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Salvia officinalis is one of the most important medicinal and aromatic plants in terms of nutritional and medicinal value because it contains a variety of vital active ingredients. Terpenoid compounds, particularly monoterpenes (C10) and sesquiterpenes, are the most important and abundant among these active substances (C15). Terpenes play a variety of roles and have beneficial biological properties in plants. With these considerations, the current study sought to clone theNAD+-dependent farnesol dehydrogenase (SoFLDH, EC: 1.1.1.354) gene from S . officinalis . Functional analysis revealed that, SoFLDH has an open reading frame of 2,580 base pairs that encodes 860 amino acids. SoFLDH has two conserved domains and four types of highly conserved motifs: YxxxK, RXR, RR (X8) W, TGxxGhaG. However, SoFLDH was cloned from Salvia officinalis leaves and functionally overexpressed in Arabidopsis thaliana to investigate its role in sesquiterpenoid synthases. In comparison to the transgenic plants, the wild-type plants showed a slight delay in growth and flowering formation. To this end, a gas chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis revealed that SoFLDH transgenic plants were responsible for numerous forms of terpene synthesis, particularly sesquiterpene. These results provide a base for further investigation on SoFLDH gene role and elucidating the regulatory mechanisms for sesquiterpene synthesis in S . offcinalis . And our study paves the way for the future metabolic engineering of the biosynthesis of useful terpene compounds in S . offcinalis .

Acinetobacter baumannii is a Gram-negative coccobacillus responsible for severe hospital-acquired infections, particularly in intensive care units (ICUs). The current study was designed to characterize the virulence traits of biofilm-forming carbapenem-resistant A. baumannii causing pneumonia in ICU patients using a Galleria mellonella model. Two hundred and thirty patients with hospital-acquired or ventilator-associated pneumonia were included in our study. Among the total isolates, A. baumannii was the most frequently isolated etiological agent in ICU patients with pneumonia (54/165, 32.7%). All A. baumannii isolates were subjected to antimicrobial susceptibility testing by the Kirby–Bauer disk diffusion method, while the minimum inhibitory concentrations of imipenem and colistin were estimated using the broth microdilution technique. The biofilm formation activity of the isolates was tested using the microtiter plate technique. Biofilm quantification showed that 61.1% (33/54) of the isolates were strong biofilm producers, while 27.7% (15/54) and 11.1% (6/54) showed moderate or weak biofilm production. By studying the prevalence of carbapenemases-encoding genes among isolates, blaOXA-23-like was positive in 88.9% of the isolates (48/54). The BlaNDM gene was found in 27.7% of the isolates (15/54 isolates). BlaOXA-23-like and blaNDM genes coexisted in 25.9% (14/54 isolates). Bap and blaPER-1 genes, the biofilm-associated genes, coexisted in 5.6% (3/54) of the isolates. For in vivo assessment of A. baumannii pathogenicity, a Galleria mellonella survival assay was used. G. mellonella survival was statistically different between moderate and poor biofilm producers (p < 0.0001). The killing effect of the strong biofilm-producing group was significantly higher than that of the moderate and poor biofilm producers (p < 0.0001 for each comparison). These findings highlight the role of biofilm formation as a powerful virulence factor for carbapenem-resistant A. baumannii that causes pneumonia in the ICU.

Salvia officinalis is one of the most important medicinal and aromatic plants in terms of nutritional and medicinal value because it contains a variety of vital active ingredients. Terpenoid compounds, particularly monoterpenes (C10) and sesquiterpenes, are the most important and abundant among these active substances (C15). Terpenes play a variety of roles and have beneficial biological properties in plants. With these considerations, the current study sought to clone theNAD+-dependent farnesol dehydrogenase (SoFLDH, EC: 1.1.1.354) gene from S. officinalis. Functional analysis revealed that, SoFLDH has an open reading frame of 2,580 base pairs that encodes 860 amino acids.SoFLDH has two conserved domains and four types of highly conserved motifs: YxxxK, RXR, RR (X8) W, TGxxGhaG. However, SoFLDH was cloned from Salvia officinalis leaves and functionally overexpressed in Arabidopsis thaliana to investigate its role in sesquiterpenoid synthases. In comparison to the transgenic plants, the wild-type plants showed a slight delay in growth and flowering formation. To this end, a gas chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis revealed that SoFLDH transgenic plants were responsible for numerous forms of terpene synthesis, particularly sesquiterpene. These results provide a base for further investigation on SoFLDH gene role and elucidating the regulatory mechanisms for sesquiterpene synthesis in S. offcinalis. And our study paves the way for the future metabolic engineering of the biosynthesis of useful terpene compounds in S. offcinalis.

