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Although plants can be grown to maturity in aerated nutrient solutions and other media, virtually all land plants, including those on which we depend for food, fibre and fuel, grow in soil. The soil has three-fold function to perform with respect to crop growth: physical, chemical and biological.

Fixation can be done by either wet fixation or dry fixation. If staining is to be delayed for a few days, cell preservation enhanced by fixation. Fix the slide within 30-60 seconds.

Wet Fixation

The craniofacial region presents a unique challenge for implantable biomaterials because the pull of the craniofacial muscles produces variable loading in different regions. In addition, craniofacial skin loses elasticity with the age and develops subcutaneous tissue sags.

Even though surgeons are familiar with the use autogenous bone grafts for craniofacial reconstruction, the usage of alloplastic bone substitutes has increased continuously, because autogenous bone is difficult to harvest, time consuming, causes significant donor morbidity, and bone resorption, but most important thing is that the biocompatibility of current alloplastic materials are improving.

Synthetic substitute creates a new avenue for clinicians to explore as adjunct in surgical procedures. These materials may not necessarily be used solely for reconstructive procedures, but when used in the right situation in combination with autologous, allograft or other synthetic, the result have the potential for more desirable results.

The low productivity of perennial fruits has been attributed to various factors, like small size of holdings, preponderance of old and senile trees and poor management of inputs such as water, nutrients and pesticides. Thickly-shaded mango orchards in Malihabad areas of Uttar Pradesh (Kalloo et al., 2005; Mishra, 2013), lanky as well as sick tall unproductive litchi orchards in Muzaffarpur and its adjoining areas in Bihar (Kumar, 2008), seedling orchards of guava and citrus fruits throughout the country, including disease-affected aonla and other perennial fruit plantations are commonly seen in large tracts in different parts of the country (Pandey et al., 2013; Singh 2007). In pomegranate, the old orchards become non- productive due to incidence of pests and diseases, and negligence (Hiwale, 2009).

The traditional trend of orcharding for most of the tropical and subtropical evergreen perennial fruit trees, in general, are regarded as not responsive to pruning. However, a number of observations made in recent decades have conclusively proved the effectiveness of this important operation in maintaining the sustained fruit yield and keeping the plant well within manageable limits. The efforts have been made to deal perennial fruits in quite details wherever deemed necessary. Climatic factors have been found to affect significantly on fruit bearing as a result of pruning treatments. Though, this aspect is one of the most misconceived and least understood when seen with shoot emergence and shoot physiology for perenation and phase change from vegetative to reproductive. Correct pruning may easily spell the difference between success and failure, yet many growers undertake infinite pains to get the best out of their trees but the neglect to give their consideration to important practice. It is obviously needless to mention here that their such efforts end in futility. For better understanding of principles and practices of pruning, it would be imperative to trace out its historical background. The present level of understanding about pruning has been developed through ages with the increased understanding of growth and developmental processes of fruit plants.

Family: Lamiaceae

Flowering: August-September

Fruiting: September-October

Botanical dcescription: The plant is a glabrous perennial herb. Stems are erect, about 1 ft tall, usually less, purplish, hairless. Leaves are stalkless, sessile, lanceolate or ovate, acute with glabrous above and glandular below. Flowers are lilac, loose cylindrical, slender with interrupted spikes.

1. Jefferies SR. 2014. Bioactive and biomimetic restorative materials: a comprehensive review. Part I. J Esthet Restor Dent. 26(1):14-26.

2. Sharma M, Murray PE, Sharma D, Parmar K, Gupta S, Goyal P. 2013. Modern approaches to use bioactive materials and molecules in medical and dental treatments. Int J Curr.Microbiol. App. Sci., 2(11):429-39.

