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Biomedical subjects

P Ambrosino

Publications and source records attributed to P Ambrosino.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

Antioxidative activity and carotenoid and tomatine contents in different typologies of fresh consumption tomatoes.

The phytonutrient intake associated with tomato consumption depends also on cultivar and fruit ripening stage. This work associates the antioxidative ability, the level of carotenoids, and the amount of glycoalkaloids to the main carpometric characteristics of four different typologies of tomatoes: "cherry", "cluster", "elongated," and "salad". These typologies have different weights and shapes, and they are usually consumed in the Mediterranean area at different ripening stages. Results showed that the considered tomato typologies also differ in their antioxidative ability and their carotenoid and glycoalkaloid contents. Growing conditions are also important in determining fruit characteristics: the analysis of the same cultivar of cherry tomato produced under the influence of moderate salt stress showed increases in the lipophilic antioxidative ability and the amount of carotenoid, whereas the level of glycoalkaloid decreased.

Antioxidants↗

Extraction of azadirachtin A from neem seed kernels by supercritical fluid and its evaluation by HPLC and LC/MS.

A new supercritical extraction methodology was applied to extract azadirachtin A (AZA-A) from neem seed kernels. Supercritical and liquid carbon dioxide (CO(2)) were used as extractive agents in a three-separation-stage supercritical pilot plant. Subcritical conditions were tested too. Comparisons were carried out by calculating the efficiency of the pilot plant with respect to the milligrams per kilogram of seeds (ms/mo) of AZA-A extracted. The most convenient extraction was gained using an ms/mo ratio of 119 rather than 64. For supercritical extraction, a separation of cuticular waxes from oil was set up in the pilot plant. HPLC and electrospray mass spectroscopy were used to monitor the yield of AZA-A extraction.

Animals↗

Synthesis, cytotoxicity, antitumor activity and sequence selective binding of two pyrazole analogs structurally related to the antitumor agents U-71,184 and adozelesin.

Two pyrazole analogs structurally related to the antitumor agents adozelesin and U-71,184 respectively were synthesized. By using a polymerase chain reaction approach, both compounds show selective binding to A + T rich sequences exactly as reference compound U-71,184. In in vitro assays, against L1210 cell lines, both derivatives showed cytotoxicity in the pM range, values comparable with the natural target compound (+)-CC-1065. The most active compound showed very high antitumor activity in mice implanted with L1210 cells (ILS% 363).

Animals↗

Phylogeny inferred from codon usage pattern in 31 organisms.

We employed the Codonusage database to analyze the codon usage pattern in 31 organisms from all the main biological taxa. We tested the similarity in codon usage pattern between each organism and all the others by the Pearson linear correlation coefficient. The 465 values obtained were located in a 31 x 31 triangular matrix from which a correlation distance matrix was calculated. An evolutionary dendrogram was then constructed from these distances. The results showed a fair correlation between codon usage patterns and phylogenetic relationships, at least for organisms which diverged in rather recent times (end of Jurassic--beginning of Cretaceous).

Animals↗

The analysis of the joint effect of substances on reversion systems and the assessment of antimutagenicity.

The statistical methods for the analysis of mutagenicity and carcinogenicity underwent considerable theoretical-practical development following the need for assessing the mutagenic and carcinogenic potential of substances. Antimutagenicity is investigated through the analysis of respondents in dose-response assays, when two different molecules are administered separately and as a mixture to a respondent system. When the number of respondent units is high, and doses are orthogonal, it is possible to apply simple models such as analysis of variance. This is not always possible or common, and alternative approaches have been developed, based on multiple regression and on tables of proportions. In this work, some of the most frequently used methods for the assessment of joint responses are reviewed, particularly those based on multiple regression, such as the method of Shaeffer et al. and the method of Hass et al. In order to illustrate these methods, joint responses of perylene and cyclopentapyrene, of N-acetylcysteine and dinitropyrene, and of N-acetylcysteine and extracts from diesel exhausts were analyzed. An antagonistic effect of perylene on the action of CPP was detected by the algorithm of Shaeffer et al. The effect is not multiplicative, i.e., it is not proportional to the product of doses. The antimutagenic effect of N-acetylcysteine on dinitropyrene is multiplicative, as detected by the method of Hass et al. The latter reveals that the inhibition by N-acetylcysteine on the mutagenic effect of extracts from diesel exhausts is also multiplicative.

Acetylcysteine↗

Microevolution in Ferrara: isonymy 1890-1990.

The distribution of surnames in the population of the town of Ferrara, as it existed in the memory banks of the Municipality Computer in June 1990, was studied by sex, age and place of birth of residents. Random isonymy was studied separately in persons born before 1901, and in persons born in the nine decades thereafter, ending with the period 1981-90. Isonymy was higher in the older age groups studied. Also other indicators of the abundance of surnames in the distribution, the common ecological indexes derived from entropy, were calculated and compared between age groups. It was found that redundancy, as isonymy, is larger in older age classes than in younger classes. Surname effective number was defined as the inverse of isonymy corrected for sample size, and it was observed that it is practically identical with Fisher's alpha. It was then possible to separate random isonymy into two components, so that for sample size N its formulation becomes Ir = 1/alpha + 1/N It was found that in Ferrara alpha increased significantly in time, indicating enrichment of surnames in the population in the century 1890-1990.

Age Factors↗