PROSPECTS OF VEGETABLE OIL DERIVATIVES FOR RURAL AGRICULTURAL ENERGY IN INDIA

Svijet je suočen s dvojnom krizom: krizom nestajanja fosilnih goriva i krizom degradacije okoliša. Alternativna goriva, očuvanje i upravljanje energijom, energetska učinkovitost i zaštita okoliša posljednjih su godina dobili na značenju. Kao alternativa dizel gorivu dosta obećavaju esterificirana biljna ulja koja su ekološki vrlo pogodna. U ruralnoj Indiji potreba za naftom otpada na poljoprivrednu mehanizaciju poput traktora i vršilica. Poljoprivrednici koji posjeduju marginalna i velika zemljišta mogu ispuniti zahtjeve dizel goriva tako da siju uljarice na vlastitoj zemlji. U ovom radu procjenjuje se isplativost lokalne proizvodnje biljnih ulja u jednom malom oglednom selu u središnjoj Indiji. Analiziraju se metilni esteri masnih kiselina iz ulja pamukovog sjemena, sojinog ulja, ulja balanitesa i jatrofina ulja da bi se ustanovila njihova svojstva i radni učinak u dizel motoru, a procjenjuje se i potrebna površina zemljišta za uzgoj tih uljnih kultura kako bi se udovoljilo potrebama seoske poljoprivrede za gorivom. Rezultati pokazuju da kalorična vrijednost metilnih estera iznosi dizela, a i druga su svojstva posve usporediva s dizelom. Analiza radnog učinka metilnih estera u motoru pokazuje neznatno smanjenje toplinske učinkovitosti od oko , dok su emisije smanjene za do u usporedbi s dizelom. Izvršena je i ekonomska analiza te je ustanovljeno da je korištenje derivata biljnih ulja kao zamjene za dizel gorivo skuplje od korištenja mineralnog dizela.The world is confronting the twin crises of fossil fuel depletion and environmental degradation. Alternative fuels, energy conservation and management, energy efficiency and environmental protection have become increasingly import in recent years. Among alternative fuels, esterified vegetable oils hold good promise as eco-friendly alternatives to diesel fuel. In rural India, of the petroleum diesel requirement is for agricultural equipment such as tractors and threshers. Marginal farmers and large landholders can meet their diesel requirement by sowing oil yielding crops on their own lands. This paper evaluates the feasibility of the local production of vegetable oil for a small representative village in central India. Fatty acid methyl esters of cottonseed oil, soybean oil, balanites oil and jatropha oil were analyzed for their properties and performance in diesel engines. The land required to grow these oil crops in order to meet rural agricultural diesel requirements was estimated. The results indicate that the calorific value of these methyl esters is that of diesel and the other properties are quite comparable with diesel. Engine performance analysis of these methyl esters indicates that there is a slight decrease in thermal efficiency of approximately , while emissions are reduced by to as compared to diesel. Economic analysis was also performed and it was found that vegetable oil derivatives as diesel fuel substitutes are costlier than mineral diesel

Prevalence, molecular signature and risk analysis of tropical theileriosis in Gir cattle in south-western region of Gujarat, India

The study signifies pioneering effort for development of preventive strategies of tropical theileriosis in Gir Cattle by shedding the light on epidemiological information regarding age, season, lactational status, tick infestation and importance of tick control. On the other hand, key clinical observations viz., pyrexia, lymphadenopathy, altered appetite, ocular and nasal discharge, pale mucous membrane, and tick infestations of the study provide the platform for early diagnosis of disease in field conditions to veterinary professionals

Evaluation of chemiluminescence, toluidine blue and histopathology for detection of high risk oral precancerous lesions: A cross-sectional study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Early detection holds the key to an effective control of cancers in general and of oral cancers in particular. However, screening procedures for oral cancer are not straightforward due to procedural requirements as well as feasibility issues, especially in resource-limited countries.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We conducted a cross-sectional study to compare the performance of chemiluminescence, toluidine blue and histopathology for detection of high-risk precancerous oral lesions. We evaluated 99 lesions from 55 patients who underwent chemiluminescence and toluidine blue tests along with biopsy and histopathological examination. We studied inter-as well as intra-rater agreement in the histopathological evaluation and then using latent class modeling, we estimated the operating characteristics of these tests in the absence of a reference standard test.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>There was a weak inter-rater agreement (kappa < 0.15) as well as a weak intra-rater reproducibility (Pearson's r = 0.28, intra-class correlation rho = 0.03) in the histopathological evaluation of potentially high-risk precancerous lesions. When compared to histopathology, chemiluminescence and toluidine blue retention had a sensitivity of 1.00 and 0.59, respectively and a specificity of 0.01 and 0.79, respectively. However, latent class analysis indicated a low sensitivity (0.37) and high specificity (0.90) of histopathological evaluation. Toluidine blue had a near perfect high sensitivity and specificity for detection of high-risk lesions.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>In our study, there was variability in the histopathological evaluation of oral precancerous lesions. Our results indicate that toluidine blue retention test may be better suited than chemiluminescence to detect high-risk oral precancerous lesions in a high-prevalence and low-resource setting like India.</p

A prospective study of maternal, fetal and neonatal deaths in low- and middle-income countries

To quantify maternal, fetal and neonatal mortality in low- and middle-income countries, to identify when deaths occur and to identify relationships between maternal deaths and stillbirths and neonatal deaths

