Intracellular accumulation of c-di-GMP and its regulation on self-flocculation of the bacterial cells of Zymomonas mobilis

Zymomonas mobilis is an emerging chassis for being engineered to produce bulk products due to its unique glycolysis through the Entner-Doudoroff pathway with less ATP produced for lower biomass accumulation and higher product yield. When self-flocculated, the bacterial cells are more productive, since they can self-immobilize within bioreactors for high density, and are more tolerant to stresses for higher product titers, but this morphology needs to be controlled properly to avoid internal mass transfer limitation associated with their strong self-flocculation. Herewith we explored the regulation of cyclic diguanosine monophosphate (c-di-GMP) on self-flocculation of the bacterial cells through activating cellulose biosynthesis. While ZMO1365 and ZMO0919 with GGDEF domains for diguanylate cyclase activity catalyze c-di-GMP biosynthesis, ZMO1487 with an EAL domain for phosphodiesterase activity catalyzes c-di-GMP degradation, but ZMO1055 and ZMO0401 contain the dual domains with phosphodiesterase activity predominated. Since c-di-GMP is synthesized from GTP, the intracellular accumulation of this signal molecule through deactivating phosphodiesterase activity is preferred for activating cellulose biosynthesis to flocculate the bacterial cells, because such a strategy exerts less perturbance on intracellular processes regulated by GTP. These discoveries are significant for not only engineering unicellular Z. mobilis strains with the self-flocculating morphology to boost production but also understanding mechanism underlying c-di-GMP biosynthesis and degradation in the bacterium.

An Updated Review of Soy-Derived Beverages: Nutrition, Processing, and Bioactivity

The global market for plant-based drinks is experiencing rapid growth driven by consumer demand for more sustainable diets, including vegetarian and vegan options. Soy beverages in particular are gaining popularity among individuals with lactose intolerance and milk protein allergies. They are considered an excellent source of high-quality protein, vitamin B, unsaturated fatty acids, and beneficial phytochemicals such as phytosterols, soy lecithins, and isoflavones. This review presents a comprehensive market survey of fifty-two soy beverages available in Spain and other European countries. The predominant category among those evaluated was calcium and vitamin-fortified drinks, accounting for 60% of the market. This reflects the need to address the nutritional gap compared to cow's milk and meet essential dietary requirements. The review covers the technological aspects of industrial soy milk production, including both traditional methods and innovative processing techniques. Additionally, it analyzes multiple studies and meta-analyses, presenting compelling evidence for the positive effects of soy beverages on various aspects of health. The review specifically examines the contributions of different components found in soy beverages, such as isoflavones, proteins, fiber, and oligosaccharides. Moreover, it explores controversial aspects of soy consumption, including its potential implications for growth, puberty, fertility, feminization, and the thyroid gland.

Surface Modification of Cyclic-Olefin-Copolymer (COC)-Based Microchannels for the Large-Scale Industrial Production of Droplet Microfluidic Devices

The copolymers of cycloolefin (COC), a type of thermoplastic material, have been widely used for the large-scale industrial fabrication of droplet microfluidic devices, which is often performed using hot-embossing or injection-molding techniques. The generation of droplets and the uniformity of droplet sizes are significantly affected by the surface wettability of COC during fabrication and the pressure stability of the employed fluid pump during operation. In order to alleviate the effects of undesirable surface wettability and pressure variation on the generation of droplets in COC-based devices, a simple surface modification procedure was applied to hydrophobically modify the surfaces of COC-based microchannels for large-scale industrial production. The surface modification procedure consisted of an oxygen plasma treatment of the polymer surface followed by a solution-phase reaction in fluorocarbon solvent. The experimental results demonstrate that following the proposed surface modification, the COC droplet microfluidic devices could stably generate microvolume water droplets with a small coefficient of variation, even if the pressure of the dispersed phase (water) fluctuated. The durability test results regarding the modified surfaces show that the hydrophobicity of the modified COC surfaces could be sustained for up to four months, deteriorating with time thereafter. Our study can provide a potential solution useful in and guidance for the large-scale industrial production of droplet microfluidic devices for various applications, including polymerase chain reaction and single-cell analysis.

