ASSESSMENT OF FOOD AND NUTRIENT INTAKE OF COMMUNITIES ACROSS THREE AGRO-BIODIVERSITY HOTSPOTS IN INDIA

Balanced and adequate nutrition is important in improving the health of the community in general and of vulnerable groups in particular. Assessment of the nutritional status of a community is important for development of implementation strategies and suitable policies. Dietary assessment indicates whether intake of macro and micro nutrient are adequate. Anthropometric measurements and comparisons of nutrient intakes with reference values are easy and non-invasive, economical and sufficiently reliable methods for the determination of nutritional status. The present study uses micro-level data drawn from 24 hours recall diet survey to calculate the mean food and nutrient intake by communities in three agro-biodiversity hotspots. The 24 hours recall diet survey was carried out among households in three study locations during June to November 2013 among the project intervention and non-intervention groups. Information on age, sex, physiological status, physical activity of the household members who took meals during the previous 24 hours was collected for computing consumption unit. The result shows that cereals are the chief source of energy in the study locations contributing 70-80% of the daily energy intake. Mean intake of green leafy vegetable are negligible in the study locations. The intake of sugar and jaggery among the intervention group of Meenangadi is 48% higher than recommended dietary intake, while in the non-intervention group it is 28% higher; and 20% higher among the nonintervention group in the Kolli Hills. The intake of vitamin A is the lowest among other nutrients across the internvention and non-intervention groups in the study locations

Assessment of Food and Nutrient Intake of Communities across Three Agro-biodiversity Hotspots in India

Balanced and adequate nutrition is important in improving the health of the community in general and of vulnerable groups in particular. Assessment of the nutritional status of a community is important for development of implementation strategies and suitable policies. Dietary assessment indicates whether intake of macro and micro nutrient are adequate. Anthropometric measurements and comparisons of nutrient intakes with reference values are easy and non-invasive, economical and sufficiently reliable methods for the determination of nutritional status. The present study uses micro-level data drawn from 24 hours recall diet survey to calculate the mean food and nutrient intake by communities in three agro-biodiversity hotspots. The 24 hours recall diet survey was carried out among households in three study locations during June to November 2013 among the project intervention and non-intervention groups. Information on age, sex, physiological status,physical activity of the household members who took meals during the previous 24 hours was collected for computing consumption unit. The result shows that cereals are the chief source of energy in the study locations contributing 70-80% of the daily energy intake. Mean intake of green leafy vegetable are negligible in the study locations. The intake of sugar and jaggery among the intervention group of Meenangadi is 48% higher than recommended dietary intake, while in the non-intervention group it is 28% higher; and 20% higher among the non-intervention group in the Kolli Hills. The intake of vitamin A is the lowest among other nutrients across the internvention and non-intervention groups in the study locations

Assessment of Food and Nutrient Intake of Communities across Three Agro-biodiversity Hotspots in India

Balanced and adequate nutrition is important in improving the health of the community in general and of vulnerable groups in particular. Assessment of the nutritional status of a community is important for development of implementation strategies and suitable policies. Dietary assessment indicates whether intake of macro and micro nutrient are adequate. Anthropometric measurements and comparisons of nutrient intakes with reference values are easy and non-invasive, economical and sufficiently reliable methods for the determination of nutritional status. The present study uses micro-level data drawn from 24 hours recall diet survey to calculate the mean food and nutrient intake by communities in three agro-biodiversity hotspots. The 24 hours recall diet survey was carried out among households in three study locations during June to November 2013 among the project intervention and non-intervention groups. Information on age, sex, physiological status,physical activity of the household members who took meals during the previous 24 hours was collected for computing consumption unit. The result shows that cereals are the chief source of energy in the study locations contributing 70-80% of the daily energy intake. Mean intake of green leafy vegetable are negligible in the study locations. The intake of sugar and jaggery among the intervention group of Meenangadi is 48% higher than recommended dietary intake, while in the non-intervention group it is 28% higher; and 20% higher among the non-intervention group in the Kolli Hills. The intake of vitamin A is the lowest among other nutrients across the internvention and non-intervention groups in the study locations

Supplementation of Madhuca longifolia Seed oil augments diclofenac-induced organ toxicities: A biochemical and histopathological approach

