Autumn trend? Leaf extracts used as food colourants and nutraceuticals

Autumn trend? Leaf extracts used as food colourants and nutraceuticals: Researchers have developed a process allowing them to extract compounds from fallen leaves that could offer potential as natural colorants.

Meta-analysis shows eggs can reduce stroke risk by 12%

Meta-analysis shows eggs can reduce stroke risk by 12%: Eating up to one egg a day has no association with coronary heart disease (CHD) but does reduce the risk of stroke by 12%, a meta-analysis has suggested. The benefits of eggs to good health are

Birth Control Is Women’s Way Out of Poverty.

According to Melinda Gates, Birth Control Is Women’s Way Out of Poverty.Melinda Gates has made providing poor women in developing countries access to contraception a mission. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which she leads with her husband, has donated more than $1 billion for family planning efforts and will spend about $180 million more this year. Since 2012, she has helped lead an international campaign to get birth control to 120 million more women by 2020. Four years later, a report explains why achieving that goal is proving tougher than expected. This is a condensed and edited version of our conversation about family planning. If you allow a woman — if you counsel her so it’s truly voluntary — to have a contraceptive tool and she can space those births, it unlocks the cycle of poverty for her. In the early days, I’d be out traveling for the foundation, I’d be there to talk to women about vaccines, I’m going be frank, for their children, and what they would say to me is: ‘O.K., I have questions for you. What about that contraceptive, how come I can’t get it anymore?’ To me, it’s one of the greatest injustices. continue

How to stop infections after surgery.

Surgical site infections are caused by bacteria that get in through incisions made during surgery. They threaten the lives of millions of patients each year and contribute to the spread of antibiotic resistance. In low- and middle-income countries, 11% of patients who undergo surgery are infected in the process. In Africa, up to 20% of women who have a cesarean section contract a wound infection, compromising their own health and their ability to care for their babies. But surgical site infections are not just a problem for poor countries. In the United States, they contribute to patients spending more than 400 000 extra days in hospital at a cost of an additional US$ 10 billion per year. The link now

Global guidelines on the prevention of surgical site infection.

The first ever Global guidelines for the prevention of surgical site infection were published on 3 November 2016. They include a list of 29 concrete recommendations distilled by 20 of the world’s leading experts from 26 reviews of the latest evidence. The recommendations have also been published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases and are designed to address the increasing burden of health care-associated infections on both patients and health care systems globally, alongside supporting tools issued by WHO. WHO will continue to issue tools in support of guideline implementation throughout 2017. Read it now

Peanut probiotic: Researchers develop commercially viable lactose-free probiotic ‘yoghurt’

Peanut probiotic: Researchers develop commercially viable lactose-free probiotic ‘yoghurt’: A newly developed peanut-based probiotic ‘yoghurt’ could serve as a functional food for those who follow a vegan diet or have lactose intolerance, say researchers.

New Weapon to Kill Bacteria has been biologically engineered.

Recent studies have shown how bacteria can easily adapt and develop antibiotic immunity. The United Nations elevated one case to a crisis, on the same level as Ebola and HIV. A recent study by a UK commission estimates that, if no new antibiotics are made, bacterial infections will kill 10 million people each year by 2050. This problem is one connected to antibiotic use and the adaptation capabilities of bacteria,and as a solution, scientists look to antimicrobial peptides, naturally occurring proteins that can kill bacteria and other known microbes ;fungi and viruses. A team of researchers from MIT, the University of Brasilia, and the University of British Columbia just gave the natural protein a boost, engineering an antimicrobial peptide that could kill many types of bacteria, even those resistant to most antibiotics. The study reported in Scientific Reports, shows that the researchers have engineered a synthetic peptide called clavanin-MO, derived from a marine tunicate antimicrobial peptide [clavanin A], which exhibits potent antimicrobial and immunomodulatory properties both in vitro and in vivo. see Clavanin-MO has improved bacterial killing abilities thanks to an added sequence of five amino acids making it more hydrophobic — allowing it to interact with and translocate to membranes more effectively. A test on mice showed that Clavanin-MO could kill strains of E. coli and Staphylococcus aureus that are extremely antibiotic resistant. more