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Consumers seek naturalness across many domains, including physical appearance. It seems that the desire for natural beauty would discourage artificial appearance-enhancement consumption, such as cosmetic use. However, across an analysis of the “no-makeup movement” on Twitter and Nielsen cosmetic sales (Study 1a), an image analysis of #nomakeup selfies using machine learning approaches (Study 1b), and three experiments (Studies 2–4), we find that calls to look natural can be associated with increased artificial beauty practices. Drawing from attribution theory, we theorize that calls to look natural maintain the value of attractiveness while adding the consumer concern that others will discount their attractiveness if overt effort is present. Thus, rather than investing less effort, consumers may engage in a self-presentational strategy wherein they construct an appearance of naturalness to signal low effort to others, thereby augmenting their attractiveness. This work contributes to attribution and self-presentation theory and offers practical implications for naturalness consumption.

Distinctions in the attributes of niche versus mainstream brands are leveraged to explain differences in the drivers of online review ratings. Specifically, we examine how customer review valence, professional critics review valence, community characteristics, location similarity, and reviewer characteristics may impact a reviewer’s rating. We use a unique dataset on the U.S. beer product category to address our research questions and find that niche brands are more impacted by OWOM activity across the board because consumers are less likely to have established brand awareness and brand imagery formed. Likewise, a reviewer is prone to rating a local niche brand more favorably. Professional critics are generally less influential than the online community for the typical focal reviewer. A prior review from the online community becomes particularly influential when its expertise is high and/or when the prior reviewer has shared geographic locational traits with the focal reviewer. Reviewers that engage more with products/brands tend to align sentiments with professional critics, while those that engage more with the online community tend to align sentiment with that community. Utilizing insights from these results, we provide several guidelines for brand managers in devising appropriate social media strategies.

Although textual emotional appeals in a donation context have been studied in past research, there has been little work looking at facial emotions expressed in posted images. Drawing on a panel data of 25,321 crowdfunding projects from Gofundme, we investigate how facial emotions expressed in posted images might be strategically used to increase individual project effectiveness as measured by metrics relevant to the platform, i.e., donation amount per project. In this research, we focus on four emotions that can be inferred accurately from facial expressions in images using artificial intelligence methods; happy, sad, anger and surprise. Our empirical analysis shows that increasing the degree to which facial expressions in an image convey any of these four emotions has a positive impact on the contributed amount to a project, with sadness having the biggest effect, followed by anger, surprise, and happiness. We also use MTurk studies to explore the process behind these effects, finding that perceived justice is the most dominant mediator in all the conditions of surprise, angry, happy and sad images, while perceived empathy and emotion contagion are mediators only in the case of surprise and happy images. And finally in a follow-up controlled study, we provide strategic recommendations for platform revenue management.

The essential oils of Thymus vulgaris L. and Origanum vulgare L. were investigated for their toxicity and physiological aspects on the lesser mulberry pyralid Glyphodes pyloalis Walker in controlled condition (24±1°C, 75±5% RH and 16L : 8D). The leaf disc method was used to study acute toxicity, the effect of LC10, LC30, and LC50 on the feeding efficiency of 4th instar larva, and biochemical indices. The essential oil doses of LC10, LC30 and LC50 were estimated to be 0.107%, 0.188% and 0.279% for T. vulgaris, and 0.67%, 1.173% and 1.728% for O. vulgare, respectively. The results showed that T. vulgaris was more toxic than O. vulgare. The essential oil sublethal dose LC30 affected the nutritional indices of 4th instar larvae of G. pyloalis. The essential oils reduced total protein, carbohydrate, and lipid. Some concentrations of essential oils changed the activity level of α-amylase, protease, lipase, general esterases, and glutathione S-transferase (GST) but others showed no effect on these enzymes. It was concluded that the used essential oil concentrations were both toxic to G. pyloalis and showed irreversible effects on key metabolic processes, therefore, the used essential oil concentrations may be considered as alternatives to the classic pest control agents.

