eChapters

Abstract

The development and management of fresh groundwater resources in coastal aquifers are seriously constrained by the impact of seawater intrusion. The coastal aquifers are fragile and this situation becomes more intense like that of the coastal Cuddalore region. The geochemical signature of groundwater of Cuddalore coast was studied for Pre Monsoon, Southwest, North east and Post Monsoon seasons by collecting total of 64 groundwater samples in each season. The collected samples from were analysed for physical parameters, such as electrical conductivity (EC), pH and major ion concentrations, such as Ca, Mg, Na, K, Cl, HCO₃, PO₄ and SO₄. Interpretation of analytical data shows the predominance of  Na–Cl type   in PRM and Ca- Mg-Cl type  is the dominant facies during POM. The Chaddas evaluation diagram shows that the hydrogeochemical evaluation plot for PRM samples fall in  Na-Cl type. The ratios of Na/Cl and Cl/HCO₃ is also enumerated the fact that the most of the samples from PRM and few samples from other seasons also indicates dominance of salt water intrusion.

I. Decimal Multiples and Sub-Multiples

II. Description of Units

Mechanical Units

Electric and Magnetic Units

The esu and emu unit systems are cgs systems.

esu denotes “electrostatic unit”, sometimes given prefix “stat”, e.g. statcoulomb emu denotes “electromagnetic unit”, sometimes given prefix “ab”, e.g. abcoulomb Some emu units have special names:

1. Fundamental Concepts of Unit Operations

    1.    Process is the set of activities or industrial operations that modify the properties of raw materials with the purpose of obtaining products to satisfy the needs of a society.

    2.    Food process engineering includes the part of human activity in which the knowledge of physical, natural, and economic sciences is applied to agricultural products as related to their composition, energetic content, or physical state.

    3.    Food process engineering can also be defined as “the science of conceiving, calculating, designing, building, and running the facilities where the transformation processes of agricultural products, at the industrial level and as economically as possible, are carried out.

    4.    In a discontinuous operation the raw material is loaded in the equipment; after performing the required transformation, the obtained products are unloaded. These operations, also called “batch” or “intermittent,” are carried out in steps:

Unsupervised classification is the technique of classification of raster data in which no prior information is provided by the user. Raster data is classified based on their spectral characteristics such that the pixels having similar spectral properties in the multispectral feature space are grouped together in one class. Unsupervised classification is mainly performed by clustering algorithms. The purpose of these algorithms is to minimize within cluster variability and maximize between clusters variability. The user must interpret and label the classes after performing unsupervised classification. This method of classification requires minimum data which makes it easy and quick, but user has toput efforts in identification of the classes. This method could be useful when user doesn’t have any prior knowledge about the study area. This method removes subjectivity and enables us to get the unique classes which might be unrecognized by the user. K-means is the most commonly used method for performing unsupervised classification. In this chapter, we have discussed K- means, CLARA and unsupervised random forest method for classification of raster data in R.

Normally we associate our agriculture and food supply with farms and villages. The new trends of greener cities and urban and peri urban horticulture (UPH) are emerging very fast. Towns and cities in the world’s developing countries are growing at great speed. Ten years ago, an estimated 40 percent of the developing world’s population or 2 billion people lived in urban areas. Since then, their numbers have expanded twice as fast as total population growth, to more than 2.5 billion. By 2025, more than half the developing world’s population of 3.5 billion will be urban. Again most of the world’s fastest growing cities are in Asia and Africa with young population.

