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An extensive study has been made to identify, document, and investigate the ethnomedicinal plants used by Rakhine ethnic minorities in Patuakhali and Barguna District of southern Bangladesh for the term of April 2018 to June 2019. In this article, we have focused on the Rakhine population trends, management concerns, and some actions for conserving the Rakhine population diversity in the study area. In this study, we have identified the locations where Rakhine population lives in Patuakhali and Barguna districts. A total of 86 plant species belonging to 71 genera and 43 families were reported to be used for treating more than 57 various physical ailments under 14 illness categories from the study area. For each of the species, the botanic name, common name, Rakhine name, family, habit, parts used and traditional medicinal uses of the plant species have been presented. The maximum numbers of ethnomedicinal plant species were utilized to treat gastrointestinal complaints (43) taken after by the treatment of dermatological issues (36). The highly cited (75.60%) plant species were found to be Ananas comosus and Aegle marmelos used for gastro-intestinal (Stomach pain, indigestion, and dysentery) digestive disorders and subsequently followed by Colocasia esculenta (70.73%) used for cut, bleeding and wound healing. The results of this study have shown that Rakhine indigenous communities still depend on conventional plant-based medication to remedy various diseases and therapeutic purposes in the study area. Our findings have also shown that despite there have adequate phytodiversity in the natural habitat of the study area but the number of Rakhine population has been declining significantly day-by-day. As an ultimate result, we have lost the plant-based traditional medicinal knowledge of Rakhine indigenous communities in Bangladesh. As a rich source of traditional knowledge and cultural diversity, it calls for urgent initiatives to conserve the cultural heritage of the Rakhine community as well as the diversity of Rakhine ethnic group.

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To isolate and characterize lipase producing bacteria from lipid-rich environment and screen the best lipolytic indigenous bacteria a study was made. For the isolation of bacteria, oil based wastewater and soil were collected from ten different sampling sites.Four different media were used for study the aerobic heterotrophic bacterial count. The highest bacterial count (1.56 × 10 7 cfu/gm) was observed in dairy farm soil and lowest (8.3 × 10 2 cfu/ml) in the Buriganga river water. The highest percentage (94.51) of lipase producing bacteria was found in edible oil mill soil and lowest (23.44) in the Buriganga river water. Among the total isolates 30 showed better lipase activity. Potential ten lipase producers were taken for molecular identification. Among them, nine genera were matched with their conventional identification but conventionally identified Acetobacter liquifaciens was found to be as Stenotrophomonas maltophilia. The enzyme produced by the isolated bacteria could be used for the treatment of lipid-rich wastewater.

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Genetic variation in 14 local Aman rice varieties of Bangladesh including single grain and multigrain rice was investigated at the DNA level by RAPD molecular typing. Fifteen random primers were initially screened against DNA from five individuals that generated highly reproducible RAPD fragments, which were then subjected to further population analysis. A total 191 RAPD fragments were generated with these primers and 153 (80.1%) were polymorphic, which indicated high level of polymorphism existed within these populations. The size of amplified fragments ranged between 450 and 6000 bp. Pair-wise distance estimated the range of 0.03 to 0.59 between single and multigrain Aman rice varieties. Results illustrated the potential of RAPD markers to distinguish improved varieties and grain specificity at DNA level.