Onychomycosis is a chronic fungal infection of the nails that accounts for10% of the population worldwide and about 50% of the nail diseases in clinical practice. It has negative impact on patient’s quality of life. Multiple treatments are introduced to treat onychomycosis but they are limited by high cost, side effects, drug interaction, and reduced transungual delivery. We aimed to investigate the safety and efficacy of calcipotriol 0.005% cream versus terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream in treatment of onychomycosis. Twenty adult patients with bilateral onychomycosis were randomized. Twenty adult patients with bilateral onychomycosis were randomized in this study. The patients received calcipotriol 0.005% cream on one side and terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream on the other side twice/day for 3 months. Outcome was evaluated after treatment by onychomycosis severity index (OSI), mycological evaluation, investigator’s assessment and patient’s satisfaction. Side effects were also evaluated. Study registration number (IRB approval number M602, 30/8/2022). Calcipotriol 0.005% cream had significant higher degree of improvement after 3-month treatment of onychomycosis compared to terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream ( p value = 0.02), while calcipotriol had significantly higher side effects in terms of tolerable irritation compared to terbenafine ( p value < 0.05). Insignificant differences between both sides were found regarding post treatment OSI, investigator’s assessment and patient’s satisfaction ( p value = 0.12, 0.73, 0.22 respectively). This pilot study provided preliminary data for significant superiority of calcipotriol 0.005% cream in treatment of onychomycosis regarding degree of improvement after 3-month treatment compared to terbinafine hydrochloride 1% cream. Irritation induced by calcipotriol 0.005% cream was tolerable by the patients. Further studies are still needed.

Background In traditional North Africa, medicine decoctions of the leaves of Periploca angustifolia are used to treat diarrhea, inflammation, ulcers, edema and diabetes. The aim of the study was to evaluate the phytochemical, anti-inflammatory, anti-ulcerogenic, and hypoglycemic activities of an ethanolic extract of P. angustifolia L. in rats. Methods An extract of air-dried powdered P. angustifolia plant was obtained using 96% ethanol. The extract was concentrated and the total phenolic and flavonoids contents were estimated colorimetrically. The phenolic and flavonoid compounds were quantified and identified using high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The anti-inflammatory, anti-ulcerogenic and hypoglycemic activities of the extract were evaluated in three rat models respectively: formaldehyde-induced paw edema, ethanol induced gastric damage and alloxan induced hyperglycemia. Results The total flavonoids and total phenolics constituted 15% and 2.69% of the extract, respectively and are expressed as quercetin equivalent and μg/mg gallic acid equivalent (GAE). Coumarin, resorcinol, isorhamnetin, quercetin, and naphthalene were isolated from the ethanolic extract of P. angustifolia . Oral administration of the ethanolic extract at 500 mg/kg body weight (b.wt.) significantly reduced paw inflammation, gastric lesions, ulcer index scores and blood glucose levels in normal and diabetic rats. Conclusion The crude ethanolic extract of P. angustifolia exhibited promising anti-inflammatory, anti-ulcerogenic, and hypoglycemic activities in accordance with the plant’s uses in folk medicine suggesting that P. angustifolia may be a safe alternative to chemical drugs.