3. Laskin Daniel M: Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery vol 1

4. Kay C. Dee, David A. Puleo, Bizios R. 2002. An Introduction to Tissue Biomaterial Interactions.

5. Peltola MJ, Vallittu PK, Vuorinen V, Aho AA, Puntala A, Aitasalo KM. 2012. Novel composite implant in craniofacial bone reconstruction. Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol. 269(2):623-8

6. Kao ST, Scott DD. 2007. A review of bone substitutes. Oral Maxillofac Surg Clin North Am. 19(4):513-21, vi.

7. Nasr HF, Aichelmann-Reidy ME, Yukna RA. 1999. Bone and bone substitutes. Periodontol 2000. 19:74-86.

Rejuvenation of fruit trees is visionary approach to save the old senile declining trees for future sustainable quality fruit production through unique integration of invasive exhaustive operations in scientific manner and skilful management. Since unproductive and uneconomic orchards are in abundance, a large-scale uprooting and replacement with new plantations (rehabilitation) will be a long-term and expensive strategy. Therefore, research efforts have been initiated at various pioneer institutes/ SAUs to standardize. The technology for restoring the production potential of existing plantations by a technique called rejuvenation. Rejuvenation of old orchard is very vital under orchard management. Reiterative pruning and canopy re-building of perennial fruit trees is medium- term strategy requiring scientific skill and technique, for bringing back the youthful vigour with enhanced quantum of quality production in sustainable way within a time gap of three years for mango, litchi and cashew (Lal et al., 2000; Kumar, 2008), while two years for guava, aonla and pomegranate (Singh, 2007; Hiwale 2009) without any economic loss to growers. The old fruit orchards need to be rejuvenated since they show decline in yield and quality of produce. These trees/plants need to be rejuvenated which have attained a stage where they are no more profitable from the grower ’s point of view (Singh, 2007; Srivastava, 2007).

Family: Rubiaceae

Flowering: September-December

Fruiting: December-March

Botanical description: The plant is erect or diffused, pubescent herb, growing up to 40 cm in height. The leaves are sessile, ovate-lanceolate, acute, pubescent and rounded at the base. Flowers are small, white in colour and verticillate in axillary fascicles with small calyx. Capsule is globose, less than 1 mm across with 2 minute seeds and having furrowed on one side.

22.1. Aim

To estimate the fruit firmness.

22.2. Apparatus/machineries/equipments required

• Magness Taylor Pressure Tester

• Penetrometer

22.3. Theory and principle

Fruit firmness is an important feature of maturity. During ripening, fruits may soften and become too soft at the overripe stage. The changes are detected by touching or by using devices like texture analyzers and pressure testers to measure texture of fruits and vegetable.

Micropropagation through artificial seeds may be commercially exploited on a large scale, generating millions of plantlets within a few days, and this may become a profitable multibillion rupees industry in near future. This technology would be feasible and even competitive economically with the other seed production methods.

In the near future, the synthetic seed technology could be the key to overcome these problems, e.g., through automated procedures of artificial seed production (Aitken-Christie et al. 1995) followed by autotrophic micropropagation (Jeong et al. 1995). The synthetic seed systems coupled with artificial intelligence and microcomputer systems like the most advanced robots, which can mimic the motions, and functions of living beings (i.e. automated encapsulations). It would tremendously increase the efficiency of encapsulation and production of artificial seeds, and revolutionized the plant propagation method in the years ahead. This technology is gradually moving towards the commercial propagation of high value crops. However, there is a great need for refinement of this technology by tackling of certain technical problems such as the need to produce high quality and high fidelity somatic embryos and to avoid the genetic instability and variability of tissue culture derived plants. The somatic variation can be overcome if the process and regulation of somatic embryogenesis and origin of somaclonal variation are well understood. The understanding about the storage, transport, handling growth habit and harvest index of artificial seeds is essential. The efforts are also needed to increase the output of embryos or plants per gram of callus tissue and conversion frequency of artificial seeds are also needed.

Family: Cucurbitaceae

Flowering: June-October

Fruiting: October-February

Botanical description: Bitter gourd is a herbaceous, tendril-bearing, slender climber, growing up to 5 m. It bears simple, alternate leaves 4-12 cm across, with 3-7 deeply separated lobes. Each plant bears separate yellow male and female flowers, about 2-3 cm in diameter. Male flowers are more numerous, having a yellow center and conical base, while female flowers have a green center and a small bump at the base. The fruits are oblong shaped and tapering at both ends, 5-20 cm long and turns yellow when ripe. It is hollow in cross-section, with a relatively thin layer of flesh surrounding a central seed cavity filled with large flat seeds and pith. Seeds and pith appear white in unripe fruits.

11.1. Storage fungi

Store fungi include all species of Aspergillus, Fusarium and Penicillium.

