eChapters

Introduction

Agriculture is a dynamic sector affected by rapid changes in environment and climate, technologies, development priorities, impact of changes in other sectors and social changes such as family structure, migration and international policies such as globalization and liberation. The Indian Green Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, with its package of improved seeds, farm technology, better irrigation and chemical fertilizers, was highly successful in meeting its primary objective of increasing crop yields and augmenting food supply. However, the Green Revolution as a development approach has not necessarily translated into benefits for the lower socioeconomic strata, particularly the rural poor and farm women, in terms of greater food security or greater economic opportunity. It has increased the need for cash incomes in rural households to cover the costs of technological inputs which has forced women to work as agricultural laborers and increased the need for unpaid female labor for farming tasks.

In the era of burgeoning population and shrinking natural resources integrated farming system may be the panacea. Integrated Farming system approach envisages the integration of agroforestry, horticulture, dairy, sheep and goat rearing, fishery, poultry, pigeon, biogas, mushroom, sericulture and by-product utilization of crops with the main goal of increasing the income and standard of living of small and marginal farmers. Integrated systems are about bringing crops and livestock into an interactive relationship with the expectation that together, as opposed to alone, they will generate positive effects on outcomes of interest, such as profitability overall productivity and conservation of nonrenewable resources. It is, however, much more than this. The “system” includes the environment, soil characteristics, landscape positions, genetics and ecology of plant and animals. It involves management practices, goals and lifestyles of humans, social constraints, economic opportunities, marketing strategies and externalities including energy supplies and costs and impacts of farm policies. Systems also reflect available natural resources and the impact on their use, wildlife issues, target and non-target plant and animal species, micro-organisms and indeed all of the definable and indefinable factors that ultimately interact to result in an outcome that is never constant. The aims of integrated farming system is to increase productivity, profitability, sustainability, balanced food, clean environment, recycling of available resources and income round the year. Besides we can also think for adoption of new technology, solving energy crises: fuel and fodder crises, avoiding deforestation, increasing employment generation by taking more than one component, input-output efficiency and enhancing opportunity for agriculture oriented industries as well as uplifting living standard of the farmers

The quality of ice cream depends on the balanced interaction of its major and minor constituents. This chapter examines ice cream mix as a multiphase system and explains the chemistry and functionality of its principal components. Milk fat, milk solids-not-fat, proteins, lactose, sugars, stabilizers, emulsifiers, water, and other constituents are considered in relation to body, texture, flavour, viscosity, freezing behaviour, and stability. The chapter also discusses minor milk constituents and the ways in which individual components interact rather than functioning independently. Understanding these relationships helps manufacturers identify formulation-related defects and optimize composition for desired sensory, processing, nutritional, and storage characteristics.

1. The Aflatoxin Molecule

Aflatoxins are chemically difuro-coumarin derivatives. Presently, 18 different types of aflatoxins have been identified with aflatoxin B₁, B₂, G₁, G₂, M₁ and M₂ being the most common. Of these Aflatoxin B₁ (AFB₁) and G₁ occur most frequently, with AFB₁ being the most potent. Physicochemical and biochemical characteristics of the AFB₁ molecule reveal two important sites for toxicological activity (Heathcote and Hibbert, 1978). The first site is the double bond in position 8,9 of the furofuran ring (Figure 1). The interactions of aflatoxin, DNA and proteins, which occur at this site alter the normal biochemical functions of these macromolecules and leads to deleterious effects at the cellular level.Monteiro et al. (1966) studied the in vitro interaction of groundnut proteins namely arachin and conarachins with AFB₁ molecule. The second reactive group is the lactone ring in the coumarin moiety (Lee et al., 1981). The lactone ring is easily hydrolyzed and is therefore vulnerable to degradation.

