Components of the peptidome and transcriptome persist in lin wa pi: the dried skin of the Heilongjiang brown frog Rana amurensis as used in Traditional Chinese Medicine

Although the ancient practice of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) utilizes predominantly herbal ingredients, many of which are now the subject of intense scientific scrutiny, significant quantities of animal tissue-derived materials are also employed. Here we have used contemporary molecular techniques to study the material known as lin wa pi, the dried skin of the Heilongjiang brown frog, Rana amurensis, that is used commonly as an ingredient of many medicines, as a general tonic and as a topical antimicrobial/wound dressing. Using a simple technology that has been developed and validated over several years, we have demonstrated that components of both the skin granular gland peptidome and transcriptome persist in this material. Interrogation of the cDNA library constructed from the dried skin by entrapment and amplification of polyadenylated mRNA, using a "shotgun" primer approach and 3'-RACE, resulted in the cloning of cDNAs encoding the precursors of five putative antimicrobial peptides. Two (ranatuerin-2AMa and ranatuerin-2AMb) were obvious homologs of a previously described frog skin peptide family, whereas the remaining three were of sufficient structural novelty to be named amurins 1-3. Mature peptides were each identified in reverse phase HPLC fractions of boiling water extracts of skin and their structures confirmed by MS/MS fragmentation sequencing. Components of traditional Chinese medicines of animal tissue origin may thus contain biologically active peptides that survive the preparation procedures and that may contribute to therapeutic efficacy.

Sustainable Value Added - ein neues Maß des Nachhaltigkeitsbeitrags von Unternehmen am Beispiel der Henkel KGaA

This article introduces a new approach to measure corporate contributions to sustainability called Sustainable Value Added. Existing approaches to measure sustainability are based on a comparative assessment of environmental and social burdens and can thus be characterised as burden-based approaches. However, these approaches suffer from severe limitations as a comparative assessment and aggregation of all relevant environmental and social burdens fails in practice. In contrast to these burden-based approaches Sustainable Value Added is value-based. It determines the value that is created by the reduced or increased use of different environmental and social resources. For this purpose the use of environmental and social resources is valued at their opportunity cost. Sustainable Value Added allows an integrated assessment of the economic, environmental, and social performance of a company and expresses the corporate contribution to sustainability in a single monetary indicator. This article explains the theoretical background of Sustainable Value Added, relates it to existing approaches to measure sustainability, and - using the example of Henkel KGaA - demonstrates its practical applicability.

Environmental Value Added - Ein neues Maß zur Messung der Öko-Effizienz. (Environmental Value Added. A new measure for the measurement of eco-efficiency)

To increase eco-efficiency environmental information needs to be integrated into corporate decision making. For decision makers the interpretation of eco-efficiency as a ratio can however be quite difficult in practice. One of the reasons for this is, that eco-efficiency as a ratio is measured in a unit, that is difficult to interpret. This article therefore suggests an alternative measure for eco-efficiency. The Environmental Value Added, the measure proposed in this paper, reflects the excess economic benefit, resulting from the difference between the eco-efficiency under consideration and a benchmark eco-efficiency. It is measured in a purely monetary unit and is thus easier to interpret and integrate than eco-efficiency as a ratio.