Their baseline LDL and HDL cholesterol was determined by conventional method of measuring Lipid Profile. Results: After two months therapy, their post treatment blood pressure and lipid profile was measured and mean values with ± SEM were analyzed biostatistically. Group-I which was on Niacin their blood pressure was reduced but it was non-significant change, LDL cholesterol decreased significantly and HDL cholesterol was increased significantly. In group-II patients LDL cholesterol was decreased significantly but HDL increase was not significant with p-value of >0.05. Conclusions: It was concluded from the research work that Niacin is potent in lowering LDL and increasing HDL cholesterol, while Jujube has significant effect as LDL cholesterol lowering potential, but it does not increase HDL cholesterol significantly. Jujubes and vitamin B-3 did not reduced blood pressure, when analyzed statistically.

Production of plant cell wall degrading enzymes by monoculture and co-culture of Aspergillus niger and Aspergillus terreus under SSF of banana peels

Filamentous fungi are considered to be the most important group of microorganisms for the production of plant cell wall degrading enzymes (CWDE), in solid state fermentations. In this study, two fungal strains Aspergillus niger MS23 and Aspergillus terreus MS105 were screened for plant CWDE such as amylase, pectinase, xylanase and cellulases (β-glucosidase, endoglucanase and filterpaperase) using a novel substrate, Banana Peels (BP) for SSF process. This is the first study, to the best of our knowledge, to use BP as SSF substrate for plant CWDE production by co-culture of fungal strains. The titers of pectinase were significantly improved in co-culture compared to mono-culture. Furthermore, the enzyme preparations obtained from monoculture and co-culture were used to study the hydrolysis of BP along with some crude and purified substrates. It was observed that the enzymatic hydrolysis of different crude and purified substrates accomplished after 26 h of incubation, where pectin was maximally hydrolyzed by the enzyme preparations of mono and co-culture. Along with purified substrates, crude materials were also proved to be efficiently degraded by the cocktail of the CWDE. These results demonstrated that banana peels may be a potential substrate in solid-state fermentation for the production of plant cell wall degrading enzymes to be used for improving various biotechnological and industrial processes.