Böcker utgivna av Mdpi AG

Both vegetables and fruits, as plant-based foods, are known for their abundance of bioactive compounds, which play a crucial role in disease prevention. Researchers from various disciplines have dedicated significant efforts to understanding the compositions of these bioactive compounds and exploring how fruits and vegetables contribute to promoting health and preventing diseases. This reprint presents studies on the composition of bioactive compounds found in the main fruit and vegetable species, their health effects when consumed fresh or processed, and their mechanisms of action against human diseases, including in vitro and in vivo models.

It has been known that cellular glutathione content and its speciation play a role, among others, in redox homeostasis, cell cycle control, immunological defense, and pathological abnormalities. Furthermore, it plays a significant role in the biotransformation of drugs and other endogenous or exogenous electrophilic species. Most of these cellular functions are related to the thiol function of the cysteine moiety.This reprint presents the publications that appeared in the Special Issue of Molecules, "Glutathione: Chemistry and Biochemistry." The first three contributions review the present-day knowledge of the GSH/GSSG system and the most important GSH-related proteins involved in regulating various cellular events. The subsequent four contributions present selected interventions that modulate the GSSG/2GSH system. One of the contributions to this session describes a new HPLC method to quantify the reduced and oxidized glutathione levels. The third session involves three contributions demonstrating the role of GSH in the metabolism of different candidate and clinically used anticancer drugs. One of the contributions, a theoretical work, provides helpful information for developing GSH analogs with high ACE inhibitor activity.By purpose and content, this Special Issue is addressed to the vast number of life science researchers (academic and industrial) and medical professionals who are interested in or already engaged in research that involves glutathione.

This reprint contains 10 papers published in a Special Issue of the MDPI journal Mathematics concerned with hypercompositional algebra. The contributions, written by 24 authors from 10 different countries, cover a wide range of topics concerning the theoretical aspects, applications, and computational issues of algebraic hyperstructures. The reader will find a wide range of problems, arguments and methods that illustrate and provide insight into the variegated features of this theory. This reprint will be of interest to those working in abstract algebra, hypergroup theory, finite geometries or combinatorics, as well as to those who wish to familiarise themselves with recent advances in hypercompositional algebra.

In the last 20 years, two factors have revolutionized the way space missions and applications are conceived, namely an increased access to space guaranteed by new launch providers and advances in miniaturized technologies. These two factors have rapidly made small satellites a reliable tool for scientific, commercial, and educational activities in space. Acting as a part of a larger mission along with larger satellites, or even substituting the latter in some cases, small satellites have now become a reality in modern space missions. This Special Issue aims to address the recent advances in small satellites' technology and the resulting impact on space missions.

This book presents numerical, experimental, and analytical analysis of convective and radiative heat transfer in various engineering and natural systems, including transport phenomena in heat exchangers and furnaces, cooling of electronic heat-generating elements, and thin-film flows in various technical systems. It is well known that such heat transfer mechanisms are dominant in the systems under consideration. Therefore, in-depth study of these regimes is vital for both the growth of industry and the preservation of natural resources. The authors included in this book present insightful and provocative studies on convective and radiative heat transfer using modern analytical techniques. This book will be very useful for academics, engineers, and advanced students.

This Special Issue is a collection of twelve papers on the design and application of biomedical circuits and systems. We hope you enjoy reading this Special Issue and become inspired to address technological challenges toward helping the medical industry and biologists to increase the quality of life for humans, which is the main objective. Several topics have been highlighted: muscle electrostimulation, analog front-end (AFE) circuits, waveform generators, real-time velocimetry estimators, interference suppression, bio-signal encryption, IoT electronic nose, ultrasound image processing, noise in medical imaging, elbow actuators, and aids for visually impaired people. We are conscious about the very wide scope of biomedical circuits and systems applications, and that our contribution represents only a grain of sand, though we expect to be useful in contributing to the progress of knowledge in the field.

The demand for cast iron components, with weights ranging from a few kilograms to several tons, has increased significantly in recent years, both for technical and economic reasons. In fact, the lower cost compared to other alloys, and the good castability, which allow one to obtain near-net shape components in as-cast conditions, and the mechanical properties that can be obtained, are just some of the motivations that attract mechanical designers. However, correct design requires a good knowledge of the intrinsic correlation among alloy chemical composition, process parameters, microstructure (with casting defects) and mechanical properties. This book is aimed at collecting excellent and recent research experimental and theoretical works in this filed. Technological (say, wear resistance and weldability) and mechanical properties (say, Young modulus, static and fatigue strength) of different grades of cast irons, ranging from solution strengthened ferritic ductile iron to compacted graphite iron as well as white and nodular cast irons, are correlated with the alloy chemical composition, process parameters and casting dimension.

