In this thesis snack production and oats as a raw material for snacks were reviewed. Oat lipid oxidation and the shelf life of snack products made of oats was also considered. The aim of experimental studies was to find out if it is possible to puff baked snacks in the oven with high temperature without using yeast as a leavener. The test was conducted with two different baking temperatures and with and without added yeast. The shelf life of oat-based snacks with spice extract were also studied for 12 months by sensory evaluation. Lipid oxidation was also measured, and the product quality was determined by microbiological tests. Also, two consumer tests (number of panelists n = 30 and n = 118) were made with the snacks. Statistically there were no difference between two baking temperatures in doughs with yeast, but the higher temperature decreased the average error of snack samples heights. Yeast in the dough was significant. Sensory evaluation panel recognised the hidden, freshly baked reference sample from the actual samples at 6 months’ time. The results from the measurements of lipid oxidation on the effect of spice extract on snacks shelf life wasn’t clear and needs further investigation. The products microbiological quality stayed good the whole time monitored.

Microvesicles (MVs) are lipid bilayered membranous vesicles containing functional lipids, proteins, RNA and DNA that are produced by most cells. The physiological significance of MVs has become evident, and increased MV counts and the contents of MVs are nowadays also associated with different pathophysiological phenomena. The goal of the field is to use MVs as diagnostic and therapeutic tools. To achieve this, the understanding of the mechanisms of the functions of MVs should be understood better and additionally, reliable methods for the quantification and characterization of MVs should be developed and standardized. The aim of the study was to determine differences in platelet-derived MVs produced by different activation mechanisms. The second aim was to set up and optimize a protocol based on the reaction of sulphur, phosphate and vanillin (SPV) for measuring lipid content of MVs. The third aim was to study the effect of thrombin and proteinase inhibitor PPACK to the vesiculation of platelets. Platelets were isolated from the whole blood of healthy volunteers and vesicles were produced by platelet agonists mediating thrombogenic activation (thrombin and collagen, TC), pathophysiological activation (lipopolysaccharide, LPS) and Ca-ionophore (A23187) as positive control for vesiculation. Quantification and size determination of produced MVs was done using Nanoparticle Tracking Analysis (NTA). MVs were characterized by protein content using bicinchonic acid assay (BCA) and by lipid content using SPV-reaction. MVs had great activation-dependent differences in the lipid and the protein content. Activation with Ca-ionophore produced the most MVs, but the lipid and protein content was only a fraction from (patho)physiologically induced MVs. Only TC increased vesiculation. Vesicle subpopulations had significant difference in lipid content. Thrombin and proteinase inhibitor PPACK mediated inhibition of platelet formation in all of the activations, but the effect was not statistically significant. The mechanism of inhibition was likely to be proteinase inhibitor mediated. The isolation of vesicle populations using differential centrifugation proved to isolate studied populations only partially and the quantification method with NTA was susceptible to concentrated samples. SPV protocol reacted with different intensity to different lipids. In the future, quantification and isolation methods for MVs and the subpopulations of MVs should be improved. Additionally, to understand the physiologically relevant mechanisms of platelet-derived vesicle formation, the inhibitor experiments with PPACK should be continued, because the number of replicates was too low to see significant effects due to a large donor-dependent deviation. Since MVs are heterogenous cellular multitools affecting varying (patho)physiological phenomena, optimization and standardization of methods should be continued in order to study MVs properly.