This study aimed to investigate the phytochemical constituents, antimicrobial activity, and antioxidant effects of successive extracts of Ziziphora capitata L. aerial parts. UPLC-QTOF-MS/MS identified 79 phytoconstituents, including phenolic acids, alkaloids, flavonoids, and anthocyanins, as major phytoconstituents. Additionally, primary phytochemical investigations revealed the presence of terpenoids, steroids, flavonoids, alkaloids, tannins, and saponins in various plant fractions. The MICs of successive extracts were tested against a range of microorganisms, including gram-positive bacteria (Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, Streptococcus mutants, Enterococcus faecalis, Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Staphylococcus epidermidis), gram-negative bacteria (Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Salmonella typhimurium, and Enterobacter cloacae), fungi (Aspergillus niger and Penicillium aurantiogriseum), and yeast (Candida albicans and Candida tropicalis), using the disk diffusion technique. The ethyl acetate and 95% ethanol extracts exhibited significant antibacterial activity against the tested microorganisms; however, the hexane fraction affected only P. aeruginosa. The effects of the CHCl3 and H2O fractions varied in their activities against most of the bacteria examined. Additionally, the AcOEt and 95% EtOH extracts exhibited significant antioxidant activity with IC50 = 18.6 ± 0.97 and 30.4 ± 1.86 µg/mL, respectively, compared to that of ascorbic acid (IC50 = 10.6 ± 0.8 µg/mL, reference drug). Antibacterial and antioxidant activities can be attributed to phytoconstituents, which were identified using UPLC-QTOF-MS/MS. Furthermore, docking simulations of the top ten phytochemicals of the 70% methanolic extract were carried out inside the active site of S. aureus DNA gyrase (PDB: 2XCT) and dihydropteroate synthase (DHPS) from S. pneumoniae (PDB: 2VEG) as bacterial targets and these compounds exhibited good binding modes with different types of interactions.Article HighlightsZiziphora capitata extracts have potential as natural antioxidants and antimicrobial agents.This study identified 79 phytochemicals, including anthocyanins, phenolic acids, alkaloids, flavonoids, terpenoids, and steroids.In silico docking simulations suggest that these phytochemicals could be used to develop innovative antibacterial agents.

Background Many studies found association between psychosocial factors and suicidal behavior; this association differs from one community to another, and this difference could affect the risk assessment and the management of suicidal behavior. The aim of this work was to evaluate the role of socioeconomic, cultural, and psychosocial profile including psychiatric comorbidity on individuals with suicidal behavior who attended Tanta University emergency hospital. Results Family troubles were the commonest cause of suicidal behavior (28%), and drug overdose was the commonest method of attempt (38%). Positive correlation is between age and score of Beck scale for suicidal ideation ( p = 0.000) which indicates that suicidal ideation increases with age. Significant association is between psychiatric comorbidity and Beck’s scale for suicidal ideation ( p = 0.019), with size of association ( η = 0.58). Regression analysis showed that older age, female sex, illiterates, widows, cases with psychiatric illness, and low socioeconomic status when act altogether are the significant predictor of suicidal ideation of our studied sample. Conclusions Our study demonstrated that studying psychosocial factors in individuals who came to emergency hospital of Tanta University could be a reflection of the community visiting this hospital asking for medical emergency service; the comprehensive and multifactorial assessment we have been adopted in this work could help in better understanding of the suicidal risk factors in this community and consequently help in part in tailoring the clinical service for this sector of patient.

Salvia officinalis is one of the most important medicinal and aromatic plants in terms of nutritional and medicinal value because it contains a variety of vital active ingredients. Terpenoid compounds, particularly monoterpenes (C10) and sesquiterpenes, are the most important and abundant among these active substances (C15). Terpenes play a variety of roles and have beneficial biological properties in plants. With these considerations, the current study sought to clone theNAD+-dependent farnesol dehydrogenase (SoFLDH, EC: 1.1.1.354) gene from S. officinalis. Functional analysis revealed that, SoFLDH has an open reading frame of 2,580 base pairs that encodes 860 amino acids.SoFLDH has two conserved domains and four types of highly conserved motifs: YxxxK, RXR, RR (X8) W, TGxxGhaG. However, SoFLDH was cloned from Salvia officinalis leaves and functionally overexpressed in Arabidopsis thaliana to investigate its role in sesquiterpenoid synthases. In comparison to the transgenic plants, the wild-type plants showed a slight delay in growth and flowering formation. To this end, a gas chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis revealed that SoFLDH transgenic plants were responsible for numerous forms of terpene synthesis, particularly sesquiterpene. These results provide a base for further investigation on SoFLDH gene role and elucidating the regulatory mechanisms for sesquiterpene synthesis in S. offcinalis. And our study paves the way for the future metabolic engineering of the biosynthesis of useful terpene compounds in S. offcinalis.