Increasing food need, decreasing land availability and concurrently attenuating synthetic nutrients supply envisage the use of alternate supplementary inputs for the cultivation of crops. India is among the few nations where systematic farming started thousands of years ago. It was not only the source of income but was also a way of life. Agricultural activities and the techniques adapted to suit local needs and conditions. Different farming systems were followed by the farmers in different areas according to their needs and weather conditions. The produce was usually shared with other communities of the society involved in other professions. Almost all the nutrients removed by the crops were recycled to the soil directly or indirectly (Yadav and Mowade, 2005). In economic terms, the system followed by the then farming community was highly cost effective since all the inputs needed were locally available and practically no expenditure was incurred except labour. The traditional agriculture was though less productive but self-sufficient. With the advent of modern scientific discoveries, agriculture also changed its face, and with the introduction of high yielding varieties, synthetic fertilizers and effective plant protection measures through chemicals, Indian agriculture made rapid strides in the shape of Green Revolution. As an upshot of Green Revolution, the grain production increased two and a half folds in about three decades with a marginal increase in net-area under cultivation.

Soil pollution is defined as presence of xenobiotics (e.g. chemical compounds, radioactive elements) that alters the soil properties viz., both chemical, physical and biological properties of soil. Soil pollution, including heavy metals, may be of natural origin, like volcanic eruptions, atmospheric lightning, animal excrements or ore leaching. Nevertheless, human activity and mostly chemical industry, mining and metallurgy, as well as municipal waste management and traffic emissions are the main source of environmental pollution.

Introduction

Groundwater investigation has a long history. In the past a waterman in the village would walk around the investigation area with a Y shaped wooden fork and identify the location for digging the wells. Certain trees and organic landforms like termite mounds were considered as indicators. The native intelligence of local topography should have played a role in identifying potential location. Successful or otherwise the method can be said to lack scientific objectivity. The optimal groundwater surveying method is no doubt drilling. This method ensures that all necessary information is being brought up from the geological formations. However, in order to obtain a desired degree of information from the subsurface of an area, drilling alone is normally not a feasible alternative.

There are a number of efficient and inexpensive geophysical surveying methods available to the hydrogeologist. It is worth noting at this point that these are, without exception, indirect methods. This implies that no method measures directly what we are actually looking for. With geophysical surveys, the target features are therefore invariably associated features. This implies that unless we understand the water context of these features, our geophysical surveys will be less than meaningful.

Objective methods of investigating groundwater are discussed in this chapter.

Improved Varieties of Bulb Crops

A. ONION

Occurrence of various diseases affecting agricultural and horticultural crop is known for several centuries. However, critical examination of crop diseases to understand the nature of the causative agents and extent of losses induced by diseases and development of effective disease management systems were possible much later. Any deviation from normal form and function of plants is considered as ‘disease’. Both pathogenic (biotic) and physiogenic (abiotic) causes are involved in diseases of plants. Adverse environmental conditions such as extremes of temperature, light and oxygen, soil moisture, pH and polluted air may alter the physiological conditions of the plants. Nutritional deficiencies also affect various crops leading to considerable losses. Microbial plant pathogens–fungus-like oomycetes, fungi, bacteria, phytoplasmas, viruses and viroids–form the major group of biotic agents that induce different diseases of crop plants in the field as well as during transport and storage (Narayanasamy 2002,2006). Presentation of information in this book is confined to various aspects of the microbial plant pathogens and the diseases caused by them.

Microbial pathogens may induce symptoms that may be visible externally and also in the deep-seated internal tissues which have to be examined using light or electron microscope. In the case of some diseases, the symptoms may be localized in different plant parts such as roots, leaves, stems, floral parts or seeds / fruits / vegetables. Such infections are known as local infection. On the other hand, the pathogen may spread from the point of entry into the host to other plant parts which exhibit characteristic symptoms. These diseases are termed as systemic diseases. In some cases, no recognizable visible symptom is produced although the pathogen is able to develop without inconveniencing the host plant species which are called as carriers and the infection is designated latent infection. Plant viruses are carried symptomlessly by many weed plant species which may serve as sources of infection for crop plants.

