Fungicidal versus Fungistatic activity of five Iranian essences against fluconazole resistant Candida species

Introduction: Antifungal resistant is one of the causes of high mortality rates during invasive candidiasis. Since development of new antifungal agents is limited, researchers have focused on natural products including essential oils (EOs) with antifungal properties. In immunocompromised patients fungicidal activity is of benefit. This study was designed to evaluate chemical composition and fungicidal/fungistatic activities of five Iranian EOs and against fluconazole resistant Candida species. Methods: To determine chemical composition of EOs gas chromatography-mass spectroscopy (GC/MS) was employed. Fluconazole resistant Candida species were chosen and minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values of studied EOs were determined by broth microdilution method. Minimum fungicidal concentration (MFC) was determined as the lowest concentration with no fungal growth on solid media. Fungicidal activity was calculated by MFC/MIC ratio. Results: The results showed that C. albicans and C. tropialis isolates were susceptible to itraconazole (ITC) and voriconazole (VRC) while one species of C. glabrata and C. krusei each was resistant to itraconzaole; and itraconazole resistant C. glabrata isolate was resistance to voriconzaole as well. Among tested EOs, the ones from Cinnamomum cayennense, Origanum majorana var. majoranoides and Andropogon citratus had the highest anti-Candida activity. Artemisia aromatica A. Nelson had the highest MIC value against Candida isolates. All EOs in this study had fungicidal activity. Conclusion: In general, the tested natural compounds are suitable to be used as anti-Candida. However more studies are needed on each chemical compound to evaluate its antifungal activity alone or in combination with other agents

Virtual dual inhibition of COX-2 / 5-LOX enzymes based on binding properties of alpha-amyrins, the anti-inflammatory compound as a promising anti-cancer drug

Hydro-alcoholic fruit extract of Cordia myxa was considerably effective on curing acute inflammation in mouse model. Previous studies suggested significant anti-inflammatory activities as well as potential anticancer agent of α-amyrins in seeds. Inhibition of Cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) and 5-Lipooxygenase (5-LOX) is significant in cancer prevention and therapeutics although this inhibition with chemo-drugs has its own side-effects. It is shown that these enzymes pathways are related to several cancers including colon, breast and lung cancer. This study was conducted based on Cordia species’ α-amyrins as a safer natural anti-cancer compound for inhibition of COX-2 and 5-LOX enzymes by molecular docking. The X-ray crystal structure of COX2 / 5-LOX enzymes and α-amyrins was retrieved and energetically minimized respectively. The binding site and surface of enzymes were detected. Docking studies were performed by AutoDock 4.2 using Lamarckian genetic algorithm (LGA). Finally drug likeness, molecular pharmacokinetic properties and toxicity of α-amyrins was calculated. Molecular Docking revealed hydrogen and hydrophobic interactions between α-amyrins with both active sites of COX-2 and 5-LOX enzymes. Interestingly, it covalently bonded to Fe cofactor of 5-LOX enzyme and chelated this molecule. Base on binding energies (ΔG) α-amyrin has more inhibitory effects on 5-LOX (-10.45 Kcal/mol) than COX-2 (-8.02 Kcal/mol). Analysis of molecular pharmacokinetic parameters suggested that α-amyrins complied with most sets of Lipinski's rules, and so it could be a suitable ligand for docking studies. Eventually, bioactivity score showed α-amyrins possess considerable biological activities as nuclear receptor, enzyme inhibitor, GPCR and protease inhibitor ligand. These results clearly demonstrate that α-amyrins could act as potential highly selective COX-/5-LOX inhibitor. Also, it is a safe compound in comparison with classical non-steroidal antiinflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) that are known as cancer preventive agents, since it is free of side effects on human body and it can be a promising drug for cancer therapeutics

FLEXCRAN: Cloud radio access network prototype using OpenAirInterface

In this demo, we describe the realization of cloud radio access network (C-RAN) prototype using OpenAirInterface (OAI) software and commodity hardware. The deployment of the centralized baseband processing on the remote cloud center (RCC), and the remote radio units (RRU), connected over Ethernet fronthaul is demonstrated. Further, the demo illustrates the flexibility in deploying several cellular radio access network protocol split architectures using OAI

The antibacterial activity of chitosan between different extraction method

his survey described the relation between chitosan extraction methods and the antibacterial activity. Chitosan were extracted from shrimp waste according to the conventional method. But in step of deprotenisation, three process acid, alkaline, and enzyme extraction was used. The extracted chitosan evaluated by inhibition of bacterial growth against current foodborne bacteria. Therefore, Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus are used to study the antimicrobial activity. These results demonstrated that good results can be achieved by enzymatic and alkaline treatment. Subject to economic advantages, alkaline can replace the other methods

Comparison of Two Self-organization and Hierarchical Routing Protocols for Ad Hoc Networks

International audienceIn this article, we compare two self-organization and hierarchical routing protocols for ad hoc networks. These two protocols apply the reverse approach from the classical one, since they use a reactive routing protocol inside the clusters and a proactive routing protocol between the clusters. We compare them regarding the cluster organization they provide and the routing that is then performed over it. This study gives an idea of the impact of the use of recursiveness and of the partition of the DHT on self-organization and hierarchical routing in ad hoc networks

Toward a fully cloudified mobile network infrastructure

Cloud computing enables the on-demand delivery of resources for a multitude of services and gives the opportunity for small agile companies to compete with large industries. In the telco world, cloud computing is currently mostly used by mobile network operators (MNO) for hosting non-critical support services and selling cloud services such as applications and data storage. MNOs are investigating the use of cloud computing to deliver key telecommunication services in the access and core networks. Without this, MNOs lose the opportunities of both combining this with over-the-top (OTT) and value-added services to their fundamental service offerings and leveraging cost-effective commodity hardware. Being able to leverage cloud computing technology effectively for the telco world is the focus of mobile cloud networking (MCN). This paper presents the key results of MCN integrated project that includes its architecture advancements, prototype implementation, and evaluation. Results show the efficiency and the simplicity that a MNO can deploy and manage the complete service lifecycle of fully cloudified, composed services that combine OTT/IT- and mobile-network-based services running on commodity hardware. The extensive performance evaluation of MCN using two key proof-of-concept scenarios that compose together many services to deliver novel converged elastic, on-demand mobile-based but innovative OTT services proves the feasibility of such fully virtualized deployments. Results show that it is beneficial to extend cloud computing to telco usage and run fully cloudified mobile-network-based systems with clear advantages and new service opportunities for MNOs and end-users

Dynamic network slice resources reconfiguration in heterogeneous mobility environments

This paper proposes a framework that optimizes network slicing provisioning in over‐the‐top (OTT) scenarios, by reducing occupied resources of slices from where the User Equipment (UE) handovers from. To achieve this, the framework leverages an existing Software Defined Networking (SDN)‐based UE virtualization scheme, which allows to instantiate in the cloud a representation of the physical device and its current connectivity context. This scheme was extended with the ability to anchor the UE's datapath and mask the underlying slices in a single end‐to‐end slice, allowing handover mechanisms between slices to become transparent to involved endpoints. This framework was implemented and evaluated in an experimental testbed where the UE moves between Wi‐Fi and long‐term evolution (LTE) slices, with results showing that upstream and downstream throughput is dynamically adapted to the UE requirements prior to the handover.publishe