Plastic and reconstructive surgery has a broad spectrum of different reconstructive techniques, including split skin transplantation and local and free flaps. By means of microsurgery and perforator flaps, every reconstructive issue can be addressed by tailored techniques. Flaps can comprise different tissues and can be designed using new imaging technologies in order to increase the safety of the procedures and to retain the form and function of the reconstructed area in accordance with the donor site morbidity. This Special Issue of the Journal of Personalized Medicine focuses on the following topics: Individualized microsurgery;Flap imaging;Customized perforator flaps;Monitoring flap perfusion;Tailored tissue engineering for reconstruction;Biofabrication applications in personalized plastic and reconstructive surgery.

The collection of articles discussed above covers various types of discharges and various processes. The discharges presented include, for example, microwave, spark, glow or surface discharges. The characterizations of the sources of these discharges, the parameters of the generated plasmas as well as the applications of these plasmas are discussed. The applications include, for example, the synthesis of nanoparticles or the treatment of skin cancer cells. I hope that the presented articles will be valuable for readers representing the world of science, medicine and technology.

Recently, many kinds of foods and food-derived nutrients have been reported to show health-beneficial effects. In particular, some foods and food-derived nutrients have shown anti-aging effects on several organs and tissues, such as brain, muscle, skin, intestine, and so on. In some kinds of foods, the molecular basis of their functionalities (e.g., anti-brain aging, anti-sarcopenia, and anti-skin aging) and inter-tissue networks activated by these foods mediated by exosomes, cytokines, and immune cells have been clarified in detail.

This reprint is about vitamin D, a molecule that can be absorbed from certain foods, such as fatty fish, which can also be produced endogenously when we expose our skin to sufficient doses of ultraviolet B radiation. When vitamin D is metabolized into 1,25(OH)2D3 (also called calcitriol), it acts as a high-affinity ligand for the transcription factor VDR, i.e., it has direct effects on gene regulation.The key physiological functions of vitamin D are the regulation of calcium homeostasis, which is essential for bone mineralization, and the modulation of the immune system by stimulating innate immunity and preventing overreactions of adaptive immunity.This reprint presents recent developments and the latest research in the fascinating broad range of today's vitamin D biology, from evolution to systems biology.

The search for bioactive secondary metabolites from marine organisms has been an active area of research since the 1950s. The distinct biodiversity of the marine environment has afforded a vast array of unique secondary metabolites, many of which possess potent biological activities. This Special Issue of Marine Drugs will highlight recent bioactive marine natural product studies conducted by southern hemisphere scientists on an array of marine organisms.

In recent years, researchers have shown a special interest in natural products as alternative methods for the prevention, treatment, and/or management of various skin illnesses and disorders, primarily due to their natural availability, efficacity, reduced cost, and minimal toxicity. In a similar vein, synthetic bioactives, as well as small molecules, have been studied in vitro, in vivo, and in clinical studies as potential drugs or supplements. This Special Issue of Nutrients comprises an array of literature reviews, original communications, and studies on the roles of natural products, synthetic bioactives, and small molecules in a variety of skin disorders and diseases, such as aging, atopic dermatitis, cutaneous T-cell lymphomas, melanoma, allergies, hyperpigmentation, inflammation, and more, which were investigated through in vitro and ex vivo approaches, preclinical trials, cell-based assays, and animal models. The mechanisms of action of certain compounds are proposed, while others are currently under investigation. The authors of the papers also explore technologies designed to improve the bioavailability and delivery of certain compounds. In lieu of ongoing research on a variety of skin disorders, the wealth of information published in this Special Issue can act as a springboard for the development of new preventive and therapeutic modalities for the management of skin diseases.

