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The various parts of the palmyra and coconut trees which are widely distributed in the southern parts of the Indian subcontinent have been studied and utilized for many years. These contain a white and spongy edible component in them which is found during the germination of the seeds called haustorium. The palmyra and coconut trees each have different sections with special medical properties. Recently, the haustorium of both coconut and palmyra trees has been gaining increased attention from researchers due to its nutritional properties. Certain studies on the haustoria have revealed the presence of various compounds that are beneficial for human health. The bioactive compounds found in the previous studies include phenols, flavonoids, terpenoids, pyrimidine groups and certain vitamins which act as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-ulcer, anti-diabetic, anti-cancer, and anti-mutagenic agents. This review focuses on comparing the nutritional composition, bioactive compounds, sugar profile fatty acid profile, amino acid profile, minerals, and vitamins of both palmyra and coconut haustorium. This review also reports on the value addition of the haustoria as usually they are consumed in their raw form. These value-added products not only enhance the economic viability of these underutilized resources but also contribute to extending their shelf life, making them more accessible in the market. Also, this review emphasizes the haustorium's potential defence against negative consequences. Therefore, this review paper helps in understanding the palmyra and coconut haustorium and its potential health benefits.

This study investigates the expanding domain of functional beverages crafted from plant‐based milk alternatives. In this study, a total of eight different fermented drinks fortified with beneficial Chlorella sp. and probiotics including Lactobacillus rhamnosus (NCIM 5775) and Saccharomyces cerevisiae (Brewer's yeast) drinks were developed using barnyard millet as the base ingredient due to its rich protein and high‐fibre content in comparison with the other millets in the market. Results revealed that the protein content increases by 2% upon the addition of Chlorella sp., among bacterial samples, with Lactobacillus rhamnosus fermented Unflavoured drink (LRFFD) > Lactobacillus rhamnosus fermented flavoured drink > Lactobacillus rhamnosus fermented with Chlorella sp. > LRFM, and among yeast samples, with Saccharomyces cerevisiae fermented Unflavoured drink (SCFUFD) > Saccharomyces cerevisiae fermented with Chlorella sp. > Saccharomyces cerevisiae fermented flavoured drink (SCFFD) > SCFRM, indicating higher protein content than in typical fermented drink. Fat content was notably low across all samples. Ash and fibre content ranged from 0.23 to 0.27 g and 0.22 to 0.35 g, respectively, for both bacterial and yeast fermented drink. Millet is generally considered a carbohydrate‐rich grain. When fermented, some of the carbohydrates may be broken down by the fermentation process. So, the carbohydrate content was low in fermented millet drink when compared to the nonfermented drink. Energy values varied, with LRFFD and SCFFD containing the highest energy due to incorporation of Chlorella sp. and chocolate flavour. Both LAB and yeast‐fermented drinks demonstrated effective antioxidant activity, with higher total phenolic content, except for non‐Chlorella sp. beverages. GC‐MS analysis identified constituents like hexadecenoic acid and hydroxy methyl furfural (HMF) with anticarcinogenic and anti‐inflammatory properties. Additionally, these samples exhibited elevated antimicrobial activity against test strains. Sensory analysis indicated a preference of SCFFD and LRFFD sample for its good taste as it contains chocolate flavour and the overall acceptability of bacterial fermented beverage was higher compared to the yeast fermented drinks. Therefore, a fermented millet beverage was successfully obtained by the coculture of LAB and Saccharomyces cerevisiae incorporated with Chlorella sp. could increase the product's functional properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to investigate the effect of PEF treatment (5, 20, and 35 kV/cm) on functional, physicochemical, and microbiological properties of rice and black gram fermented batter. The PEF treatment efficaciously inhibited the total bacterial, yeast, and mold count from 1 × 107 to 1.8 × 105 CFU/gm and 3.7 × 103 to 4.1 × 102 CFU/gm, respectively at 35 kV/cm. PEF treatment significantly improved protein solubility, reducing sugar, total phenolic content, and antioxidant activity in the fermented batter. Herschel–Bulkley model best described the change in apparent viscosity which significantly decreased in PEF treated samples. Further, FTIR analysis of the PEF treated sample exhibited an increase in the area of percentage in each functional group. The results of the study suggest that the potential of PEF treatment at 20 kV/cm enhanced bioactivity and bioavailability of protein, and carbohydrate content as well as impeded the microorganisms to avoid over‐fermentation. Practical applications: PEF technology effectively inhibits or inactivates the microorganisms in rice and black gram fermented batter and is highly suitable to avoid