Effects of high temperature, high humidity, and cold storage on structure and qualities of whole oat flour noodles during processing

Gelation and structure of oat starch significantly affect qualities of whole oat flour noodles. During extrusion, the structure of noodles is loose, resulting in high cooking loss and poor texture. Therefore, oat noodles were treated with high temperature, high humidity (HTH), and cold storage (CS), and their structure and qualities were analyzed. The results showed that compared with CS, HTH could reduce the cooking loss of noodles from 10.12% to 6.13%, increase the hardness (65.59 g) and chewiness (20.67) of noodles, and effectively improve the sensory quality of noodles. The change in texture and sensory of noodles was due to HTH by accelerating the retrogradation of starch in noodles, promoting the cross-linking of starch molecules to form an ordered structure, causing an increase in the ordered degree and crystallinity of starch and making the structure of noodles denser. It made the mobility of water in the noodles decrease, and more tightly bound water was transformed into weakly bound water and free water. HTH can be applied to industrial production of whole oat flour noodles. This study could effectively guide the production of high-quality whole oat flour noodles without any food additives.

Metabolic Profiling of CHO Cells during the Production of Biotherapeutics

As indicated by an ever-increasing number of FDA approvals, biotherapeutics constitute powerful tools for the treatment of various diseases, with monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) accounting for more than 50% of newly approved drugs between 2014 and 2018 (Walsh, 2018). The pharmaceutical industry has made great progress in developing reliable and efficient bioproduction processes to meet the demand for recombinant mAbs. Mammalian cell lines are preferred for the production of functional, complex recombinant proteins including mAbs, with Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells being used in most instances. Despite significant advances in cell growth control for biologics manufacturing, cellular responses to environmental changes need to be understood in order to further improve productivity. Metabolomics offers a promising approach for developing suitable strategies to unlock the full potential of cellular production. This review summarizes key findings on catabolism and anabolism for each phase of cell growth (exponential growth, the stationary phase and decline) with a focus on the principal metabolic pathways (glycolysis, the pentose phosphate pathway and the tricarboxylic acid cycle) and the families of biomolecules that impact these circuities (nucleotides, amino acids, lipids and energy-rich metabolites).

Robustness: linking strain design to viable bioprocesses

Microbial cell factories are becoming increasingly popular for the sustainable production of various chemicals. Metabolic engineering has led to the design of advanced cell factories; however, their long-term yield, titer, and productivity falter when scaled up and subjected to industrial conditions. This limitation arises from a lack of robustness - the ability to maintain a constant phenotype despite the perturbations of such processes. This review describes predictable and stochastic industrial perturbations as well as state-of-the-art technologies to counter process variability. Moreover, we distinguish robustness from tolerance and discuss the potential of single-cell studies for improving system robustness. Finally, we highlight ways of achieving consistent and comparable quantification of robustness that can guide the selection of strains for industrial bioprocesses.

D-allulose, a versatile rare sugar: recent biotechnological advances and challenges

D-Allulose is the C-3 epimer of D-fructose, and widely regarded as a promising substitute for sucrose. It's an excellent low-calorie sweetener, with 70% sweetness of sucrose, 0.4 kcal/g dietary energy, and special physiological functions. It has been approved as GRAS by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and is allowed to be excluded from total and added sugar counts on the food labels. Therefore, D-allulose gradually attracts more public attention. Owing to scarcity in nature, the bioproduction of D-allulose by using ketose 3-epimerase (KEase) has become the research hotspot. Herein, we give a summary of the physicochemical properties, physiological function, applications, and the chemical and biochemical synthesis methods of D-allulose. In addition, the recent progress in the D-allulose bioproduction using KEases, and the possible solutions for existing challenges in the D-allulose industrial production are comprehensively discussed, focusing on the molecular modification, immobilization, food-grade expression, utilizing low-cost biomass as feedstock, overcoming thermodynamic limitation, as well as the downstream separation and purification. Finally, Prospects for further development are also proposed.

