Cow's milk is currently the most consumed product worldwide. However, due to various direct and indirect contamination sources, different chemical and microbiological contaminants have been found in cow's milk. This review details the main contaminants found in cow's milk, referring to the sources of contamination and their impact on human health. A comparative approach highlights the poor efficacy and effects of the pasteurization process with other methods used in the treatment of cow's milk. Despite pasteurization and related techniques being the most widely applied to date, they have not demonstrated efficacy in eliminating contaminants. New technologies have appeared as alternative treatments to pasteurization. However, in addition to causing physicochemical changes in the raw material, their efficacy is not total in eliminating chemical contaminants, suggesting the need for new research to find a solution that contributes to improving food safety.

Certain chemicals/materials that are contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) have been widely detected in water bodies and terrestrial systems worldwide while other CECs occur at undetectable concentrations. The primary sources of CECs in farmlands are agricultural inputs, such as wastewater, biosolids, sewage sludge, and agricultural mulching films. The percent increase in cropland area during 1950–2016 was 30 and the rise in land use for food crops during 1960–2018 was 100–500%, implying that there could be a significant CEC burden in farmlands in the future. In fact, the alarming concentrations (μg kg⁻¹) of certain CECs such as PBDEs, PAEs, and PFOS that occur in farmlands are 383, 35 400 and 483, respectively. Also, metal nanoparticles are reported even at the mg kg⁻¹ level. Chronic root accumulation followed by translocation of CECs into plants results in their detectable concentrations in the final plant produce. Thus, there is a continuous flow of CECs from farmlands to agricultural produce, causing a serious threat to the terrestrial food chain. Consequently, CECs find their way to the human body directly through CEC-laden plant produce or indirectly via the meat of grazing animals. Thus, human health could be at the most critical risk since several CECs have been shown to cause cancers, disruption of endocrine and cognitive systems, maternal–foetal transfer, neurotoxicity, and genotoxicity. Overall, this comprehensive review provides updated information on contamination of chemicals/materials of concern in farmlands globally, sources for their entry, uptake by crop plants, and their likely impact on the terrestrial food chain and human health.

Background:Given the chemical richness of medicinal plants (Bidens pilosaL. andCroton floccosus) in Ecuador, they are considered the natural source of numerous medicines. Methods: The leaves were dried at 40°C and 50°C and the extracts were characterized by means of phytochemical screening, verifying the presence of secondary metabolites such as alkaloids, reducing sugars, phenols, flavonoids, tannins and saponins. Three extraction processes were carried out, with two solvents of different polarities: hexane and ethanol. The extraction methods that were applied to the leaves of the plants were Soxhlet, ultrasonic bath and maceration, the latter two at room temperature and Soxhlet at the boiling temperature of the solvent. Determination of the total content of phenols and flavonoids is carried out using the Follin-Ciocalteau colorimetric reaction, Quercetin standard, Aluminum Chloride solution measured with a UV-Vis spectrophotometer. The antioxidant activity was performed with the DPPH radical and measured with the same equipment. Results: The highest content of total phenols obtained by employing the Soxhlet method for extraction when the material was dried at 50°C was 48.609 ± 0.370 mg GAE/g of dry sample forBidens pilosaL. while in the case ofCroton floccosusit was 128.212 ± 0.601 mg GAE/g of dry sample obtained from the extraction by means of maceration. Finally, the antioxidant activity against the 1.1-diphenyl-2-picryl-hydrazyl radical was determined, and it was found that theBidens pilosaL. species performed better and responded better to the test, with an IC50value of 239.33 µg/mL, thanCroton floccosus(IC50of 644.125 µg/mL). Conclusions:The following preliminary phytochemical study of theBidens pilosaL. andCroton floccosusplants provided important information on the content of secondary metabolites and response to the DPPH radical reported for the first time in Ecuador, which may be future use for medicinal application.

La harina integral de Cucurbita moschata posee un alto contenido de carotenoides totales que pueden contribuir a la pigmentación del tarso y la piel de pollos de engorde. El objetivo de la investigación fue evaluar el efecto de la sustitución de maíz en tres niveles por harina integral de zapallo (10 %, 12 % y 15 %) sobre el rendimiento productivo y la pigmentación de los pollos. Se utilizó un diseño experimental completamente al azar con cuatro tratamientos y cuatro repeticiones, cada una con 15 pollos de la línea Cobb 500 sin sexar. Se evaluaron las variables productivas de peso, ganancia de peso, consumo de alimento, consumo acumulado, conversión y pigmentación de piel y tarsos de los pollos con el uso del colorímetro Konica-Minolta CR-300. Los análisis de varianza de las variables consumo, consumo acumulado, ganancia de peso y peso acumulado presentaron diferencias estadísticas (p < 0,05) en las etapas primera y segunda entre los diferentes tratamientos. En la etapa de finalización, luego de 42 días, no se observaron diferencias significativas entre las variables estudiadas y se alcanzó un peso de 2 232,22 g a 2 384,00 g por pollo. Los resultados sobre la pigmentación de piel y tarsos muestran que la inclusión del 15 % de harina integral de zapallo generó diferencias significativas entre el tratamiento T0 y el tratamiento T2. Se concluye que la utilización de harina integral de zapallo en sus diferentes formulaciones logró resultados satisfactorios; sin embargo, el 15 % de esta harina resultó favorable sobre los rendimientos productivos y la pigmentación de los pollos.

Enhanced solvent extraction (ESE) and pressurized liquid extraction (PLE) have been used for the first time to obtain antioxidant compounds from Prestonia mollis leaves. The effects of pressure (100–250 bar), temperature (55–75 °C) and the composition of the extraction solvent (ethanol, water and hydroalcoholic mixtures) were evaluated according to multilevel factorial designs. PLE provided the largest extraction yields compared to ESE, as well as a greater impact of the operating conditions studied. The highest total phenolic content was obtained when using a hydroalcoholic mixture (CO₂/ethanol/water 50/25/25) through ESE at 100 bar and 75 °C. The antioxidant capacity of this extract is related to higher concentration levels of the identified flavonoids: Quercetin 3-O-xylosyl-rutinoside, Kaempferol 3-(2G-apiosylrobinobioside) and Kaempferol 4′-glucoside 7-rhamnoside. This extract was tested for the supercritical impregnation of polylactic acid (PLA), which is a polymer widely used in the biomedical industry. The influence of pressure (100–400 bar), temperature (35–55 °C), amount of extract (3–6 mL) and impregnation time (1–2 h) have been evaluated. The best results were obtained by impregnating 3 mL of extract at 100 bar and 55 °C for 2 h, achieving 10% inhibition with DPPH methods. The extract presented a potentially suitable impregnation of PLA for biomedical applications.