over‐fermentation without major changes in the physicochemical properties of batter. Therefore, this study promotes inevitable scientific information that could further investigate the industrial production of fermented rice and black gram batter with targeted physicochemical properties through PEF treatment. This also creates new opportunities for food industries to strategically diversify microbial arrest aspects in the commercial fermented batter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The most frequent cancer in women worldwide is breast cancer, it is also the second leading cause of cancerrelated death in women. As a consequence, there is a pressing need to develop more effective cancer medicines. The seed of pumpkin C. maxima reported to have medicinal properties and pharmacological activities like anti-inflammatory, antioxidant and anti-microbial activity. In the present study, we performed DPPH free radical scavenging activity and anti-microbial activity against microorganisms E. coli, P. aeruginosa, A. bracilences, S. aureus using aqueous extract of C. maxima seed were preferred. MCF-7 breast cancer cells were used to test anti-cancer activities in -vitro. The outcomes revealed high anti-oxidant activity of the extract 0.781 ± 0.016 in 100 μg/ml and anti-microbial activity showed the most prominent activity of the extract against all the tested microorganisms. The MTT assay showed IC50 value of 45.40 μg/ml of the extract. Further, the Ao/EtBr staining proved that the methanolic extract of C. maxima possess protective activity against MCF-7 cell lines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Retinal vessel segmentation is a critical task in fundus image analysis, providing essential insights for diagnosing various retinal diseases. In recent years, deep learning (DL) techniques, particularly Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs), have garnered significant attention for their potential to enhance medical image analysis. This paper presents a novel approach for retinal vessel segmentation by harnessing the capabilities of GANs. Our method, termed GANVesselNet, employs a specialized GAN architecture tailored to the intricacies of retinal vessel structures. In GANVesselNet, a dual-path network architecture is employed, featuring an Auto Encoder-Decoder (AED) pathway and a UNet-inspired pathway. This unique combination enables the network to efficiently capture multi-scale contextual information, improving the accuracy of vessel segmentation. Through extensive experimentation on publicly available retinal datasets, including STARE and DRIVE, GANVesselNet demonstrates remarkable performance compared to traditional methods and state-of-the-art deep learning approaches. The proposed GANVesselNet exhibits superior sensitivity (0.8174), specificity (0.9862), and accuracy (0.9827) in segmenting retinal vessels on the STARE dataset, and achieves commendable results on the DRIVE dataset with sensitivity (0.7834), specificity (0.9846), and accuracy (0.9709). Notably, GANVesselNet achieves remarkable performance on previously unseen data, underscoring its potential for real-world clinical applications. Furthermore, we present qualitative visualizations of the generated vessel segmentations, illustrating the network’s proficiency in accurately delineating retinal vessels. In summary, this paper introduces GANVesselNet, a novel and powerful approach for retinal vessel segmentation. By capitalizing on the advanced capabilities of GANs and incorporating a tailored network architecture, GANVesselNet offers a quantum leap in retinal vessel segmentation accuracy, opening new avenues for enhanced fundus image analysis and improved clinical decision-making.

The ac conductivity and dielectric relaxation properties of silver selenomolybdate glasses, Y% AgI-(1-Y)%{MAg&2acute;O-F[0.4SeO3-0.6MoO3]} with varying dopant salt concentration, Y = 20-80% have been investigated as a function of frequency and temperature. The dc conductivity is found to increase by more than two orders of magnitude with increasing AgI concentration. The variation of conductivity with AgI concentration has been rationalized by considering "mixed cluster tissue to amorphous AgI aggregate" model for glass structure. The presence of positional disorder of Ag[sup +] ions in the AgI aggregate region is found to be responsible for the observed enhancement in ionic conduction and also to the variation of conductivity with AgI concentration. The ac conductivity is frequency independent at low frequencies and follows an apparent power law, σ(ω) ∝ ω[sup n] at the high-frequency region. The observed dispersion in conductivity with frequency is attributed to the high probability for the correlated forward-backward hopping of mobile ions in the high-frequency region. The temperature dependence of ac conductivity at fixed frequencies is analyzed using biexponential law with two distinct activation energies. The origin of the two activation energies observed in the ac conductivity is explained in the light of the jump relaxation model. The electrical modulus which describes the dielectric relaxation behavior of the glasses is fitted to a stretched exponential φ(t)=exp[-(t/τ)β] and it obeys time-temperature superposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]