Urban climatology deals with changes in climatic conditions that prevail in large cities and towns that differ from the surroundings. Urban climates are influenced by large built-up areas, increased human activities and dense population and are found to experience differences in temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction and rainfall compared to adjoining areas. Tall buildings, paved streets and parking lots affect radiation balance, wind flow and run-off. The atmosphere in urban areas will have higher concentration of pollutants like carbon monoxide, oxides of sulphur and nitrogen, hydrocarbons, oxidants and particulate matters. Heavy concentration of air pollutants will have considerable impact on temperature, humidity, wind, and precipitation in and around urban areas. Heavy concentrations of air pollutants for longer periods or several days may lead to temperature inversions. The temperature inversions prevent convection and vertical movement of air. The centre of urban area will be warmer by even 5 to 6°C compared to adjoining areas. During summer months, the concrete structures absorb, store and reradiate more solar energy per unit area compared to vegetation. During nights, radiative losses from urban buildings and roads keep city warmer than the rural areas. The average relative humidity in cities is usually lower due to lack of evapotranspiration from vegetation. The mean wind speed will be 20 to 30 percent due to increased frictional drag induced by built up urban terrain (Fig.17.1).
The urban areas influence precipitation patterns in its vicinity as turbulence and convection get modified by city environment.
17.1. Urban Heat Islands
An urban heat island is a type of microclimate that is created when an urban area becomes warmer than the surrounding area. It is common in large cities (Fig.17.2). The characteristic features of urban heat islands are as follows:
• Increased temperature
• Large temperature difference by even 5 to 6°C
• The south facing buildings receive more sunlight in the northern hemisphere
• The tall buildings in urban areas create streets that act like deep valley
• The albedo will be very less. The darker areas lead to more absorption of incoming solar radiation and emit more of long wave radiation
• The concrete structures are built with materials having low specific heat. Therefore, concrete structures warm up faster and lead to quick rise in temperature
• The higher density of buildings reduces wind speeds.

Abstract

The constant improvement in automation of bakery industry has placed higher demands on wheat. As a consequence bakery industry requires wheat possessing specific quality attributes. In view of this, there is need to produce good quality wheat not only for good chapattis but also for better bakery products viz., bread, biscuit, noodles, pasta products. New technologies are emerging which could be exploited for determining the Indian wheats for their suitability for various value added products. In the current investigation, 50 genotypes possessing low protein content (<10.5%) selected from a vast amount of breeding material were analysed for their biscuit making attributes. These lines were screened by actual baking test and alkaline water retention capacity (AWRC) test keeping the standard prescribed for biscuit making qualities viz., low protein content, low sedimentation value, low AWRC and larger diameter with larger spread factor of biscuit. Further with the help of Stable Micro Systems TA.HDi Texture Analyser the biscuits were analysed for hardness and crispness. Correlation coefficient among 8 quality traits suggested highly significant and positive correlation between sedimentation value and AWRC, biscuit diameter and spread factor, and biscuit hardness and fracturability, and significant negative correlation between biscuit diameter and its thickness. On the basis of findings, genotypes identified for biscuit making qualities may be used as donor for developing varieties suitable for biscuit making.

Abstract

Aquifers are usually composed of permeable layers that can ways a considerable amount of groundwater. Usually, aquifer units are correlated through the concept of lithostratigraphy. For low-permeable aquifers, it is difficult to define the spatial distribution of hydrogeological units, and this study attempts to use geochemical methods to identify the groundwater flow paths in an area of Southeast coast of Tamil Nadu, India. Multiple geochemical analyses, including groundwater chemistry; stable isotopic compositions of d¹⁸O and 8D contents were performed.  Spatial distribution of d¹⁸O, dD, Cl-/HCO-₃ show that northeastern part of the study area seriously affected by seawater intrusion. The highly permeable aquifers at the east coastal region are characterized by high hydraulic conductivity as compared with other regions of the study area. Hydrogeochemical characteristics based on bivariate diagrams of major and minor ions show that changes in the chemical composition of groundwater are mainly controlled by the salinization process followed by cation-exchange reactions.

Abstract

The weather or climate is a natural resource and is an important basic input in agricultural planning and strategies. Every plant process, related with growth, development and yield of a crop and each of inseason and off-season farm operations (according to World Meteorological Organization) is more than 10 per cent and can reach up to 50 per cent in smaller areas and not a surprise even if it reaches to 100 per cent on micro scale. Amongst the various weather elements, temperatures, radiation and rainfall play major role in deciding the crop growth and yield levels. Precipitation is one of the important weather factors being responsible for atmospheric and soil moisture and therefore has more agricultural importance, especially in rainfed agriculture.

