Cellulase finds use in saccharification of lignocellulosic agroresidues to fermentable sugars which can be used for production of commercially important metabolites. This study reports endoglucanase (CMCase) production by Enhydrobacter sp. ACCA2. The CMCase activity of the strain ACCA2 was successively improved by optimization of range of physical and nutritional parameter in a set of non-statistical and statistical experiments. Initial non-statistical selection of carbon source, incubation time, temperature and pH resulted in 1.07 fold increase of CMCase activity. In a subsequent statistical method, response surface methodology, optimization of medium components such as carboxymethylcellulose, peptone, NaCl, MgSO4, K2HPO4, and (NH4)2SO4 yielded further increase up to 2.39 fold CMCase activity. The cellulolytic potential was evaluated in biomass saccharification with different plant materials and the results revealed that the enzyme produced by strain may have significant commercial values for industrial saccharification process. Moreover, this is the first report of cellulase production by an Enhydrobacter spp.

Introgression lines (ILs) of groundnut with enhanced resistance to rust and late leaf spot (LLS) recorded increased pod and haulm yield in multilocation testing. Marker-assisted backcrossing (MABC) approach was used to introgress a genomic region containing a major QTL that explains >80% of phenotypic variance (PV) for rust resistance and 67.98% PV for LLS resistance. ILs in the genetic background of TAG 24, ICGV 91114 and JL 24 were evaluated for two seasons to select 20 best ILs based on resistance, productivity parameters and maturity duration. Multilocation evaluation of the selected ILs was conducted in three locations including disease hot spots. Background genotype, environment and genotype 9 environment interactions are important for expression of resistance governed by the QTL region. Six best ILs namely ICGV 13192, ICGV 13193, ICGV 13200, ICGV 13206, ICGV 13228 and ICGV 13229 were selected with 39-79% higher mean pod yield and 25-89% higher mean haulm yield over their respective recurrent parents. Pod yield increase was contributed by increase in seed mass and number of pods per plant.

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Cotton, a crop of choice, occupies the second premier position next to food crops in providing clothing. Though 53 species of Gossypium are available, only four species are cultivable and among the four, the major cultivable area falls under G. hirsutum. Though varieties with medium, superior medium, long and extra long staple cotton were released earlier, with the advent of machineries, ginning facilities, mills were literally requiring cotton fiber of any length. With the advent of Bt technology and the release of hybrids during 2002, cotton productivity had a momentum. However, considering the duration, cost involved in manual harvesting etc., farmers were looking for alternate option and High Density Planting System (HDPS) offered a promise in this direction. Farmers were looking for genotypes that could yield better under higher planting densities with fewer bolls per plant, synchronized maturity with uniform bursting. Efforts have been taken all over the World in this direction and India is not an exception. Handful of varieties fitting to this situation has been released from many of the Universities. This chapter essentially summarizes the genetic, agronomic, plant protection interventions and the futuristic requirements for achieving at least 700 kg of lint per hectare.

Purpose Traditional organic formulations are widely used as a plant growth promoters; however, the knowledge on the microbial aspect of traditional organic formulations is still limited. The aim of this study was to illustrate the cultivable bacterial diversity of various traditional organic formulations and their potential for early plant growth promotion. Methods Five different traditional organic formulations such as 100 % panchagavya, 33 % panchagavya, plant extract with native microorganisms, commercial organic fertilizer extract with two percent leaf soil extract and commercial organic fertilizer extract with 2 % yogurt were prepared and used in this study. The liquid fraction of these traditional organic formulations were used to analyze the beneficial effect on plant growth by seed treatment and foliar applications.Results Bacterial 16SrDNA analysis revealed that the isolates fell into forty-three different genera, which can be grouped into seven different classes, such as Alphaproteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Bacilli (or Firmibacteria), Betaproteobacteria, Cytophagia, Flavobacteriia and Gammaproteobacteria. Higher bacterial diversity was observed in cow dung followed by 33 and 100 % panchagavya. Radish and Chinese cabbage seed germination and growth were significantly improved by traditional organic formulations compared to control. Conclusion The results of this study showed that the bacterial diversity changes depend on the type and concentration of ingredients used in traditional organic formulations. Substantial increase in plant growth by the traditional organic formulations indicates the suitability of using these organic preparations in eco-friendly agriculture.

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Improvement of agronomic traits and fibre quality in cotton requires detailed information on genetic variation available in the population. The objective of this study was to investigate variability, heritability and character association in nine agronomic and five fibre quality traits among 220 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) derived from MCU 5 and TCH1218. The study was undertaken during kharif 2018-19 at Department of cotton, TNAU, Coimbatore. High PCV and GCV were exhibited by number of monopodia per plant, while moderate GCV and high PCV were recorded by number of bolls per plant. The traits boll weight, single plant yield, lint index and fibre fineness exhibited moderate GCV. Most of traits except five were in similar trend for GCV and PCV indicating less environmental influence. All traits had high heritability, whereas high GAM was expressed for number of monopodia per plant, boll weight, lint index, elongation percentage and fibre fineness. Such traits were additive in nature and process of selection will be effective. Number of bolls per plant and number of sympodia per plant were positively and significantly correlated with single plant yield. In fibre quality, bundle strength and elongation percentage were significantly and positively correlated with upper half mean length. So, while selecting high yielding genotypes these traits are to be considered. Superior transgressive segregants for single plant yield was identified as RIL 44 as it performed better for other yield component traits, while for fibre quality RIL 63 performance was comparatively higher. Among the population RIL 220 ranked top for single plant yield and upper half mean length. Fibre quality traits had few favourable segregants when compared to yield traits. These identified RILs can be used in advance breeding trial for varietal development.