Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) in the environment represents a danger to people's health. Conventional methods for monitoring H2S require absorbent solutions, which usually contains harmful substances such as cadmium sulphate (CdSO4). Constant exposure to cadmium sulphate may cause health damage. In the present work, Ulvan polysaccharides were evaluated as additives in the preparation of absorbent solutions for H2S(g) capture. The resultant Ulvan-based solution featured low content of harmful substances such as cadmium sulphate, sodium hydroxide, and arabinogalactan. The parameters used to validate the performance of the prepared Ulvan-based absorbent solutions included linearity, precision, selectivity, working range, detection limit, quantification limit, robustness, and uncertainty. The relative standard deviation of repeatability (%RSD) was compared to the Horwitz's %RSD. It was found that %...

We used starches from two different Andean-native tubers to prepare nano-sized particles, and tested their ability to stimulate inflammatory reactions in human monocytes. Our data show that the release of inflammatory cytokines by monocytes can be differentially modulated by the administration of non-toxic doses of nanoparticles synthesized from the starch of the Andean sub-species Solanum tuberosum and Solanum goniocalyx. Furthermore, we observed a starch-nanoparticle-specific increase in inflammatory chemokine-dependent migration, and an up-regulation of immunoglobulin receptor CD16. Based on this preliminary study, we conclude that different potato starch nanoparticles possess specific properties that can induce immune responses and may be employed as immune modulators in the future.