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[Objective] This study aimed to determine the optimal processing conditions for Dali ginseng (DG) and evaluate its antioxidant activity. [Methods] Total ginsenosides content in DG was measured under different liquid-material ratios, temperatures, and extraction time. The response surface method was employed to optimize the processing conditions. UPLC-QQQ-MS was used to analyze the ginsenoside content, and the antioxidant activity of DG extracts with different polarities was evaluated using various antioxidant indexes. [Results] The optimal processing conditions of DG were processing at 95 °C with liquid-solid ratio 22:1 (mL/g) for 30 mins. Under the control of these conditions, the maximum content of total ginsenosides at 3.75% was achieved. All the DG extracts certain antioxidant activity, among which the ethyl acetate extract has the strongest antioxidant activity. [Conclusion] The optimum processing technology and antioxidant active parts of Dali ginseng were obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Panax ginseng is a famous valuable folk herb, the price of which particularly depends on its cultivation age. Since the classical chemical analysis usually needs to destroy the plants which is not suitable for the old wild ginseng due to the huge cost, in the current study, we employed the headspace solid-phase microextraction (HS-SPME) GC-MS methodology which has the advantage of time-saving, nondestructive, and green to analyze the growth age of ginseng (roots) via determining the volatile components of ginseng stem and leaves (GSLs) combined with metabolic profiles way. 100 mg of finely ground GSL samples (3–7 years) were extracted by a 65 μm PDMS-DVB fiber in the headspace and then analyzed within 20 mins. The content assay of total saponins, crude polysaccharides, and total protein was also included. As a result of GC-MS-based profiling, the orthogonal partial least-squares discriminant analysis' (OPLS-DA) score plots showed excellent classification of four comparison groups (the 3- and 4-, 3-and 5-, 3- and 6-, and 3- and 7-year-old GSL) with 100% discrimination rate, respectively. 263 common differential variables were gained referring to the VIP and P values. 32 volatile metabolites were identified and showed good age discrimination capacities with an area under the curve (AUC) value of more than 0.8 by the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis. Remarkably, there was one volatile component of sesquiterpenes, 1-cyclohexene-1-carboxaldehyde, 2, 6, 6-trimethyl-, which showed an excellent prediction with the AUC value of 1.0 among all the four compared groups, which could be the potential biomarker to distinguish all the four compared groups. The total contents of different growth ages of components of ginseng stems and leaves were distinct. The contents of total protein (4.80 ± 0.27%) and crude polysaccharide (24.15 ± 0.89%) in the 4th year of GSLs were the highest among the five cultivation years. The content of total saponins (4.66 ± 0.38%) in the 5th year of GSLs was the highest. These results could provide a novel reference for the GSLs' harvest and application periods. Moreover, the current study could also supply a promising way to set up a nondestructive, in situ, and green approach to discriminate the growth age of Panax ginseng rapidly without digging the roots out instead of detecting the VOCs of GSLs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Divergent synthesis of heterocycles with controllable ring sizes from the same starting materials is a long‐standing challenge. We report herein the first example of controllable divergent [4+5] and [2+3] cycloadditions of α,β‐unsaturated imines and vinylethylene carbonates, which enables the selectively synthesis of nine‐membered and different five‐membered heterocycles by controlling the reaction temperature and the steric hindrance of substituent. This protocol features a broad substrate scope, wide functional group tolerance as well as operational simplicity. The reaction mechanism was investigated by con‐ducting a series of control experiments as well as DFT calculations and the origins of the regioselectivities of the cycloaddition process were rationalized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To explore a green and efficient extraction technology for the extraction of active ingredients of Asarum, the deep eutectic solvent combined with ultrasonic was applied to compare the extraction efficiency of 10 kinds of deep eutectic solvents, taking the extraction rate of methyl eugenol and asarinin as indices. Single-factor experiments were adopted to investigate the influence of molar ratio, liquid-to-solid ratio, eddy time, ultrasonic time, and temperature of the deep eutectic solvent on the extraction rate of methyl eugenol and asarinin. Based on single-factor experiments, the surface response methodology was used to optimize the extraction process conditions. The results showed that the optimum extracting process conditions of methyl eugenol and asarinin in Asarum consisted of a ratio of choline chloride to glycerol of 1 : 3, a DES volume of 2 mL, an ultrasonic temperature of 60°C, an ultrasonic time of 30 min, and a vortex oscillation of 7 min. Under the optimum extracting process conditions, the contents of methyl eugenol and asarinin were 1.9428 mg/g and 0.9989 mg/g, respectively, and the comprehensive index was 2.3280 (RSD of 1.91%). The results were close to the predicted values of the response surface model, demonstrating the applicability of the model. The extraction rate of methyl eugenol and asarinin in Asarum by this method was higher than that of water extraction and alcohol extraction, which fully indicated the high efficiency of ultrasonic-assisted green deep eutectic solvent extraction technology. The results provide data support for further development and utilization of Asarum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Various prefabricated maxillofacial implants are used in the clinical routine for the surgical treatment of