This research includes three main contributions to nonlinear control and estimation system theory, applications, and designs: 1. Formulating a new control strategy based on the Control Lyapunov Function (CLF) for Human Immunodeficiency Virus type one (HIV-1) nonlinear systems. 2. Determining a regulator design using input/output feedback global linearization methodology for multiple observed HIV-1 patients. 3. Modeling and identifying the problem for experimental biolaboratory data on the effect of Herpes Simplex Virus type one (HSV-1) on the corneas of infected mice. In the first contribution, construction of a new control strategy to efficiently manipulate HIV-1 dynamics is considered. A nonlinear controller design based on the Lyapunov function is developed and demonstrated for basic and complex HIV-1 dynamic models. The HIV-1 model with and without time delays is controlled by adding a control input (T cells drug modulator) through the infected cells in order to improve the dynamic performance and effectively damps out the oscillations of HIV-1 dynamics in the presence of parameter variations and dynamic disturbances. Furthermore, a nonlinear Lyapunov-based control for a reduced model of HIV-1 with observed data is formulated. In the second contribution, a multi input/multi output control affine HIV-1 system for several patients is addressed when the system is partially linearized by nonlinear transformation. Regulating the viral level for different observed patients under the limit of detection was accomplished by using an LQR controller along with the input/output feedback linearization technique. In the third contribution, system modeling and new identification for HSV-1 with innate immune response from experimental biolaboratory data are conducted. The main challenge in this area of the research was that there are no existing models in the literature to describe the dynamics of HSV-1 with immune responses. Thus, a nonlinear model that can characterize the essential biological interactions between the HSV-1 virus and innate immune system and simultaneously fit the observed data that were taken from Oakland University-Department of Biological Sciences was developed. The laboratory measurements were divided into training and testing data sets after preprocessing experimental data and an estimation algorithm was applied to identify the parameters of the proposed model. Moreover, the validation of the model was performed by considering the root mean square error measure and the sensitivity analysis. Simulations and results for the HIV-1 and HSV-1 applications are extensively reported.

Favipiravir is considered a potential treatment for COVID-19 due its efficacy against different viral infections. We aimed to explore the safety and efficacy of favipiravir in treatment of COVID-19 mild and moderate cases. It was randomized-controlled open-label interventional phase 3 clinical trial [NCT04349241]. 100 patients were recruited from 18th April till 18th May. 50 patients received favipiravir 3200 mg at day 1 followed by 600 mg twice (day 2-day 10). 50 patients received hydroxychloroquine 800 mg at day 1 followed by 200 mg twice (day 2-10) and oral oseltamivir 75 mg/12 h/day for 10 days. Patients were enrolled from Ain Shams University Hospital and Assiut University Hospital. Both arms were comparable as regards demographic characteristics and comorbidities. The average onset of SARS-CoV-2 PCR negativity was 8.1 and 8.3 days in HCQ-arm and favipiravir-arm respectively. 55.1% of those on HCQ-arm turned PCR negative at/or before 7th day from diagnosis compared to 48% in favipiravir-arm (p = 0.7). 4 patients in FVP arm developed transient transaminitis on the other hand heartburn and nausea were reported in about 20 patients in HCQ-arm. Only one patient in HCQ-arm died after developing acute myocarditis resulted in acute heart failure. Favipiravir is a safe effective alternative for hydroxychloroquine in mild or moderate COVID-19 infected patients.