Current Journal of Applied Science and Technology

Over the years, water transportation has been a major way of carrying over 90 percent of the physical carriage of Nigeria’s external trade . “The reason behind this overwhelming dominance of water transportation, compared with others can be seen in over congestion of most of our sea ports in Nigeria, even in other countries of the world, can be seen in the over congestion of most of our sea ports in Nigeria.”

However, the issue of safety and security in the maritime industry is a serious and complex one. The economic losses arising from security lapse in most of our ports in Nigeria have become unacceptable in today’s commercial climate. The most noticeable distruptions  in our present day commercial climate are  in the form of kidnapping, terrorism, theft of valuable cargoes, politically motivated crimes. In maritime business world, the undisputed facts are that, loss prevention mechanism which include security, safety, fire and risk management are top priority concerns. This paper has however attempted to analyze the contributing factors to insecurity in most of our seaports in Nigeria. And how insecurity in Nigeria sea can be curtailed or eradicated with the enabling laws governing the usage, management and control of the Nigeria sea ports.

It is a need of the time to try out different sources of natural dyes to colour the textiles as the synthetic dyes used on textiles are carcinogenic and can create havoc in the human life system. The research was carried out for optimizing different conditions for dyeing wool with dye extracted from False Black Pepper seeds. The study was conducted in Department of Textiles and Apparel Designing, College of Community Science, Vasantrao Naik Marathwada Krishi Vidyapeeth, Parbhani, Maharashtra (India). The dyeing conditions optimized for dyeing wool were, medium of dye extraction, dye extraction time, dye material concentration, dyeing time and mordant concentrations. The colour fastness of wool dyed by adopting optimized conditions were tested for different parameters. The   alkaline medium was most suitable for extracting dye from False Black Pepper seeds for dyeing wool. On the basis of percent dye absorption the standardized dye extraction and dyeing time was 30 min, dye material concentration was 5%.  The highest dye absorption percent was seen when wool was dyed with 10% Potassium Aluminum Sulphate  (Alum) mordant in a simultaneous mordanting while for Copper Sulphate mordant 3%  in post mordanting and  for Ferrous Sulphate it was 3% in pre-mordanting. Wool dyed with False Black Pepper dye using different mordents adopting different mordanting methods exhibited very good to excellent colour fastness to sunlight, washing, rubbing and perspiration except wet rubbing as noticeable  colour staining was observed in all the samples.  The subtle,attractive colour range of light brown  to dark brown  acquired by the wool when dyed with False Black Pepper dye using different mordents.

The investigation of species diversity and abundance of birds in Lake Hora Arsedi Bishoftu town was conducted from September 2018 to July 2019. The aim of the study was to assess the diversity and abundance of bird species in Lake Hora Arsedi at Bishoftu town. Point count method was used to investigate the abundance of birds. Observation was conducted periodically walking along the study area early in the morning and late in the afternoon. Different diversity indices and statistical methods (Chi-square test and correlation) were used to analyze data collected during the field survey. Abundance of birds, their richness and evenness as well as birds` diversity recording were made. A total of 14 bird species grouped under 7 orders and 11 families were recorded. The month February had the lowest species diversity (H’= 0.33), species evenness (E = 0.13) and species richness (12). The highest species diversity, evenness and richness were recorded in March and April (H’=0.35), (E = 0.35) and (S = 14), respectively. Variation in abundance of birds was statistically significant between months. Abundance score of frequency of bird species was high during rainy season and uncommon are high during small rainy seasons using encounter rate. Lake Hora Arsedi has a number of natural and human induced bird attractant features. The area possesses favorable places for birds to nest, rest, roost and a good access to food as well as water resources. The study recommends the maintenance of bird watching records to monitor the effectiveness of management and to ensure early detection of any impact on bird numbers or behavior; conservation of Lake Hora Arsedi, its surroundings and making it free from human interference will enable us to conserve these valuable bird species. Hence, conservation measures by wildlife conservation authority and other concerned agencies are important to safeguard these species in the area.

Aims: The aim of this study was to evaluate the drying behavior of bottle gourd slices using tray dryer.

Study Design: The bottle gourd slices were dried in a tray dryer at 50, 55, 60, 65 and 70 + 1°C. The moisture loss was determined by gravimetry. Readings were taken at 30 minutes till constant weight was observed.

Place and Duration of Study: Experiments were done in Department of Food Science and Technology, MPKV Rahuri and completed within 12 months.

Methodology: The drying curves were fitted into four different drying models (Henderson, Logarithm, Page and Modified Page) widely accepted for modeling of agricultural materials drying. The best model describing the drying process was selected based on the low RMSE, low χ², and high R².