Keywords: Remote sensing, weather, agroadvisory, GIS

1.0 Introduction

India receives more than 70 per cent of its annual rainfall during South West monsoon season. Indian summer monsoon rainfall shows large intra - seasonal and intra-annual variability (Parthasarathy, 1960; Alexander et al., 1978; Mooley and Parthasarathy, 1984) and also changes in space and time, intensity and distribution. Borgaonkar and Pant (2001) have reported that Indian monsoon rainfall has shown trend less nature since 17^th century based on proxy data with large inter-annual fluctuations. IPCC (2001) has reported increase in rainfall over tropical and higher latitudes and decrease in rainfall over subtropics and mid latitudes.

4.1. Information and Communication Technology

Refers to technologies that provide access to information through telecommunications.

Similar to IT, but focuses on communication technologies.

Includes the Internet, wireless network, cell phones, and other communication medium.

ABSTRACT

The study shows the use of information resources and services by the academia. Aim: study focuses on age, designation, gender, qualification and computer literacy impact all use of information resources and services. Objectives: To know the use of information resources by faculty of fashion institute, to study the awareness of OPAC among faculty of fashion institute, to find out the frequency of using library by faculty and to investigate the level of computer literacy. Methodology: used survey method, collected data through questionnaire method. The questionnaire designed and distributed 380 questionnaires to users of selected fashion design institute and we received 120 filled questionnaires. The outcome shows that they are satisfied with information resources and services of Fashion design institution.

Keywords: Information, Resources, Services, Fashion design, Fashion institution, Fashion technology, Swatch library; South India.

Protected cultivation, encompassing systems like greenhouses, polyhouses, and shade nets, has revolutionized modern agriculture by creating controlled environments that shield crops from adverse climatic conditions. This method not only extends the growing period but also enhances the quantity and quality of yields.
A key element of success in protected cultivation is the efficient management of water and nutrients, made possible through advanced irrigation and fertigation techniques.
IRRIGATION IN PROTECTED CULTIVATION
Irrigation is essential for delivering adequate moisture to crops, which is crucial for their healthy development. In protected cultivation settings—where rainfall is either insufficient or unpredictable—reliable irrigation systems become even more important. Traditional methods like surface or furrow irrigation are less effective, often leading to water loss and irregular distribution. In contrast, modern systems such as drip and micro-sprinkler irrigation provide precise delivery of water directly to the plant’s root zone, significantly reducing evaporation and runoff. Among these, drip irrigation has become particularly popular due to its high efficiency. By applying water directly at the soil surface near the roots, it minimizes wastage and ensures consistent moisture levels. This technique not only saves water but also supports healthy root growth and reduces the incidence of soil-borne diseases. Research shows that drip irrigation can decrease water consumption by 30–70% while improving crop productivity by 20–90% compared to conventional irrigation methods.

Introduction

The country’s population is growing at fast pace putting pressure on agriculture sector to grow more with declining resources. Proper planning and management become ever more crucial to ensure the sustainability of food production with minimal environmental footprints. Space technologies have unique advantages of providing large area synoptic coverage, with repetitive, objective and scientific datasets essential for monitoring a hugely vast and heterogeneous country like India. Agriculture being very dynamic and highly dependent on different natural resources needs continuous monitoring. Therefore these technologies have immense potential for application in the agriculture sector of the country. Space based technologies provide information on crops and natural resources on a real-time basis, proving unmatched opportunity for planning including in-season manipulation of crop production and management practices improving the resilience of farming against weather aberrations. Advanced estimates of regional agricultural output are critical to anticipate and mitigate the course of food shortage from sudden crop failure.

