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JournalISSN: 0379-7791

Mesopotamia Journal of Agriculture 

University of Mosul
About: Mesopotamia Journal of Agriculture is an academic journal published by University of Mosul. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Awassi & Yield (engineering). It has an ISSN identifier of 0379-7791. Over the lifetime, 440 publications have been published receiving 889 citations.


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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Two field experiments were carried out during the 2009-2010 growing season at the station of Directorate of Agricultural Researches/Erbil under dry farming conditions, showing high genetic variation, heritability and genetic advance for plant height, number of spikes, 1000 grain weight, biological yield and grain yield in durum wheat.
Abstract: Two field experiments were carried out during the 2009-2010 growing season at the station of Directorate of Agricultural Researches/Erbil under dry farming conditions. The first experiment included 25 strains of durum wheat, and the second included 20 strains of bread wheat. Growth trait, yield and its components were studied, and then data are entered in the statistical genetic analysis, as well as the path coefficient analysis. The results showed high genetic variation, heritability and genetic advance for plant height, number of spikes, 1000 grain weight, biological yield and grain yield in durum wheat. While it was high in all traits in bread wheat. The grain yield was correlated genetically positive and significantly with 1000 grain weight, biological yield and harvest index in durum wheat, while showed genetically positive and significant correlation with all traits in bread wheat. The path coefficient analysis revealed that harvest index and biological yield had the maximum positive direct effects on grain yield in durum wheat reached 0.966 and 0.242, respectively. While the harvest index had the maximum positive direct effect (1.417) on grain yield in bread wheat, which was used as a criterion for the selection of superior genotypes in each group. INTRODUCTION The grain yield is a complex traits which is influenced by many factors, would be plant breeders interested to know the nature of the relationship and the kind between these traits, especially under dry farming conditions, where the water is the main limiting factor in many areas of wheat production around the world due to uneven rainfall distribution during the growing season, so it is important that characterized cultivars cultivated in these areas in the superior performance of grain yield and its components under the limited and non-limited of moisture conditions (Okuyama et al., 2004). Grain yield is the result of many developmental and physiological events that occur during the life cycle of the plant, and grain yield is determined by three main components; the number of spikes/plant, number of grain/spike and weight of grains (Poehlman, 1987). Hochman (1982) and McMaster et al. (1984) referred that the influence of each one of these components on the product of grain depends on the stage of growth that occurs due to water deficit. At elongation stage, the inadequate availability of water or rain affect on the components of grain yield by increasing the number of spikes/plant, grains/spike, and weight of grains/plant, while leading to increased weight of grains during the grain filling stage (McMaster et al.,1984). Simane et al. (1993) reported high correlation between the number of grains/spike and grain yield along the span of Recived 15/3/2011 accepted 10 / 10 /2011. Vol. ( 40 ) No.