Quality evaluation of yoghurt stabilized with sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) and taro (Colocassia esculenta) starch

Stabilizers are important component in manufactured products such as yoghurt. The addition of stabilizers improves body, texture, appearance, mouth feel and prevents technical defects such as synersis in yoghurts. In this study starch was extracted from plant sources (sweet potato, taro) with and without use of chemicals. Yoghurt was enriched with different levels of extracted starch. Yoghurt samples were analyzed for physicochemical and functional attributes such as pH, acidity, synersis, water holding capacity, viscosity, total solids and sensory profile. Use of chemically extracted starches at the level of 0.3-0.4% (Sweet potato) and 0.2-0.3% (Taro)   in yoghurt manufacturing showed better  results  in  terms  of  lowering synersis, increasing water holding capacity, viscosity and overall acceptability as compared to the yoghurt containing stabilizer i.e. gelatin 0.5% w/w. Use of starches did not significantly affect the sensory attributes. Yoghurt that contains sweet potato and taro starch at 0.5% gave excellent results for water holding capacity, viscosity and for all sensory attributes as compared to gelati

Investigation of a Battery Storage System Aimed at Demand-Side Management of Residential Load

In this paper, an approach is presented for the demand-side management of residential loads in the urban areas of Pakistan using a battery storage system at the feeder level. The proposed storage system will be installed by a private distributor to supply affordable electricity during peak hours. The experimental data used to carry out this research work are the Pakistan Residential Energy Consumption (PRECON) data set. The households of the data set are categorized based on electric power usage through K-means clustering. The clusters are expanded for feeder synthesis to represent small-scale, medium-scale, and large-scale consumption. This expansion is performed through uniform distribution in a Monte Carlo simulation. The techno-economic analysis for the installation of a battery storage system is carried out for each feeder using SAM. The results of the research project elucidated that the load factors of the feeders representing small-scale, medium-scale, and large-scale consumption improved by 1%, 6%, and 7% by using the optimally sized batteries of 50 kW (670 kWh), 90 kW (1207 kWh), and 100 kW (1360 kWh), respectively. The distributor profit and the consumer utility bill savings ranged from US$12 k to US$25 k. The results proved the validity of the used approach to simultaneously reduce the consumer bill, maximize the distributor profit, and improve the feeder load factor. The novelty of this work lies in the location and in the way the system modeling has been performed with limited data

Effect of Sulfur Levels on Two Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) Varieties under Climatic Conditions of Pakistan

Present study was carried out at Agronomic Research Area, University of Agriculture Faisalabad during summer season, 2011 to determine the best variety and optimum sulfur level to get higher yield of sesame crop. The experiment was laid out in randomized complete block design (RCBD) with factorial arrangement. The experiment comprised of; two varieties, (TH-6, T-89) and six sulfur levels (0, 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 kg ha-1). It has been observed that the variety TH-6 was more responsive to the sulfur application than the variety T-89. The collected data showed that variety V1 (TH-6) gave significantly maximum number of seeds plant-1, number of capsules plant-1, 1000-seed weight, seed yield, oil content and protein content. Similarly, the sulfur level S6 (when 50 kg sulfur was applied) gave significantly maximum plant height, number of capsules per plant, number of seeds per capsules, 1000-seed weight, seed yield, and oil content of sesame. For obtaining higher yield and good nutritional value, sulfur fertilizer should apply at the rate of 50 kg ha-1 and the variety TH-6 should grow under the irrigated condition of Faisalabad