Forage Seed Production in Egypt for Domestic Marker and for Export

In Egypt, no major effort is made to provide local and export markets with seeds of correctly identified and pure cultivars of forage crops in spite of the existence of all the essential factors for a successful seed industry. A wide genetic base of indigenous forage crops such as berseem clover and alfalfa, proper irrigation, a harvest and seed maturation period free from rain, sunshine and clear sky all year and highly fertile soils in isolated areas are available. Moreover, uncertified, uncontrolled and unidentified local seeds of berseem clover and alfalfa are highly demanded by foreign markets due to their unique productivity and high tolerance to adverse conditions. However, forage crop seed production technology is not well understood by most forage growers. Alfalfa and berseem clover seeds are produced from small patches from areas grown mainly for forage production purposes. This may be due to the lack of infrastructure such as cleaning facilities, specific insecticides, and many other components that are not available at competitive prices to growers. The challenge of producing a high yield of forage crop seed at a reasonable cost, includes the mastering of all known principles and putting them in practice under environmental and field conditions and has not been achieved yet

Carry-Over Effect in Forage Rotations on Newly Reclaimed Sandy Soil in Egypt

This study was carried out to investigate the carry-over effect of a preceding crop on the productivity of the following crop in various rotations in newly reclaimed lands in Egypt. The productivity of peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.), soyabean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.), maize (Zea mays L.) and pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.) in summer season were much higher following berseem (Trifolium alexandrinum L.) or lentil (Lens culinaris Medic) than after wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) or barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) in both years of the study. Soyabean was the best summer season pre-crop for lentil and berseem, whereas peanut was best for barley. Maize was a suprisingly good pre-crop in this study. The carry-over effect from pearl millet was inferior to that of maize. Of the winter season crops berseem had the most positive effect on the four summer crops studied. Winter season crops had a decreasing positive effect in the order: berseem, lentil, barley and wheat. The data suggest that, cropping systems on newly reclaimed sandy soils should include legume crops (soyabean or peanut in summer, and berseem or lentil in winter) to maximise production of the following crop

Forage Production from Perennial vs. Annual Crop R~ on in Sandy Soils in Egypt

Forage production was studied on newly reclaimed sandy soil in Egypt trom perennial lucerne (Medicago sativa L.) and two annual crop rotations. The cropping systems were: A) lucerne, B) berseem clover (Trifolium alexandrinum L.) in the winter followed by pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum R. Br. Emend. Stantz.) in the summer and C) triticale (XX Triticosecale Wittm.) (forage cut + grain harvest) in the winter followed by maize (Zea mays L.) (grain + stover) in the summer. Mean annual dry matter yields (t ha-1 ) were 20.65, 26.59 and 27.48 from A, B and C, respectively. However, lucerne provided the most even seasonal forage production

Structural Pattern and Growth Analysis of Rice Production in Odisha

Even though rice has high importance for food security and agricultural GDP in the agrarian economy of Odisha, production is constrained by several factors. The trends, patterns, and instability of key production parameters such as area, yield need to be studied to suggest insightful measures for the development of rice cultivation in the state. The resource use efficiency also assumes significance to determine the profitability of rice production. The study used both secondary and primary data and analyzed trend, instability, and resource use efficiency using compound annual growth method (CAGR), Cuddy-Della Valle Instability Index, and Cobb-Douglas production function respectively. While the area under rice in Odisha marked a negative annual growth (-0.18), the yield and productions have shown significant positive growth of 1.95 and 1.76% respectively for the period of 1960-2019. In respect of instability in production and productivity, moderate variability was observed. However, for the area, the instability is very less. The production function analysis has shown excessive usage of significant resources like labor, fertilizers, and pesticides. The ratio of marginal value product and marginal factor cost for these inputs were much less than one, thus suggesting resource use optimization for profit maximization.  The considerable variability in rice production, area and productivity in Odisha should be responded with strategic and sustainable measures