( 4 )2012 ISSN: 2224-9796 (Online) Mesoptamia J. of Agri ISSN: 1815 – 316 X (Print) 28 water stress.The wheat plants are more sensitive to water stress between the two phases (booting stage) and (grain filling) as compared to all other periods (Fisher et al., 1977 and Hochman, 1982). On the other hand, avoiding of wheat plants to water stress during the tillering and elongation stages is more important than the flowering and grain filling stages (Thompson and Chase, 1992). The breeding program for higher yield depends on the estimation of genetic variability, heritability, genetic advance and the correlations between yield and its components, but it is not sufficient to understand the importance of each one of these components in determining the grain yield (Dewey and Lu, 1959). Path analysis is a standarized partial regression coefficient that measures the direct influence of one variable upon another, it also provides a means of partitioning both direct and indirect effects and effectively measuring the relative importance of causal factors, which, helps to build an effectively selection program. Using this method (Kumar and Hunshal, 1998) observed that the harvest index, biomass yield, spikes/plant and grains/spike had most important direct effects on the grain yield. Under the water deficit conditions, but a long period of grain filling Simane et al.(1998) found high correlation between drought tolerance and spikes/m 2 and grains/spike. Yagdi (2009) found that the 1000 grain weight have high direct effect on grain yield. This research aims to estimates heritability, genetic variation and genetic correlation between different quantitative traits in a number of strains selected from durum and bread wheat, and then to identify the most important traits of a direct effect on the grain yield to be adopted as a criterion for selection. MATEREALS AND METHODES Two field experiments were carried out separated during the season 20092010 at the research station of the Directorate of Agricultural Research in the area of Ainkawa in Erbil/Kurdistan region of Iraq under the circumstances amounted to rain (315 mm) with good distribution depend on meteorological in the search site. The first experiment included 25 advanced strains of durum wheat (Triticum durum Desf.), and second included 20 advanced strains of bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) (Table, 1) was originally selected (on the basis of phenotypic characteristics and grain yield in the nursery of the observations had been planted during the season 2008-2009) of 57 and 67 advanced strain of two types, respectively. Each experiment was carried out according to randomized complete block design with three replicates and each experimental unit included a one row of each one of genotype. The grains were dibbled in rows (using 120 kg/ha seeding rate) keeping between row distances at 20 cm. Single row of 2.5 m length served as an experimental unit. Conducted service operations of soil and crop, and when plants reached the flowering stage, were recorded the flag leaf area of mother shoot according to formula (leaf length × width × 0.95) (Thomas, 1975), and at maturity data were recorded for plant height (cm), then harvested plants of each line as a whole to calculate biomass yield (t/ha), grain yield (t/ha), harvest index, spike Genetic statistical analysis for all the traits studied were computed, then the estimates of genetic variation, heritability and coefficints of genetic correlation between traits were done by the components of expected mean squares from Vol. ( 40 ) No.( 4 )2012 ISSN: 2224-9796 (Online) Mesoptamia J. of Agri ISSN: 1815 – 316 X (Print) 29 Table (1): Pedigree of durum and bread wheat strains used in the study. length (cm) and the components of grain yield [number of spikes/m 2 , number of grains/spike and 1000 grain weight (g)]. Durum wheat No. I g crop pop type Selection 1 114239 ICDW UM ICD86-0471-ABL-0TR-8AP-0TR-20AP-0TR 2 114251 ICDW UM ICD85-1340-ABL-6AP-0TR 3 114262 ICDW UM ICD85-0641-ABL-6AP-0TR-2AP-0TR-4AP-0TR 4 114293 ICDW UM ICD84-0322-7AP-TR-20AP-0TR 5 114300 ICDW UM ICD83-0050-4AP-14AP-TR-3AP-0TR 6 114322 ICDW UM ICD78-0064-19AP-4AP-1AP-1AP-1AP-0SH 7 114326 ICDW UM ICD-BM-ABL-413-0AP 8 114347 ICDW UM CD 523-3Y-1Y-2M-0Y 9 114385 ICDW UM 12938-5L-1AP-1AP-4AP-0AP 1

35 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Results indicated that, application of amino green compound as a foliar spray at a rate of 4 ml/L gave the maximum number of head lettuce leaves compared with other treatments.
