January 2017

Microbial production of carotenoids – A review

Carotenoids are natural pigments that can be synthesized by various microorganisms, including bacteria, yeasts, filamentous fungi and microalgae. These pigments comprise around 700 different structures with peculiar colors and biological properties that are beneficial to health. Advantages of biotechnological production of carotenoids include the ability of microorganisms to use low cost substrates, the optimized...

Author(s): Ligia Alves da Costa Cardoso, Karen Yuri Feitosa Kanno and Susan Grace Karp

January 2017

Relationship analysis between gene expression profiles and rat liver cirrhosis occurrence

Liver cirrhosis (LC) is a kind of liver disease which is pathologically characterized by abnormality and necrosis of hepatic cells, proliferation of fibrous tissue, nodular regeneration and pseudolobule formation. To explore the mechanism of LC occurrence at the level of mRNA, Rat Genome 230 2.0 Array was used to detect gene expression profiles of rat fibrotic livers in 3, 6 and 9 weeks after CCl4 treatment in this...

Author(s): Gaiping Wang, Congcong Zhao, Meng Chen, Shasha Chen, Cuifang Chang and Cunshuan Xu

January 2017

Molecular identification, micronutrient content, antifungal and hemolytic activity of starfish Asterias amurensis collected from Kobe coast, Japan

The starfish Asterias amurensis is one of the common species in Japanese coastal area. The species is considered an extremely rich source of biological active compounds, including saponin. Saponins are secondary metabolites and exhibit a wide spectrum of biological activities. The species of starfish caught in Kobe, Hyogo prefecture, Japan, was analyzed for species identification and micronutrient content. The starfish...

Author(s): Farhana Sharmin, Shoichiro Ishizaki and Yuji Nagashima

January 2017

Genetic diversity among Sawakni, Berberi and Najdi sheep breeds in Saudi Arabia using microsatellites markers

The present study was conducted to assess the genetic diversity and population genetic structure of three sheep populations namely; Sawakni (SW), Berberi (BR) and Najdi (NJ), in Saudi Arabia, utilizing 45, 18 and 31 individual blood DNA extractions, respectively. Seventeen microsatellite markers were used to genotype these 94 sheep individuals. There were 195 alleles generated employing the 17 microsatellites loci with...

Author(s): Ahmed Hossam Mahmoud, Ayman swelum, Mohammad Abul Farah, Khalid. Alanazi, Ahmed Rady, Mahmoud Salah, Nabil Amor and Osam Mohammed