Antifungal activities of quince seed mucilage hydrogel decorated with essential oils of Nigella sativa, Citrus sinensis and Cinnamon verum

Background and Objectives:

Candidiasis and pityriasis versicolor are opportunistic fungal infections that are caused by Candida spp. and Malassezia spp. yeasts. Conventional drugs like azole and amino derivatives are known to treat fungal skin diseases. However, drawbacks like long-term side effects and drug resistance lead to investigate on antifungal properties of phytochemicals as an alternative to available synthetic drugs.

Materials and Methods:

The herbal nano hydrogel was successfully synthesized from Quince Seed extract followed by ultrasonic treatment and it has been formulated using a mixture of essential oils. We evaluated the antifungal in vitro assay for a mixture of essential oils in combination with herbal nano hydrogel against Candida albicans and Malasezia furfur strains by micro dilution method.

Results:

The results indicated that essential oils possess antifungal activity with the MIC value of 12.5 and 6.24 mg/ml against C. albicans and M. furfur, respectively. No fungicidal effect was reported for the herbal hydrogel before nanofabrication while it shown some antifungal activity after ultrasonic treatment for 5 and 10 minutes. As anticipated; the antifungal property of essential oil mixture was appreciably improved when it combined with herbal nano hydrogel where the highest level of inhibition was observed at concentration of 3.125 mg/ml for both strains. The loss in biological activity observed when the ultrasonic treatment on herbal nano hydrogel performed for longer time.

Conclusion:

The proposed plant-based nano formulation shown promising in vitro antifungal activities against C. albicans and M. furfur strains and its antifungal properties were comparable with commercially available agents like clotrimazole. The new formulation expected to be safe with minimum long-term side effects. Further investigations are underway to confirm the safety and the mechanism of the action of this new herbal formulation.

A Simple Aluminum Bromide-Promoted Diastereoselective Synthesis of Panduratin A Derivatives

A facile diastereoselective synthesis of panduratin A derivatives using commercially available aluminum(III) bromide is reported. The effect of substituents on the Diels–Alder reaction of various trans-chalcones with (E)-ocimene was investigated. A series of panduratin A derivatives were prepared in moderate to good yields.

Rational Design and Synthesis of New, High Efficiency, Multipotent Schiff Base-1,2,4-triazole Antioxidants Bearing Butylated Hydroxytoluene Moieties

A new series of multipotent antioxidants (MPAOs), namely Schiff base-1,2,4-triazoles attached to the oxygen-derived free radical scavenging moiety butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT) were designed and subsequently synthesized. The structure-activity relationship (SAR) of the designed antioxidants was established alongside the prediction of activity spectra for substances (PASS). The antioxidant activities of the synthesized compounds 4-10 were tested by the DPPH bioassay. The synthesized compounds 4-10 inhibited stable DPPH free radicals at a level that is 10(-4) M more than the well-known standard antioxidant BHT. Compounds 8-10 with para-substituents were less active than compounds 4 and 5 with trimethoxy substituents compared to those with a second BHT moiety (compounds 6 and 7). With an IC50 of 46.13 ± 0.31 µM, compound 6 exhibited the most promising in vitro inhibition at 89%. Therefore, novel MPAOs containing active triazole rings, thioethers, Schiff bases, and BHT moieties are suggested as potential antioxidants for inhibiting oxidative stress processes and scavenging free radicals, hence, this combination of functions is anticipated to play a vital role in repairing cellular damage, preventing various human diseases and in medical therapeutic applications.

Understanding the chemistry behind the antioxidant activities of butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT): a review

Hindered phenols find a wide variety of applications across many different industry sectors. Butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT) is a most commonly used antioxidant recognized as safe for use in foods containing fats, pharmaceuticals, petroleum products, rubber and oil industries. In the past two decades, there has been growing interest in finding novel antioxidants to meet the requirements of these industries. To accelerate the antioxidant discovery process, researchers have designed and synthesized a series of BHT derivatives targeting to improve its antioxidant properties to be having a wide range of antioxidant activities markedly enhanced radical scavenging ability and other physical properties. Accordingly, some structure-activity relationships and rational design strategies for antioxidants based on BHT structure have been suggested and applied in practice. We have identified 14 very sensitive parameters, which may play a major role on the antioxidant performance of BHT. In this review, we attempt to summarize the current knowledge on this topic, which is of significance in selecting and designing novel antioxidants using a well-known antioxidant BHT as a building-block molecule. Our strategy involved investigation on understanding the chemistry behind the antioxidant activities of BHT, whether through hydrogen or electron transfer mechanism to enable promising anti-oxidant candidates to be synthesized.

Chalcones with electron-withdrawing and electron-donating substituents: anticancer activity against TRAIL resistant cancer cells, structure-activity relationship analysis and regulation of apoptotic proteins

In the present study, a series of 46 chalcones were synthesised and evaluated for antiproliferative activities against the human TRAIL-resistant breast (MCF-7, MDA-MB-231), cervical (HeLa), ovarian (Caov-3), lung (A549), liver (HepG2), colorectal (HT-29), nasopharyngeal (CNE-1), erythromyeloblastoid (K-562) and T-lymphoblastoid (CEM-SS) cancer cells. The chalcone 38 containing an amino (-NH2) group on ring A was the most potent and selective against cancer cells. The effects of the chalcone 38 on regulation of 43 apoptosis-related markers in HT-29 cells were determined. The results showed that 20 apoptotic markers (Bad, Bax, Bcl-2, Bcl-w, Bid, Bim, CD40, Fas, HSP27, IGF-1, IGFBP-4, IGFBP-5, Livin, p21, Survivin, sTNF-R2, TRAIL-R2, XIAP, caspase-3 and caspase-8) were either up regulated or down regulated.

3-(2-Amino-phenyl-sulfanyl)-1,3-diphenyl-propan-1-one

In the title compound, C₂₁H₁₉NOS, the three aromatic rings are not coplanar, the dihedral angles between them being 84.75 (7), 88.01 (8) and 8.36 (16)°. In the crystal, two types of C—H⋯ π inter­actions, one of which is weak, and N—H⋯π inter­actions link the mol­ecules into layers parallel to the ab plane.

(E)-3-(6-Nitro-benzo[d][1,3]dioxol-5-yl)-1-(2,4,6-trimethoxy-phen-yl)prop-2-en-1-one

In the mol-ecule of the title compound, C(19)H(17)NO(8), the benzodioxole unit is oriented at a dihedral angle of 61.45 (6)° with respect to the meth-oxy-substituted phenyl ring. The nitro group is not co-planar to the benzene ring to which it is attached, making a dihedral angle of 31.86 (17)°. In the crystal structure, inter-molecular C-H⋯O inter-actions link the mol-ecules into chains through R(2) (2)(8) ring motifs. The π⋯π contacts between the benzodioxole rings, [centroid-centroid distances = 3.7610 (9), 3.6613 (9) and 3.7975 (9) Å] may further stabilize the structure.

4-Chloro-2-[(E)-2-(4-methoxyphenyl)ethyliminomethyl]phenol

In the title Schiff base, C₁₆H₁₆ClNO₂, the 2-(4-methoxy­phen­yl)ethyl (CH₃OC₆H₄CH₂CH₂–; r.m.s. deviation = 0.10 Å) and 4-chloro-2-(imino­meth­yl)phenol (N=CHC₆H₃ClOH; r.m.s. deviation = 0.01 Å) portions are both essentially planar, the two parts being inclined at an angle of 61.8 (1)°. The hydroxy group forms a hydrogen bond to the imino N atom.