Abstract: Two field experiments were conducted during the two successive winter seasons of 2004/2005 and 2005/2006 at Berkash cv. Lymor (9283) to foliar spray by dry yeast at a rate of ( 2 and 4 g/L), amino green compound at a rate of (2 and 4 ml/L) and humic acid at a rate of (2 and 4 ml/L) on growth, yield and s\"Giza Governorate\" to investigate the response of head lettuce plants ome chemical contents of head lettuce plants.The results indicated that, application of amino green compound as a foliar spray at a rate of 4 ml/L gave the maximum number of head lettuce leaves compared with other treatments. In addition, the highest values of leaf dry weight, head fresh weight, total yield of heads and quality ( ascorbic acid and T.S.S ) were obtained by foliar application of 4 g/L dry yeast.The lowest amount of N-NO3 in leaves of head lettuce was recorded by using humic acid as a foliar spray at a rate of 4 ml/L. On the other hand, the highest amount of N-NO3 was recorded when amino green compound was used as a foliar spray at a rate of 4 gm/L. The highest content of N and P as well as Fe, Mn and Zn were recorded by foliar spray of dry yeast at a rate of 4 ml/L. Meanwhile, the highest amount of K given when humic acid was sprayed at a rate of 4 ml/L. INTRODUCTION Head lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) is the world's most used salad crop. It is one of the important leafy vegetable crops which are eaten fresh and is a major and extensively grown cool season vegetable best adopted to temperate locations (Rubatzky and Tamaguchi, 1997). Dry yeast is a natural bio-substance suggested to be of useful stimulatory, nutritional and protective functions when it is applied on to vegetable plants during stress conditions due to its content of hormones, sugars, amino and nucleic acids, vitamins and minerals. Thereby, it can be induce thermatolerance due to its role in the synthesis of protein and nucleic acids and in minimizing their degradation (Natio et a.l, 1981). Many investigations cleared out that, application of dry yeast as a foliar spray was found to increase growth, yield and quality of some vegetable crops. (Abdel Aziz 1997, Fathy and Farid 2000 on some vegetable crops, Abou El–Nasr et a.l, 2001 on squash, Fathy et al 2002 and Khedr and Farid 2002 on tomato plants, Tarek 2003 and Mona et al, 2005 on cucumber plant). Amino green compound contains (w/v) told organic acids plus amino acids 15% and some microelements such as iron, zinc and manganese. Micronutrients in yeast and amino green compound play a very important role in vital processes of plants. They improve photosynthesis which intensifies the assimilating activity of the whole plants (Marschner, 1995). Zinc in plants is involved in enzymatic relations. One of the most important functions of zinc shows that starch synthesis is widely interrupted at zinc deficiency. It was also added that zinc plays also an important role in protein synthesis from amino acids and in decarboxlation of pyruvate. Concerning iron, Derar et al., 1996 observed that using Received 19/9/2010 accepted 4/10/2010 Mesopotamia J. of Agric. (ISSN 1815 – 316X) Vol. (38) No. (Supplement 1) 2010 some materials containing Fe as a foliar spray significantly increased growth and yield of beans. Humic acid is particularly used to decrease the negative effects of chemical fertilizers and could have beneficial effect on the nutrition of the plant (Martinez et al., 1983). The commercial humic acids were found to improve growth, yield production, quality and increased significantly in the accumulation of P,K, Ca, Mg, Fe, Zn and Mn in tissues of some vegetable crops (David et al 1994, Padem and Ocal 1999 and Erik et al., 2000).This work was carried out to study the effect of dry yeast, amino green compound and humic acid as a foliar spray on the growth, yield and chemical contents of head lettuce plants. MATERIALS AND METHODS The present investigation was carried out during the two successive seasons of 2004/2005 and 2005/2006 at Berkash Giza Governorate, to study the effect of 7 treatmentsas a foliar application .i.e., dry yeast, amino green compound and humic acid at two rates for eash compared with the control (spray with water only) on growth, yield and chemical content of lettuce plants. Seeds of head lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) cv. Lymar (9283) were drilled in foam trays of 209 holes in a media consisting of peatmoss and vermiculite 1:1. Trays were wetted and warmed under plastic sheet for three days, then kept under plastic tunnel. Normal nursery treatments were followed till seedlings become suitable for transplanting. The time of transplanting took place 15 and 19 th of November in both seasons, respectively. The seeds of head lettuce was cultivated in Mid. September in the two seasons of study. The experiment included seven treatments as follows: 1Foliar spray with water (control). 2Foliar spray with amino green compound at a rate of 2 ml/L.( Amino 1) 3Foliar spray with amino green compound at a rate of 4 ml/L.( Amino 2) . 4Foliar spray with dry yeast at a rate of 2 g/L.( Yeast 1). 