Biofloc Technology for Sustainable Growth of Shrimp Species: Litopenaeus Vannamei

Aquaculture stands as the fastest-growing food-producing sector globally, undergoing continuous development, expansion, and intensification across all regions. Despite the anticipation of higher production levels, the global growth of aquaculture is constrained by the severe scarcity of water and the limited availability of suitable land. Biofloc systems have emerged as a viable solution tailored for water-scarce areas. This innovative system offers a potential food source for shrimp reared in an environmentally friendly, limited or zero water exchange environment, with minimal effluents released into the surrounding ecosystem. The present study was conducted at a corporate aquaculture farm facility located in Cuddalore district, Tamilnadu. The research focused on evaluating the water quality, survival rates, and growth performance of Litopenaeus vannamei, ranging from post-larvae (PL-9) to 26.6 grams, over a 120-day period within a Biofloc system. Three cement tanks, designated as C1 (control) and C2, C3 (test), were utilized, each with a stocking density of 120 PL/sq.m. After reaching a weight of 2 grams, the shrimp were transferred to grow-out ponds. The results indicated that shrimp reared in Biofloc tanks exhibited significantly higher final weights, survival rates, and favorable water quality parameters compared to the control group, which relied solely on commercial feed. Significantly, as the biofloc volume rose, there was a noteworthy decrease in the requirement for feed application, thereby establishing the Biofloc system as a financially efficient option for shrimp cultivation

Photonic Crystals for Plasmonics: From Fundamentals to Superhydrophobic Devices

Production engineerin

Chapter Photonic Crystals for Plasmonics: From Fundamentals to Superhydrophobic Devices

Production engineerin

Effect on the grain size of single-mode microwave sintered NiCuZn ferrite and zinc titanate dielectric resonator ceramics

Microwave sintering of materials significantly depends on dielectric, magnetic and conductive losses. Samples with high dielectric and magnetic loss such as ferrites could be sintered easily. But low dielectric loss material such as dielectric resonators (paraelectrics) finds difficulty in generation of heat during microwave interaction. Microwave sintering of materials of these two classes helps in understanding the variation in dielectric and magnetic characteristics with respect to the change in grain size. High-energy ball milled Ni0.6Cu0.2Zn0.2Fe1.98O4-δ and ZnTiO3 are sintered in conventional and microwave methods and characterized for respective dielectric and magnetic characteristics. The grain size variation with higher copper content is also observed with conventional and microwave sintering. The grain size in microwave sintered Ni0.6Cu0.2Zn0.2Fe1.98O4-δ is found to be much small and uniform in comparison with conventional sintered sample. However, the grain size of microwave sintered sample is almost equal to that of conventional sintered sample of Ni0.3Cu0.5Zn0.2Fe1.98O4-δ. In contrast to these high dielectric and magnetic loss ferrites, the paraelectric materials are observed to sinter in presence of microwaves. Although microwave sintered zinc titanate sample showed finer and uniform grains with respect to conventional samples, the dielectric characteristics of microwave sintered sample are found to be less than that of conventional sample. Low dielectric constant is attributed to the low density. Smaller grain size is found to be responsible for low quality factor and the presence of small percentage of TiO2 is observed to achieve the temperature stable resonant frequency

Plasmon based biosensor for distinguishing different peptides mutation states

Periodic and reproducible gold nanocuboids with various matrix dimensions and with different inter-particle gaps were fabricated by means of top-down technique. Rhodamine 6G was used as a probe molecule to optimize the design and the fabrication of the cuboid nanostructures. The electric field distribution for the nanocuboids with varying matrix dimensions/inter-particle gap was also investigated. These SERS devices were employed as biosensors through the investigation of both myoglobin and wild/mutated peptides. The results demonstrate the probing and the screening of wild/mutated BRCA1 peptides, thus opening a path for the fabrication of simple and cheap SERS device capable of early detection of several diseases