Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology

About: Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology is a education organization based out in Bhubaneswar, Orissa, India. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Agriculture. The organization has 867 authors who have published 693 publications receiving 7780 citations.

Oxidative Stress in Lead and Cadmium Toxicity and Its Amelioration

Abstract: Oxidative stress has been implicated to play a role, at least in part, in pathogenesis of many disease conditions and toxicities in animals. Overproduction of reactive oxygen species and free radicals beyond the cells intrinsic capacity to neutralize following xenobiotics exposure leads to a state of oxidative stress and resultant damages of lipids, protein, and DNA. Lead and cadmium are the common environmental heavy metal pollutants and have widespread distribution. Both natural and anthropogenic sources including mining, smelting, and other industrial processes are responsible for human and animal exposure. These pollutants, many a times, are copollutants leading to concurrent exposure to living beings and resultant synergistic deleterious health effects. Several mechanisms have been explained for the damaging effects on the body system. Of late, oxidative stress has been implicated in the pathogenesis of the lead- and cadmium-induced pathotoxicity. Several ameliorative measures to counteract the oxidative damage to the body system aftermath or during exposure to these toxicants have been assessed with the use of antioxidants. The present review focuses on mechanism of lead- and cadmium-induced oxidate damages and the ameliorative measures to counteract the oxidative damage and pathotoxicity with the use of supplemented antioxidants for their beneficial effects.

Antibacterial and antifungal activity of ten essential oils in vitro

Abstract: The essential oils of aegle, ageratum, citronella, eucalyptus, geranium, lemongrass, orange, palmarosa, patchouli and peppermint, were tested for antibacterial activity against 22 bacteria, including Gram-positive cocci and rods and Gram-negative rods, and twelve fungi (3 yeast-like and 9 filamentous) by the disc diffusion method Lemongrass, eucalyptus, peppermint and orange oils were effective against all the 22 bacterial strains Aegle and palmarosa oils inhibited 21 bacteria; patchouli and ageratum oils inhibited 20 bacteria and citronella and geranium oils were inhibitory to 15 and 12 bacterial strains, respectively All twelve fungi were inhibited by seven oils (aegle, citronella, geranium, lemongrass, orange, palmarosa and patchouli) Eucalyptus and peppermint oils were effective against eleven fungi Ageratum oil was inhibitory to only four fungi tested The MIC of eucalyptus, lemongrass, palmarosa and peppermint oils ranged from 016 to > 20 microliters ml-1 for eighteen bacteria and from 025 to 10 microliters ml-1 for twelve fungi

Application of Biodegradable Polymers in Food Packaging Industry: A Comprehensive Review

Abstract: For last 50 years plastics are widely used for manufacturing of packaging materials because of their performance and ease in production. With the advent of food processing industries there is a great demand for petroleum based packaging materials for food applications. However, increased use of plastics has created serious ecological problems to the environment because of their resistance to biodegradation. Biopolymers can be used as a solution to the problems posed by plastics as they easily degrade in the environment and also mimic the properties of conventional polymers. Biopolymers can be classified into three categories according to their origins of production. These are polymers extracted from biomass, synthesized from bio-derived monomers and produced from microorganisms. There are different film formation methods for biopolymers like solution casting method, melt mix method, electro spinning method, thermo pressing and casting, extrusion blown film method. The quality of polymers can be expressed as different properties like physical, thermal, mechanical and barrier properties. This review highlights the different kinds of biodegradable polymers, their characteristics with special emphasis on their market potential for food packaging applications. The review revels that presently starch based, PLA, PHA and different blends have been manufactured by industries, film properties compared with petrochemical based polymer for MAP and other food packaging applications. Since information on biopolymers is widely scattered over many sources and are very scarce compared to the conventional polymers, this article intends to give an overview of the state of the art on biodegradable polymer packages for food applications.