5Foliar spray with dry yeast at a rate of 4 g/L. ( Yeast 2) 6Foliar spray with humic acid compound at a rate of 2 ml/L. (Humic 1) 7Foliar spray with humic acid compound at a rate of 4 ml/L. (Humic 2) Plants were sprayed with dry yeast, amino green compound and humic acid solution at 4 and 6 weeks after transplanting. Pest control and other agriculture practices, such as cultivation and irrigation, etc. were applied wherever it was necessary and as commonly recommended in the commercial head lettuce production. Harvesting was carried out 85 and 91 days after transplanting in the first and second seasons, respectively.With regard to the chemical analysis of the dry yeast, N.R.P 1977 stated that, the analysis of dry yeast was protein (47.2%), arginine (2.6%), glycin (2.6%), histidin (1.4%), islysine (2.9%), lauicine (3.5%), Lysine (3.8%), methionine systine (0.6%), phnyl-alanine (3%), tyrosine (2.1%), threonine (2.6%), tryptophan (0.5%) and vitamin B (2.9%). Goyal and Khuller (1992), Yatskovskaya et al (1992), Murakami et al (1996) Ahmed et al (1997) and Khedr and Farid (2002) reported that, yeast preparation contained carbohydrates, sugars, proteins, fatty acids, amino acids, hormones, macro and micro elements in suitable balance. Amino green compound contains (w/v) total organic acids plus amino acids 15%, iron (Fe) 2.9%, zinc (Zn) 1.4% and manganese (Mn) 0.7%, free amino acids, proline, hydroxy proline, glycine, alanine, valine, methionine, Mesopotamia J. of Agric. (ISSN 1815 – 316X) Vol. (38) No. (Supplement 1) 2010 escaliosin, lysine, cycteine, phenylalanine, serine, glutamic, arginine, histidine, lysine and hystiden.Humic acid compound contains humic acid 25.0 g/L, Folic acid 0.7 g/L, nitrogen 4.0 g/L, phosphorus 0.6 g/L and potassium 8.0 g/L. This compound from theorem will be reformed to as \"humic acid\" . The experiment was arranged in a complete randomized block design in four replicates. Six plants of each plot were chosen randomaly at 75 days after transplanting and the following data were recorded. AVegetative growth: 1Number of leaves/ plant. 2Dry weight of leaves/ plant (g). BYield: 1Average head weight (g) 2Total yield (Ton/fed.) CChemical content: Samples of heads were taken at harvesting time. Ascorbic acid (vitamin C mg/100) and Total soluble solids (T.S.S) were determined according to A.O.A.C (1984). Nitrate-N content in the fresh head lettuce leaves was determined using the method of Wooley et al., (1960). Samples of leaves were oven dried at 70°C then fine grounded and wet digested. Total nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium concentration in the tissues of plant leaves were determined according to the methods described by Jackson (1958) Troug and Mayer (1939) and Brown and Lilleland (1946), respectively. Some micro-elements, i.e. Fe, Zn and Mn were determined using Atomic Spectrophotometer (Phillips) according to Chapman and Pratt (1961). Data obtained were subjected to the statistical analysis according to the method of Gomez and Gomez (1984). RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Data in Table (1) show clearly that, using dry yeast, amino green and humic acid as a foliar spray on head lettuce plants increased vegetative growth characters compared with the control treatment except for dry weight of leaves in the second season of the study. The highest number of leaves was recorded by using 4 ml/L amino green in the two seasons. On the contrary, the lowest number of leaves was found in case of the control treatment. These findings were true in both seasons. These results may be due to the physiological roles of amino acids in the amino green which increased the metabolic processes rate, and in the same time it is cells that each micronutrient in the amino green compound has a role in improving plant growth. Zn directly involved in the synthesis of the in dole acetic acid (IAA). Mn is directly involved in the catalytic rates in plants being the enzyme activator on some respiratory enzymes and in reaction of nitrogen metabolism and photosynthesis (Marschner 1995). These results may be attributed to the effect of yeast extract in increasing levels of endogenous hormones in treated plants which could be interpreted by cell division and cell elongation (Khedr and Farid، 2002). In addition, these results may be due to the physiological roles of vitamins and amino acids in the yeast extract which increased the metabolic processes role and levels of indogenous hormones, i.e. IAA and GA3 (Chailakhyan، 1957). Mesopotamia J. of Agric. (ISSN 1815 – 316X) Vol. (38) No. (Supplement 1) 2010 Table(1): Effect of foliar spray of amino green, yeast and humic acid on leaf number and leaves dry weight of head lettuce plants in 2004-2005 and 2005-2006 seasons. 2005-2006 2004-2005 Treatments Leaves dry weight (g) Leaves Number Leaves dry weight (g) Leaves Number 21.83 33.02 14.73 36.30 Control 16.02 43.30 16.49 38.60 Amino 1 20.80 49.00 16.25 43.40 Amin

22 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A positive significant effect of humic acid and seaweed extracts and their interactions on all yield quantitative characters was appeared and the plants which got a humic Acid and sprayed with mixture of Alga 600 and sea force 2 gave the highest values of vegetative characters as compared with lowest values of control plants.
