Thus, luteolin functions by neuroprotection possibly through a rebalancing of pro-oxidant-antioxidant status. This agent points to possible interventions for preventing neurodegenerative diseases such as cerebral ischemia, Parkinson’s disease, and Alzheimer’s disease, as well as for improving brain aging. (C) 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.”
“Background: Determining the proportion of blood meals on humans by outdoor-feeding and resting mosquitoes is challenging. This is largely due to the difficulty

of finding an adequate and unbiased sample of resting, engorged mosquitoes to enable the identification of host blood meal sources. This is particularly difficult in the south-west Pacific countries of Indonesia, the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea where thick vegetation constitutes the primary resting sites for

Selleck MK2206 the exophilic mosquitoes that are the primary malaria and filariasis vectors.\n\nMethods: Barrier screens of shade-cloth netting attached to bamboo poles were constructed between villages and likely areas where mosquitoes might seek blood meals or rest. Flying mosquitoes, obstructed by the barrier screens, would temporarily stop and could then be captured by aspiration at hourly intervals throughout the night.\n\nResults: In the three countries where this method was evaluated, blood-fed females of Anopheles farauti, Anopheles Nocodazole concentration bancroftii, Anopheles longirostris, CX-6258 purchase Anopheles sundaicus, Anopheles vagus, Anopheles kochi, Anopheles annularis, Anopheles tessellatus, Culex vishnui, Culex quinquefasciatus and Mansonia spp were collected while resting on the barrier screens. In addition, female Anopheles punctulatus and Armigeres spp as well as male An. farauti, Cx. vishnui, Cx. quinquefasciatus and Aedes species were similarly captured.\n\nConclusions:

Building barrier screens as temporary resting sites in areas where mosquitoes were likely to fly was an extremely time-effective method for collecting an unbiased representative sample of engorged mosquitoes for determining the human blood index.”
“Soil organic carbon (SOC) content and radiocarbon concentration were measured in three particle-size fractions and charcoal fragments at four depths to bedrock in a sandy soil from SE Australia. SOC content declined with depth for all fractions. The enrichment factors of SOC showed that the finest particles are most important for SOC storage throughout the soil profile, and their importance for SOC storage increased with depth. In the topsoil, all particle-size fractions contained modern SOC. In contrast, charcoal from this depth gave radiocarbon ages of 85-165 years Before Present (BP). This difference was more pronounced at 30-60 cm, where the charcoal was dated at 2,540 years BP, over 12 times as old as the youngest fraction at that depth.