Current Protein and Peptide Science - Volume 22, Issue 12, 2021

Soybean has become an important world commodity because of its low price, good nutritional value and recognized functional health benefits in recent years. β-conglycinin is one of the major storage proteins in soybean. It has captured a growing interest recently because of its allergenicity and potential health benefits, which continues to drive the research and commercial development of β-conglycinin-based food products and ingredients. In this review, the structure, the amino acid composition, extraction methods and electrophoretic pattern of β-conglycinin are briefly summarized. Studies on β-conglycinin by allergenicity, plasma lipid-controlling, obesity and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease are highlighted, critically discussing their main shortcomings and challenges and identifying the research gaps. Studies to date have demonstrated the cultivation of β-conglycinin with health benefits as functional ingredients and foodstuffs. The current research focuses on proteins, mainly challenging the mechanisms of subunit/peptide effects interaction and identifying and characterizing the hidden biological activities in the polypeptide chains. There is much scope for further exploration into various aspects of β-conglycinin, such as the selection of mutant strains and genetic engineering and prospects on targeted β-conglycinin exploitation in the nutraceutical area. In addition, the safety evaluation of β-conglycinin and its stabilized emulsions deserve more attention to food-related applications.

Communication among different species across kingdoms occurs through a chain of regulatory molecules that are transferred around cellular boundaries. These molecules are also crucial for defense, virulence, and pathogenesis. In the past, the transport of proteins in long distance communication was observed, but in the present era, the discovery of extracellular vesicles (EVs) has changed our understanding of molecular communication. EVs are not only involved in cell signaling and immunity but also can transfer information by sRNAs, forming a basis for interactions among a wide variety of organisms. Despite extensive research on EVs in other areas, their role in communication between plants and the plant microbiome has been lacking. EVs are potentially involved in protein trafficking along with the transport of lipids and nucleic acids. Interactions between hosts and their microbiomes may also be mediated by EVs, which can be involved in stress responses, immune surveillance and defense, virulence, and signaling, along with many metabolic activities within plant microbiomes. In this review, we have focused on recent information about the role of EVs and the molecules they transport between hosts and microbes. The connection between biofilms and the generation of EVs is also considered. These findings enhance our knowledge about plant-microbiome interactions in terms of immunity and virulence and challenge the conventional viewpoint of inter-kingdom signaling.

Programmed cell death (PCD) is a fundamental genetically controlled process in most organisms. PCD is responsible for the selective elimination of damaged or unwanted cells and organs to maintain cellular homeostasis during the organ’s development under normal conditions as well as during defense or adaptation to stressful conditions. PCD pathways have been extensively studied in animals. In plants, studies focusing on understanding the pathways of PCD have advanced significantly. However, the knowledge about the molecular basis of PCD is still very limited. Some PCD pathways that have been discovered in animals are not present in plants or found with a similar form. PCD in plants is developmentally controlled (by endogenous factors) to function in organs development and differentiation as well as environmentally induced (by exogenous stimuli) to help the plant in surviving under stress conditions. Here, we present a review of the role of PCD in plant development and explore different examples of stress-induced PCD as well as highlight the main differences between the plant and animal PCD.

Exposure to organophosphorus pesticides is an important public health issue due to a large number of occupationally exposed populations, as well as their effects mainly at the level of the nervous, reproductive, and immune systems. It has been reported that one of the molecular mechanisms by which adverse effects of exposure to organophosphorus pesticides can be explained is oxidative stress, which leads to alterations at the cellular level that, if chronic, could affect the functionality of different organs and tissues. These data constitute the basis of the relevant literature on its toxicity. The induction of oxidative damage, which has been referred to, increases the occurrence of processes such as eryptosis and/or hemolysis in erythrocytes that promote greater susceptibility to clinical conditions such as anemia, dehydration, and chronic kidney disease. Thus, it is mentioned that the determination of oxidative damage parameters could be useful to monitor occupationally exposed people by exploring their oxidative status. This review focuses on presenting the state of knowledge in recent years on the toxicity of organophosphorus pesticides and their relationship with the oxidative damage evaluated in erythrocytes.

Background: Recent advancements in cell engineering and bioreactor engineering have enabled high monoclonal antibody (mAb) concentrations in harvested solutions for the downstream process (DSP). Methods: As many unit operations such as capture chromatography, polish chromatography, membrane filtration, virus inactivation, virus filtration, and concentration by ultrafiltration are involved in DSP, it is crucial to monitor the process carefully in order to perform reliable and stable DSP operations. One of the most important signals (process parameter) to be monitored is the protein concentration CP. Although various methods are available, most of them are not suited for measuring high CP. In this paper, we have developed a method for measuring very high CP by optical rotation (OR). Result: Linear correlations were confirmed between OR and Cp in the range CP = 0 to 80 g/L for mAbs with high repeatability and small variation coefficients. This method was applied to the monitoring of CP in the opaque (colored) solution during the cell culture. The CP by OR was in good agreement with those by the standard Protein A HPLC method. Conclusion: Monitoring of high CP by OR is expected to be an efficient process analytical tool (PAT) for DSP.