patients. In addition to these prefabricated implants, customized CAD/CAM implants become increasingly important for a more precise replacement of damaged anatomical structures. This paper reviews the design and manufacturing of patient-specific implants for the maxillofacial area. Areas covered: The contribution of this publication is to give a state-of-the-art overview in the usage of customized facial implants. Moreover, it provides future perspectives, including 3D printing technologies, for the manufacturing of patient-individual facial implants that are based on patient's data acquisitions, like Computed Tomography (CT) or Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). Expert opinion: The main target of this review is to present various designing software and 3D manufacturing technologies that have been applied to fabricate facial implants. In doing so, different CAD designing software's are discussed, which are based on various methods and have been implemented and evaluated by researchers. Finally, recent 3D printing technologies that have been applied to manufacture patient-individual implants will be introduced and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A high-throughput fashion for screening protein binders from complicated samples. • The factors such as incubation time and buffer can affect the binding affinity. • The relative binding affinities can be simultaneously determined. • The structures of protein binders can be determined by this information-rich method. • Differences and analogies in PNA-binding capabilities of oligosaccharides from ginseng. Conventional strategies for screening of protein binders cannot be used for complicated samples such as ligand libraries created by combinatorial chemistry or from natural product extracts. In the current study, we developed a novel method in a competitive binding configuration for screening protein binders from complicated samples by a combination of streptavidin-coated 96-well plate format in conjunction with ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with Orbitrap mass spectrometry (UHPLC-Orbitrap-MS). The concanavalin A (Con A) modified 96-well plate and lysozyme modified 96-well plate (as control) were incubated with oligosaccharide standards respectively, and the compounds with the decreased peak areas in experimental group compared to those in the control group were detected as binders by UHPLC-ESI-MS. The factors such as incubation time, incubation temperature, and buffer, which might affect the binding affinity and reproducibility were optimized. The potential of the approach is examined using the extracts of Radix ginseng cruda and American ginseng. The relative binding degrees (RBDs) of the detected disaccharides were relatively high in the extracts of Radix ginseng cruda, and those of the trisaccharides were similar in the extracts of the two kinds of ginseng. To our knowledge, it's the first time to reveal the differences and analogies in lectin peanut agglutinin (PNA)-binding capabilities of oligosaccharides between the extracts of radix ginseng cruda and American ginseng, indicating the efficiency of the method for analysis of complicated samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Minimally invasive surgery (MIS) remains technically demanding due to the difficulty of tracking hidden critical structures within the moving anatomy of the patient. In this study, we propose a soft tissue deformation tracking augmented reality (AR) navigation pipeline for laparoscopic surgery of the kidneys. The proposed navigation pipeline addresses two main sub-problems: the initial registration and deformation tracking. Our method utilizes preoperative MR or CT data and binocular laparoscopes without any additional interventional hardware. The initial registration is resolved through a probabilistic rigid registration algorithm and elastic compensation based on dense point cloud reconstruction. For deformation tracking, the sparse feature point displacement vector field continuously provides temporal boundary conditions for the biomechanical model. To enhance the accuracy of the displacement vector field, a novel feature points selection strategy based on deep learning is proposed. Moreover, an ex-vivo experimental method for internal structures error assessment is presented. The ex-vivo experiments indicate an external surface reprojection error of 4.07 ± 2.17mm and a maximum mean absolutely error for internal structures of 2.98mm. In-vivo experiments indicate mean absolutely error of 3.28 ± 0.40mm and 1.90±0.24mm, respectively. The combined qualitative and quantitative findings indicated the potential of our AR-assisted navigation system in improving the clinical application of laparoscopic kidney surgery.

Panax ginseng C. A. Meyer is a dual-purpose plant for medicine and food, its polysaccharide is considered as an immune enhancer. Four polysaccharides, WGP-20-F, WGP-40-F, WGP-60-F and WGP-80-F were obtained from ginseng via water extraction and gradient ethanol precipitation with different molecular weights ( Mw ) of 1.720 × 10 6 , 1.434 × 10 6 , 4.225 × 10 4 and 1.520 × 10 4  Da, respectively. WGP-20-F and WGP-40-F which with higher Mw and a triple-helix structure are glucans composed of 4-ɑ-Glc p , do not show remarkable immunoregulatory effects. WGP-60-F and WGP-80-F are heteropolysaccharides mainly composed of 4-ɑ-Glc p and also contain t-ɑ-Ara f , 5-ɑ-Ara f and 3,5-ɑ-Ara f . They are spherical branched conformations without a triple-helix structure and can effectively increase the index of immune organs, lymphocyte proliferation, activate macrophages to regulate the immune system in mice and further enhance immune functions by improving delayed-type hypersensitivity reaction and antibody response. These results indicated that WGP-60-F and WGP-80-F could be used as potential immune enhancers, and gradient ethanol precipitation can be applied for the preparation of ginseng bioactive polysaccharide., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Xu, Ren, Jiang, Zhou, Wang, Li, Wu, Zhang, Wang and Jiao.)