Informatics Publishing Limited

Sarita Devi ¹, P. S. Chauhan ², Disha Thakur ²

Affiliations
1 Regional Horticultural Research Station (Dr. Y.S. Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry), Bajaura, Kullu H.P., IN
2 Department of Fruit Science, Dr. Y.S. Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry, Nauni, Solan H.P., IN

Abstract

A field experiment was conducted on five ischolar_mainstocks viz., EMLA 9, EMLA 26, EMLA 7, EMLA 106 and EMLA 111 on 12 year old plantations of two cultivars viz., Scarlet Gala and Red Fuji. The experiment was laid out to study the effect of clonal ischolar_mainstocks on the stomatal conductance, transpiration rate, photosynthetic rate and leaf nutrient status of the scion grafted on them. The experiment was laid out in a split plot design with 5 ischolar_mainstocks and two cultivars with the treatment combinations of 10 and replicated 5 times. The maximum stomatal conductance (0.17 and 0.20 mol/ m2/s),transpiration rate (3.88 and 3.93 m mol/m/s) and photosynthetic rate(11.08 and 11.16 μ mol/ m2/s) during 2008 and 2009, respectively, were observed in EMLA 7 ischolar_mainstock. Red Fuji on EMLA 7 ischolar_mainstock recorded the maximum stomatal conductance (0.18 and 0.22 mol /m2/s), transpiration rate (3.92 and 3.99 m mol/m2/s) and photosynthetic rate (11.32 and 11.39 μ mol/m2/s) as compared to Scarlet Gala on EMLA 26 ischolar_mainstock which recorded the minimum values of all these parameters. The maximum content of leaf leaf nitrogen (2.23% and 2.26%), leaf phosphorus (0.154 % and 0.159%) and leaf potassium (1.64% and 1.65%) and leaf calcium content (1.66% and 1.69%) was recorded in EMLA 111 ischolar_mainstock during 2008 and 2009, respectively, whereas the maximum leaf magnesium content (0.51% in 2008 and 0.56 % in 2009) was recorded in EMLA 7 ischolar_mainstock. Red Fuji on EMLA 111 ischolar_mainstock recorded maximum of N, P, K, however, Scarlet Gala on EMLA 111 ischolar_mainstock recorded the maximum of leaf calcium. Scarlet Gala on EMLA 7 ischolar_mainstock recorded maximum of leaf magnesium content. Based on these results, it may be inferred that Red Fuji on EMLA 111 and Scarlet Gala on EMLA 7 ischolar_mainstock performed better in terms of photosynthetic efficiency and nutritional uptake.

Keywords

Clonal Rootstocks, Apple, Stomatal Conductance, Photosynthetic Efficiency

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Sarita Devi ¹, Tinku Thomas ², Pratibha Dwarkanath ¹, Annamma Thomas ³, C. N. Sheela ³, Arpita Mukhopadhyay ¹, Anura V. Kurpad ¹

Affiliations
1 Division of Nutrition, St. John’s Medical College, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore-560 034, IN
2 Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics Unit, St. John’s Medical College, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore-560 034, IN
3 Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, St. John’s Medical College, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore-560 034, IN

Abstract

Low intakes of quality dietary protein could affect the methionine cycle during pregnancy, which is important for fetal growth and epigenetic regulations. Since low quality protein intake is prevalent in India, it is important to define biomarkers of the low protein intake, specifically of methyl cycle homeostasis. A secondary analysis of data was performed, from a randomized intervention trial with 500 ml milk/d on south Indian pregnant women, to examine the association of dietary protein intake with concentrations of specific amino acids (methionine, glycine and serine). The subjects also underwent isotopic infusions (n = 52) for the measurement of amino acid kinetics. Dietary intakes were measured each week by multiple 24 h recall until delivery. The plasma concentrations of amino acids (methionine, serine and glycine) were compared with kinetics of methionine i.e. transmethylation, remethylation and transulfuration (TM, RM, TS) and serine to glycine conversion rates, as measured by stable isotope labeled amino acid infusion. Dietary protein intake in the 3^rd trimester correlated positively with intakes of milk and milk based food products (ρ=0.52, p<0.001) and methionine (ρ=0.97, p<0.001) and with gestational weight gain (GWG, ρ=0.32, p=0.044). While the methionine concentration did not correlate with methyl cycle flux parameters (TM, RM and TS), the plasma concentrations of conditionally essential serine and glycine were positively correlated with their respective flux rate and with RM, TM and TS rates. Further, glycine concentrations specifically correlated positively with serine to glycine conversion rates (ρ=0.32, p=0.027). Dietary protein and methionine supply are important for the conservation of methionine during pregnancy. This had an effect on GWG, but not on birth weight, though this may have been due to the relatively small sample size. The plasma concentration of glycine was correlated with the serine-glycine conversion, which affords methyl groups for the body and supplies these when dietary protein/methionine is in poor supply. This indicates that itcan act as a biomarker of the serine-glycine conversion flux rate, which increases in the presence of a poor protein supply. In general, the plasma concentrations of these conditionally essential amino acids may be biomarkers of the methyl cycle during pregnancy, but this needs to be tested in a larger sample.