Abstract: This study was conducted in College of Agriculture Farms/University of Duhok. At the spring season 2009 on potato plants CV. Desiree. RCBD Design with two factors was applied to study the effect of Humic acid and two seaweed extracts Alga 600 and sea force 2 on potato plants. Humic acid and seaweed extracts treatments caused a significant increase in all vegetative growth and yield characteristics of potato CV desiree. The interaction between treatments also caused a significant effect and the plants which got a humic acid and sprayed with mixture of Alga 600 and sea force 2 gave the highest values of vegetative characters as compared with lowest values of control plants. Also the results appeared a positive significant effect of humic acid and seaweed extracts and their interactions on all yield quantitative characters.

21 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors used transglutaminase to enhance the cross-linking reaction among milk proteins and found that the most suitable way of adding the enzyme was after coagulation and curd cutting.
Abstract: Microbial transglutaminase (MTGase) was isolated from the bacteria Streptoverticillium mobaraense and used to improve the yield and properties of soft cheese manufactured from cow milk by enhancing the cross-linking reaction among milk proteins. The enzyme was applied at different concentrations and at various addition times. Results indicated that the addition of the enzyme before rennet prevented milk coagulation while the simultaneous addition of MTGase and the rennet significantly decreased curd strength and cheese hardness and increased the loss of proteins and fat in the whey. It was found that the most suitable way of adding the enzyme was after coagulation and curd cutting. This treatment enhanced the cross-linking of whey proteins with the curd proteins which was proportional to the concentration of the added enzyme up to 60 enzyme units/liter. The crosslinking reaction was verified by SDS-PAG electrophoresis experiment which showed a high molecular weight band accompanied by a decrease in the density of αs-casein, β-casein and whey proteins bands. Transglutaminase affected the produced cheese composition noticeably by increasing protein content, total solids and decreasing the protein content of the whey. Sensory evaluation of the obtained product showed that the enzyme treated cheese was superior to the untreated cheese throughout all storage period (8 days). INTRODUCTION Cheese production is rising sharply and so is whey. Several billion pounds of fluid whey are produced annually as a by-product all around the world. It is not efficiently utilized and more than 80% of this whey ends up as pollutant. In conventional processes for cheese making, a considerable amount of protein is lost with the whey, as protein is a valuable component of milk and milk products. One of the efforts to reduce cost of cheese production has been to keep the whey proteins from being lost in the manufacturing process. Several methods have been proposed to recover whey proteins. They included the concentration or drying the whey proteins and adding it to the cheese curd, heat or pressure treatment of the milk, and concentration of the milk by ultrafiltration, evaporation or reverse osmosis (Ernstrom et al., 1980; Hinrichs, 2001; Kosikowski, 1977; Lo and Bastian, 1998; O’Reilly et al., 2001). Most of these methods are inefficient due to the lost of whey proteins during curd pressing stage. One of the most attractive methods of recovering whey proteins is the enzymatic treatment of milk or curd with transglutaminase which links whey proteins with curd proteins leading to a noticeable increase in protein and yield of the cheese accompanied by a decrease in whey protein content. This treatment has economical, nutritional and environmental importance. Part of Ph.D. Dissertation of the second author. Received 30/12/2008 Accepted 25/3/2009 Mesopotamia J. of Agric. (ISSN 1815-316X) Vol.