Rubaiya Jesmin

University of South Carolina | USC · Department of Environmental Health Sciences

Aflatoxins, a family of fungal secondary metabolites, are toxic and carcinogenic compounds that pose an enormous threat to global food safety and agricultural sustainability. Specifically agricultural products in African, Southeast Asian and hot and humid regions of American countries suffer most damage from aflatoxin producing molds due to the ide...

Aspergillus flavus is an opportunistic pathogen of oilseed crops such as maize, peanut, cottonseed, and tree nuts and produces carcinogenic secondary metabolites known as aflatoxins during seed colonization. Aflatoxin contamination not only reduces the value of the produce but also is a health hazard to humans and animals. Previously, we observed i...

Over the past several years, numerous studies have demonstrated the feasibility of using engineered nanoparticles as antifungals, especially against those fungal pathogens that produce mycotoxins and infect plants, animals, and humans. The high dosage of nanoparticles has been a concern in such antifungal applications due to the potential toxicolog...

Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is the primary psychoactive compound in Cannabis, which is studied extensively for its medicinal value. A central gap in the science is the underlying mechanisms surrounding THC’s therapeutic effects and the role of gut metabolite profiles. Using a mass-spectrometry based metabolomics, we show here that intraperit...

Recent studies from our laboratory indicate that engineered silver nanoparticles can inhibit aflatoxin biosynthesis even at concentrations at which they do not demonstrate antifungal activities on the aflatoxin-producing fungus. Whether such inhibition can be modified by altering the nanoparticles’ physical properties remains unclear. In this study...

A mini-survey of 29 different foods produced by 21 different Indian manufacturers was conducted for the presence of aflatoxins B1, B2, G1 and G2, aflatoxin M1 and deoxynivalenol. The products were purchased from local markets in Kolkata, India and commonly used in the complementary feeding of infants and toddlers in India. Using a previously establ...

An experiment was conducted to study genetic divergence in 29 CMS restorer lines of rice. The study was carried out at the experimental farm, Dept. of Genetics and Plant Breeding, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University, Gazipur during January, 2014 to June, 2014. Genetic divergence was estimated using D2 and principal component a...

A reliable and reproducible protocol is established to get healthy and wellformed callus from juvenile explants of cucumber. The sterilized seeds of cucumber cultivar were cultured on MS basal medium (Murashige and Skoog, 1962). The seeds germinated after 7 days of culture with 24 hours dark photoperiod. Explants from germinated seedlings were cult...