Keywords

Amino Acid Kinetics, Maternal Protein Intake, Glycine, Serine, Methionine Cycle, Pregnancy.

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Sarita Devi ¹, Julian Crasta ², Tinku Thomas ³, Pratibha Dwarkanath ¹, Annamma Thomas ⁴, C. N. Sheela ⁴, Anura V. Kurpad ¹, Arpita Mukhopadhyay ¹

Affiliations
1 Division of Nutrition, St. John’s Medical College, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore-560 034, IN
2 Department of Pathology, St. John’s Medical College, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore-560 034, IN
3 Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics Unit, St. John’s Medical College, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore-560 034, IN
4 Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, St. John’s Medical College, St. John’s National Academy of Health Sciences, Bangalore-560 034, IN

Abstract

Maternal intake of quality protein regulates placental development and function thereby affecting fetal growth. Considering the prevalence of inadequate intakes of quality protein in Indian pregnant women, understanding the interplay between maternal supply of protein, its metabolism and fetoplacental growth becomes important. A secondary analysis of data from an open labelled-randomized intervention trial with 500 ml milk/day on south Indian pregnant women with marginally low vitamin B₁₂ status, was performed to assess the relations between placental parameters and maternal trimester 3 methyl-cycle amino acid status as well as kinetics. This analysis was performed for 42 pregnancies from the trial where placentae had been collected and placental parameters had been measured. For these pregnancies, data on trimester 3 methionine, serine and glycine kinetics as well as plasma free amino acid concentrations were available. Protein intake and plasma citrulline concentrations were positively correlated at trimester 3 (ρ = 0.34, P = 0.027). Placental weight correlated positively with methyl-cycle specific amino acid concentrations [methionine (ρ = 0.32, P = 0.0388), serine (ρ = 0.49, P = 0.0009)], methionine kinetics [total methionine flux rates (ρ = 0.42, P = 0.006), RM (ρ = 0.45, P = 0.003), TS (ρ = 0.32, P = 0.046), TM (ρ = 0.45, P = 0.004)] and with birth weight (ρ = 0.57, P < 0.001). Findings from the current study indicate that maternal amino acid availability and more importantly, maternal methionine kinetics, positively influenced placental growth, likely mediated by key amino acids such as citrulline, which is known to regulate placental blood flow and function. As an appropriately functioning placenta is indispensable for fetal growth, these findings will form the basis for detailed mechanistic explorations into the placental regulation of maternal supply of amino acid to the fetus for designing effective intervention strategies towards optimizing fetomaternal health during and after pregnancy.

Keywords

Vitamin B₁₂, Pregnancy, Glycine, Methionine, Serine, Methionine Kinetic, Amino Acids.

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Sarita Devi ¹, Amrita Baranwal ², Asha Singhal ²

Affiliations
1 Department of Home Science Extension and Communication Management, College of Home Science, M.P. University of Agriculture and Technology, Udaipur (Rajasthan), IN
2 Department of Home Science, Mahila Mahavidyalaya, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi (U.P.), IN

Abstract

The present paper describe about the entrepreneurial need as perceived by rural women in Faizabad city of Uttar Pradesh. The study was conducted in 8 villages of Bikapur block of Faizabad district of Uttar Pradesh. The sample comprised of purposively selected 80 rural women i.e. 40 women entrepreneur and 40 non entrepreneurs (5 entrepreneurs and 5 non-entrepreneurs from each of the 8 selected villages). All the respondents perceived and expressed entrepreneurial need in agriculture enterprises. From the findings of the study it could be thus inferred agro-based enterprises were the perceive need of women. Hence the planners and the policy makers should think and promote these enterprises to rural community.

Keywords

Entrepreneurial Needs, Rural Women, Agriculture Sector, Non-Agriculture Sector.