Diclofenac medication has been extensively used for anti-inflammatory, anti-pyretic, and analgesic actions. Its abiding usage and overdose have induced toxicity and harmful effects on the liver, kidney, and gastrointestinal tract. The research aims to scrutinize the protective effect of Madhuca longifolia seed oil against diclofenac-induced toxicity in female Wistar albino rats. A period of 10 days of study was aimed at 7 groups; Group 1 was assigned as normal control. Group 2 has been administered diclofenac (50 mg/kg b.w. /day, i.p.) only on the last two days of each study period. Group 3 and Group 4 have been pre-treated with 1 mL, and 2 mL of Madhuca longifolia seed oil, respectively, and diclofenac was induced as per Group 2. Group 5 was treated with the standard drug silymarin and diclofenac. Group 6 and Group 7 were given 1 mL and 2 mL of Madhuca longifolia seed oil alone. After the study period, parameters like liver enzyme markers, renal enzyme markers, and antioxidants were measured, and tissue samples were analyzed for histopathological changes. The results proved that pre-treatment of 1 mL of Madhuca longifolia seed oil has efficacy against diclofenac-induced toxicity

Strategic maintenance technique selection using combined quality function deployment, the analytic hierarchy process and the benefit of doubt approach

The business performance of manufacturing organizations depends on the reliability and productivity of equipment, machineries and entire manufacturing system. Therefore, the main role of maintenance and production managers is to keep manufacturing system always up by adopting most appropriate maintenance methods. There are alternative maintenance techniques for each machine, the selection of which depend on multiple factors. The contemporary approaches to maintenance technique selection emphasize on operational needs and economic factors only. As the reliability of production systems is the strategic intent of manufacturing organizations, maintenance technique selection must consider strategic factors of the concerned organization along with operational and economic criteria. The main aim of this research is to develop a method for selecting the most appropriate maintenance technique for manufacturing industry with the consideration of strategic, planning and operational criteria through involvement of relevant stakeholders. The proposed method combines quality function deployment (QFD), the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and the benefit of doubt (BoD) approach. QFD links strategic intents of the organizations with the planning and operational needs, the AHP helps in prioritizing the criteria for selection and ranking the alternative maintenance techniques, and the BoD approach facilitates analysing robustness of the method through sensitivity analysis through setting the realistic limits for decision making. The proposed method has been applied to maintenance technique selection problems of three productive systems of a gear manufacturing organization in India to demonstrate its effectiveness

Odonata (Insecta) diversity of Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary, the southern Western Ghats, India

A study was conducted at Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary, Idukki District, Kerala, the southern Western Ghats, to assess the diversity of odonates. We report 48 species of odonates, which include 31 species of Anisoptera (dragonflies) and 17 species of Zygoptera (damselflies). Among the dragonflies, the family Libellulidae dominated with 25 species, while Coenagrionidae with seven species was the dominant family among the damselflies. The odonate diversity of Chinnar WS accounted for 31.16 % of the odonates in Kerala and 27.58% of the odonates of the Western Ghats. Chinnar also recorded two species of odonates that are endemic to the Western Ghats, which are, the Pied Reed Tail Protosticta gravelyi and the Travancore Bamboo Tail Esme mudiensis

Design of Robust and Power Efficient Full Adder Using Energy Efficient Feed through Logic

ABSTRACT – An Energy Efficient Feedthrough Logic (EE-FTL) is proposed in this paper to reduce the power consumption for low power applications. The EE-FTL is well suited to arithmetic circuits where the critical path is made of a large cascade of inverting gates. It has a unique characteristic where the output is pre-evaluated before the inputs from the preceding stage are ready. The proposed logic style requires low power when compare to the existing feedthrough logic (FTL). The proposed circuit is simulated and a comparison analysis has been carried out using 90-nm, 1.2V CMOS process technology. A CMOS Full Adder is designed by the energy efficient feedthrough logic and the simulation result in MicroWind environment shows that the proposed logic reduces the power consumption by 77%, 70 % and 36 % over FTL, Low Power FTL (LP-FTL) and Constant Delay Logic (CDL), respectively. The problem of requirement of inverter as in dynamic logic is completely eliminated in the proposed logic