Yeasts are truly fascinating microorganisms. Due to their diverse and dynamic activities, they have been used for the production of many interesting products, such as beer, wine, bread, biofuels and biopharmaceuticals. Saccharomyces cerevisiae (bakers' yeast) is the yeast species that is surely the most exploited by man. Saccharomyces is a top choice organism for industrial applications, although its use for producing beer dates back to at least the 6th millennium BC. Bakers' yeast has been a cornerstone of modern biotechnology, enabling the development of efficient production processes for antibiotics, biopharmaceuticals, technical enzymes, and ethanol and biofuels. Today, diverse yeast species are explored for industrial applications, such as e.g. Saccharomyces species, Pichia pastoris and other Pichia species, Kluyveromyces marxianus, Hansenula polymorpha, Yarrowia lipolytica, Candida species, Phaffia rhodozyma, wild yeasts for beer brewing, etc. This Special Issue is focused on recent developments of yeast biotechnology with topics including recent techniques for characterizing yeast and their physiology (including omics and nanobiotechnology techniques), methods to adapt industrial strains (including metabolic, synthetic and evolutionary engineering) and the use of yeasts as microbial cell factories to produce biopharmaceuticals, enzymes, alcohols, organic acids, flavours and fine chemicals, and advances in yeast fermentation technology and industrial fermentation processes.

This reprint includes a collection of up-to-date articles on epidemiology, prevention, diagnosis and treatment of melanoma, basal cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma and Merkel cell carcinoma. It also includes items on the use of artificial intelligence for skin cancer diagnoses as well as the impact of new immunotherapies on patient's quality of life.

The book has 25 articles about the status and new directions in forensic genetics. Approximately half of the articles are invited reviews, and the remaining articles deal with new forensic genetic methods. The articles cover aspects such as sampling DNA evidence at the scene of a crime; DNA transfer when handling evidence material and how to avoid DNA contamination of items, laboratory, etc.; identification of body fluids and tissues with RNA; forensic microbiome analysis with molecular biology methods as a supplement to the examination of human DNA; forensic DNA phenotyping for predicting visible traits such as eye, hair, and skin colour; new ancestry informative DNA markers for estimating ethnic origin; new genetic genealogy methods for identifying distant relatives that cannot be identified with conventional forensic DNA typing; sensitive DNA methods, including single-cell DNA analysis and other highly specialised and sensitive methods to examine ancient DNA from unidentified victims of war; forensic animal genetics; genetics of visible traits in dogs; statistical tools for interpreting forensic DNA analyses, including the most used IT tools for forensic STR-typing and DNA sequencing; haploid markers (Y-chromosome and mitochondria DNA); inference of ethnic origin; a comprehensive logical framework for the interpretation of forensic genetic DNA data; and an overview of the ethical aspects of modern forensic genetics.

The discovery of new drugs is one of pharmaceutical research's most exciting and challenging tasks. Unfortunately, the conventional drug discovery procedure is chronophagous and seldom successful; furthermore, new drugs are needed to address our clinical challenges (e.g., new antibiotics, new anticancer drugs, new antivirals).Within this framework, drug repositioning-finding new pharmacodynamic properties for already approved drugs-becomes a worthy drug discovery strategy.Recent drug discovery techniques combine traditional tools with in silico strategies to identify previously unaccounted properties for drugs already in use. Indeed, big data exploration techniques capitalize on the ever-growing knowledge of drugs' structural and physicochemical properties, drug-target and drug-drug interactions, advances in human biochemistry, and the latest molecular and cellular biology discoveries.Following this new and exciting trend, this book is a collection of papers introducing innovative computational methods to identify potential candidates for drug repositioning. Thus, the papers in the Special Issue In Silico Strategies for Prospective Drug Repositionings introduce a wide array of in silico strategies such as complex network analysis, big data, machine learning, molecular docking, molecular dynamics simulation, and QSAR; these strategies target diverse diseases and medical conditions: COVID-19 and post-COVID-19 pulmonary fibrosis, non-small lung cancer, multiple sclerosis, toxoplasmosis, psychiatric disorders, or skin conditions.

Collagen is the main fibrous structural protein in the extracellular matrix and connective tissue of animals. It is a primary building block of bones, tendons, skin, hair, cartilage, and all joints in the body. It is also considered a "glue" that holds the body together. Collagen production begins to slow down, and cell structures start losing their strength as we become older. Collagen supplementation is a vital way to help our body revive itself and stay youthful. Recently, collagen-based biomedical materials have developed important and clinically effective materials that have become widely acceptable. However, collagen extraction from land animal sources is complex, time consuming, and expensive. Hence, marine sources have started to be researched and have been found to be the most convenient and safest sources for obtaining collagen. Another reason for favouring these sources is due to concerns over adverse inflammatory and immunologic responses and the prevalence of various diseases among land animals that can cause health complications.Marine sources also have plenty of advantages over land animal sources: (1) a high collagen content; (2) environmentally friendly; (3) the presence of biological contaminants and toxins is almost negligible; (4) a low inflammatory response; (5) greater absorption due to their low molecular weight; (6) less significant religious and ethical constraints; (7) minor regulatory and quality control problems; (8) metabolic compatibility, among others. This huge source of marine collagen is expected to make a great contribution to marine biotechnology products and medical applications.

