Crop performance and soil fertility improvement using organic fertilizer produced from valorization of Carica papaya fruit peel.

In recent times, research attention is focusing on harnessing agricultural wastes for the production of value-added products. In this study, the valorization of Carica papaya (Pawpaw) fruit peels was evaluated for the production of quality organic fertilizer via anaerobic digestion (AD) while the effects of the fertilizer on maize crop were also assessed. Pawpaw peel was first pretreated by thermo-alkaline methods before AD and analyses were carried out using standard methods. The resulting digestate was rich in nutrients and was dewatered to form solid organic fertilizer rich in microbes and soil nutrients. When applied to maize plants, organic fertilizer showed a better effect on plant traits than NPK 15-15-15 fertilizer and without fertilizer application. These were more pronounced at mid to high organic fertilizer applications (30-to-60-kg nitrogen/hectare (kg N/ha)) rate. Comparison between the values obtained from the field experiments reveals that the organic fertilizer showed better performance in all parameters such as the number of leaves, leaf area, plant height, stem girth, total shoot, and root biomass, and length of the root. However, the chemical fertilizer outperformed all the organic fertilizer applied rates in the average highest size of the corn ear by 1.4%. After harvesting, nutrient elements were found to have bioaccumulated in plant organs (leaves, stem, and root) with the highest values being 29.7 mg/L for nitrogen in the leaf and this value was reported from the experiment with 50 kg N/ha. For phosphorus and potassium, the highest concentrations of 7.05 and 8.4 mg/L were recorded in the plant' stem of the experiment with 50 kg N/ha. All the treated soils recorded an increase in values of all nutrient elements over the control with the highest values recorded in the experiment with 60 kg N/ha. In soil with 60 kg N/ha, the nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium increased by 28, 40, and 22% respectively over the chemical fertilizer applied experiment while different levels of increases were also recorded for all other macro and microelements in all the experiments. Thus, agricultural practices by using anaerobic digestates as organic fertilizers is a sustainable method to overcome the dependence on inorganic fertilizers high rate.

The regulation of adipose tissue pyruvate dehydrogenase activity of dietary fiber.

In vitro studies have established that insulin enhances the oxidation of pyruvate to acetyl CoA by the stimulation of mitochondrial pyruvate dehydrogenase (PDH) activity through plasma membrane binding response (Jarett and Seals 1979; Kiechle, Jarett, Dennis and Kotagal 1980). In the present study adipose tissue PDH activity was utilized as a marker for insulin responsiveness. The metabolic response of this enzyme to exogenous insulin was employed to test the hypothesis that dietary fiber enhances tissue responsiveness to insulin using adipose tissue from male weanling Sprague Dawley rats. Eight groups of rats (n = 5 per group) were fed ad libitum various diets containing different levels of cellulose and protein as already reported elsewhere (Ogunwole, Knight, Adkins, Thomaskutty and Pointer 1985). Percent insulin stimulation of PDH from basal activity (PDS) was utilized as an index of insulin responsiveness. Compared to all fiber treated groups, both basal (PDB) and insulin stimulated (PDI) activities were significantly lower (P less than 0.05) in the fiber free groups at both low (10%) and high (20%) protein levels. At all fiber levels tested (0, 5, 15 and 30%) protein intake resulted in a significant increase in both PDB and PDI. Gradual increase in cellulose intake resulted in a biphasic increase in PDS in both protein groups at the 5% and 30% fiber levels. PDS was higher (P less than 0.05) in the 10% protein groups than the 20% protein group at all fiber levels tested. A significant interaction effect of protein and fiber was observed on PDB (P less than 0.001) and PDI (P less than 0.04) when caloric intake was held constant as a covariate.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Rat erythrocyte insulin receptors: radioreceptor assay and characterization.

Highly specific insulin receptors have been identified on the rat erythrocyte. A radioreceptor assay for the evaluation of these receptors has been developed, and the characteristics of these receptors have been investigated. Insulin receptor binding on the rat erythrocytes was found to be dependent on pH, temperature, time, and ionic strength. When incubated for 3½ hours at 15° C, 5.0 × 10(9) erythrocytes/mL from each of 10 rats were found to bind specifically 7.54 percent (±0.15 SEM) of 40 pg of (125)I-insulin. Specific binding was found to be a function of cell concentration. The pH optima for insulin binding were found to be 7.4 and 7.0 in the absence of cations. The presence of cations not only shifted pH optimum to 7.4 from 7.0, but also increased specific insulin binding.These observations suggest the stabilization of negatively charged groups on ligand and receptor, as well as providing a suitable ionic environment for the hormone-receptor interaction. Based on the resistance of rat erythrocytes to the pH of the external buffer, a simple method for determining the internal pH of rat red- blood cells is described. Scatchard analyses of insulin-binding data yielded curvilinear plots, and the number of receptor sites per cell was found to be 762 (±12.1 SD), as opposed to the large variation (410 ± 260 SD) in normal humans. The rat erythrocytes may serve as a useful, precise, sensitive, and efficient model system for future erythrocytic-receptor studies that would be difficult to obtain from human subjects.