Parshant Bakshi

Genome Editing Using Crispr/Cas System: New Era Genetic Technology in Agriculture to Boost Crop Output

Genome engineering with the RNA-guided CRISPR-Cas9 system in animals and plants is revolutionizing biology. First techniques of genome editing like zinc finger nucleases and synthetic nucleases called TALENs were a starting point but turned out to be expensive, difficult to handle and timeconsuming to engineer, limiting their widespread use, particularly for large scale, high-throughput studies. Moreover, these existing technologies depending on proteins as address labels and customizing new proteins for any new change to introduce in the DNA is a cumbersome process. Of the current generation of genome editing technologies, CRISPR-Cas9 is easier to use and more efficient and can be easily targeted to almost any genomic location of choice by a short RNA guide and has been successfully applied in many organisms, including model and crop plants. Together the system has the ability to detect specific sequences of letters within the genetic code and to cut DNA at a specific point. Simultaneously with other sequence-specific nucleases, CRISPR/ Cas9 has already breach the boundaries and made genetic engineering much more versatile, efficient and easy. There really doesn’t seem to be a limit in applications of CRISPR system extendable from bacteria to complex eukaryotic organisms including plants changing the pace and course of agricultural, Biomedicine and Biotechnological research in the future. This review provides an overview of recent advances in genome editing technologies in plants, and discusses how these can provide insights into current plant molecular biology research and molecular breeding technology.

Studies on Variability of Seedling Origin Jamun (Syzygium cumini (L.) Skeels) Germplasm Growing in Subtropical Region of Jammu, India

Almost all parts of the Jamun tree are used for various purposes. Ripened fruits are very juicy, almost odourless, with a pleasant, slightly bitter, astringent taste and consumed fresh or processed into various products. The fruit pulp is used to make squash, sharbat, syrup, jams, jellies, juice, vinegar, wine and puddings. Jamun wood being very strong and resistance to water and termite attack, is used to install motors in the wells. Being a fastgrowing tree, it provides excellent firewood and charcoal to the rural population in India (Chaudhary and Mukhopadhyay, 2012). Jamun has many medicinal values and in the Indian System of Medicine, Jamun fruit has been described as astringent, stomachic, carminative, antiscorbutic and diuretic (Singh, 2001). It has wonderful antihyperglycaemic properties and has also proven to have good anti-oxidant, anti-bacterial, antigenotoxic antiinflammatory and anti-HIV properties (Sagrawat et al., 2006).

Effect of Deficit Irrigation Scheduling on Yield and Quality of Kinnow Mandarin Fruits

Water availability becomes a major constraint to crop production in almost all regions of the world. In recent years, regulated deficit irrigation (RDI) has emerged as one of the potential tools to be used for sustainable crop production in water scarce regions. Reducing water supply to optimal level of crop water requirement in certain growth stages of the crop improves water use efficiency and quality of produces, without affecting the yield significantly (Panigrahi et al., 2014). Citrus, an evergreen and high water requiring perennial fruit crop, is mainly grown in tropical and sub-tropical regions of the world. Irrigation water is a key input to successful cultivation of citrus (Singh and Srivastava, 2004). Drip irrigation (DI) is one of the potential water saving irrigation methods in citrus (Panigrahi et al., 2012a). In recent years, several research contributions have documented the advantages of DI in citrus in water scarce regions. Abu-Awwad (2001) reported that irrigation at 100% evaporation produced the highest fruit yield. Kallsen and Sanden (2011) stated that the intensity of water stress decreased the fruit yield by International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences ISSN: 2319-7706 Volume 6 Number 7 (2017) pp. 261-269 Journal homepage: http://www.ijcmas.com

Integrated Nutrient Management in Fruit Production

India has been bestowed with wide range of climate and physio-geographical conditions and as such is most suitable for growing various kinds of horticultural crops such as fruits, vegetables, flowers, nuts, spices and plantation crops (coco nut, cashew nut and cocoa). Its horticulture production has increased by 30 per cent in the last five years. This has placed India among the foremost countries in horticulture production, just behind China. During 2012-13, its contribution in the world production of fruits was 12.6 %. Total production of fruits during 2012-13 was 81.2 million tonnes (Anonymous, 2014). Though production of fruits has increased manifold over the last decade but there exists a gap between the demand and supply of fruits. The present fruit production in India meets only the 46% of the total demand. Thus there is strong need to increase the production and productivity through crop diversification and use of best horticultural techniques among which Integrated Nutrient Management is the one. International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences ISSN: 2319-7706 Volume 6 Number 7 (2017) pp. 32-40 Journal homepage: http://www.ijcmas.com

Effect of inorganic and organic fertilizers along with Azotobacter on growth, yield and quality of Kinnow mandarin

A study was conducted during 2013 and 2014 on the effect of integrated use of inorganic and organic fertilizers (vermicompost) along with bio-inoculants on plant growth, yield and quality of Kinnow mandarin. Vegetative growth parameters like plant height and canopy volume showed maximum increase with cent per cent nitrogen through urea augmented with Azotobacter. Replacing 25 per cent of nitrogen in the form of vermicompost resulted in maximum number of fruits, fruit weight, fruit volume, fruit length and width and fruit yield. TSS, Total sugars (reducing and non-reducing) and ascorbic acid contents of the fruits improved with the integrated application of vermicompost along with inorganic fertilizers and biofertilizers.