Caffeine is present in coffee and many other beverages and is the most widely used central nervous system stimulant. Coffee drinking or caffeine supplementation may have a role in preventing cardiometabolic and endocrine disease, neuroinflammation, cancer, and even all-cause mortality. Other aspects are either less known or controversial, including the effects on the brain-gut axis, neurodevelopment, behavior, pain, muscle-skeletal health, skin or sexual function. Studies focusing on special populations (neonates, children, adolescents, athletes, elderly, pregnant and nonpregnant women), or interactions with other drugs and foods, are relatively scarce but of obvious interest. Other compounds present in coffee and other caffeinated food stuffs may affect caffeine´s physiological effects with a tremendous impact on health. This Special Issue, which contains twenty-one manuscripts, has focused on some of these varied topics, providing further evidence of the multiple health benefits that coffee/caffeine intake may exert in humans, at least in specific populations (with a particular genetic profile or suffering from specific diseases). However, the specific effects in the different organs and systems, as well as the mechanisms involved are not yet clear. Furthermore, within the current context aiming to sustainable development, the coffee plant Coffee sp. and its so-far relatively neglected by-products are expected to become soon a source of ingredients for new functional foods whose properties will need to be precisely determined. We hope the readers of this Special Issue will find inspiration for new studies on the topic.

This reprint focuses on novel findings of diagnostic dermatopathology, such as diagnosable new morphological (histopathologic) findings, immunohistochemical and immunofluorescent markers, and molecular techniques.Dermatopathology is the most sophisticated area in anatomic pathology; we can easily observe superficial skin lesions using our eyes without the need for an invasive approach and can easily compare gross configurations to microscopic and immunohistochemical findings. Meanwhile, dermatopathology has recently focused on the study of various cutaneous diseases at the molecular biology level. Many cutaneous diseases are now being well-researched, and special attention is paid to keratoacanthoma, lichen sclerosus (et atrophicus), mycosis fungoides, atopic dermatitis, epidermolysis bullosa, extramammary Paget's disease, malignant melanoma, psoriasis, and secondary neoplasms associated with nevus sebaceous.

The Spanish nation has been contested almost since its conception in the early nineteenth century, and the Spanish state has therefore been involved in perpetual conflicts between various nationalisms, particularly between different versions of Spanish nationalism as well as between Spanish majority nationalism and various minority nationalisms. At different times in history, the conflicts have revived and turned into organizing principles of the political communities in Spain, as communities in conflict or contention but, nevertheless, as communities providing the Spaniards with different senses of belonging. In recent times, both lines of contention have been activated again, and in this volume, we focus particularly on the conflict between majority and minority nationalism, which has been revived from approximately 2010 around the Catalan separatist conflict, but other sub-state identities are potentially conflictual as well. Both the state-wide - Spanish - as well as the sub-state actors try to develop feelings of territorial attachments to the Spanish political community or to the respective sub-state political communities, and both use emotions and feelings to secure support and to assert or claim sovereignty for the political community in question. The contributions in this volume shed light on various issues related to these questions.

Fuzzy Logic is a good model for the human ability to compute words. It is based on the theory of fuzzy set. A fuzzy set is different from a classical set because it breaks the Law of the Excluded Middle. In fact, an item may belong to a fuzzy set and its complement at the same time and with the same or different degree of membership. The degree of membership of an item in a fuzzy set can be any real number included between 0 and 1. This property enables us to deal with all those statements of which truths are a matter of degree. Fuzzy logic plays a relevant role in the field of Artificial Intelligence because it enables decision-making in complex situations, where there are many intertwined variables involved. Traditionally, fuzzy logic is implemented through software on a computer or, even better, through analog electronic circuits. Recently, the idea of using molecules and chemical reactions to process fuzzy logic has been promoted. In fact, the molecular word is fuzzy in its essence. The overlapping of quantum states, on the one hand, and the conformational heterogeneity of large molecules, on the other, enable context-specific functions to emerge in response to changing environmental conditions. Moreover, analog input-output relationships, involving not only electrical but also other physical and chemical variables can be exploited to build fuzzy logic systems. The development of "fuzzy chemical systems" is tracing a new path in the field of artificial intelligence. This new path shows that artificially intelligent systems can be implemented not only through software and electronic circuits but also through solutions of properly chosen chemical compounds. The design of chemical artificial intelligent systems and chemical robots promises to have a significant impact on science, medicine, economy, security, and wellbeing. Therefore, it is my great pleasure to announce a Special Issue of Molecules entitled "The Fuzziness in Molecular, Supramolecular, and Systems Chemistry." All researchers who experience the Fuzziness of the molecular world or use Fuzzy logic to understand Chemical Complex Systems will be interested in this book.