Fast-Setting Permeable Alkyd/Polyester Composites: Moulding Sands

This paper presents the outcomes of extensive research targeting the development of high-performance alkyd and polyester resins used as binders in mould- and core-making permeable composite materials designated for large-size/complex-shape, heavy alloy-steel and cast-iron castings (0.5 to 50 tonnes): steam turbine casings (e.g., 18K360 condensing turbine), naval engine blocks and heavy machinery. The technology was implemented by Zamech/ALSTON Power. The key issues discussed here are: (1) control of resin crosslinking kinetics; slow or rapid strength development, (2) shelf-life control of pre-mixed composite, (3) improved thermo-mechanical stability; (4) kinetics of gaseous by-product emission. Optimised composite formulations (resins, crosslinkers and catalysts) allow for the flexible control of material properties and mould-/core fabrication, i.e.,: shelf-life: 10–120 min; mould stripping time: 10 min to 24 h; compressive strength: 4–6 MPa (with post-cure: 10–12 MPa); tensile strength: up to 3 MPa (after post-cure). The moulding sands developed achieved thermal resistance temperatures of up to 345 °C, which exceeded that of 280 °C of comparable commercial material. The onset of the thermal decomposition process was 2–3 times longer than that of furan or commercial alkyd/polyester resin. The technology developed allows for the defect-free manufacture of castings (no pinholes) and binder contents minimisation to 1.2–1.5% with quartz and 1.2% with zirconium or chromite sand.

Ensuring the Robustness and Reliability of Data-Driven Knowledge Discovery Models in Production and Manufacturing

The Cross-Industry Standard Process for Data Mining (CRISP-DM) is a widely accepted framework in production and manufacturing. This data-driven knowledge discovery framework provides an orderly partition of the often complex data mining processes to ensure a practical implementation of data analytics and machine learning models. However, the practical application of robust industry-specific data-driven knowledge discovery models faces multiple data- and model development-related issues. These issues need to be carefully addressed by allowing a flexible, customized and industry-specific knowledge discovery framework. For this reason, extensions of CRISP-DM are needed. In this paper, we provide a detailed review of CRISP-DM and summarize extensions of this model into a novel framework we call Generalized Cross-Industry Standard Process for Data Science (GCRISP-DS). This framework is designed to allow dynamic interactions between different phases to adequately address data- and model-related issues for achieving robustness. Furthermore, it emphasizes also the need for a detailed business understanding and the interdependencies with the developed models and data quality for fulfilling higher business objectives. Overall, such a customizable GCRISP-DS framework provides an enhancement for model improvements and reusability by minimizing robustness-issues.

[The health issues in self-appraisal of workers of industrial production and social sector]

The article considers issues of health, safety and well-being of working citizens in such sectors of economy having great importance for every state such as production and social sphere. The problem of health preservation and working place safety is actual for working population all around the world, going beyond interests of individual citizens and their families and playing primary role in issues of labor safety and productivity, competitiveness and development of enterprises, stability of national economy sectors. The actuality of the study is conditioned by the fact that human resources and labor market are key institutional factors impacting the level of state socioeconomic development and determining health status of working citizens. In Russia, the issues of support by employers safe working conditions in various spheres of national economy to contribute to preservation of their employees health, to occupational diseases prevention ultimately determine both labor productivity at particular enterprise and development and stability of national economy as a whole. The study of self-assessment of health status of workers in industrial production and social sphere was carried out on the basis of results of survey implemented in September 2020 among medical personnel of the Municipal Hospital No. 11 of the city of Ryazan and employees of the oil refining plant - JSC Ryazan Oil Refinery. The analysis of the study results permitted to conclude that, in answering question about health status assessment, workers of social sphere consider themselves to be healthier than workers in industrial production.

Current Situation of the Challenging Scale-Up Development of Hydroxymethylfurfural Production

Hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) is a high-value platform chemical derived from renewable resources. In recent years, considerable efforts have been made to produce HMF also at industrial scale, which still faces some challenges regarding yield as well as sustainable and economic process designs. This critical Review evaluates the industrial process development of sustainable biomass conversion to HMF. Qualitative and quantitative guidelines are defined for the technological assessment of the processes described in patent literature. The formation of side products, difficulties in the separation and purification of HMF as well as catalyst regeneration were identified as major challenges in the HMF production. A first small-scale, commercial HMF production plant with a capacity of 300 tHMF per year has been operating in Switzerland since 2014.

