eChapters

The ultrasonography is based on echo-principal i.e. reflection of sound waves. The ultrasound waves, commonly termed as ultrasound beam is generated from the pizzo-electric crystals, under electric stimulation. The sound beam travels and strike to the organs/tissues on its way and get either reflected or reabsorbed by these structures. The reflected beam is received back by the transducer, which are processed and displayed on the monitor of ultrasound scanner. The display of signal is in form of shades of grey scale i.e. from bright to black picture. If these sound beams strike to organ such as bone, then major part of the beam is reflected and it appears bright (white) on screen. If the sound waves strike to fluid, these get absorbed and are not reflected back, therefore, the image of fluid appears as black on the screen. Other organs appear in between black and bright white. In fact, the reflected sound beam is not proportionate to frequency and velocity of emitted ultrasound beam. The strength of ultrasound beam (grey scale) or brightness of the image depends upon the acoustic impedance of organ or tissue. In simple term acoustic impedance is the capacity of tissue or organ to reflect or absorb these sound beams that again depends upon density or composition of these structures. The reflection of sound beams also depends upon, the angle at which the ultrasound beam strikes the structure on its way. The distance of the organ from the transducer also affects image brightness.

Introduction

Access to adequate food, which is one of the fore-most basic needs of life, should be birthright of every single human being on this earth but in our country one fourth population is still underfed. The food insecurity situation is more rampant in the North-eastern region of the country. The proportion of population below poverty line (BPL) was reported at 31.4 per cent in Arunachal Pradesh, 34.0 per cent in Assam, 37.9 per cent in Manipur, 16.10 per cent in Meghalaya, 15.4 per cent in Mizoram, 8.8 per cent in Nagaland and 40.0 per cent in Tripura, in the year 2015 (RBI, 2015). At national lavel it was reported to be 37.20 per cent. By comparing BPL population in NE Region states and national level poverty it was found that several states of this region like Nagaland, Mizoram and Meghalaya were far better as in these states BPL percentage were very less than the national average, whereas in the states like Tripura, Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh BPL percentages were close to National level (37.20%). It has now been well established fact that the availability of food grains may not be the real problem of food security; it is prevailing poverty that comes in the way of achieving household’s food security. Hence, household food security is a function not only availability of food but also of the purchasing power of household. Any effort to achieve sustainable development demands concerted efforts to reduce poverty, including finding the solutions to hunger and malnutrition. In this study, an attempt has been made to analyze the status of food deprivation among fish farmers of West Tripura district of Tripura and to examine consumption expenditure behavior fish farming families of the study area.

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.

ABSTRACT

Coastal aquaculture in India is synonymous with shrimp culture since shrimp has a pronounced presence among the basket of commodities produced in the sector. In coastal aquaculture, maximum area is under shrimp culture due to its high profitability, ready marketability, premium price and unlimited export demand. Since the growth of shrimp has showed significant fluctuations in terms of area, production and productivity over time, this paper aims to seek and use appropriate methodology for computation of growth rates. Accordingly, the present study utilized nonparametric regression method for computation of growth rates. Results indicated that the methodology has been successful in extracting required information from the data set. The analysis revealed that growth of Indian shrimp farming is largely governed by east coast states. Potentiality of west coast states remains grossly underexploited. Broad results also indicate that growth rate is higher in commercial shrimp farming states compared to traditional farming states. Shrimp farming being a livelihood option for small and marginal farmers of the deprived sections of the population of a developing country, like India, consistent yield is more important than substantial growth in yield in shrimp farming.

Principle
If a sample of feed is heated and dried in a hot air oven at the temperature of boiling water (100°C ± 2°C), the water present in feed sample escapes as vapour. The loss in weight is considered as moisture and the residue is termed as dry matter (DM).