Results: The drying time at 50, 55, 60, 65 and 70ºC drying temperature were 630, 570, 450, 420 and 360 min respectively for bottle gourd slices. By comparing time required at 50ºC and 60ºC temperature and 60ºC and 70ºC there were 28.57% and 20.00% reduction in drying time respectively. At the beginning of a drying process, the moisture content of fresh bottle gourd was 92.09% (w.b.) which is reduced to 7.08% (wb). The drying rate decreased with increase in drying time. The drying rates were as high as 0.89 at 55ºC and as low as 0.1 at almost all the temperatures. The R² values ranged from 0.788 to 0.954, the adjusted R² values also ranged from from 0.777 to 0.951, χ² values between 0.029 and 0.681, and RMSE values between 0.0533 and 0.3742.

Conclusion: Henderson and Pabis model was found to be a better model for describing the drying characteristics of bottle gourd at all temperatures. The product quality was found well at all the temperature.

The phenomenon of social cohesion has gained much traction in the extant literature. However, research that assesses how celebrity self-disclosure can be leveraged to engender social cohesion remains very scanty in the existing literature. The current study aims at empirically testing the effect of celebrity self-disclosure on social cohesion while accounting for the roles of fans’ behavior, social presence and attachment to celebrities. To realize this aim, data is collected from 306 Instagram users who follow at least one celebrity. The hypothesis intended to realize these aims are tested by adopting structural equation modeling technique. The results show that celebrities’ descriptive self-disclosure (but not emotional self-disclosure) influences fans’ archiving and commenting behavior. Additionally, celebrities’ emotional self-disclosure (but not descriptive self-disclosure) as well as fans’ commenting, and archiving behaviors are instrumental in predicting fans’ social presence. The study further finds that fans’ social presence is essential in predicting their attachment to celebrities, while their (fans’) attachment to celebrities and social presence are significant antecedents of social cohesion. Furthermore, attachment to celebrities is found to significantly mediate the relationship between social presence and social cohesion. The study provides practical and theoretical insights into understanding social cohesion, celebrity self-disclosure, fans’ behavior, social presence and attachment to celebrities.

Environment is a basic and fundamental factor determining the growth of plants. Amount and distribution of rainfall is the key variable influencing crop productivity in rainfed farming. Maximum heat units of 1386 growing degree days, rainfall (577 mm), rainy days (33), PET (456 mm), SSH (677 hrs.), day length (1474 hrs.), photo thermal units (16921) and helio thermal units (7372) were recorded during 2015 compared to growing season 2016 with growing degree days (GDD) (1266), rainfall (102 mm), rainy days (9), PET (382 mm), SSH (701 hrs.), day length (1474 hrs.), photo thermal units (15136) and helio thermal units (8163). Increased cumulative SSH and helio thermal units during 2016 was mainly due to clear weather condition and higher maximum and minimum temperature at crop growing period. Higher grain yield, straw yield, heat, photo thermal and helio thermal use efficiency (3638 and 2443 kg ha ^-1, 2.62, 0.22 and 0.49 during 2015, 1.93, 0.16 and 0.30 during 2016, respectively) was recorded in transplanting with recommended spacing along with application of RDF (50:40:37.5 NPK, ha^-1) + FYM 7.5 t ha^-1 compared to other treatment combinations.

Droughts are regional phenomena, which are considered as one of the major natural environmental hazards and severely affect the water resources. Climate variability may result in harmful drought periods in semiarid regions. Meteorological drought indices are considered as important tools for drought monitoring, they are embedded with different theoretical and experimental structures. This study compares the performance of three indices of Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), Rainfall Anomaly Index (RAI) End Palmer Drought Severity Index (PNPI) to predict long-term drought events using the Thomas-Feiring Model and historical data. For studies of areal drought extent, the 61 years (1951-2011) historical rainfall data of Trichy District were utilized to generate 58 years (2012-2070) synthetic data series so that the characteristics of long-term drought might be determined and the performance of those three indices might be analyzed and compared. The results show that SPI and PNPI perform similarly with regard to drought identification and detailed analysis to determine the characteristics of long-term drought. Finally, the RAI indicated significant deviations from normalized natural processes.

Soilless culture is a technique of crop production using no soil. The main reason towards need for soil to soilless culture for horticultural crops is the problem related to proliferation of soil borne pathogen in the soil cultivation. Recent research studies reported that commercial production of greenhouse vegetables with soilless media has paved the way for reduction in economic losses caused by soil-borne pathogens. In this context, the present study was initiated to identify suitable substrate mixes for soilless culture. The experiment was laid out in a randomized block design. There were fifteen different media levels including control, with three replications. Crop Tomato TNAU hybrid CO3 were assessed for the mean performance in respect of growth characters namely shoot length, root length, germination percent and vigour index. The treatment Vermicompost: Coir pith (3:1) was found to have the highest value for growth characters for the crop. With regard to the physical and chemical properties, all combination media showed optimal range for crop growth. Further a cost analysis was made to find the suitable media based on cost aspects comparing reduction in vigour index and cost of media with that of best media. Treatment T₇ (Vermicompost: coir pith (2:1)) and T₆ (Vermicompost: Coir pith (1:3) were found to be the best media considering above factors.