Georeferenced soil information system: assessment of database

Land-use planning is a decision-making process that facilitates the allocation of land to different uses that provide optimal and sustainable benefit. As land-use is shaped by society–nature interaction, in land-use planning different components/facets play a significant role involving soil, water, climate, animal (ruminant/ non-ruminant) and others, including forestry and the environment needed for survival of mankind. At times these components are moderated by human interference. Thus land-use planning being a dynamic phenomenon is not guided by a single factor, but by a complex system working simultaneously,which largely affects the sustainability. To address such issues a National Agricultural Innovation Project (NAIP) on ‘Georeferenced soil information system for land-use planning and monitoring soil and land quality for agriculture’ was undertaken to develop threshold values of land quality parameters for land-use planning through quantitative land evaluation and crop modelling for dominant cropping systems in major agro-ecological sub-regions (AESRs) representing rice–wheat cropping system in the Indo-Gangetic Plains (IGP) and deep-rooted crops in the black soil regions (BSR). To assess the impact of landuse change, threshold land quality indicator values are used. A modified AESR map for agricultural landuse planning is generated for effective land-use planning

Soil information system: use and potentials in humid and semi-arid tropics

The articles presented in this special section emanated from the researches of consortium members of the National Agricultural Innovative Project (NAIP, Component 4) of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), New Delhi. These researches have helped develop a soil information system (SIS). In view of the changing scenario all over the world, the need of the hour is to get assistance from a host of researchers specialized in soils, crops, geology, geography and information technology to make proper use of the datasets. Equipped with the essential knowledge of data storage and retrieval for management recommendations, these experts should be able to address the issues of land degradation, biodiversity, food security, climate change and ultimately arrive at an appropriate agricultural land-use planning. Moreover, as the natural resource information is an essential prerequisite for monitoring and predicting global environmental change with special reference to climate and land use options, the SIS needs to be a dynamic exercise to accommodate temporal datasets, so that subsequently it should result in the evolution of the soil information technology. The database developed through this NAIP would serve as an example of the usefulness of the Consortium and the research initiative of ICAR involving experts from different fields to find out the potentials of the soils of humid and semi-arid bioclimatic systems of the country

A low Reynolds number Reynolds stress modeling of turbulent pipe flow: flow pattern and energy balance

The present paper addresses a comparative analysis of two different versions of low Reynolds number Reynolds stress turbulence models. The predictive capability of the models has been tested on the basis of flow patterns and energy balance. Numerical simulations were performed at the Reynolds numbers of 7400 and 22,000 respectively. The predicted mean axial velocity, three components of the r/m/s fluctuating velocities and the turbulent kinetic energy have been compared with the experimental data of Durst et al. (1995) Schildknecht et al. (1979). The predicted turbulent energy dissipation rate was validated with the experimental data of Schildknecht et al. (1979) and the direct numerical simulations of Eggles et al. (1994). The energy balance calculations were performed for the Reynolds numbers of 7400, 22,000 and 50,000. A comparison for the models has been presented

Relative importance of turbulent diffusion and bulk motion to mixing in bubble columns

This article does not have an abstract

Comparative evaluation of conventional staining method and enzyme linked immunosorbent assay kits for the detection of bovine cryptosporidiosis

Out of 428 faecal 178 (41.59%) animals were found positive for Cryptosporidium parvum oocysts in the bovine faeces in modified Ziehl-Neelsen (mZN) staining and/ or commercial plate and dipstick- enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kits (Cypress diagnostics, Langdorp, Belgium) with statistically non-significant difference in the occurrence rate in cattle and buffalo calves. Seasonal prevalence difference was statistically significant in cattle calves while non-significant in buffalo calves, respectively. The highest overall prevalence was recorded during rainy season (45.15%) and almost same per cent during winter and summer. Prevalence of 67.26, 37.11, 30 and 17.65% was recorded in calves aged below 1 month, 1-3 months, 4-8 months and 9-12 months, respectively (p&gt;0.05). There was no significant difference in the age group prevalence between cattle and buffalo calves. Both sexes of bovines are equally susceptible to the cryptosporidiosis (p&gt;0.05). The prevalence of cryptosporidiosis was 59.54 and 29.41% for diarrhoeic and non-diarrhoeic samples, respectively (p&gt;0.05). Both diarrhoeic and non-diarrhoeic groups of calves aged between 1-30 days were equally susceptible to the infection of Cryptosporidium spp. Almost same per cent prevalence of the infection was observed in dairy calves reared in organized (40.76%) and unorganized farms (42.21%) and the difference was non-significant in both cattle and buffalo calves. Highest prevalence of cryptosporidiosis was found in HF cross calves. The tests failed to detect the oocysts in infected soil samples. There was highly significant difference in the prevalence of cryptosporidiosis estimated by plate/ dipstick-ELISA and mZN staining with highest sensitivity and specificity in plate-ELISA.</jats:p

CFD modeling of heat transfer in turbulent pipe flows

Twelve versions of low Reynolds number k-ε and two low Reynolds number Reynolds stress turbulence models for heat transfer were analyzed comparatively. Predictions of the mean axial temperature, the radial and axial turbulent heat fluxes, and the effect of Prandtl number on Nusselt number were compared with the experimental data. The model by Lai and So from the k-ε group and Lai and So from the Reynolds stress group had the best overall predictive ability for heat transfer in turbulent pipe flow. The Lai and So model was attributed to its success in the predictions of flow parameters such as mean axial velocity, turbulent kinetic energy, eddy diffusivity, and the overall energy dissipation rate. The k-ε models performed relatively better than the Reynolds stress models for predicting the mean axial temperature and the Nusselt number. This qualitative and quantitative study found the need for more sophisticated near-wall experimental measurements and the accuracy of the dissipation (of turbulent energy) and the pressure-scrambling models