Anju KumariMohammad, Sadiq2019-05-172019-05-172018http://krishikosh.egranth.ac.in/handle/1/5810103554Banana has a high nutritional value and is a good source of energy due to its high level of starch and sugar. Banana peel is an abundant and low cost agricultural waste residue. Pectinaceous nature of the banana fruit is one of the biggest prolem during its processing. Keeping this in view, the present work aims at bio-utilization of inexpensive and readily available banana peel as cheap substrate for production of pectinase by A. niger with the following objectives viz. to optimize various cultural conditions to maximize pectinase production and to study the effect of crude pectinase on clarification of banana juice. Pectinase production was studied in solid state fermentation by using banana peel powder sole carbon substrate by A. niger. Maximum pectinase activity 8.12U/ml was observed with 1:3 moisture level, pH 5, 3% inoculum of 108 spore/ml, 120 h of incubation time at 40 ºC. Therefore, these optimized conditions were used for crude enzyme production for banana slurry treatment. Maximum juice yield (59.7%) and minimum turbidity (539 N.T.U.) was achieved with 3% crude pectinase concentration at 60 minutes incubation time at 40 ºC. Banana RTS was prepared from banana slurry with and without (control) enzyme treatment. During storage studies of banana RTS, it was observed that the TSS, total sugar and acidity significantly increased whereas pH, pectin and ascorbic acid were decreased. While, significant differences were observed in TSS, total sugars, pectin, acidity and turbidity among control and pectinase treated banana RTS. No microbial count was detected up to 45 days of storage but 2.6 log10CFU/ml yeast count was observed after 45 days of storage. However, no significant differences were observed among banana RTS prepared with or without enzyme treatment. The overall acceptability of the juice at 15-days of storage was 7.66 and at 30-days of storage it was 7.75 and at 45 days it was decreased up to 6.40. The overall acceptability scores of enzyme treated juices, throughout the storage period were significantly higher than control.ennullThesis