(37) No.(4) 2009 Transglutaminase (Protein-glutamine : Amine γ-glutamyl transferase, EC: 2.3.2.13) catalyzes the acyl-transfer reaction between the γ-carboxamide group of peptide-bound glutamine residues and various primary amines, including the εamino group of protein lysine residues. The cross-links introduced by this enzyme change the protein structure and improve its functional properties, like texture, viscosity and water-holding capacity without decomposing the nutritional quality of the lysine residue (Seguro et al., 1996). The enzyme is found in almost all eukaryotic and prokaryotic organisms. It has been approved by food industry to improve quality of many foods such as meat, fish, soy products, yogurt, ice cream and cheese (Zhu et al., 1995; Motoki and Seguro, 1998; Kuraishi et al., 2001). Several factors may affect the efficiency of transglutaminase in stimulating the cross-linking of whey proteins with the curd proteins such as temperature, pH, concentration of the enzyme, heat pretreatment of the milk, availability of cofactors and the step in cheese manufacture at which the enzyme is added. The present work was aimed to investigate the effect of MTGase concentration and its addition time on the physical and sensory properties of the produced cheese as a function of storage time. MATERIALS AND METHODS Chemicals: N-carbo-benzoxy-L-glycine, L-glutamic acid γ-monohydroxamate and hydroxylamine were obtained from Sigma Chemical Co. Calf rennet was from Chr. Hansonsۥ Laboratories, Copenhagen. All other chemicals were reagent grade. Bacterial cultures: A lyophilized culture of Streptoverticillium mobaraense (DSM40847) was obtained from Deutsche Sammulung Von-Micro-Organismen Und Zelkulturen GmbH (DSMZ). The culture was maintained on slants of malt extract agar at 30 oC for 6 days and stored at 4 oC. The bacteria were transferred from the slants to 100 ml of the propagation medium used by Ando et al. (1989) and contained 0.5% glucose, 0.2% peptone, 0.2% K2HPO4 and 0.1% MgSO4 at pH 7 in 500 ml Erlenmeyer flasks. Propagation was conducted in a shaker incubator at 30 oC and 100 rpm for 2 days. The culture was then transferred to the enzyme production medium which was consisted of 2% starch, 2% peptone, 0.2% yeast extract, 0.2% K2HPO4, 0.1% MgSO4 and 0.05% glycerol. Incubation conditions were as described above. Enzyme isolation and precipitation: At the end of the incubation period (3 days), the culture was filtered through Whatman no.1 filter paper and the filtrate was cooled to 0 oC. The enzyme was precipitated from the filtrate by adding one volume of cold acetone (-15 oC) with gentle stirring. The precipitate was dissolved in Tris-acetate buffer (0.1 M, pH 6) and lyophilized. Determination of transglutaminase activity: The activity was measured by the colorimetric hydroxamate procedure with N-carbo-benzoxy-L-glycine as the substrate according to the method of Folk (1970). Reaction mixture containing 50μl of the enzyme, 350 μl of Tris-acetate buffer (0.1 M, pH 6), 25 μl of 2 M hydroxylamine and 75 μl of 0.1 M CBZ-L-GLN-GLY, was incubated at 37 oC for 10 minutes and then the reaction was stopped by adding 500 μl of 15% trichloroacetic acid (TCA) containing 5% FeCl3. The absorbance was measured at 525 nm using CECIL 3021 spectrophotometer. One unit of transglutaminase Mesopotamia J. of Agric. (ISSN 1815-316X) Vol.(37) No.