Aspergillus flavus, A. candidus, A. niger, A. parasiticus, A. repens, A. rubber, A. versicolor, etc. Penicillia etc

Penicillia are more prevalent in cooler climate.

Good smear is well spread and tongue shaped. If forced during discharge of materials from the syringe, it is sprayed on to slide.

The ideal smears will yield intact and well stained cells (Figure) should have a clear demarcation between the nucleus and cytoplasm

Poor smear will show no cellularity or damaged cells.

Family: Moraginaceae

Flowering: January-March

Fruiting: April-June

Botanical description: The plant is a small deciduous tree, having corky gray bark, branching and fernlike leaves and growing up to 10 metre in height. The leaves are pinnately compound, 25-50 cm long with thickened and articulated at the base. The flowers of the plant are scented and white in colour with lanceolate petals. Capsule is pendulous, long bean like seed pods and usually 22-45 cm long.

1.1. Above ground feeders

1.1.1. Feeding on flower buds, leaves and bulbs.

Seed gall nematode: Anguina tritici

Leaf and bud neamtode: Aphelenchoides

Stem and bulb nematode: Ditylenchus

It has been well established that the biofertilizers are beneficial to plants and are cost-effective inputs for sustainable production system. However, there are some constraints with respect to its production, which are presented below:

10.1 Production constraints

10.1.1 Raw material

Eventhough there are large number of biofertilizer formulations, only few are considered as good carrier materials for biofertilizers such as peat and lignite. Moreover, its availability in India is limited and the quality is lacking for these carrier materials. Hence, a cost effective and locally available material with increased shelf-life is the need of the hour.

10.1.2 Specificity and availability of strains

As the microbial strains used as biofertilizers are specific to soil and agro-ecological conditions, availability of specific strains for the specific host and soil edaphic factors are inadequate.

Forages can be classified according to the nutrient density in the dry matter.
Roughages: These are diets that have more than 18% crude fiber, more than 35% cell wall content, and less than 60% TDN on DMB. There are two types of roughage: dry roughage and green roughage. Roughages are classified as succulent or non-succulent according on their moisture content. Succulent feeds are ones with greater than 80% moisture. Non-succulent feed contains less amount of moisture. Roughages can also be classified based on legumes, for example, leguminous and non-leguminous roughages. Roughages are divided into three types based on their nutritional content (on DMB): maintenance, productive and non-maintenance.
Roughages: Feedstuffs having more than 18% crude fibre, more than 35% cell wall contents and less than 60% TDN on dry matter basis (DMB) are known as roughages. There are two kinds of roughages, dry roughage and green roughage. On the basis of moisture content the roughages can be classified into succulent and non-succulent. Succulent feeds are those which contain more than 80% moisture. Feed contains lesser amount of moisture is known as non-succulent. Roughages can also be classified on the basis of legumes. e.g. leguminous and non-leguminous roughages.
Roughages can be classified based on their nutritive value (on DMB) into maintenance type, productive type and non-maintenance type.

January Thaw : A period of mild weather, usually following a cold spell, which often occurs in late January in the eastern regions of North America, particularly around the Great Lakes region, New England and the Canadian Maritime Provinces. The thaw is associated with a strong flow of warm air northward from the Gulf of Mexico on southerly winds on the back of a high pressure system.

Jet Stream : A relatively narrow band of high-speed winds, generally greater than 50 knots (57 mph or 93 kmph), found in the upper troposphere above regions of strong horizontal temperature contrasts such as fronts. The major jet streams are the subtropical jet and the polar jet stream.

Joule : The unit of work or energy. In mechanical systems, this is the work done when a force of one Newton displaces the point of application by a distance of one metre in the direction of force. In electrical systems, a joule is the equivalent of moving one coulomb through a potential difference of one volt. One joule is equal to one watt per second

Family: Rutaceae

Flowering: February-April

Fruiting: May-September

Botanical description: The plant is a small tree, growing up to 4-6 m tall, with a trunk up to 40 cm diameter. The leaves are opposite or alternate, lanceolate or ovate, strongly scented with 11-21 leaflets. The flowers are small white, and fragrant. The berries are small, ovoid or ellipsoid, black in colour, shiny and edible, but their seeds are poisonous.