Paddy husk support and rice bran for the production of glucoamylase by Aspergillus niger

Aspergillus niger CFTRI 1105 was cultivated on solid medium for glucoamylase production. Glucoamylase activity obtained was 83.7 U g⁻¹ DFR (Dry Fermentation Residue) in a medium containing rice bran (100 g), corn flour (2 g), stock mineral solution (10 mL) and tap water (90 mL). When corn flour (2 g) in the medium was substituted with soya flour (2 g) no significant increase in glucoamylase was observed. The effects of soya flour, urea and peptone at the same elemental nitrogen concentration as with corn flour as carbon source on glucoamylase production were investigated. Supplementation with soya flour gave the highest glucoamylase activity (121 U g⁻¹ DFR) at 72 h and addition of paddy husk to a medium containing corn and soya flour altered the enzyme production from 121 U g⁻¹ DFR to 71.3 U g⁻¹ DFR. Addition of gingili oil and coconut oil to the medium caused no improvement in glucoamylase production.     

Comparison of Industrial Scale Ethanol Production from a Palmyrah‐Based Carbon Source by Commercial Yeast and a Mixed Culture from Palmyrah Toddy

Palmyrah (Borassus flabellifer) based products were used as an alternative carbon source for industrial scale ethanol production. The fermentation medium was enriched with spent wash obtained from a distillation column. The performance of a commercially available baker's yeast in the media was compared with a ‘palmyrah toddy mixed culture’ where the organisms were obtained from the sedimentation of palmyrah toddy. In a laboratory scale study, the ethanol produced from a palmyrah fruit pulp extract, diluted with distilled water, was 16.5 gL^?1 (36 h) and 13.0 gL^?1 (48 h) with ‘palmyrah toddy mixed culture’ and baker's yeast respectively. The ‘palmyrah toddy mixed culture’ performed better than the baker's yeast with palmyrah fruit pulp extract, diluted either with distilled water or spent wash. Among the different palmyrah based carbon sources, both cultures preferred molasses diluted with spent wash and both performed best in the medium containing the spent wash supplemented with sucrose. In a 5,000 L industrial scale fermentation of 20° Brix molasses supplemented with 10 gL^?1 ammonium sulphate, 72 gL^?1 and 65 gL^?1 ethanol was produced by the ‘palmyrah toddy mixed culture’ (72 h) and the baker's yeast (90 h) respectively. As the performance of the ‘palmyrah toddy mixed culture’ was better than that of the baker's yeast, the former was selected for the industrial scale studies of molasses fermentation media diluted with spent wash. In these studies the temperature reached 42°C by 36 h and resultant cell death was observed. However ethanol production was higher and more rapid in the molasses diluted with spent wash, rather than in the molasses diluted with tap water and supplemented with (NH₄)₂SO₄. Cell recycle operation obviated the interruption in fermentation caused by temperature induced cell death and increased rates and efficiency of ethanol production were observed.     

Cabs, male drivers and midnight commuting: manufacturing respectability of the unmarried women agents of call centers in India

The present paper discusses the role of cabs and the presence of other men in the cab in manufacturing respectability for the unmarried women agents of call centers in India. The night shift, an intrinsic part of work, at call centers in India demands mobility and access to public space during nights for its women employees. The paper elaborates how the relation between gender and space is evolving in the backdrop of the presence of someone trusted, through a shift from private patriarchy to public patriarchy for the women agents while accessing the public space. The paper is based on a total of sixty-one qualitative interviews conducted with unmarried women call center employees and parents based in Gurgaon, India.     

Palmyrah Distillery Spent Wash for Ethanol Production by a Thermotolerant Saccharomyces cerevisiae S1 at 40°C

Palmyrah distillery spent wash was used as an alternative to the predefined PYN medium (peptone, yeast extract, magnesium sulphate, potassium hydrogen phosphate and ammonium sulphate). In this study, the focus was on the utilization of spent wash from Sri Lankan palmyrah based distilleries to reduce the biological oxygen demand (BOD). To utilise the spent wash, it was supplemented with glucose and different nitrogen sources. Replacing PYN medium with spent wash and the increase in the glucose concentration led to a decrease in ethanol production. Hydrolysis of spent wash with a commercial protease (Neutrase) and supplementation with 200 gL^?1 glucose produced 73.4 gL^?1 ethanol. Among the different nitrogen sources supplemented 4.6 gL^?1 (NH₄)₂SO₄ increased ethanol production to 92.5 gL^?1 indicating that the spent wash could be economically used to produce ethanol, while decreasing the BOD from 25,000 to 4,000 mgL^?1.     