The dry matter production is maximum in cassava (3.0 m t ha^-1) and is followed by yams (2.4 m t ha^-1) and sweet potato (2.1 m t ha^-1) and are higher than rice, wheat, maize and banana (1.3 to 1.9 m t ha^-1). The energy production is maximum in yams (182 M J ha^-1 day^-1) and it is followed by sweet potato (152 M J ha^-1 day^-1) and cassava (121 M J ha^-1 day^-1) (Horton and Fano, 1985).

1. Sweet Potato

Both sweet potato roots and tops are nutritious foods which could be used to advantage in combating nutritional deficiencies in parts of the developing world if means could be found to overcome resistance to their increased consumption. The roots are used primarly as human food and are eaten boiled, steamed, fried or baked. They are not only a moderately good energy source, but also contain significant quantities of the water-soluble vitamins viz., ascorbic acid and thiamin, besides supplying part of the daily requirement for riboflavin and niacin. Their contents of pyridoxine, folic acid and pantothenic acid may be relatively high. Raw leaves and tender tips are also excellent sources of ascorbic acid and some of the B-vitamins, especially riboflavin which is deficient in many Asian diets. However, high percentages of water-soluble vitamins are lost on cooking (Woolfe, 1992).

Detection and identification of the causes and diagnosis of the diseases rapidly and precisely are the basic requirements for developing effective crop disease management systems suitable for different ecosystems. Incorrect diagnosis leads to failure to contain the disease spread and consequent additional expenditure to the growers. Hence, it is essential that proper diagnostic procedures are followed to achieve the goal of reducing both quantitative and qualitative losses of agricultural and horticultural produce. Morphological, biological, biochemical, physiological, immunological and genomic characteristics of microbial plant pathogens have been carefully considered to develop rapid, sensitive and reliable methods of detection and identification of cause(s) of newly observed disease (s) in the locations concerned. Various methods of establishing the nature of microbial plant pathogens are discussed in detail in earlier publications

I. Introduction

India has been deeply concerned about the food security on the one hand and health and welfare of its people on the other. Agriculture has been traditionally the backbone of Indian economic progress and development. The role of agriculture including animal husbandry, dairying and fisheries accounts for some 33 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) and about 65 per cent of the work force depends directly or indirectly on agriculture for its livelihood and support. Along with the food grain, the production of vegetables and fruits has also been increased to meet the nutritional security of the people.

India is the second most populated nation with a geographical land area of about 329 million hectares (Table 1). The gross cropped area is 185.5 million hectares with a net sown area of about 142.5 million hectares. Currently area under assured irrigation is estimated to be 50.10 million hectares which is 35.15 percent of the cultivated area which has progressively risen to this level due to the expansion of major and medium irrigation projects including harnessing of ground water reserves excluding tanks (Shantaram, 1998). A substantial part of the net cultivated area which works out to be about 92.3 million hectares is rainfed depending on the vagaries of rains. The forest area (68.07 million hectares) only 22.3 per cent which is much less than the desired level because the national forest policy demands it at least 66 per cent in hills and 33 per cent in plains. However, it is not feasible to divert land for forest plantation due to obvious population pressure on agricultural land. However, the advantages of forest can be harnessed by growing trees on marginal lands alongwith crops through agroforestory practices for restoring ecological balance.

14.1 Introduction

In this chapter we shall describe various simple and easy to fabricate fiber optic sensors. Most of these sensors are based on intensity modulation. Intensity modulated optical fiber sensors have been extensively studied in comparison to sensors based on other modulation techniques. This is because of their several advantages such as simplicity, reliability, flexibility and relatively low cost. Intensity modulated sensors make use of multimode fibers. Multimode fibers have large core and high numerical aperture that make the coupling of light into the fiber easier. The large core is also better suited to propagate high power laser beams. Further, the plastic-clad fused silica multimode fibers are available. Plastic-clad silica multimode fibers have an additional advantage. Their plastic cladding can be removed easily permitting access to the core. The evanescent field in the unclad part has been used for various kinds of chemical and biochemical sensors (see chapter 5). Above all, these fibers are cheap. This chapter is devoted to simple and easy to make both intrinsic and extrinsic type sensors. Sensors utilizing bare-ended fibers have also been described.