The major constituents of the oil of Lavandula angustifolia Mill were estimated as borneoll (8.57%), alpha terpinene (6.22%), linolool (4.91%) geranyl proprionate (3.76%), butanoic acid hexyl ester (2.99%) and caryophyllene oxide (2.72%). LC 10 , LC 30 and LC 50 were estimated as 0.31%, 0.705% and 1.24% respectively. The sublethal concentration (LC 30 ) of essential oil affected the nutritional indices of 4th instar larvae of Glyphodes pyloalis . The essential oil reduced total protein, carbohydrate and lipid when compared with the control. All concentrations (0.25%, 0.5%, 1%, and 2%) of essential oil affected the major macromolecules and activities of key enzyme in G. pyloalis .

Digestive proteolytic activities were studied in the larval midgut of Papilio demoleus by using azocasein, specific substrates and inhibitors regarding enzymatic allocation in the alimentary canal. The highest proteolytic activity was found in the midgut rather than foregut and hindgut that highest proteolytic activity was observed in soluble fraction. All specific proteases were almost equally distributed in both the anterior and posterior midgut except for trypsin- and chymotrypsin-like proteases, which showed the highest activity in the anterior midgut. Two peaks were observed in alkaline and acidic pHs when general proteolytic activities were assayed using azocasein in soluble and membrane-bound fractions. Specific substrates revealed the presence of trypsin-like, chymotrypsin-like, elastase, cathepsins B and L as well as two exopeptidases. These findings were confirmed using specific inhibitors including PMSF, TLCK, TPCK, SBTI, cystatin, DTT, E-64, EDTA and phenanthroline. Determination and characterization of the insect’s digestive proteases will enable development of pest control by designing protease inhibitors. This procedure will help us to designate an efficient pest control method with the lowest impact on the environment.

Methyl silane coated Fe3O4 magnetic nanoparticles were used for simultaneous extraction of the fat-soluble vitamins (FSVs). The amounts of extracted vitamins were determined by HPLC. The synthesized Fe3O4 nanoparticles were coated with silica and then modified withtrimethoxymethylsilane (TMMS). The prepared particles were characterized by different methods. The best amounts of silica and TMMS in sorbent synthesis were1.2 and 0.5 mL, respectively. The optimum pH values for the sample solution and washing buffer were 5 and 3, respectively. Application of 100 mg sorbent, 700 μL tetrahydrofuran, 5-fold dilution of the sample solution, and 1 min for sorption and desorption times were among the best conditions. At the optimum conditions, the calibration plots for each vitamin were obtained with good linearity (R2 >0.9992) and suitable linear ranges. This method has a low LOD (90.3%). Preconcentration of low concentrations of vitamin D3 was performed, and results showed 3.7 times greater sensitivity after preconcentration. Finally, the amounts of the FSVs in pharmaceutical formulations were determined using the proposed method, and results showed good agreement with those reportedby manufacturers.

Some studies showed that piperine (the alkaloid of piper nigrum) can change the activities of microsomal enzymes. Midazolam concentration is applied as a probe to determine the CYP3A enzyme activity. This study was done to determine piperine pretreatment role on midazolam plasma concentration. Twenty healthy volunteers (14 men and 6 women) received oral dose of piperine (15 mg) or placebo for three days as pretreatment and midazolam (10 mg) on fourth day of study and the blood samples were taken at 0.5, 2.5 and 5 h after midazolam administration. The midazolam plasma levels were assayed using HPLC method (C18 analytical column, 75:25 methanol:water as mobile phase, UV detector at 242 nm wavelength and diazepam as internal standard). Data were fit in a “one-compartment PK model” using P-Pharm 1.5 software and analyzed under statistical tests. The mean ±SD of the age and body mass index were 24.3 ± 1.83 years (range: 21–28 years) and 23.46± 2.85, respectively. The duration of sedation in piperine receiving group was greater that the placebo group (188±59 vs. 102±43 min, p3 vs. 1.71± 0.04 h (pvs. 37.09 ± 1.07 ml/min (p According to the results, piperine can significantly increases half-life and decreases clearance of midazolam compared to placebo. It is suggested that piperine can demonstrate those effects by inhibition CYP3A4 enzyme activity in liver microsomal system.