(4) 2009 activity was defined as the amount of enzyme which causes the formation of one micromole of hydroxamic acid per min at 37 oC. A calibration curve was prepared using L-glutamic acid γ-monohydroxamate. Soft cheese manufacturing: Whole fresh cow milk (containing 3.7% fat, 3.38% protein and 12.44% total solids) was pasteurized at 72 oC for 15 seconds, cooled down to 35 oC then calcium chloride (0.3 gm/10 kg) and the rennet were added followed by incubation for 40-45 minutes for coagulation then the curd was cut and left for 5 minutes. The separated whey was drained out and the salt was added ( 3% of curd weight) with mixing for five minutes. The curd was then transferred into plastic molds and pressed (2 kg/cm) for two hours. The produced cheese was then stored at 4 oC. Treatment with MTGase: The enzyme with concentrations ranging from 12-72 unit/liter milk was incorporated into the cheese at three different stages of manufacturing. In the first treatment, MTGase was added to the milk and incubated at 35 oC for 30 minutes before adding the rennet. In the second treatment, the enzyme was added with the rennet at the same time. In the third treatment, the enzyme was added after coagulation and curd cutting using the same concentrations. Chemical analysis of milk and cheese: Fat content of milk was estimated using Gerber method according to British Standards Institution (1969). Milk protein was estimated by Micro Kjeldahl method according to AOAC (2000). Total solids were measured by a hydrometer (Quevenne). pH of cheese was measured using a pHmeter (WTW-530). Titratable acidity was estimated according to AOAC (2000). To detect the formation of cross-links, SDS-PAG electrophoresis was conducted for cheese and whey proteins by using vertical electrophoresis apparatus (Jookoh Co. LTD) following the procedure described by Laemmli (1970). Determination of curd tension and cheese hardness: A texture analyzer with TA7 plate-shaped probe was used for curd tension measurement while a TA16 conical-shape probe was used for the measurement of cheese hardness. The force required to penetrate 20 mm of the sample at a speed of 1 mm. sec was estimated. Sensory evaluation: Sensory evaluation of the produced cheese was carried out for flavor, texture, holes, consistency, color and bitterness after 1, 4, and 8 days of storage. Statistical analysis: The data were analyzed by using the Complete Random Design (CRD). Sensory evaluation data were analyzed by using Factorial Complete Random Design (FCRD) according to SAS (2001). RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Soft cheese was manufactured using TGase-treated and untreated milks. Three treatments of the enzyme addition with various concentrations were tested. Addition of MTGase prior or with the rennet addition: The addition of the enzyme to the milk prior to rennet addition caused the prevention of milk coagulation. The second treatment included the addition of MTGase to the milk with the rennet at the same time. This treatment caused a significant drop in the curd and cheese strength accompanied by a noticeable loss of protein and fat in the whey with all concentrations of the added enzyme (Table 1). The curd strength is considered as an important parameter in the cheese manufacture process due to its Mesopotamia J. of Agric. (ISSN 1815-316X) Vol.(37) No.(4) 2009 direct effect on cheese properties. Weak curd always produces cheese with low quality and yield due to the loss of noticeable amounts of protein and fat in the

21 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The results showed that spraying bread yeast or seaweed extract resulted in positive significant difference in shoot characteristics and in all yield traits as compared to untreated treatment.