Last Patents on Bubble Electrospinning

Due to their unique properties, nanofibers have been widely used in various areas, for example, information industry, pharmaceutical application, environmental industry, textile and clothing, etc. Bubble electrospinning is one of the most important non-needle electrospinning methods for nanofiber fabrication. It usually uses polymer bubbles for the production of nanomaterials by using electrostatic force, flowing air or mechanical force to overcome the surface tension of bubbles. Bubble electrospinning mainly includes bubble electrospinning and blown bubble electrospinning. History of the development of bubble electrospinning is briefly introduced in this article, and the most promising patents on the technology are elucidated. The methods of bubble electrospinning are single bubble electrospinning, porous bubble electrospinning, blown bubble electrospinning, electrostatic-fieldassisted blown bubble spinning and others. These different bubble electrospinning methods are also discussed in this paper.

An Optimized and Feasible Preparation Technique for the Industrial Production of Hydrogel Patches

For hydrogel patches, the laboratory tests could not fully reveal the existing problems of full scale of industrial production, and there are few studies about the preparation technique for the industrial manufacturing process of hydrogel patches. So, the purpose of this work was to elucidate the effects of mainly technological operation and its parameters on the performance of hydrogel patches at the industrial-scale production. The results revealed the following: (1) the aqueous phase was obtained by polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) along with tartaric acid dissolved in purified water, then feeding this into a vacuum mixer as a whole in one batch, thus extended the crosslinking reaction time of hydrogel paste (matrix) and allowed the operation of coating/cutting-off to be carried out easily, and there was no permeation of backing layer; (2) the gel strength of the hydrogel patches increased with the increase of working temperature, however, once the temperature exceeded 35 ± 2 °C, the hydrogel paste would lose water severely and the resultant physical crosslinking structure which has lower gel/cohesive strength would easily bring gelatinization/residues during application; (3) the relative humidity (RH) of the standing-workshop was dynamically controlled (namely at 35 ± 2 °C, keeping the RH at 55 ± 5% for 4 days, then 65 ± 5% for 2 days), which would make patches with satisfactory characteristics such as better flexibility, higher adhesive force, smooth flat matrix surface, and without gelatinization/residues and warped edge during the using process; (4) the aging of the packaged hydrogel patches was very sensitive to storage temperature, higher temperature, higher gel strength and lower adhesiveness. The storage temperature of 10 ± 2 °C could effectively prevent matrix aging and adhesion losing, which would also facilitate the expiration date of patches extended obviously. In conclusion, this work provides an optimized and feasible preparation technique for the industrial production of the hydrogel patches and establishes the hydrogel patches as a novel carrier for transdermal drug delivery.

Progress in Research and Development of Potato Staple Food Processing Technology

In 2014, potato production in China amounted to 96 million tons, which was the highest in the world. As one of the most important nutritional foods in the world, potato is rich in starch, dietary fiber, vitamins, minerals, etc. Potatoes stand barren environment, drought, saline, and alkaline environment, and cold weather, with a short growing season. These features make them the best rain-fed crops suitable for production even when the annual rainfall is below 400 mm. In 2013, the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture suggested a potato staple food strategy using potatoes to make Chinese traditional staple foods such as steamed bread, noodles, etc. Our research group carried out a study on processing technology of potato staple food, especially fermented staple food. Some new processing technologies of potato staple food have been investigated and developed. The aim of this paper is to give an overview of the possible effects of adding potato flour in the dough and of the microstructure characteristics, technological parameters, total polyphenol content, and antioxidant activity of staple foods. We also systematically describe the processing technology of potato staple foods, which may be of great importance in promoting further expansion of the potato-processing industry and increasing the economic benefit of the companies.

Comparison of lactic acid bacteria diversity during the fermentation of Tarhana produced at home and on a commercial scale

In this study, lactic acid bacteria diversity during the fermentation of homemade and commercially prepared Tarhana, a traditional fermented cereal food from Anatolia, was determined and compared. The isolates collected from Tarhana dough were differentiated according to their (GTG)₅ profiles and then identified using 16S rDNA and pheS gene sequences. The variation of lactic acid bacteria during fermentation was also screened using PCR-DGGE. Commercially prepared Tarhana dough was fermented with higher Lactobacillus spp. diversity than homemade Tarhana dough. Lactobacillus casei, L. alimentarius, L. fabifermentas, and L. paralimentarius were identified differently from the fermentation of commercially prepared Tarhana dough. PCR-DGGE analysis revealed that L. plantarum was the main strain for homemade Tarhana, whereas L. brevis and L. alimentarius were observed in commercially prepared Tarhana dough fermentation. In conclusion, L. plantarum, L. brevis and L. alimentarius can be useful as a potential starter culture for the industrial production of Tarhana.