Plant oleoresins, often referred to as resins, are sticky plant secretions synthesized in large quantities by about 10 % of plant families. Resin is secreted when a plant is disturbed and the sticky substances produced contain many toxic compounds used to defend the plant from herbivores and pathogens. A major component of resin is the terpenoid compounds. Although terpenoid compounds can be quite complex, they are all composed of five-carbon units, with an isoprene unit as the base. The simplest of these terpenes are the monoterpenes that possess 10- carbon atoms derived from two fused isoprene units. Monoterpenes are an important component of the volatile portion of terpenes and often emit very strong odors.

Abelia grandifolia Villarreal (Caprifoliaceae): Eng.- Glossy Abelia; Kash.– Abeel [NI]. A vigorous, arching, medium sized semi-evergreen shrub commonly grown in gardens for hedging. Leaves ovate, short petioled, entire, dark glossy-green. Flowers born in axillary cymes and terminal panicles, slightly fragrant, produced over a long period from June to October; sepals 2-5; corolla funnel form, white tinged pale- pink.

Introduction

All models are but approximations of reality. When we approximate there is always room for uncertainty. The preference of a particular model over the other is the relative degree of uncertainty acceptable to the objective and budget of the study. With the advent of computers, hosts of modeling software promising a lot to the researcher have arrived on the horizon. It is not in the scope of the book to enumerate all the techniques of hydrogeological modeling. Physical modeling using sand tanks was the earliest attempted modeling technique, about 107 years ago. Most recent and significant modeling technique practiced by many in groundwater potential identification is Geographic Information System (GIS) based modeling. After a brief treatment of physical models, concepts of mathematical models and GIS modeling are elaborated. The modeling techniques have involved mathematics and or software specific instructions. Hence it is recommended that relevant text books for individual techniques be referred. This chapter deals more on modeling concepts.

1.1    Cereals
    Wheat/Barley
    
    1. Wheat aphid, Macrosiphum miscanthi (Hemiptera; Aphididae)
    2. Armyworm, Mythimna separata (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
    3. Ghujhia weevil, Tanymecus indicus (Coleoptera: Curculionidae)
    4. Termites, Odontotermes obesus Ramb. (Isoptera: Termitidae)
    5. Shoot fly, Mayetiola destructor (Say) (Diptera: Cecidomyidae)
    6. Wheat Gall nematode, Anguina tritici (Tylenchida: Tylenchidae)
    7. Molya nematode, Heterodera avenae (Tylenchida: Heteroderidae)
        
    Pulses
    Chickpea
    
    1. Pod borer, Helicoverpa armigera (Hubner) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
    2. Semilooper, Autographa nigrisigna Walker (Lepidoptera; Noctuidae)
    3. Aphids, Aphis craccivora Koch (Homoptera: Aphididae)
    4. Hairy caterpillar, Amsacta moorei (Butler) (Lepidoptera: Arctiidae)
    5. Cut worm, Agrotis ipsilon (Hufnagel) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
    
    Fieldpea
    
    1. Pea leaf miner, Chromatomyia horticola (Goureau) (Diptera: Agromyzidae)
    2. Pea pod borer, Etiella zinckenella Treitschke (Lepidoptera: Phycitidae)
    3. Gram pod borer, Helicoverpa armigera (Hubner) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
    4. Pea stem fly, Melanogromyza phaseoli Tryon (Diptera: Agromyzidae)
    5. Pea blue butterfly Lampides boeticus Linnaeus (Lepidoptera Lycaenidae)
    6. Pea green aphid, Acyrthosiphon pisum (Harris) S. lat. (Hemiptera: Aphididae)
    7. Cut worm, Agrotis ipsilon (Hufnagel) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
        