Abstract: An experiment was carried out in the plastic house of Horticulture Department/college of Agriculture/ Duhok University on Cucumber plants during 2009 growing season to determine the effect of bread yeast and seaweed extracts Alga 600 and sea force 2 on growth, yield and its component on Cucumber C.V. shadi. The results showed that spraying bread yeast or seaweed extract resulted in positive significant difference in shoot characteristics and in all yield traits as compared to untreated treatment. The interaction between yeast and seaweed extract was significantly enhanced all detected traits. Since cucumber plant received 6 g.l bread yeast and sprayed with a mixture of 0.33ml.l Alga 600 +2.5 ml.l Sea force 2 were characterized by the highest values of all shoot and yield characteristics. INTRODUCTION Cucumber, Cucumis sativus L. has been commonly cultivated in Iraq during the summer and fall as well as in low tunnels and plastic and green houses and its fruit use as fresh or after processing (Matlob et al 1989). The yield per unit area in Iraq is still too low comparing with world production. Bread yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is considered as a type of biofertilizer which is usually added to soil or as foliar application on vegetable crops (ElGhamry et al 1990) because its nutrition properties as well as its produce substances like growth regulators such as gibberellins and auxins (Sarhan and Sharif 1988), and its ability to produce a group of enzymes (Dinkha and Khazrge 1990). Yeast treatment suggested to participate beneficial role in improving growth of vegetable crops which reported by Fathy and Farid (1996), Hewedy et al. (1996) Mohammed et al. (1999) Fathy et al (2000), Omer (2003) and Sarhan (2008). The uses of plant extracts is began to be applied like seaweed extract which is rich in macro and micro elements, Important plant hormones like Auxins, Gibberellins and Cytokinin which induce cell division and increasing cell enlargement and lead to balance of physiological and biological processes and increasing photosynthesis processes and improving growth characters (Jensen (2004)). Kowalski et al (1999) describe the positive effects of seaweed extract on plant growth and increasing yield of potato plant significantly, and Thomas (2002) describe that using seaweed extract (sea Buck thorn ) causes increasing growth and fresh weight of vegetative and roots growth significantly of Rosemary plant while Jensen (2004) stated that seaweed extract contain micro elements ( Co, B, Mo, Zn, Cu) and macro elements, Auxins, Gibberellins and Cytokinin and when sprayed lead to increase nutrient absorption and root growth ability and increasing stem thickness . Mesopotamia j. of Agric (ISSN 1815-316X) Vol. (39) No(2) 2011 27 ــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــ Received date 15-2-2010 accepted date 21/6/2010. MATERIALS AND METHODS The experiment was carried out at the vegetative research farm, College of Agriculture, University of Duhok under plastic house during the season of 2009 to study the effect of bread yeast and seaweed extract (Alga 600 and sea force 2) on plant growth, yield and fruit quality of cucumber. The seed of cucumber C.V. Shadi was sowing at 15 February 2009. The experiment included eight treatments as follows: Y0 E0 untreated plants (control) Y0 E1 Alga 600 at 0.33 g.l concentration. Y0 E2 sea force 2 at 2.5 ml l concentration. Y0 E3 mixture of two seaweed extracts 0.33g l +2.5 ml l (E1+E2) Y1 E0 yeast and without seaweed extracts 6g l. Y1 E1 yeast and seaweed extracts (Alga 600) at concentration 0.33g l. Y1 E2 with yeast and seaweed extract (sea force 2) at 2.5 ml l concentration. Y1 E3 yeast and mixture of both seaweed extracts 0.33g/L + 2.5 ml l. (E1+E2). Yeast spraying was applied three times within ten days intervals. Starting from 20 day after sowing .Seaweed extract was sprayed three times as well as, after flower initiation ten days –intervals. The seeds were sown on rows with width of 75 cm and the distance between plants was 40 cm. uniform cultivation practices were followed according commercial farmers. The previous treatments were arranged in three replicates using complete randomized block design (RCBD). Data were analyzed by using SAS program (Anonymous, 2001). Experimental measurements were as follows: Vegetative characteristics: which include Plant height (cm): measurement were made at the end of the growing season, Total chlorophyll content, take after 45 day from planting by Chlorophyll meter, model SPAD-502. And Yield characteristics: which include, Early fruits yield: of first six harvests from each treatment were weighted to calculate the early yield per M2 and per hectare. Total yield: all fruits harvested from each treatment along the harvesting period were weighted to calculate the total yield per M2 and per hectare Harvesting was recorded on march .20 and the final harvest was on may 2

21 citations

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