Structural, Optical, Magnetic and Photon Attenuation of Novel Potassium Lead Borate Glasses Doped with MnO

Potassium lead borate glasses doped with MnO (40B2O3 + 40PbO + (20-x)K2O + xMnO: x = 0–5 mol%) have been prepared via standard melting quenching process. The impact of MnO on the structure, optical, magnetic and gamma-ray protection properties of pottisium lead borate glasses have been examined. The density was increased from 4.83to 5.23 g/cm3 as MnO content increased while the molar volume of prepared glass sample was decreased from 28.112 to 25.755 cm3/mol. The obtained direct optical gap (Eg) values were 2.84, 2.59, 2.41, 2.19, 1.95, and 1.84 eV for the Mn-x (x = 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5) glass samples, respectively. Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) spectra demonstrated that as the MnO concentration increases in the glass network the intensity and width of the IR bands were increased. The magnetic measurement revealed that the magnetic saturation (Ms) was decreased while the magnetic coercivity (Hc) was increased with increasing MnO substitution ratio. The linear attenuation coefficient of the μMn-glass follows the order: µMn-0 < µMn-1 < µMn-2 < µMn-3 < µMn-4 < µMn-5. Half value layer (HVL) rises as µ decreases and vice versa. The range of the HVL is 0.002–3.378, 0.002–3.334, 0.002–3.291, 0.002–3.248, 0.002–3.176, and 0.002–3.106 cm for Mn-x (x = 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and5). The trend of effective atomic number (Zeff) variation is related to that of both linear and mass attenuation coefficients (µ and µm). The produced Mn-glasses can be employed in a variety of optical, magnetic and radiation protective applications. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature

A comprehensive study on optical features, gamma photon buildup factors and neutron shielding capability of B2O3-SB2O3-LI2O-BI2O3 glasses

ABSTRACT. Linear, nonlinear optical properties, photon buildup factors, and neutron shielding capability of glasses with chemical composition (65-x)B2O3-10Sb2O3-25Li2O-xBi2O3, where x = 0 (BSLB0) – 20 (BSLB20) mol% with steps of 4 mol% were examined. Molar refractivity (Rmolar) and molar polarizability (αmolar) were increased as Bi2O3 content mol% increase in the examined BSLB-glasses. The values of metallization criterion (Mcriterion) confirmed that the BSLB-glasses were non-metallic materials. The static (εstatic) and optical (εoptical) dielectric constants having the same trend of the refractive index (noptical). Values of optical electronegativity (χ*) were reduced from 0.825 for BSLB0 (Bi2O3 = 0 mol%) glasses to 0.758 for BSLB20 (Bi2O3 = 20 mol%) glasses. The linear electric/dielectric susceptibility (χ(1)) increased from 0.370 to 0.397. The nonlinear optical susceptibility (χ3) and nonlinear refractive index n2optical were enhanced by increasing Bi2O3 content in the BSLB-glasses. The BSLB20 glasses presented the least exposure and energy absorption build-up factors (EBF and EABF) at all considered thickness. BSLB20 sample achieved the best fast neutron removal cross section ( ) shield among all glasses. The total stopping powers (TSP) follows the trend (TSP)BSLB0 < (TSP)BSLB4 < (TSP)BSLB8 < (TSP)BSLB12 < (TSP)BSLB16 < (TSP)BSLB20. The electron absorbing and hence shielding capacity of the BSLB-glasses improves as their Bi2O3 content increase.     KEY WORDS: Antimony lithium-borate glasses, Optical properties, Buildup factors, Neutron shielding   Bull. Chem. Soc. Ethiop. 2022, 36(4), 949-962.                                                                DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.4314/bcse.v36i4.19                                                     &nbsp

Accurate characterizations of material using microwave T-resonator for solid sensing applications

