Opacity with Orwellian Observers and Intransitive Non-interference

Opacity is a general behavioural security scheme flexible enough to account for several specific properties. Some secret set of behaviors of a system is opaque if a passive attacker can never tell whether the observed behavior is a secret one or not. Instead of considering the case of static observability where the set of observable events is fixed off line or dynamic observability where the set of observable events changes over time depending on the history of the trace, we consider Orwellian partial observability where unobservable events are not revealed unless a downgrading event occurs in the future of the trace. We show how to verify that some regular secret is opaque for a regular language L w.r.t. an Orwellian projection while it has been proved undecidable even for a regular language L w.r.t. a general Orwellian observation function. We finally illustrate relevancy of our results by proving the equivalence between the opacity property of regular secrets w.r.t. Orwellian projection and the intransitive non-interference property

Supercritical SC-CO2 and Soxhlet n-Hexane Extract of Tunisian Opuntia ficus indica Seeds and Fatty Acids Analysis

The fatty acids profiles of Tunisian Opuntia ficus indica seeds (spiny and thornless form) were investigated. Results of supercritical carbon dioxide (SC-CO2) and soxhlet n-hexane extract were compared. Quantitatively, the better yield was obtained through soxhlet n-hexane: 10.32% (spiny) and 8.91% (thornless) against 3.4% (spiny) and 1.94% (thornless) by SC-CO2 extract (T = 40°C, P = 180 bar, time = 135 mn, CO2 flow rate = 15 mL·s−1). Qualitatively, the main fatty acids components were the same for the two types of extraction. Linoleic acid was the major compound, SC-CO2: 57.60% (spiny), 59.98% (thornless), soxhlet n-hexane: 57.54% (spiny), 60.66% (thornless), followed by oleic acid, SC-CO2: 22.31% (spiny), 22.40% (thornless), soxhlet n-hexane: 25.28% (spiny), 20.58% (thornless) and palmitic acid, SC-CO2: 14.3% (spiny), 12.92% (thornless), soxhlet n-hexane: 11.33% (spiny), 13.08% (thornless). The SC-CO2 profiles fatty acids showed a richness with other minority compounds such as C20:1, C20:2, and C22.The seeds oil was highly unsaturated (US = 4.44–5.25), and the rising temperatures donot affect the selectivity of fatty acids extract by SC-CO2: US = 4.44 (T = 40°C) and 4.13 (T = 70°C)

Engineering process for capacity-driven web services

This paper presents a novel approach for the engineering of capacity-driven Web services. By capacity, we mean how a Web service is empowered with several sets of operations from which it selectively triggers a set of operations with respect to some run-time environmental requirements. Because of the specificities of capacity-driven Web services compared to regular (i.e., mono-capacity) Web services, their engineering in terms of design, development, and deployment needs to be conducted in a complete specific way. Our approach define an engineering process composed of five steps: (1) to frame the requirements that could be put on these Web services, (2) to define capacities and how these capacities are triggered, and last but not least link these capacities to requirements, (3) to identify the processes in term of business logic that these Web services could implement, (4) to generate the source code, and (5) to generate the capacity-driven Web Services Description Language (c-WSDL)

Phenolic Compounds and Skin Permeability: An In Silico Investigation

Background: The skin is the largest organ of the body and provides the main barrier between the internal and external environment. Assessment of skin permeability is of critical importance for understanding and predicting in vivo efficacy and bioavailability of bioactive phenolic compounds. Objectives: This study investigated the relationship between skin permeability and phenolic compounds using in silico methods. Methods: Screening of skin permeability was performed on 475 randomly selected phenolic compounds. Molecules were expressed in SMILE format downloaded from Phenol-Explorer Database (version 3.6, 2016). Then, their skin permeability was determined by the linear model of the quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR). The obtained results were investigated for normal distribution and correlation with pharmacological properties. Results: Our investigation showed that ferulate hydroxycinnamic acid derivatives were the most important phenolic subclass with a permeability of -1.65 cm/s. The relationship between permeability and lipophilicity, water solubility, synthetic accessibility, and bioavailability was evaluated. The statistical analysis revealed that the highest skin permeability was associated with three parameters: the topological polar surface area (TPSA), molecular weight, and lipophilicity (iLog P). Conclusion: The cutaneous permeability depended on several chemical parameters of the molecule used. The classification of phenolic compounds according to their structures proved a wide variability in this permeability

Synergistic Effect of Cloves (Syzygium aromaticum), Thyme (Thymus vulgaris) and Lemon (Citrus limon) Blended Essential Oils Optimized by Mixture Design for Improving the Antioxidant Activity

