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This is a conventional kind of monitoring study. The objective of the study was to assess and monitor the physicochemical parameters in wastewater at inlet and outlet of sewage treatment plant (STP) and also to study the effectiveness of the STPs. The average concentration of parameters at inlet sampling site pH, electrical conductivity, total dissolved solids, are 7.16, 2,169 lS/cm, 766.06 mg/l, and major ions bicarbonate, nitrate, sulphate, phosphate, chloride, sodium, potassium, magnesium and calcium values 515. 88, 4.28, 82.85, 15.17, 7.01, 23.08, 29.34, 4.14 and 84.31 mg/l. While the average concentration of these parameters, after treatment shows following values 7.47, 2,161.43 (lS/cm), 695.81, 436.52, 1.25, 99.22, 12.69, 6.83, 23.18, 29.07, 4.40 and 82.65 mg/l, respectively. Further, to check the Na % and sodium absorption ratio at inlet and outlet which 27.89 %, 0.67 and 28.19 %, 0.68, respectively, for the suitability of the wastewater. Finally, the agglomerative hierarchical clustering techniques were used to study the similarity in the sewage treatment plants. The result suggests that there is considerable improvement in the wastewater quality after treatment except at the Pappankalan and Coronation Pillar, Timarpur.

Thermostable hemicellulases have potential to improve the quality of products of various industries including pulp and paper, food and feed, textile, etc. This study was aimed to isolate, screen, and identify potential xylanase and mannanase producers from heated environments. Sixty-eight thermophilic and thermotolerant fungi were isolated from various self-heated habitats based on their ability to grow at 45°C. With the aid of cultural and morphological observations, the fungi were identified and grouped into 19 fungal species. The enzyme production was evaluated by cultivating isolated fungi in submerged fermentation using wheat bran as carbon source. Screening of these isolates for hydrolysis of xylan and mannan was confirmed by Congo red plate assay method followed by assessment of xylanase and mannanase activity. Based on experimental analysis, we have found that all the isolates have exhibited xylanase activity, whereas only 22 isolates have found positive for mannanase activity. The highest xylanase and mannanase production was obtained by the cultivation of Malbranchea cinnamomea NFCCI 3724 (242 and 27 nkat/ml) followed by Melanocarpus albomyces (195 and 24 nkat/ml), Aspergillus terreus (165 and 21 nkat/ml), and Myceliophthora thermophila NFCCI 3725 (130 and 18 nkat/ml), respectively.

The main objective of this paper was to evaluate characteristics of plant community and the present status of soil in natural forest, home garden as well as agroforestry and shifting cultivation. We adopted a very well defined standard methodology for assessing various properties of soil. Plant community attributes were determined for different land use systems. The results showed that the importance value index (IVI) was the highest for natural forest, and then for agroforestry system, home garden while shifting cultivation indicated the least value of IVI. The study clearly shows that soil pH, organic matter content, total nitrogen, calcium, magnesium, and phosphorous under the conditions of the land use systems observed differ significantly from those in natural forest. The changes of topsoil properties and plant characteristics are very distinctive in shifting cultivation (jhuming system, i.e. slash-and-burning farming practice in hilly areas). Thus, the results obtained indicate that once natural forest has been removed, the soilvegetation system is disrupted significantly. The results of this study reveal that shifting cultivation system has negative impact on environment in the region. Furthermore, the land use study carried out based on remote sensing showed that the area of settlement over natural forest has been increasing for last three decades, which results in many environmental problems such as loss of biodiversity, water and soil as well as air pollution.

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The results obtained from this work strongly indicate that the solid state fermentation (SSF) system using the palm kernel cake (PKC) as a substrate is an economical method for the production of β-mannanase at extremely low operational cost based on the fact that PKC is one of the cheap and abundant agro-waste by-products of the palm oil industry. Under initial conditions, i.e. 2 mm particle size of PKC, the moisture ratio of 1:1 of PKC:moistening agent and pH 7, Malbranchea cinnamomea NFCCI 3724 produced 109 U/gram distribution of the substrate (gds). The production of β-mannanase was optimised by the statistical approach response surface methodology (RSM) using independent variables, namely initial moisture (12.5), pH (9.0) and solka floc (100 mg). Noticeably, six fold enhancement of β-mannanase production (599 U/gds) was obtained under statistically optimised conditions. HPLC results revealed that β-mannanase is an endo-active enzyme that generated manno-oligosaccharides with a degree of polymerisation (DP) of 3 and 4. Semi-native PAGE analysis revealed that M. cinnamomea produced three isoforms of mannanase. Selective production of oligosaccharide makes M. cinnamomea β-mannanase an attractive enzyme for use in food and nutraceutical industries.

Eighty‐eight fungi isolated from soil and decaying organic matter were screened for mannanolytic activity. Twenty‐eight fungi produced extracellular mannanase on locust bean gum as evidenced by zone of hydrolysis produced on mannan agar gel. Six prominent producers, including four Fusarium species namely Fusarium fusarioides NFCCI 3282, Fusarium solani NFCCI 3283, Fusarium equiseti NFCCI 3284, Fusarium moniliforme NFCCI 3287 with Cladosporium cladosporioides NFCCI 3285 and Acrophialophora levis NFCCI 3286 produced the β‐mannanase in the range of 84–140 nkat/mL. All these grew well on particulate substrates in solid‐state fermentation (SSF), producing relatively higher titers on mannan‐rich palm kernel cake (PKC) and copra meal. Two high yielding strains, F. equiseti (1747 nkat/gds) and A. levis (897 nkat/gds) were selected for statistical optimization of mannanase on PKC. Interaction of two critical solid state fermentation parameters, pH and moisture on mannanase production by these two molds was studied by response surface method. Optimized production on PKC resulted in three‐ to fourfold enhancement in enzyme yield was observed in case of F. equiseti (5945 nkat/gds) and A. levis (4726 nkat/gds). HPLC analysis of mannan hydrolysate indicated that F. equiseti and A. levis mannanase performed efficient hydrolysis of konjac gum (up to 99%) with exclusive mannooligosaccahride (DP of 4) production. A seminative SDS‐PAGE revealed that A. levis and F. solani produced three isoforms, F. moniliforme produced two isoforms while F. fusarioides, F. equiseti, and C. cladosporioides produced a single enzyme.

The aim was to investigate the role of seasonal changes of physico-chemical parameters in forest soil of Doon Valley of Uttarakhand, India. The samples were collected from four different environmental conditions viz. urbanized area, industrial area, urbanization with dense forest area, and wetland area during summer, monsoon, and winter seasons from two different depths of 0-15 cm and 15-30 cm, respectively. The soil parameters were analyzed such as pH, total nitrogen, total phosphorous, total hydrogen, total carbon, organic carbon, inorganic carbon, exchangeable cations such as sodium, potassium, calcium, and magnesium. The result revealed that site-I and IV of both depths were found to be of good quality due to less human interference, low urbanization effect, and covered by the forest area whereas site-II and III were confirmed of poor quality. Pearson's correlation coefficient analysis suggest soils at both depths has following relation: total carbon and nitrogen (r = 0.90), magnesium and potassium (r = 0.74), Ca with N, P, C, OC, Na, K, Mg, organic carbon and total phosphorous (r = 0.85), organic carbon and nitrogen (r = 0.91). Hence, the soil fertility is good and very important for plant growth and development in agriculture process for sustainable development.