Effect of pH on Preparation and Performance of Physically Immobilized Amyloglucosidase on DEAE-Cellulose

This study was to optimize the pH for immobilization as well as for repeated saccharification of dextrinized starch by physically immobilized amyloglucosidase on DEAE-cellulose. Immobilization activity yield for physical immobilization of amyloglucosidase on DEAE-cellulose was high at neutral pH values. Activity of immobilized amyloglucosidase increased as pH decreased and was high at pH 4.0 under our experimental conditions. However, for the repeated batchwise saccharification of dextrinized starch, pH 4.5 was optimal as both degree of saccharification (85%) and enzyme retentivity(72%) of immobilized enzyme were high at the end of third cycle.     

Mattering Matters: Agency,Empowerment, and Mobile Phone Use by Female Microentrepreneurs

This article attempts to enrich our understanding of the role that mobile phones play in the empowerment of women in the developing world. We adapt and explicate an innovative social psychological concept, “mattering,” embed it in the literature that examines the impact of mobile phones on social development outcomes, and consider the utility of mattering for the ICT4D community. Mattering is the perception that others are aware of, interested in, and depend on us. Based on a sample of 335 female microentrepreneurs in Chennai, India, we created a valid and reliable measure of mattering and its three dimensions. Mattering was predicted by (1) entrepreneurial expectations, an element of an individual's mindset; (2) social use of mobile phones; and (3) the perceived benefits of mobile phones for maintaining business networks. Findings suggest that mobile phone use plays a significant role in contributing to female entrepreneurs' perception that they matter.     

Bridging ICTD research and policy-making: notes from a systematic review on MSMEs in the low- and middle-income countries

There is criticism that information and communication technology and development research community contributes less to policy-making. The present article shares an attempt to fill this gap. Systematic review is a structured way to collate, review, summarize, and use the published research for policy-making. A systematic review on the impact of information and communication technologies on the growth of urban micro, small, and medium enterprises in the low- and middle-income countries indicates a tiny impact and a lack of rigorous causal studies in this focus area. Quantitative meta-analysis did not find statistical significance for the impact. From an initial result of 24,000 plus hits, a set of 10 research studies were finalized for data extraction and analysis. The article suggests areas for future research and calls for rigorous research and reporting.     

Two-Steps Procedure for the Purification of Corn Flour Hydrolysate

When corn flour hydrolysate filtrate (CFHF) was treated with 100% (w/v) (NH₄)₂SO₄ for purification, 80.5% of the protein was removed. Among the pH values studied, at pH 1.5, 90.2% of the total protein was precipitated from CFHF and supernatant was removed by decantation. The corn flour hydrolysate was purified with Amberlite and DEAE-cellulose after precipitating the protein at pH 1.5. Charcoal was better than cation- and anion- exchange resins for the removal of proteins, amino acids and pigments from the hydrolysate.     

Detection of Spammers in Twitter marketing: A Hybrid Approach Using Social Media Analytics and Bio Inspired Computing

Customer engagement is drastically improved through Web 2.0 technologies, especially social media platforms like Twitter. These platforms are often used by organizations for marketing, of which creation of numerous spam profiles for content promotion is common. The present paper proposes a hybrid approach for identifying the spam profiles by combining social media analytics and bio inspired computing. It adopts a modified K-Means integrated Levy flight Firefly Algorithm (LFA) with chaotic maps as an extension to Firefly Algorithm (FA) for spam detection in Twitter marketing. A total of 18,44,701 tweets have been analyzed from 14,235 Twitter profiles on 13 statistically significant factors derived from social media analytics. A Fuzzy C-Means Clustering approach is further used to identify the overlapping users in two clusters of spammers and non-spammers. Six variants of K-Means integrated FA including chaotic maps and levy flights are tested. The findings indicate that FA with chaos for tuning attractiveness coefficient using Gauss Map converges to a working solution the fastest. Further, LFA with chaos for tuning the absorption coefficient using sinusoidal map outperforms the rest of the approaches in terms of accuracy.     

Large Scale Preparation of Crystalline Glucose from Raw Starch in Corn Flour

Starch in considerable amount is lost during its purification from raw materials. Further, purification costs energy and time. To avoid these, starch in corn flour was hydrolyzed by the synergistic action of α-amylase and glucoamylase while avoiding high temperature gelatinization and liquefaction processes. When 1600 g (16%, W/W suspension) and 4000 g (40%, WW suspension) corn flour was hydrolyzed and purified, 76.0% and 50.2% glucose yields were obtained. The residues obtained were rich in protein and minerals.