The topic of microwave sensors in enclosures is one of the most active areas in material characterization research today due to its wide applications in various industries. Surprisingly, a microwave sensor technology has been comprehensively investigated and there is an industry demand for an accurate instrument of material characterization such as food industry, quality control, chemical composition analysis and bio-sensing. These accurate instruments have the ability to understand the properties of materials composition based on chemical, physical, magnetic, and electric characteristics. Therefore, a design of the T-resonator has been introduced and investigated for an accurate measurement of material properties characterizations. This sensor is designed and fabricated on a 0.787 mm-thickness Roger 5880 substrate for the first resonant frequency to resonate at 2.4 GHz under unloaded conditions. Various standard dielectric of the sample under test (SUT) are tested to validate the sensitivity which making it a promising low-cost, compact in size, ease of fabrication and small SUT preparation for applications requiring novel sensing techniques in quality and control industries

Analysis And Investigation Of A Novel Microwave Sensor With High Q-Factor For Liquid Characterization

In this paper, a new design of microwave sensor with high Q-factor for liquid characterization is analyzed and investigated. The new microwave sensor is based on a gap waveguide cavity resonator (GWCR). The GWCR consists of upper plate, lower plate and array of pins on the lower plate. The liquid under test (LUT) is characterized by placing it inside the GWCR where the electric field concentrates using a quartz capillary that is passing through microfluidic channels. The results show that the proposed sensor has a high Q-factor of 4832. Moreover, the proposed sensor has the ability to characterize different typesof liquids such as oils, ethanol, methanol and distilled water. The polynomial fitting method is used to extract the equation of the unknown permittivity of the LUT. The results show that the evaluated permittivity using the proposed sensor has a good agreement with the reference permittivity. Therefore, the proposed sensor is a good candidate for food and pharmaceutical application

Determination of solid material permittivity using T-ring resonator for food industry

In this paper, we present a simple design of a T-ring resonator sensor for characterizing solid detection.  The sensor is based on a planar microwave ring resonator and operating at 4.2 GHz frequency with a high-quality factor and sensitivity. An optimization of the T-ring geometry and materials were made to achieve high sensitivity for microwave material characterizations. This technique can determine the properties of solid materials from range of 2 GHz to 12 GHz frequencies. Techniques of current microwave resonator are usually measuring the properties of material at frequencies with a wide range; however, their accuracy is limited. Contrary to techniques that have a narrowband which is normally measuring the properties of materials to a high-accuracy with limitation to only a single frequency. This sensor has a capability of measuring the properties of materials at frequencies of wide range to a high-accuracy. A good agreement is achieved between the simulated results of the tested materials and the values of the manufacturer’s Data sheets. An empirical equation has been developed accordingly for the simulated results of the tested materials. Various standard materials have been tested for validation and verification of the sensor sensitivity. The proposed concept enables the detection and characterization of materials and it has miniaturized the size with low cost, reusable, reliable, and ease of design fabrication with using a small size of tested sample. It is inspiring a broader of interest in developing microwave planar sensors and improving their applications in food industry, quality control and biomedical materials

Analysis and investigation of a novel microwave sensor with high Q-factor for liquid characterization

In this paper, a new design of microwave sensor with high Q-factor for liquid characterization is analyzed and investigated. The new microwave sensor is based on a gap waveguide cavity resonator (GWCR). The GWCR consists of upper plate, lower plate and array of pins on the lower plate. The liquid under test (LUT) is characterized by placing it inside the GWCR where the electric field concentrates using a quartz capillary that is passing through microfluidic channels. The results show that the proposed sensor has a high Q-factor of 4832. Moreover, the proposed sensor has the ability to characterize different types of liquids such as oils, ethanol, methanol and distilled water. The polynomial fitting method is used to extract the equation of the unknown permittivity of the LUT. The results show that the evaluated permittivity using the proposed sensor has a good agreement with the reference permittivity. Therefore, the proposed sensor is a good candidate for food and pharmaceutical applications