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Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa

In the imperial Gazetteer of India 1878, Pusa was recorded as a government estate of about 1350 acres in Darbhanba. It was acquired by East India Company for running a stud farm to supply better breed of horses mainly for the army. Frequent incidence of glanders disease (swelling of glands), mostly affecting the valuable imported bloodstock made the civil veterinary department to shift the entire stock out of Pusa. A British tobacco concern Beg Sutherland & co. got the estate on lease but it also left in 1897 abandoning the government estate of Pusa. Lord Mayo, The Viceroy and Governor General, had been repeatedly trying to get through his proposal for setting up a directorate general of Agriculture that would take care of the soil and its productivity, formulate newer techniques of cultivation, improve the quality of seeds and livestock and also arrange for imparting agricultural education. The government of India had invited a British expert. Dr. J. A. Voelcker who had submitted as report on the development of Indian agriculture. As a follow-up action, three experts in different fields were appointed for the first time during 1885 to 1895 namely, agricultural chemist (Dr. J. W. Leafer), cryptogamic botanist (Dr. R. A. Butler) and entomologist (Dr. H. Maxwell Lefroy) with headquarters at Dehradun (U.P.) in the forest Research Institute complex. Surprisingly, until now Pusa, which was destined to become the centre of agricultural revolution in the country, was lying as before an abandoned government estate. In 1898. Lord Curzon took over as the viceroy. A widely traveled person and an administrator, he salvaged out the earlier proposal and got Londonā€™s approval for the appointment of the inspector General of Agriculture to which the first incumbent Mr. J. Mollison (Dy. Director of Agriculture, Bombay) joined in 1901 with headquarters at Nagpur The then government of Bengal had mooted in 1902 a proposal to the centre for setting up a model cattle farm for improving the dilapidated condition of the livestock at Pusa estate where plenty of land, water and feed would be available, and with Mr. Mollisonā€™s support this was accepted in principle. Around Pusa, there were many British planters and also an indigo research centre Dalsing Sarai (near Pusa). Mr. Mollisonā€™s visits to this mini British kingdom and his strong recommendations. In favour of Pusa as the most ideal place for the Bengal government project obviously caught the attention for the viceroy.

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Subject: Microbiology Ɨ Author: Kumar, Chandra Mohan Ɨ End date: 2020 Ɨ Start date: 2018 Ɨ Thesis Type: M.Sc Ɨ
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    Study of microbes in button mushroom compost production
    (DRPCAU, Pusa, 2020) Kumar, Chandra Mohan; Meena, Khem Raj
    Mushrooms are rich source of nutrients and have exceptional medicinal properties. The most important commercially grown genus of edible mushroom is Agaricus bisporus (button mushroom) and A. bisporus (Lange) Imbach, which accounts 86% of the overall mushroom yield in India. The cultivation of mushroom requires nutritionally rich substrate i.e., compost but microbiology and biochemistry of composting is not understood properly yet. The microbial consortium can be help as a booster for bio-composting agricultural residues and fasten the rate of composting for mushroom production. Therefore, in the recent studies, the compost degrading bacteria were isolated from the button mushroom compost (degraded compost and spent mushroom substrate) which was collected from AICRP on mushroom of Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa on different media viz. Nutrient Agar media, T3 Media, Kingsā€˜s B agar media, Trypticase soya agar media and Kenknight agar media. A total of 40 isolates were obtained based on different colony characteristics and which were screened for cellulose and hemicellulose degradation activities. Out of the 40 isolates, 18 isolates showed cellulose degradation ability with the zone of clearance was in the range of 12.6 mm to 35.3 mm and isolate C-7 showed highest zone of clearance (35.3 mm). Among the cellulose degrader, 10 isolates were positive for hemicellulose degradation with the zone of clearance in the range of 12.4 mm to 33.5 mm and isolate M-18 showed highest zone of clearance (33.5 mm). Those isolates which showed both cellulose and hemicellulose degradation abilities were further characterized morphologically and biochemically by gram staining, endospore staining and IMViC test. It was observed that out of 10 cellulose and hemicellulose degrading isolates, 4 isolates viz. M-3, M-18, C-4 and C-6 were gram negative and 6 isolates viz. M-1, M-10, M-11, M-19, C-10 and C-12 were gram positive and among gram positive isolates, only two isolates viz. C-12 and M-1 showed endospore formation. Those isolates which showed positive result for cellulose and hemicellulose degradation were further assayed for IMViC test. It was observed out of 10 isolates, isolates M1, M6, M13 and C11were positive for Indole test whereas in Methyl red test, all the 10 isolates showed positive result. For Voges-Proskauers (VP) test, it was found that except 2 isolates viz. M6 and C19,all the isolates showed positive result whereas all the 10 isolates were negative for citrate utilization test. These ten isolates were also tested for antagonistic behavior for consortia formation and found that none of the isolates showed any antagonistic ability against each other. Therefore, these isolates were used for the preparation of microbial consortia by growing them in enrichment culture media which were further inoculated in developed formulations. Different formulations were prepared using different combinations of substrates i.e., lime (3%), urea (2%), glucose (10g) and distilled water at different concentration and then inoculated with microbial consortium and 3g sterilized wheat straw and stored at 280 C. These formulations were further characterized for pH, microbial growth (optical density) and cell count at different time interval i.e., 0 day, 14days, 28 days, 42 days and 56 days. A total of 18 formulations were developed with three replicates. It was reported that pH varied according to the substrates added to the formulations. The addition of lime increased the pH when compared to the other formulations. In almost all the formulations, the pH values initially (14 days) decreased then increased and became almost static at the end of incubation i.e., after 56 days. It was found that in all the formulations, where glucose was added, there was lowest pH recorded as compared to the other formulations. Formulation F18 showed highest pH (11.78) followed by F17 (11.32) when consortia was inoculated and least (2.65) in case of formulation F1. When the optical density (at 660 nm) of formulations were recorded at various time intervals, it was observed that, in all the formulations there was increase in optical density gradually and the optical density of the formulations did not show a specific pattern and varied independently. At 0 day, the optical density was highest i.e., 2.57 in formulation F18 followed by formulation F7 (2.26) and lowest was recorded in formulation F3 (0.68). Whereas at 56 days of incubation, formulation F16 showed the highest optical density (2.97) and the lowest was observed in formulation F3 (0.80). The cell count of formulations varied according to the change in the pH i.e., the cell count was higher at neutral pH as compared to the acidic and alkaline pH of the formulations. As compared to the initial cell population (6.3 X 106) added to each formulation, the cell population in most of the formulation declined initially up to 14 days and then increased and became static at 56 days of incubation. Formulation F5 showed the highest cell count (6.0 X 106) followed by formulation F7 and F8 (5.8 X 106) formulation F1 showed the lowest cell count (5.1 X 106) after 56 days of incubation. Therefore the developed microbial consortium based formulations can be used to hasten the rate of composting for button mushroom production.