In vitro fermentation by human faecal bacteria of total and purified dietary fibres from brown seaweeds

TL;DR: In this review, several representative NDCs are introduced, and their chemical components, structures, and physiological functions, including promotion of the proliferation of butyrate-producing bacteria and enhancement ofbutyrate production are discussed.

TL;DR: This article aims to gauge the potential use of alginate as a dietary supplement for the maintenance of normal health, or the alleviation of certain cardiovascular or gastrointestinal diseases.

TL;DR: The effects of marine alga consumption on growth and body weight, mineral availability, lipid metabolism, blood pressure, and antioxidant properties are reviewed, together with preliminary data on the effects of some functional foods containing seaweeds on lipid metabolism and gene expression of enzymes engaged in antioxidant protection.

TL;DR: The role for fucoidan in the control of acute and chronic inflammation via selectin blockade, enzyme inhibition and inhibiting the complement cascade is discussed, as well as the recent data on toxicology and uptake of fucoidans.

Abstract: Many separation methods are based on chromatography, that is, separation of the components of a mixture by differences in the way they become distributed (or partitioned) between two different phases. To illustrate with an extreme example, suppose we have a mixture of gaseous methane and ammonia and contact this mixture with water. Ammonia, being very soluble in water (~\(90 \: \text{g}\) per \(100 \: \text{g}\) water at \(1 \: \text{atm}\) pressure), will mostly go into the water phase, whereas the methane, being almost insoluble (~\(0.003 \: \text{g}\) per \(100 \: \text{g}\) of water) will essentially remain entirely in the gas phase. Such a separation of methane and ammonia would be a onestage partitioning between gas and liquid phases and, clearly, could be made much more efficient by contacting the gas layer repeatedly with fresh water. Carried through many separate operations, this partitioning procedure is, at best, a tedious process, especially if the compounds to be separated are similar in their distributions between the phases. However, partitioning can be achieved nearly automatically by using chromatographic columns, which permit a stationary phase to be contacted by a moving phase. To illustrate, suppose a sample of a gaseous mixture of ammonia and methane is injected into a long tube (column) filled with glass beads moistened with water (the stationary phase), and a slow stream of an inert carrier gas, such as nitrogen or helium, is passed in to push the other gases through. A multistage partitioning would occur as the ammonia dissolves in the water and the resulting gas stream encounters fresh water as it moves along the column. Carrier gas enriched with methane would emerge first and effluent gas containing ammonia would come out later. This is a crude description of the method of gas-liquid chromatography (abbreviated often as glc, GC, or called vapor-phase chromatography, vpc). This technique has become so efficient as to revolutionize the analysis and separation of almost any organic substance that has even a slight degree of volatility at some reasonably attainable temperature. The most modern glc equipment runs wholly under computer control, with preprogrammed temperatures and digital integration of the detector output. A wide variety of schemes is available for measuring the concentration of materials in the effluent carrier gas, and some of these are of such extraordinary sensitivity that only very small samples are necessary (\(10^{-9} \: \text{g}\), or less).

TL;DR: In this article, the chemical components of seaweeds are reviewed in relation to potential food uses, and the nutritive values of seaweed are briefly discussed, and practical uses for seaweeds as food in Japan are described.