Background: Combining various essential oils (EOs) for developing pharmaceutical formulations has been the focus of attention in recent years. Objectives: This study aimed to determine the antioxidant effect of the combination of three Eos obtained from clove (Syzygium aromaticum L.), lemon peel (Citrus limon L.), and thyme (Thymus vulgaris L.) by using mixture design. Methods: The EOs of lemon peel (EOL), clove (EOC), and thyme (EOT) as well as their combination were analyzed using a gas chromatograph with flame ionization detector (GC/FID). The antioxidant activities of the EOs from EOL, EOC, and EOT as well as their combination were measured adopting DPPH assay. The construction and statistical analysis of the experiment were designed using the NemrodW (LPRAI, version 2000) software. Results: EOL, EOC, and EOT were found capable of neutralizing DPPH radical. EOC was distinguished by its strongest antiradical activity with IC50=15.02±0.02 µg/mL. EOT had an IC50=29.20±0.12 µg/mL while EOL had 188.69±0.95 µg/mL. The positive standard BHT was detected to be IC50=24±0.02 µg/ mL. The optimal, combinative mixture of essential oils may have been determined based on these isoresponse curves which allowed fixing the ideal combinations of ingredient in terms of quantity to obtain an EO mixture possessing appreciable and optimal antioxidant characteristics. The predicted antioxidant properties determined by the mixing plan model were retained and the experiments were carried out respecting the contents of proposed ingredients of 25.7% EOT, 32.3% EOL, and 41.9% EOC equivalent to 15.42 mg, 19.38 mg and 25.14 mg, respectively. This resulted in arriving at an essential oil mixture with an experimental IC50=11.023±0.145 µg/mL which was similar to those of the predicted antioxidant properties with an order of 10.907±0.212 µg/mL and a non-significant difference of P<0.05, based on which the validity of the proposed mixing plan model was determined. The combined EO was also found to be rich in eugenol (32.35±1.13%), thymol (25.49±0.03%), and limonene (21.30±0.02%). Conclusion: Statistical planning and the development of utility profiles for mixtures of essential oils may have been used to predict the optimal composition as well as to determine their antioxidant profile

A comparative assessment of antifungal activity of essential oils of five medicinal plants from Tunisia

The leaf essential oil yields of clementine, cypress, rosemary, tea, and thyme were 0.22, 0.87, 1.46, 1.20, and 0.72%, respectively, based on the dry weight of the plant material. The leaf essential oils of rosemary, tea, and thyme contained the highest levels of oxygenated monoterpenes (60.14-91.70%). Rosemary and tea leaf essential oils were rich in 1,8-cineole (49.98% and 57.55%, respectively), and they have potent antifungal activity against Alternaria alternata strain (MIC = 5000 μg/ml). Thyme was rich in carvacrol (78.54%) and had a MIC of 6000 μg/ml against A. alternata strain. Clementine leaf essential oil was characterized by the predominance of monoterpene hydrocarbons (88.65%), and it possessed a weak antifungal activity against A. alternata (MIC = 8000 μg/ml). Cypress leaf essential oil was characterized by the predominance of oxygenated sesquiterpenes (60.67%), having an antifungal activity of 8000 μg/ml

Food industry by-products valorization and new ingredients: cases of study

The concern about food and beverages is gaining importance for the general public in terms of health and more environmentally sustainable food products. Healthy foods imply the awareness on their safety, nutritional characteristics, and the potential inclusion of nutritive complements such as antioxidants, vitamins, and proteins, which promote a benefit to the consumer's health. Also, organic foods, with less added chemicals such as pesticides, are more demanded recently. The environmentally sustainable food production has to reconsider the wastes as by-products that can be transformed to provide valuable compounds (antioxidants, fiber, fuels, etc.) that could be used as new products or raw materials in the food industry or even applied in other sectors such as pharmaceutical, polymer, and energy industries. In this chapter, selected successful case studies in which food wastes are transformed into new products by using different separation and purification technologies will be shown. Furthermore, the use of different wild vegetables from natural environments as a source of valuable compounds and new ingredients will be described.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Phenolic composition, antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities of extracts from Moroccan Opuntia ficus-indica flowers obtained by different extraction methods

© 2014 Elsevier B.V. The objectives of this study were to compare the phenolic extraction efficiency of four extraction procedures, to explore the extract phenolic profile by HPLC-DAD-ESI-MS and to evaluate the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities of cactus flowers from Morocco. accelerated solvent extraction (ASE) with 80% acetone in water at 80. °C gave rise to extracts with higher yields of total polyphenols, procyanidins and flavonoids. The qualitative analysis of the phenolic composition showed that these extracts were composed mainly by flavonol glycosides in addition to hydroxycinnamic acids which were detected in the extracts for first time. Our study also revealed the high antioxidant and anti-inflammatory potential of cactus pear flower extracts. In light of the obtained results, cactus flowers are a good source of polyphenols that could be used in foods, cosmetics or pharmaceutical products, thus contributing to diminish the environmental impact of cactus by-products and to its valorization.Peer Reviewe