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Sarita Devi ¹, Deepika Garg ¹

Affiliations
1 G. D. Goenka University, Gurgaon - 122103, Haryana, IN

Abstract

Objective: In manufacturing setup, limited budget is allocated for each system. In order to increase reliability of the system, redundancy is allocated within given cost constraints. Objective of this paper is to come out with the best optimal solution and increase their liability of a system under cost constraint in a manufacturing plant. Methods: In this paper Heuristic Algorithm (HA) and Constrained Optimization Genetic Algorithm (COGA) are used to optimize constrained Redundancy Allocation Problem (RAP) in a manufacturing plant. These methods are used to allocate the best redundancy strategy for each subsystem with a view to increase the reliability of the system under cost constraints. Best optimal solution is reached by comparing results of CPU time taken by these two methods. Findings: Generally RAP is a NP hard problem and a non-linear integer programming problem, which is difficult to solve. Both methods are applied and comparison between reliability of both the methods is made on the basis of which result obtained by COGA is 0.8632 which is found better against HA which is 0.8380. Application: Results applied in the manufacturing plant which resulted in the increase of reliability by using best redundancy strategy.

Keywords

COGA, HA, Optimization, Reliability, Redundancy

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Sarita Devi ¹, Vivek Singh ¹, Parveen Punia ¹, Nisha Arya ¹

Affiliations
1 Department of Textile and Apparel Designing, I.C. College of Home Science, C.C.S. Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar (Haryana), IN

Abstract

Trimmings are an ornamental addition used on clothing and home furnishing such as facing, piping, braids, cords, laces, tassels patches, borders etc. Market is flooded with trimmings of numerous sizes, shapes, styles and colours. The study was conducted to know the latest trends of trimmings. Ten shopkeepers purposively selected ten shops and thirty consumers visiting these shops were selected on the basis of responsively to collect information regarding existing trends of trimmings. The information regarding availability of trimmings and sale of trimmings was collected through shopkeepers. Thirty consumers visiting these trimming shops were selected as respondents to know their usage pattern of trimmings for apparels. The information was collected using self-structured interview schedule and by observations.Majority of respondents preferred surface embellishments for female wears followed by children and male wears. The ornamentation materials (beads, sequins, rhinestone etc.) and readymade decorative trimmings were the most preferred types of surface embellishments used for female apparels. Majority of consumers preferred piping and facing as functional trimmings and laces and borders as decorative trimmings for formal, casual and night female wears. Most of consumers preferred laces, borders and tassels, as decorative trimmings for female formal wears.

Keywords

Trimmings, Fabric Used, Embellishment Materials, Apparels.

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Rajiv Angrish ¹, Sarita Devi ²

Affiliations
1 #741, Sector 4, Panchkula 134 112, IN
2 Department of Botany and Plant Physiology, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar 125 004, IN

Abstract

The commentary ‘Bioinformatics: how it helps to boost modern biological re-search’¹ aptly summarizes how modern bioinformatics has moved from simple mapping and sequencing to the era of functional genomics. We would like to supplement new and exciting develop-ments which may result in an overall paradigm shift in bioinformatics and re-lated in silico data domains. First, it is to be appreciated that plant phenotyping, a relatively novel field, involves high-throughput plant phenomic platforms that accurately measure trait values and varia-bility across crop genotypes² . A dialogue of phenomics with genomics (and vice versa) seems to be operative ushering in a big-data era that shall see a synthesis of traditional omics (genomics, transcrip-tomics, metabolomics) and phenomics as never before^2,3 .

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Bharti ¹, Kaustav Aditya ¹, Sarita Devi ²

Affiliations
1 ICAR-Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute, New Delhi 110 012, IN
2 College of Horticulture and Forestry, Dr Yashwant Singh Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry, Thunag, Mandi 175 048, IN

Abstract

Apple crop is the predominant temperate fruit in the high hills of Himachal Pradesh (HP), India, primarily due to the ideal temperate climate of the region characterized by high altitude and significant snowfall. This study aims to examine the marketing aspects of apple crops in the high hills of HP, taking into account the complex nature of its marketing patterns. It emphasizes the importance of maintaining a cautious approach within the marketing channel, as any oversight can reduce prices and profits. Additionally, the study examines the arrival trends of apples in the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee of HP. The findings reveal that the retail channel demonstrated the highest marketing efficiency, followed by the commission agent’s channel, suggesting that reducing the intermediaries in the channel contributes to enhanced marketing efficiency.

Keywords

Apple, Arrival Trend, High Hills, Marketing Efficiency, Price Spread.

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