Growth and quality of low chilling peach cultivars under different irrigation and rainfed conditions

Sub-tropical peach requires large amount of water during growth and development, but with the decreasing monsoon rainfall and dwindling irrigation water and higher demand of water for fruit tree due to increased temperature had affected the growth and quality of peach. This experiment was undertaken to study the effect of low chilling peach cultivars to different irrigation scheduling during 2010 and 2011. The results revealed that irrigation applied at 40 mm evapotranspiration was optimum for growth and development of peach under sub tropical conditions.

Cost and return analysis of different treatments of mulching and herbicide application on Peach (Prunus persica (L.) Batsch) cv. Shan-e-Punjab

The trees of peach cv. Shan-e-Punjab were treated with different orchard floor management practices (mulching and herbicidal treatment) in the month of February 2014. In all, there were 14 treatments including mulches viz., black polythene, paddy straw, saw dust, white polythene and herbicides viz., atrazine 50 WP (1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 Kg a.i. per hectare), oxyflurofen 23.5 EC (0.5, 0.75 and 1.0 l a.i. per ha) and pendimethalin 30 EC (1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 l a.i. per ha) and control which were replicated thrice. The total cost of cultivation per hectare was found to be highest (` 207480.00) in treatments T1 and T2 i.e. black polythene mulch and white polythene mulch, respectively whereas, it was found to be lowest of ` 185240.00 in the treatment (T14) i.e. control. Among all the treatments, the benefit: cost ratio was found highest with black polythene mulch (1:1.89) followed by atrazine 2.0 kg a.i/ha (1:1.86) and lowest in control (1:1.55). Thus, for improving growth, yield and fruit quality of peach cv Shan-e-Punjab, black polythene mulch and atrazine 2.0 kg a.i/ha are found to be most suitable and economically feasible under the Jammu subtropics.

Cost and return analysis of phalsa (Grewia asiaticaL.) propagation by semi-hard wood cuttings

Phalsa (Grewia asiatica L.) belongs to family Tiliaceae and is native to the Indian sub-continent and South-East Asia. But there is hardly any work which has analysed its costs and returns.In order to evaluate the most profitable treatment, economic analysis of treatments was worked out in terms of net returns and benefit cost (B:C) ratio. The cost and analysis structure of production of 1000 plants through rooting of cuttings was worked out for 15th July, 30th July, 15th August and 30th August planting in combination with IBA (150 ppm, 300 ppm and 450 ppm), NAA (150 ppm, 300 ppm and 450 ppm) and untreated cuttings planted i.e., treatment seven on different dates of planting. The cost incurred on preparation of land (500.00), labour charges (515.00), Farm yard manure (180.00), planting material ( 1500.00), irrigation (560.00) and depreciation on assets ( 79.80) was found to be same in all the treatments. The cost incurred on the preparation of different solutions of IBA in various treatments was found to be 403.20 for 450 ppm IBA followed by 269.00 for 300 ppm IBA and 134.40 for 150 ppm IBA and in case of preparation of NAA it was found to be 378.00, 252.00 and 126.00, respectively. It was found that 30th July was best date of planting of phalsa cuttings and IBA treatment was best among growth regulators treatment. Also phalsa cuttings treated with IBA 300 ppm and planted on 30th July showed highest survival percentage (71%) and net returns ( 3496.20) Thus, planting of phalsa cuttings on 30th July and treated with IBA 300 ppm was found to be best treatment combination as evidenced by the cost: benefit ratio of 1:1.97.

Influence of Gibberellic Acid and Blossom Removal on Fruit Quality of Strawberry (Fragaria x ananassa Duch.) CV. Belrubi

A study were carried out to investigate the effect of gibberellic acid (GA3) and blossom removal on fruit quality of strawberry cv. belrubi under subtropical region. Various quality parameters were monitored with the application of three concentrations of gibberellic acid (GA3) 50 ppm, 100 ppm and 150 ppm and two levels of blossom removal partial and without deblossoming. Results of experimental showed that the highest juice content of fruits (86.70/86.46%), TSS (7.56/7.43°Brix), sugar content (4.33/4.26%), pH of fruit (3.87/3.86) were recorded in lower concentration of gibberellic acid 50 ppm treated plants with partial deblossoming during both the years of experimentations (2003–04 and 2004–05). However, the highest vitamin-C (63.75/63.66 mg/100g) was obtained with treatment combination 100 ppm GA3 with partial deblossoming. In addition, the highest acidity of fruit (0.77 and 0.79%) was registered in control (water spray without deblossoming) during both the years. From this study, it can be concluded that spraying of 50 ppm GA3 with partial blossom removal treated plants showed improve of fruit quality.