Requirement
    1.    Aluminium/steel moisture cup or Iron trey
    2.     Analytical balance
    3.     Dessicator
    4.     Hot air oven
    5.     Metal tongs
    6.     Spatula

24.1 Aim

To determine the moisture content in fresh and processed products

24.2 Theory

Estimation of moisture in fresh and processed fruit and vegetable products is important for evaluating their nutritive composition as well as to optimize method for their processing like drying, preparation of different products viz; jams, preserve, candies etc. Moisture is determined by drying the weighed sample to a constant weight in hot air oven and measuring the loss in weight to express the moisture content in percent. This method is used for estimation of moisture in all food products which do not decompose at 100ºC. Moisture content of some commodities (Table 4.1) is as under:

The estimation of moisture in foods is one of the most important and most widely used measurements in the processing and testing of food products. It is used to determine the nutritive value of food, to express results of analytical determinations on a uniform basis, and to meet compositional standards or food laws. The level of moisture in different fruits and vegetables varies widely. Most fresh fruits contain more than 85-90% moisture in edible portions. Broad range of moisture content in common fruit, vegetables and their products as general guideline are given in Table 3.1.
Estimation of Moisture content in food products: Moisture content in foods can be estimated by following methods.
i. By Drying in an oven
ii. By distillation with an immiscible solvent
iii. By Chemical and physical methods (Infra-red heating method)

Mycotoxins are toxic secondary metabolites produced by different types of moulds which are present in soil, plant and feed ingredients. Ingestion of toxins will result in reduced growth and production performance due to reduced nutrient utilization, illness or death of animals. Analysing the presence of mycotoxin and its concentration in grain and feeds is necessary to eliminate the adverse health effects of mycotoxins in animals. Estimation of mycotoxin in feed ingredients is a challenging task because the concentration of toxin is at µg/kg or parts-per billion levels. At the same time, analysing inappropriate samples is a waste of resources. Mycotoxins are not evenly distributed in feeds or grains. If the specimen collected for analysis includes contaminated grain, the mycotoxin will be detected. If not, the mycotoxin will not be detected.

Sample collection for mycotoxin analysis

The objective of sample collection is to collect the specimen samples from as many parts of the feed lot as possible. The size of the collected specimen depends on the size of the load received. Sample collecting probes can be used to collect the samples from bags.

Principle

Carbohydrates are divided into two groups i.e., crude fibre (CF) and nitrogen free extractives (NFE). The NFE comprises the sugars, starch and a large part of the material classed as hemicellulose.

The NFE is not determined by analytical procedures. This is calculated as the figure obtained when the sum of water, ash, protein, fat and crude fibre of a feed is subtracted from 100. Since the figure is determined by difference, it includes the cumulative errors of the other determinations and thus it is not an exact value.

Requirement

Following analysed volumes of a feedstuff are very much essential to derive the nitrogen free extractives of the same feedstuff.

Calculation
The nitrogen free extractives can be derived from the following formula:

[Titrimetric/ Walkley and Black (1934) Method]

Introduction

The role of soil organic matter, in relation to soil fertility and physical conditions, are widely recognized. The organic matter is the source of plant nutrients which are released inassimilable forms during microbial degradation. A major proportion of N (95 – 99 % of the total), P (33 – 67 % of the total) and S (75 % of the total) in soils occur in organic combinations, which mineralize to release the nutrients in inorganic forms to be used by plants. Nevertheless, it serves as a reservoir of plant nutrients, in promoting water storage, and in regulating microbial activity.

The organic matter content of a soil varies from 0.344 % in very sandy arid soils to more than 86 % in Peats and Mucks. Soil organic matter contains 5 % N, and 0.5 % each of P and S, thereby, having a N:P:S ratio of 10:1:1. The organic matter content of a soil is estimated by the amount of organic carbon (C) present, as this element represents, on an average, 52 – 58 % of the organic matter, and the C:N ratio is 10 – 15. In the sub-soil, the average organic carbon amount is 36 – 44 % (40 %), and the C:N ratio is < 8. In order to find out the amount of humified organic material, the organic carbon content is multiplied by 1.724, which represents the ratio between the humus and the organic carbon (100/58) and is known as the ‘von Bemmlen factor ’.

The organic matter content of soils is estimated from the organic carbon, determined by using the ‘Titrimetric method / Walkley and Black method. The Titrimetric determination, also known as the ‘wet-digestion method’ involves a rapid titration procedure for the estimation of organic carbon content of soils.

