BACKGROUND Typhoid fever remains an important cause of morbidity and mortality in the developing countries. Vi capsular polysaccharide conjugate vaccine demonstrated safety and efficacy in young children in high endemic regions. A novel typhoid conjugate vaccine based on plant polysaccharide pectin was studied in a phase I trial. METHODS Fruit pectin, having the same carbohydrate backbone str...

Axenic (germfree) and holoxenic (conventional) rats were given a pectincontaining diet (5 %1 or a pectin-free diet. The diet was not sterilized and the axenic state was maintained by the addition of antibiotics. Pectin modified little or not at all the quantity of bile acids in the small intestine, fecal bile acid excretion and fecal elimination of the sum of cholesterol and bile acids. It simi...

Water retting is a traditional retting method that enables the low-cost production of bast fibers. This study investigated the retting of flax straws by distilled water for three different durations at room temperature in laboratory condition. The retting quality was evaluated in terms of the weight loss and degumming rate together with the fiber properties, which included color, linear density...

Colon targeted delivery of satranidazole (STZ), which immediately releases the drug as soon as the drug delivery system reaches the colon was formulated. Different grades of pectin were used as a compression coat and the effect of degree of esterification (DE) of pectin on swelling and drug release property was evaluated. STZ is a sparingly soluble drug, so to obtain maximum effect of drug at t...

Manipulating and stretching single pectin molecules offer convenience to determine the chain lengths and further illustrate the action between pectins and other macromolecules. Pectin molecules on mica surfaces, which were imaged in air with atomic force microscopy (AFM), can be aligned and stretched through applying modified molecular combing and fluid fixation techniques. Modified molecular c...

In bacteria, fungi and plants, pectin methylesterases are ubiquitous enzymes that modify the degree of methylesterification of pectins, which are major components of plant cell walls. Such changes in pectin structure are associated with changes in cellular adhesion, plasticity, pH and ionic contents of the cell wall and influence plant development and stress responses. In plants, pectin methyle...

Pectin is a complex polysaccharide and natural food additive extracted from citrus peel and apple pomace in the form of brownish powder. It is widely used as a jelling and thickening agent and the food industry especially in jams and jellies. It is also recommended for use as fat replacer and also lowers blood cholesterol by increasing viscosity in the intestinal tract thus lowering cholesterol...

Two experiments were performed to compare the effect of pectin and its hydrophobic derivatives on homeostasis of cholesterol and cecal metabolism in male young rats. Control rats were fed a diet supplemented with palm fat and cholesterol (50 and 10 g/kg, respectively). Rats of other groups were fed the same diet containing citrus pectin or octadecylpectinamide (60 g/kg). Diets were fed for 4 we...

Segment membranes from 4 citrus species selected from 4 sections were treated with water to obtain polysaccharides containing pectin. The extracts, which inhibited pancreatic lipase activity in a concentration-dependent manner, were divided into high molecular weight fractions [molecular weight (M.W.) >300,000], which inhibited the activity strongly, and low molecular weight fractions (M.W. <30...

The contents of the lower alimentary tract from rats fed a semisynthetic, pectin-supplemented diet showed increased nitrate reductase activity and an increase in the amount of luminal contents in the intestine and cecum. Nitrate reductase activity was associated with the insoluble fraction of the gut contents which was sedimented by centrifugation (5,100 X g,20 min) and was abolished after trea...