Search results for " culturali"
showing 10 items of 1669 documents
Transportan 10 Induces Perturbation and Pores Formation in Giant Plasma Membrane Vesicles Derived from Cancer Liver Cells
2023
Continuous progress has been made in the development of new molecules for therapeutic purposes. This is driven by the need to address several challenges such as molecular instability and biocompatibility, difficulties in crossing the plasma membrane, and the development of host resistance. In this context, cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) constitute a promising tool for the development of new therapies due to their intrinsic ability to deliver therapeutic molecules to cells and tissues. These short peptides have gained increasing attention for applications in drug delivery as well as for their antimicrobial and anticancer activity but the general rules regulating the events involved in cell…
Thioflavin T Promotes Aβ(1−40) Amyloid Fibrils Formation
2015
Fibrillogenesis of the small peptide Aβ(1-40) is considered to be the hallmark of Alzheimer's disease. Some evidence indicates small oligomers, rather than mature fibrils, as the key cytotoxic agents. The fluorescent dye Thioflavin T (ThT) is often used to detect amyloid deposits in both in vivo and in vitro experiments, and it is used to study kinetic measurements, under the fundamental hypothesis that this probe does not influence the aggregation processes. We report experimental data showing that ThT may promote the Aβ(1-40) peptide amyloid aggregation changing solvent-peptide interactions and stabilizing more ordered β-like conformation. This finding has a two-fold importance: It is a f…
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in indoor emission from decorative candles
2011
Abstract This study investigates PAHs indoor emissions from burning decorative candle in an indoor environment because emissions from burning wax in home have rarely been addressed. A total of 12 air samples were collected during the entire burning period of the decorative candles. Particulate and gaseous PAHs emissions were simultaneously measured by passing effluent through a filter (to collect particulate-phase PAHs), a cold trap and ORBO 43 tubes (to capture gaseous-phase PAHs). Analysis involved ultrasound extraction, followed by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS). The measured total PAHs concentration (particulate + aqueous phase + gas phases) for the candles, reported as ma…
Cyclodextrin/surfactant inclusion complexes: An integrated view of their thermodynamic and structural properties
2021
Cyclodextrins (CDs) play an important role in self-assembly systems of amphiphiles. The structure of CDs provides distinguished physicochemical properties, including the ability to form host-guest complexes. The complexation affects the properties of guest molecules and can produce supramolecular aggregates with desirable characteristics for fundamental and practical applications. Surfactants are particularly attractive host molecules due to their wide variety, availability, responsiveness to different stimuli, and high relevance in different fields, e.g. medical, cosmetic, pharmaceutical, and food industries. The tendency of organization in higher-order supramolecular aggregates arises the…
Contamination from polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in the soil of a botanic garden localized next to a former manufacturing gas plant in Pale…
2010
The Botanical Garden lies within the city of Palermo, a few meters away from one of the largest unused Manufacturing Gas Plant in Sicily. The total concentrations of PAHs (23 compounds) in the soil of Botanical Garden ranged from 947 to 18,072 microg/kg. The wide range of PAH concentrations (RSD=84%) found in the soil samples indicates heterogeneous levels of contamination in the area and this can be explained by considering the different tree distributions which prevents the homogeneous deposition of pollutants on the soil. Soils collected in the Botanical Garden generally showed the highest PAH concentrations, being almost 2-3 times higher than the concentration samples obtained in the ur…
Chemical speciation of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in sediments: partitioning and extraction of humic substances.
2010
The primary objective of this study was to examine the chemical speciation of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) found in sediments endowed with different characteristics. To achieve this purpose and because the nature of the sediments influences the distribution of PAHs, we have analyzed four different types of sediments. To study the role of organic matter in the sequestration of PAHs, we fractionated humic substances into humic acids and humin–mineral fractions. After their separation and purification, the humic components were examined for their sorptive reactivity by extracting them with organic solvents; these extracts were subsequently subjected to GC/MS analysis. Our results sh…
Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons in Sediments of Marine Coastal Lagoons in Messina, Italy: Extraction and GC/MS Analysis, Distribution and Sources
2004
The content of 21 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) has been determined in 16 samples of sediments collected from Ganzirri and Faro marine coastal lagoons in Messina (Italy). Analysis was performed by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) in selected ion monitoring (SIM) mode. The total concentration of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) ranged from 74 to 5755 ...g/Kg of dry matrix. The resulting distributions and molecular ratios of specific compounds have been discussed in terms of sampling location and origin of organic matter. The results obtained show that levels of contamination are not homogeneous throughout the stations, while the relative distributions of PAH are…
Translocation dynamics of a short polymer driven by an oscillating force
2013
Under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
Determination of selected polyaromatic hydrocarbons by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry for the analysis of wood to establish the cause of sinkin…
2014
Abstract The aim of this paper was to establish the cause of sinking of an old wooden vessel by polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) analyses because wood combustion is a source of PAHs. In particular, the molecular PAH patterns generated by each source are like fingerprints and it is possible to determine the processes that generate PAHs by studying their distribution in wood samples. The relative abundance of high molecular weight PAHs, together with the PAH compound ratios and with total index (proposed by us) has demonstrated that samples owe their PAHs in wood archaeological material to a predominant single mode of origin, i.e. combustion processes, therefore we can say that the sinki…
MbCO embedded in trehalosyldextrin matrices: thermal effects and protein-matrix coupling
2010
Saccharide-based biopreservation is widely studied because of its scientific importance and possible technological outcomes for food and pharmaceutical industries. Ternary protein/saccharide/water systems have been extensively exploited to model the characteristics of the in vivo biopreservation process. A tight, water dependent, protein–matrix coupling has been shown to occur in various simple saccharide amorphous matrices, which is stronger in trehalose. The efficiency as bioprotectant of trehalose has been ascribed to this tight coupling, since the appearance of damages on biological structures will more involve structural variations of the surrounding matrix. Here we present, as an appl…