    Lentil
    
    1. Lentil pod borer, Etiella zinckenella (Lepidoptera: Phycitidae)
    2. Black aphid, Aphis craccivora Koch (Homoptera: Aphididae)
    3. Cut worm,  Agrotis ipsilon (Hufnagel) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
        
    Lathyrus
        
    1. Pod borer, Helicoverpa armigera
    2. Aphid, Aphis craccivora Koch (Homoptera: Aphididae)
    3. Bean bugs, Clavigralla gibbosa Spinola (Hemiptera: Coreidae)
    
    Horsegram
    
    1. Pod borer, E. zinckenella (Lepidoptera:Phycitidae)
    2. Hairy caterpillar, Amsacta sp. (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)
    3. Aphids, Aphis craccivora (Homoptera: Aphididae)
    4. Whitefly and Green Jassid
    5. Plume moth, Exelastis atomosa (Lepidoptera: Pterophoridae)
        
    Oilseeds
    Mustard/Toria / Gobhi Sarson
    
    1. Mustard Aphid, Lipaphis erysismi (Hemiptera : Aphididae)
    2. Mustard saw fly: Athalia lugens proxima (Hymenoptera: Tenthredinidae)
    3. Leaf webber: Crocidolomia binotalis (Lepidoptera: Pyralidae)
    4. Leaf miner: Chromatomyia horticola (Phytomyza atricornis)(Diptera: Agromyzidae)
    5. Cabbage head borer: Hellula undalis (Lepidoptera: Crambidae)
    6. Diamondback moth: Plutella xylostella (Lepidoptera: Plutellidae)
    7. Painted bug: Bargrada hilaris cruciferarum (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae)
    
    Polyphagous Pests
        
    1. Rodents

Abstract

The rhizosphere or the zone of influence around roots harbors a multitude of microorganisms that are affected by both abiotic and biotic stresses. Among these are the dominant rhizobacteria that prefer living in close vicinity to the root or on its surface and play a crucial role in soil health and plant growth. Both free-living and symbiotic bacteria are involved in such specific ecological niches and help in plant matter degradation, nutrient mobilization and biocontrol of plant disease. While the rhizosphere as a domain of fierce microbial activity has been studied for over a century, the availability of modern tools in microbial ecology has now permitted the study of microbial communities associated with plant growth and development, in situ localization of important forms, as well as the monitoring of introduced bacteria as they spread in the soil and root environment. Plant-microbe researchers have studied the diversity of rhizobacteria in a variety of plants, cereals, legumes and others along with assessment of their functionality based on the release of enzymes (soil dehydrogenase, phosphatase, nitrogenase, etc.), metabolites (siderophores, antifungals, HCN, etc.), growth promoters (IAA,

8.1 Introduction

Common onion, Allium cepa L., is a vegetable that is the most widely cultivated species of the genus Allium. It has been cultivated for more than 5000 years. However, its wild species do not exist. Allium is a Greek word. Onion is native of Central Asia. According to Vavilov onion originated in Pakistan, however, others opined it to have domesticated in the mountainous regions of Central Asia comprising Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and north Iran. Jones and Mann proposed the area comprising Pakistan and Iran or South East Asia as the centre of origin. Onion is very important in cookery. 

Introduction

Climate change is an important determinant of abundance and distribution of species. It is concerned with everyone since it posess potential threat to environment, and agricultural productivity and production throughout the world. It has implications for livelihood and survival of human beings. According to Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2001), it is defined as “Change in climate over time, either due to natural variability or as a result of human activity.” As described by IPCC, the most of global warming observed over last 50 years is attributed to the human activities.