The demand from health conscious consumers has lead to emergence of various functional foods. Trend in food science and technology has shown development of prebiotic, which is able to modulate the human gut microbiota and improve the host health in return. The concept has been introduced for more than a decade with inulin and oligosaccharides being the most established and studied prebiotics. Better understanding on the benefits of prebiotics has urged a need for invention of new sources of prebiotics. This paper reviewed the potential of mushrooms as a source of prebiotic with thorough explanation on its concept and application.

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The aim of this study was to evaluate the physicochemical properties of cassava starch that was processed using different parameters (types of water, drying temperatures and milling sizes) to be added into the food products as an ingredient. Selected commercial cassava starch was used as a reference. Mineral water showed a significantly higher value (p<0.05) for the paste viscosity of cassava starch compared to the other types of water, but indicated no significant difference (p>0.05) with tap water for the swelling power, solubility and gel strength of cassava starch. The increase in the drying temperature significantly decreased (p<0.05) swelling power, paste viscosity and gel strength of cassava starch but significantly increased (p<0.05) its solubility. The increase in the milling size significantly increased (p<0.05) swelling power and solubility, paste viscosity and gel strength of cassava starch. For industrial benefits, the use of mineral water for starch processing, the lowest drying temperature of 70°C and the largest milling size of 63 μm shall be the best processing parameters to produce cassava starch with the highest swelling power which could act as a reliable expansion aid in food products. These parameters shall also be the best processing parameters to produce cassava starch with the highest paste viscosity which could function as a desirable food thickening or gelling agent, as well as the highest gel strength that could be applied as an excellent texture enhancer, binder, or coating for food products.

Background: World Health Organization (WHO) has reported the antimicrobial resistance as one among the ten threats to global health in 2019. The development of plant-derived antibiotics is currently considered as a modern medicine’s greatest success. Persea americana is a plant with high medicinal profile which allow its different parts to be used for therapeutic purposes. This study is aimed to determine the antibacterial potential of ethanol and chloroform extracts from epicarp of mature fruits of P. americana Mill against human pathogens.Materials and Methods: The epicarps of avocado were dried in oven and ground into powder using porcelain mortar and pestle. The powdered plant materials were extracted with both 96% ethanol and chloroform. Extracts were qualitatively screened to examine their bioactive contents and agar well diffusion method was used to analyze the antibacterial activity of extracts against both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria.Results: Both solvents showed the ability to dissolve the secondary metabolites from avocado epicarps. Phytochemical screening disclosed the presence of alkaloids, proteins, terpenoids, tannins, flavonoids, steroids and phenolic compounds in ethanolic extracts and absence of flavonoids and tannins in chloroform extracts. The extracts showed the inhibition zones ranging from 14±4.5 mm to 26±2.1 mm while streptomycin demonstrated high inhibition zones ranging from 20±3.1 mm to 30 mm. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values of extracts fall in the range of 0.3125 mg/mL and 20 mg/mL while the MIC values for streptomycin vary from 0.25 mg/mL to 1.25 mg/mL.Conclusion: The ethanol and chloroform extracts proved to be potentially effective and to be used as natural alternative preventives to fight against various disease-causing bacteria.Keywords: antibacterial activity, ethanol extract, chloroform extract, Persea americana, Rwanda

ABSTRAK Kajian ini dijalankan untuk menentukan kesan penggunaan yis daripada fermentasi beras putih dan perang terhadap This study was conducted to determine the effects of yeast from fermented polished and brown rice on physical characteristics of bread. Yeast from four fermentation treatments which were raw polish rice (BP), cooked polish rice (BPM), raw brown rice (BB) and cooked brown rice (NBB), were used for the production of bread. The quality of bread was