The cytological insult due to exposure of different environmental pollutant viz. pesticides, herbicides etc. impose great loss to the vitality and health of the individuals. The basic pathophysiological distrubances following the expo sure of these deterrents to the different visceral organs leads to dysfunction of these organs. Imbalance between body’s antioxidant defense and peroxidation of the lipid layer of cells’ causing free radical generation is defined as Oxidative stress. Free radicals are the molecules or entity that contains one or more than one unpaired electron. Pathophysiology of several diseases are associated with the generation of oxidative insult and many xenobiotics associated toxicity are also a result of oxidative damage and generation of reactive oxygen species and reactive nitrogen species. Alzheimer’s Disease is one of the fine example of oxidative damage associated neuronal degeneration.

Oxidative stress can be estimated using following parameters:

1. Lipid peroxidation (Paula et al., 2005)

2. Reduced glutathione (Sedlak and Lindsay, 1968)

3. Superoxide dismutase (Madesh and Balasubramanian, 1998)

4. Catalase (Aebi, 1983)

Sample Digestion

Dry ashing and wet oxidation are two widely adopted methods for releasing mineral elements from plant tissues. Dry ashing, typically conducted at temperatures between 550 and 600 °C, can lead to the loss of phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) through volatilization. This method is more time consuming and has several drawbacks, such as the volatilization of sulfur (S) and chlorine (Cl), which can be mitigated by adding sodium carbonate (Na2 CO3 ). Additionally, some phosphorus and micronutrients may become occluded during the process, making dry ashing less commonly used.

In contrast, wet oxidation employs oxidizing acids, such as a mixture of nitric acid and perchloric acid (HNO3-HClO4 ) or a tri-acid mixture of nitric acid, sulfuric acid, and perchloric acid (HNO3-H2 SO4-HClO4 ). The use of perchloric acid (HClO4 ) prevents the volatilization loss of potassium (K) and provides a clear solution, while sulfuric acid (H2 SO4 ) aids in completing the oxidation. Upon heating, perchloric acid dissociates into nascent chlorine and oxygen, enhancing the oxidation efficiency at high temperatures. However, direct contact between perchloric acid and plant samples can lead to explosions and f ires; thus, pre-digestion of samples is preferred.

Principle

Phosphorus is the chief acid forming mineral constituent of plant and feeds. Phosphorus present in the ash solution (Mineral extract) is precipitated as ammonium phosphomolybedate. The precipitate is washed with dilute potassium nitrate till free from acid and dissolved in a known excess of standard sodium hydroxide solution. The excess alkali is back titrated against standard acid to arrive at the exact quantity of standard solution required.

Objective: Estimation of photosynthetic pigment from plant leaves.

Material required: Plant leaves, test tube, test tube stand, spectrophotometer, balance, centrifuge machine, mortar and pestle, acetone and distilled water.

Theory: Photosynthetic pigments, namely, the chlorophylls are present in green leaves and shoots of plants. There are at least five types of chlorophylls in plants. Chl’a’ and ‘b’ occur in higher plants, ferns and mosses. Chl ‘c’,‘d’ and ‘e’ are found only in algae and in certain bacteria. Chlorophylls are extracted from plant leaves. The absorption peaks of chl ‘a’ at 663 nm and ‘b’ at 645 nm are characteristic measures from which amount of chlorophylls can be calculated.

The physical properties of seeds are a basic activity for designing processing equipments and precision planters. Since these characters vary with crop or variety, one needs to have the data handy to be used on shop floor. This data also helps to quantify processing efficiency, presence of dormancy and suitability for seed treatments for all existing and new crops or varieties.

INTRODUCTION

In nature water is considered as the most important natural resource which is utilized in large quantity throughout the world for drinking, washing, bathing, recreation, irrigation, aquaculture and many industries. Water also plays a fundamental role in regulation of water cycle in nature. India is a agriculture based country totally based on different water sources. The quality of water plays a important role to mankind because it is directly linked with human health. Lake water’s are mainly used for farming and domestic activities like cloth washing. Increasing human activities continuously in lake basins is posing a great threat to all forms of life in aquatic environment. Most of the people who live in villages use irrigation facilities for farms and use excessive use fertilizers and pesticides for agriculture purposes and subsequently and degrade the aquatic ecosystems of lakes. We need to conserve water for future generations and safeguard our natural resources for sustainable development and biodiversity conservation.

