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Recent epidemiological studies have suggested that the development and progression of several chronic diseases may be initiated or augmented by oxidative stress. Reactive oxygen species and reactive nitrogen species react readily with and can damage nucleic acids, proteins, and lipids. While biological systems are equipped antioxidant defenses to cope with oxidative stress, oxidative damage may still occur when oxidative stress overwhelms antioxidant defenses. This damage, if left unchecked, may lead to a variety of degenerative diseases, including heart disease, Alzheimer's Disease, Parkinson's Disease and cancer. Several assays have been designed to describe the antioxidant activity of various phytochemicals, vitamins, and other compounds. The ORAC and TOSC assays have emerged as industry standards for measuring antioxidant activity due to their high reliability and sensitivity. Until recently, however, little has been done to assess the relative correlation between these two assays. Furthermore, no assay has been developed to measure changes in antioxidant activities of cells in response to oxidative stress. The current work investigates the correlation between measured antioxidant activities of samples in the both the ORAC and TOSC assays. Recent antioxidant research also focuses on relating chemical structure to antioxidant activity. Previous research in this area has included a broad range of chemical groups, but no study has attempted to formulate a structure-function framework that has applicability to compounds of any group. The current work uses amino acids as a simplest-case model for studying the relationships between chemical structure and antioxidant activity. One particular area of emerging research has centered around comparing organic and conventionally grown food products. The impetus of these investigations lies in claims made by organic supporting groups that these food products are generally more beneficial than their conventional counterparts. Despite the rapid rise in popularity of organic foods, there remains a dearth of research investigating these claims. The current work compares the antioxidant activities of organic and conventionally grown blueberries and apples.

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With diet being such a huge factor in the development of diseases, emerging research has supported that apple consumption is a promising candidate for disease prevention due to the high phenolic content it possesses. These polyphenols can be found in two forms: extractable polyphenols (EP) and non-extractable polyphenols (NEP). Polyphenols have been shown to have strong anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant properties, but up until this point, most researchers focus on EP fractions, while NEP are neglected. After the EP extraction using acetone and acetic acid (99:1) from the Apple Boost powder, three additional extraction methods were conducted on the remaining powder residue to extract the NEP. These extractions put the residue in three different environments for hydrolysis to compare their extraction abilities: enzyme, alkaline, and acid. After analyzing the EP and NEP total phenolic content (TPC) levels, oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC) assay was conducted to measure anti-oxidation capacity of each extraction, and in vitro anti-inflammatory assay was performed to evaluate the anti-inflammation capacity of each extraction where inflammation was induced by LPS. The results showed that the NEP obtained from acid hydrolysis had the highest readings in both the TPC and ORAC assay, but did not show any anti-inflammatory effects in vitro. The EP extraction had the second highest readings in the TPC, ORAC and anti-inflammatory assays. The NEP enzyme extraction had the second lowest TPC and ORAC assay performance, but highest performance in the anti-inflammatory assay. The NEP alkaline extraction had the lowest TPC and performed poorly in both the anti-inflammatory assay and ORAC assay.

The position of newly expanded shoot leaves in the canopy of apple trees had significant and similar effects on specific leaf weight (SLW), leaf thickness, length of palisade tissue, and number of cell layers in the palisade tissue. Inside canopy leaves had lower SLW, leaf thickness, palisade length, and number of palisade cell layers than middle and outside leaves at each of six sample dates ranging from late May to early October. Outside canopy leaves had the highest values at all sample dates. Differences in SLW, leaf thickness, and palisade length between inside and outside leaves increased as the season progressed, primarily due to a general increasing trend in outside leaves that developed later in the season. Effects of canopy position on spur leaves were not as great as with shoot leaves. Regression analysis showed SLW to be significantly correlated with leaf thickness and palisade length. / M.S.