Incidentally, the first practical application of remote sensing in India was in the field of agriculture, wherein early detection of coconut wilt disease in Kerala was possible using air borne infrared cameras (Dakshinamurty et al. 1971). To explore the potential of space technology through satellites Joint Experiment Programme (JEP) started for defining the appropriate configurations of sensors in Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) satellites during the early 1980s. After exhaustive field experimentation, the potential of remote sensing (RS) technology to estimate crop yield and area to forecast its productivity at district and regional level due to the multispectral, large area and repetitive coverage was established. By that time this technology was being used operationally used by a few advance nations. With the launch of the first IRS satellite IRS-1A in 1988, in India

All these methods of utilization and the conversion to useful energies depend on the climate, population density of the area and the basic infrastructure. It is important to work out the market for the products which are produced.
 
Bio-waste management: It needs to take from small actions to the ambitious ones. European Commission proposes to use wastes which could make up to 25% of total energy consumption by 2020. They propose to have directives for the promotion of renewable electricity (Directive 2001/77/EC) and biofuels (Directive 2003/30/EC). The waste production in Europe has gone upto 2 kg per capita per day. Recycling rates are also rising (European Commission, 2017). The Member states must develop a national action plan and outline the national policies to develop existing biomass resources and mobilise new biomass resources for different uses. A European project has studied the amount of renewable energy to be used in 2020. According to them it will be around 195 million tons of oil equivalents (Mton) of biomass which is biodegradable part of MSW. This will be 20% of renewable energy target. It has also been estimated that the amount of bio-energy from the MSW will be 20 Mton, which would account for around 7% of all renewable energy in 2020. This may be available after composting and anaerobic digestion (Atanasiu, 2010).

ABSTRACT

Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images are being used more extensively than ever before for geosciences Applications in the moist tropics. With SAR's side viewing geometry, longer wavelengths, and almost all-weather sensing capability, SAR imagery has been extensively useful mapping tool for coastal geomorphology in the moist tropics. The purpose of this study to assess the use of Multitemporal C-band ENVISAT- ASAR data for identification of different coastal geomorphology in part of Tamilnadu coast. The orbital ASAR data was digitally geometric corrected (ortho-rectified) and filtered for speckle noise, and linearly stretched in order to enhance contrast between the coastal environment features. By using the methods of crisp enhancement, linear stretching and PCA, to show the various Coastal geomorphological units. The information extraction is based on recognition of the mechanism interactions occurring between radar signal and the target on the ground, represented by shallow water morphology in the intertidal conditions, coastal dunes, mangroves, marshes and highland. In an application perspective, Orbital ASAR data proved to be a fundamental source of information for both geomorphological mapping and land use pattern in moist tropical environments.

Key Words : ASAR, Geomorphology, Mangroves, Land Cover, Coastal mapping.

INTRODUCTION TO DRONES USED FOR EARLY PEST AND DISEASE DETECTION
The utilization of drones for the early detection of pests and diseases in agriculture represents a novel and effective strategy that enables farmers to proactively oversee crop health. Drones outfitted with sophisticated sensors can consistently surveil fields, delivering real-time data and facilitating the prompt detection of possible dangers.
Agricultural drones are employed to identify pests and illnesses at an early stage by capturing aerial imagery of crops. This enables farmers to respond swiftly to safeguard their crops, perhaps resulting in increased yields and reduced environmental impact.
The utilization of drones in agricultural pest management presents numerous benefits compared to conventional techniques. Drones outfitted with infrared cameras can furnish farmers with real-time information on crop health, facilitating the early identification of possible problems such as pests, illnesses, or nutritional deficits.
Pathology can adversely affect plant vitality prior to the manifestation of any obvious indicators such as foliar discoloration. Although these pressures are imperceptible to the unaided eye, cameras equipped with specialized filters may identify these nuanced variations.
Researchers at the Department of Life Sciences and Computing are collaborating with the agricultural services firm Agrii to develop cameras placed on drones. These cameras can autonomously identify early signs of disease and notify farmers when to apply treatments, prior to crop harm.
Applying fungicides promptly in the appropriate locations would enable farmers to utilize them effectively and optimize their application. They are

8.1 Introduction

The concept of social justice led to a raise the standard of living of the masses. This is only possible by meeting the energy needs of industry, agriculture, transport and domestic use. The energy of demand has been increasing tremendously all over the world science mid – nineteenth century due to rise in industrial and agricultural activities and was being met to a great extent by fossil fuels.