Antireduction: an ancient strategy fit for future

While antioxidants are on everyone's lips, antireductants are their much less-known counterparts. Following an antioxidant's definition, an antireductant prevents the chemical reduction of another compound by undergoing reduction itself. Antireductants have been traced back as far as the origin of life, which they facilitated by removal of atmospheric dihydrogen, H2 Moreover, as electron acceptors, antireductants equipped the first metabolic pathways, enabling lithoautotrophic microbial growth. When the Earth's atmosphere became more oxidizing, certain antireductants revealed their Janus-face by acting as antioxidants. Both capacities, united in one compound, were detected in primary as well as plant secondary metabolites. Substantiated by product identification, such antireductants comprise antiradicals (e.g. carotenoids) up to diminishers of ruminal methane emission (e.g. fumarate, catechin or resveratrol). Beyond these Janus-faced, multifunctional compounds, the spectrum of antireductants extends to pure electron-attractors (e.g. atmospheric triplet oxygen, O2, for plant root and gut protection). Current and prospective fields of antireductant application range from health promotion over industrial production to environmental sustainability.

Tools for metabolic engineering in Streptomyces

During the last few decades, Streptomycetes have shown to be a very important and adaptable group of bacteria for the production of various beneficial secondary metabolites. These secondary metabolites have been of great interest in academia and the pharmaceutical industries. To date, a vast variety of techniques and tools for metabolic engineering of relevant structural biosynthetic gene clusters have been developed. The main aim of this review is to summarize and discuss the published literature on tools for metabolic engineering of Streptomyces over the last decade. These strategies involve precursor engineering, structural and regulatory gene engineering, and the up or downregulation of genes, as well as genome shuffling and the use of genome scale metabolic models, which can reconstruct bacterial metabolic pathways to predict phenotypic changes and hence rationalize engineering strategies. These tools are continuously being developed to simplify the engineering strategies for this vital group of bacteria.

Mushroom immunomodulators: unique molecules with unlimited applications

For centuries, mushrooms have been used as food and medicine in different cultures. More recently, many bioactive compounds have been isolated from different types of mushrooms. Among these, immunomodulators have gained much interest based on the increasing growth of the immunotherapy sector. Mushroom immunomodulators are classified under four categories based on their chemical nature as: lectins, terpenoids, proteins, and polysaccharides. These compounds are produced naturally in mushrooms cultivated in greenhouses. For effective industrial production, cultivation is carried out in submerged culture to increase the bioactive compound yield, decrease the production time, and reduce the cost of downstream processing. This review provides a comprehensive overview on mushroom immunomodulators in terms of chemistry, industrial production, and applications in medical and nonmedical sectors.

Over-expression, secretion, biochemical characterisation, and structure analysis of Bacillus subtilis aminopeptidase

BACKGROUND

Aminopeptidases have great application in the food industry. Current research on the expression of aminopeptidases mainly focuses on the Escherichia coli expression system. However, the application of recombinant E. coli in the food industry is restricted due to its pathogenicity and low secretory efficiency, which should be concerned in the industrial production of aminopeptidases.

RESULTS

The gene of aminopeptidase from Bacillus subtilis Zj016 (BSAP) was identified. Over-expression and secretion of BSAP were achieved in a B. subtilis expression system with the signal peptide of itself. The yield researched 52 ± 1.9 U mL(-1) , which was 18 times that of the wild-type microbe. The purified enzyme was stable at pH 7.5-9.0 and below 60°C, and was inhibited by several metal ions except appropriate Co(2+) . BSAP was most active toward p-nitroaniline derivatives of Leu, Arg and Lys. Homology modelling and structure analysis showed that there was a flexible protease-associated domain in the predicted structure of BSAP.

CONCLUSIONS

The study presented a simple procedure for over-expression and purification of BSAP. The substrate specificity and structure information were indicated based on the characterisation and homology modelling. This will be useful for further research of aminopeptidases not only from an academic standpoint but also from an applied point of view.