Many researchers investigated the freshwater lakes and ponds in the Indian subcontinent viz. Bagde and Verma (1985), Desai (2014), Patel and Patel (2012), Nirbhavanae and Khobragade (2017), Mehta et al (2016), Gupta (2018), Bastola (2013), Raj and Sevankodiyane (2018), Rana Phul Kunwar Singh (2016), Shyamala and Hemvathy (2018), Meshram et al (2014), Fule and Nimgare (2018), Chaudhary and Sitre (2020), Pimpalshende and Sitre (2021).

There are stages in seed supply chain where seed losses happen at harvesting and post harvest stage. These losses may occur due to higher moisture at harvest, due to harvesting methods, processing methods, at seed storage, during transport etc. Estimation of these losses is an important function of seed inventory management. Estimating seed losses help to improve processing and seed distribution efficiency. These simple statistical tools will help to measure quantitative post harvest seed losses. Seed testing can be used for measuring qualitative post harvest seed losses.

Vegetables form an important component of our daily diet as they provide necessary nutrients to the diet and they add colour, texture and flavour to it. Vegetables contain very high content of water (about 78 to 98%) and are reasonably good source of starch, sugar, cellulose, hemicellulose, pentosans and pectic substances. They also contribute minerals, vitamins and indigestible fibers to our diet. The yellow, orange and dark green leafy vegetables are rich source of carotenes- the precursors of vitamin A. Non-volatile acids, such as citric, malic, oxalic and succinic acids, contribute to their flavour. The very strong flavour characteristics of some vegetables like onion, garlic, cabbage, cauliflower, etc. are due to certain sulfur containing volatile compounds. However, vegetables, in general, are poor source of protein and amino acids.

India has made significant progress in the production of vegetables since independence because its diverse agro-climatic zones ranging from tropical to temperate allow the production of a wide spectrum of vegetables.At present, the country is producing about 108 million tonnes of vegetables and considered the second largest producer in the world (Venkatesan et al., 2006). Currently, the plant breeders are focusing their efforts to produce high yielding varieties having resistance against diseases and herbicides and tolerance against drought and salinity. Therefore, the physical aspects of quality, i.e., shape, size, texture, colour, tenderness, etc. are given due priority in the breeding programme with no emphasis to the biochemical and nutritional quality parameters, which include dry matter, proteins, vitamins, sugars, flavouring compounds, alkaloids, flavonoids, etc. However, under present set up of World Trade Organization (WTO), the country will have to compete with quality conscious European and developed countries, and with inferior quality product, it would not be possible to penetrate the foreign market. Therefore, breeding programme in a country like India with future-plans of globalization of agriculture produce must be aimed at achieving good nutritional quality. In different types of vegetable, a varied set of biochemical parameters determines the quality. In this chapter, the methods for qualitative and quantitative determination of these parameters in vegetables have been described.

Principle

    Inorganic salts are relativity insoluble in aromatic solvents which has been detrimental to the estimation of 45Calcium by scintillation counting. This technique inolves the counting of 45Calcium as calcium 2-ethyl hexanoate in a solution of toluene phosphor; and the counting as calcium chloride in a tertiary mixture of absolute ethyl alcohol-hydrochloric acid-toluene-phosphor.

Reagents
    1.    ⁴⁵Calcium. A ⁴⁵Calcium solution supplied as calcium chloride in hydrochloric acid solution, is suitably diluted.
    2.    Calcium chloride, 0.045 N, is prepared by dissolving ACS grade calcium carbonate, dried to constant weight at 110ºC, in 5 N hydrochloric acid.
    3.    Calcium acetate, citrate, lactate, acid phosphate, chloride and hydroxide.
    4.    Ammonium oxalate solution, 4 percent
    5.    2-Ethyl-hexanoic acid.
    6.    Toluene-diphenyloxazole solution, 2g of diphenyloxazole are dissolved in 500 ml of toluene.

When there is indication of linkage from F or testcross data through significant deviation from 9: 3: 3: 1 and 1: 1: 1: 1 ratio, it is implied that independent assortment is not taking place and this is taken as an indication of linkage. The inverse of linkage strength is the recombination value and is often symbolized by ‘p’ whose maximum value is 50% because out of four strands of a tetrad, two are always parental types and two are recombinant types when all the cells show crossing over.