Three factors led the mankind to look for alternative renewable sources of energy like solar, wind, hydro etc. (1) there is a danger that the rate at which the non renewable sources of energies are being consumed presently may lead to a global shortage in the near future. This has already happen in case of oil. (2) Use of fossil fuel involves emission of toxic gases polluting the environment causing health hazards of living being. and (3) the demand and supply gas of energy is continuously widening, thus necessitating to exploit renewable sources of energy.

Out of various renewable energy sources, solar energy has been a promising one and lot of development has been taken in its technology for various uses. The numbers of technology engaged in developing solar energy for meaningful use are aiming to achieve the following objectives-

ABSTRACT

Of late, the importance of integrated study of multi-theme data is being realised in geological mapping and mineral exploration programmes. The usefulness of such a study lies in the fact that data integration and interpretation in a conjunctive mode enables to infer more information than the sets can separately provide. The present paper presents several case studies, illustrating the usefulness of multi-theme data integration in geological mapping and mineral exploration.

1. INTRODUCTION

Integrated study of multi-theme data is being practiced in the recent times in the geological mapping and mineral exploration campaigns. Such a study, in a synergetic fashion, helps to extract more meaningful information than from the study of individual datasets. It not only helps in deciphering regional geological picture, but also in the precise location of drilling targets, thereby yielding rich dividends for the expenditure incurred in the mapping and mineral investigations. Besides, the success ratio of the mineral investigations has also shown a significant increase, resulting in the discovery of more mineral

deposits. Hence the integration of multi-theme data is of paramount importance for the success of geological mapping and mineral investigations.

ABSTRACT

Spectral signatures are the specific combination of reflected and absorbed electromagnetic radiation at varying wavelengths which can uniquely identify an object. The “Spectral signature” of an object is a function of 1) incidental EM wavelength and material interaction with that section of the electromagnetic spectrum. The measurements can be made with various instruments, including a task specific spectrometer, although the most common method is separation of the Red, Green, Blue and Near Infrared portion of the EM spectrum as acquired by digital cameras. The spectral signatures serve as diagnostic tools in understanding the composition and structure of the materials. The present paper highlights the usefulness of the spectral signatures in rock and mineral discrimination and mineral exploration and stresses the need for creation of a spectral data base in India for various applications.

1. INTRODUCTION

Objects at the Earth's surface emit and reflect many wavelengths of radiation. In principle, each object has a unique spectral signature, which could be used for identification much like a finger print. Remotely sensed spectral signatures could be utilized for recognizing and mapping for all kinds of features. This can be done to a limited extent with conventional multispectral scanners that operate in a few broad bands of visible and infrared energy. However, broad spectral bands often do not distinguish between similar features. To overcome this limitation, a more sophisticated approach toward spectral signatures has arisen during the past few years. This approach is called image spectroscopy or hyperspectral analysis, which is based on scanning hundreds of closely spaced and very narrow spectral bands. With this technique, it is possible to create continuous spectral response curves, which may be used to identify many objects positively.

The utilization of biomass presents a promising avenue for addressing the challenges of resource scarcity, waste management, and environmental sustainability. This book chapter delves into the multifaceted applications of biomass, with a particular focus on the processing of straw, a versatile agricultural residue. From providing essential bedding material for animals and enhancing agricultural practices to playing a pivotal role in horticulture, cushioning, mulching, and composting, this chapter examines the diverse roles that processed straw assumes. Furthermore, it explores its significance in paper and cardboard manufacturing and its emergence as a renewable fuel source, underscoring how thoughtful biomass utilization paves the way toward a more environmentally conscious and resilient future.