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This paper focuses on the preparation of environmentally friendly biomass carbon-based solid acid catalysts from black soldier fly larvae (BSFL) shells. The effective catalysts were prepared by incomplete carbonization of BSFL shells and then the p-toluenesulfonic acid (PTSA) groups were introduced to obtain catalysts. The synthesized composite catalysts were characterized by XPS, FT-IR, SEM, XRD, and BET analysis to reveal the physiochemical properties. Meanwhile, the effects of various reaction conditions on the yield of biodiesel with oleic acid (OA) and methanol were studied in detail. The results showed that the conversion rate reached 93.2% under the optimal conditions in this paper: carbonization temperature = 400 °C, carbonization time = 2 h, sulfonation temperature = 100 °C, and reaction time = 4 h, respectively. Furthermore, the stability and reusability of the prepared catalysts were also demonstrated. At last, the possible catalytic mechanism of the prepared catalyst was comprehensively described. Moreover, the results showed that the synthesized biomass-based solid acid catalyst under these conditions had good catalytic activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the present study, an efficient catalyst based on the immobilization of the heteropoly acid (HPA) on activated biomass-derived carbon was prepared and applied in the conversion of the insect lipid for biodiesel production. The chemical and structural properties of the synthesized catalyst were assessed using different methods (SEM, TEM, XRD, XPS, FTIR, and N2 adsorption–desorption isotherms analysis). Moreover, the sensitivity to the free fatty acid and water in conversion systems was further concerned to explore the catalyst stability under the used reaction conditions. The results showed that the biodiesel yield of 93.87% was obtained under mild operation conditions (carbonization temperature of 500 °C, activation concentration of 3 mol/L, HPA loading of 0.75 wt%, reaction time of 3 h, and reaction temperature of 65 °C). Notably, the findings of this study also suggested that the one-pot surface functionalization strategy with ZnCl2 solution enhanced the pore structure of the biochar support providing more channels for the reactants. The Environmental factor was used to determine the potential of the prepared catalyst in this study. Furthermore, three kinetics models and thermodynamic studies were applied to describe the complicated conversion reaction system. Finally, the physicochemical properties of the synthesized biodiesel were analyzed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Atractylodes lancea is a medicinal plant widely used in treating rheumatic diseases, digestive disorders, night blindness, and influenza. Microbes greatly impact plant growth and metabolism. However, the microbiome associated with A. lancea remains unclear. Hence, we aimed at assessing the effect of soil microbe inoculation on A. lancea under heat stress from multiple perspectives, including regulation of growth, valuable secondary metabolites, root endophytic and rhizosphere bacterial communities. Methods: A. lancea was inoculated with soil microbes, then grown under normal/high temperature. Biomass, chlorophyll contents, production of major medicinal compounds, physiochemical properties of the soil, and in the composition of root bacterial communities of A. lancea were investigated. Results: Soil microbe inoculation promoted root sink strength, accumulation of medicinal compounds, and attenuated damage caused by heat stress. A. lancea showed preference for the endophytic bacterial genera Rhodococcus, Ralstonia, Dongia Paenibacillus and Burkholderia-Caballeronia-Paraburkholderia post-inoculation, the latter four genera playing important roles in protection from heat stress, with abundance of the latter two specifically positively correlated to medicinal compound production. A. lancea enriched the bacterial genera Saccharimonadales, Novosphingobium and excluded Chitinophaga in its rhizosphere post-inoculation. Conclusions: Soil microbes characteristically promoted A. lancea growth, improved heat stress tolerance, and promoted root medicinal compound accumulation. A. lancea selectively enriched particular endophytic and rhizospheric bacterial communities post-inoculation, possibly due to unique aromatic root exudates. The selected bacteria potentially synergistically improved soil available nutrients and uptake by root. Bacterial species selected by A. lancea root have the potential to serve as biological fertilizers for A. lancea farming. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Polyphenol compounds are widely found in natural plants and they are attracting a lot of interests in their functional activities including anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory, liver-protection, anti-bacteria, neuroprotection, anti-obesity, and other related effects. However, the mechanisms of polyphenolic functional activities are still limited. Although chemical reagent methods have been widely used to study various polyphenol activities, it is difficult to deeply investigate the specific mechanism of polyphenol activities in vivo only by chemical methods. Recently, as a method to discover biomarkers associated with polyphenol activities, foodomics technique including proteomics, metabolomics, genomics, transcriptomics and lipidomics technique was developed to study the mechanisms. In this review, we summarized the worldwide research advances of polyphenolic functional activities using foodomics techniques. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A previous survey of lotus virus disease has revealed sweet potato latent virus-lotus (SPLV-lotus) to occur at high frequencies in Jiangsu Province, China. The objective of this study was to develop a loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) assay for the rapid and sensitive detection of SPLV-lotus in lotus plants. The products were analysed by visual inspection of colour change. The sensitivity of the LAMP assay was similar to that of RT-PCR. The LAMP assay shows excellent potential for application in the rapid detection of SPLV-lotus in field samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Acidovorax citrulli has become quite common in China. A collection of 118 strains of A. citrulli was made from throughout China and other countries to determine their genetic relatedness. Strains were identified as A. citrulli by pathogenicity, phenotypic characterization, and PCR. Genetic diversity was determined using pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) and multilocus sequence typing (MLST). PFGE electrophoresis resulted in nine genotypes, which could be typed into two groups based on host; group 1 included strains mainly from melon and group 2 included strains mainly from watermelon. MLST analysis resulted in 73 sequence types (ST) among the 118 A. citrulli strains . All A. citrulli strains were typed into three groups: group 1 with 82 strains (including type strain Fc247), group 2 with 35 strains and group 3 a singleton (Fc380). Similar to PFGE results, group 1 included strains mainly from melon and group 2 included strains mainly from watermelon. The difference was the 10 watermelon strains (pslbtw1-3, 5-11) from Beijing grouped with melon strains of group 1 based on MLST, suggesting that these 10 watermelon strains had a close relationship with melon. Our study indicated that there was genetic differentiation among A. citrulli strains between watermelon and melon. Also, our study was the first attempt to compare PFGE and MLST on analyzing genetic diversity of A. citrulli strains and proved MLST could better distinguish A. citrulli strains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]