PART 1. Functional Textiles: Photochromic Textiles Based upon Aqueous Blends of Oxygen-Deficient WO3-x and TiO2 Nanocrystals. 50/60 Hz Power Grid Noise as a Skin Contact Measure of Textile ECG Electrodes. Characterizing Steam Penetration through Thermal Protective Fabric Materials. Stretchable Textile Yarn Based on UHF RFID Helical Tag. Fibers and Textiles for Personal Protective Equipment. Textile-Based Sound Sensors (TSS). High-Performance and Functional Fiber Materials. Geotextiles-A Versatile Tool for Environmental Sensitive Applications in Geotechnical Engineering. Review of Fiber- or Yarn-Based Wearable Resistive Strain Sensors. Wearable Actuators: An Overview. Bacterial Secondary Metabolites as Biopigments for Textile Dyeing.PART 2: Process and Modelling. Loop Order Analysis of Weft-Knitted Textiles. New Geometrical Modelling for 2D Fabric and 2.5D Interlock Composites. Meso-Macro Simulations of the Forming of 3D Non-Crimp Woven Fabrics. Continuous Yarn Electrospinning. A Review on Tough Soft Composites at Different Length Scales. Textile Branch and Main Breakthroughs of the Czech Republic in the Field of Textile Machinery. Recent Efforts in Modeling and Simulation of Textiles.PART 3: Control. A Comparison of Two Different Light Booths for Measuring Color Difference of Metameric Pairs. Effect of Textile Characteristics on the AR-Glass Fabric Efficiency. Dielectric Properties of Textile Materials.PART 4: Consumers and Behavior. Development of a Consumer-Based Quality Scale for Artisan Textiles. Organic Cotton Clothing Purchase Behavior. A Review on Textile Recycling Practices and Challenges.

In recent years, AI/ML tools have become more prevalent in the fields of medical imaging and imaging informatics, where systems are already outperforming physicians in a range of domains, such as in the classification of retinal fundus images in ophthalmology, chest X-rays in radiology, and skin cancer detection in dermatology, among many others. It has recently emerged as one of the fastest growing research areas given the evolution of techniques in radiology, molecular imaging, anatomical imaging, and functional imaging for detection, segmentation, diagnosis, annotation, summarization, and prediction. The ongoing innovations in this exciting and promising field play a powerful role in influencing the lives of millions through health, safety, education, and other opportunities intended to be shared across all segments of society. To achieve further progress, this Special Issue (SI) invited both research and review-type manuscripts to showcase ongoing research progress and development based on applications of AI/ML (especially DL techniques) in medical imaging to influence human health and healthcare systems in the diagnostic decision-making process. The SI published fourteen articles after a rigorous peer-review process across the spectrum of medical imaging modalities and the diversity of specialties depending on imaging techniques from radiology, dermatology, pathology, colonoscopy, endoscopy, etc.

Bayesian predictive inference is at the core of the mathematical theory of inductive reasoning. Nowadays, this field has become very attractive especially for its connections with algorithmic probability, machine learning and artificial intelligence. The complexity of both problems and algorithm represents a constant source of research of asymptotic techniques, which are necessary to handle vast datasets.The present book contains the 11 papers accepted and published in the Special Issue "Bayesian Predictive Inference and Related Asymptotics-Festschrift for Eugenio Regazzini's 75th Birthday" of the MDPI Mathematics journal. The topics of the paper focus, among others, on Bayesian nonparametrics, species sampling models, partial exchangeability and optimal stopping. Finally, as the title suggests, the Special Issue aims to celebrate the 75th birthday of Prof. Eugenio Regazzini, who has provided so many important contributions to the field of Bayesian inference.