Worldwide salinity is one of the most severe abiotic stresses limiting crop growth and productivity. Further salt-affected area in Tunisia is fast escalating due to intrusion of saline water on arable land and use of chemicals compounds. To overcome these agricultural problems, the aim of this study is the selection of bacterial strains from saline soil sites for their capacity of promoting growth plants under stressful conditions after a seed biopriming approach.

Differents biochemical parameters of plant growth were analyzed such as bacterial growth under 100 and 150 mM, phosphate solubilization, ACC metabolic pathway, AIA secretion, siderophores, HCN, antimicrobials compounds,…

Four strains within fifty were selected for their high ability to produce many growth factors under stressful conditions (150mM) and promote seed germination of Tunisian var. durum wheat. Moreover, seed biopriming with strain MA13 had the highest ability of seed germination after 2 days of incubation at room temperature under obscurity light.

Warfarin is a commonly prescribed anticoagulant in clinic. It has large individual variability. The pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics (PKPD) of warfarin had been established. There also exist some unknown factors that could affect warfarin effect. The purpose of the study was to explore the contribution of vitamin K and gut microbiota to individual variability of warfarin in cardiac surgery patients. A total of 246 patients were enrolled in the present study. Serum and fecal samples were collected used to detect warfarin and vitamin K (VK1 and MK4) concentrations and the diversity of gut microbiota, respectively. The demographic characteristics, drug history, and CYP2C9 and VKORC1 genotype were recorded from the patients’ medical records. The INR and warfarin concentration bias were predicted according to the PKPD model. The results of INR and warfarin concentration predicted bias by the PKPD model were: 78.7% of Ideal prediction for INR, 66.7% of Ideal prediction for S-warfarin, 75.0% of Ideal prediction for R-warfarin. Only INR PE was compared with VK concentration and gut microbiota due to INR was the main indicator for warfarin therapy in clinic. The INR of patients decreased with increasing of VK concentration. The pharmacodynamic parameter C50 of S-warfarin, which was derived from the PKPD model, increased with increasing of VK concentration. The results diversity of gut microbiota showed that Prevotella might be associated with warfarin anticoagulation. In conclusion, vitamin K had some effect on the individual variability of warfarin. The gut microbiota might also have a certain effect on the variability of warfarin.

Despite improvements in diagnosis and chemotherapy, non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) remains one of the most common cancer and has the largest proportion of all cancer death rates today. Computational approaches have been widely applied for early detection of novel treatment for NSCLC. Herein we developed a multi-objective approach or the screening of chemical compounds simultaneously active against three NSCLC cell lines: A549, NCI-H1299 and NCI-H1975. The first step consisted of developing ensemble models based on cytotoxicity data against three NSCLC cell lines curated from ChEMBL database. A desirable-based algorithm was then applied to incorporate these models into a multi-objective optimization system that can be used for virtual screening protocol. This system showed suitable screening performance with the Boltzmann-Enhanced Discrimination of ROC BEDROC = 0.62, the Enrichment Factor (EF)_1% = 30 and the Area Under the Accumulation Curve (AUAC) = 0.69

Some flowering plants biosynthesize peptides known as cyclotides. These peptides present a peculiar cyclic structure with a molecular weight range of 2.8 to 3.7 kDa. They are characterized by a head-to-tail cyclized backbone, which is stabilized by three disulfide bonds forming a cyclic cystine knot (CCK) motif. This structural topology allows remarkable stability, with exceptional resistance to thermal, chemical, or enzymatic degradation. The structural features confer to these "mini-proteins" several biological properties, which have attracted attention from both the scientific community and the pharmaceutical industry. In Brazil, the research focus on this class of natural products is under-exploited. Although this country gathers one of the largest biodiversity in the world, being an ideal ‘playground’ for phytochemists to discover peptides from plants, there are only a few studies reporting cyclotides from Brazilian plants. The relative lack of study of cyclotides in Brazilian plants probably reflects an earlier focus among Brazilian researchers on nonpeptidic natural products. It is estimated that Violaceae and Rubiaceae plants could exhibit >150,000 individual cyclotides.Thus, this work aims to present an overview of Brazilian studies focusing on cyclotides, their sequence diversities and reported activities.

Surgical site infection is a common complication after surgery. It is necessary to prevent or treat postoperative infection with antibiotics. The use of antibiotics could disturb the composition and/or functions of gut microbiota. The purpose of the present study was to explore the effect of antibiotics on gut microbiota in patients who underwent cardiac surgery. A total of 622 fecal samples were collected from 244 cardiac surgery patients. The V3–V4 hypervariable region of the bacterial 16S rRNA gene was amplified and sequenced on a MiSeq PE300. The gut microbiota diversity of samples was analyzed from alpha diversity at the OTU level and the distribution proportion of dominant bacteria at the genus level by a Circos graph, and the differences among different groups were compared by partial least squares discriminant analysis at the OTU level. As expected, antibiotics could perturb the composition of the gut microbiota in cardiac surgery patients. When antibiotics were administered over 7 days, the composition of the gut microbiota was significantly disturbed. The gut microbiota composition of patients returning to preantibiotic levels might need antibiotic withdrawal for at least 28 days.