Colocasia esculenta

Background Many plant species worldwide cultivated for food have been neglected and are being underutilized despite their crucial contributions to food security, nutrition and income generation to rural citizens, leading to a nearly permanent diet deficiency. Taro (Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott), an important food crop in the family Araceae, is one of the neglected species. This study therefore focused on identifying potential challenges mitigating taro production and utilization in taro-producing areas of Ghana and to formulate recommendations for overall increased production and utilization of the crop. The study was conducted in Ahanta West Municipal, Dormaa Municipal, Kumasi Metropolitan and East Akim Municipal in the Western, Bono, Ashanti and Eastern Regions of Ghana, respectively. These districts were ever known for taro production in Ghana. Well-structured questionnaires were used to collect information on ethnobotany of taro, possible causes of taro endangerment and remed...

Farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa suffer economic losses after harvest of more than 40% due to fungi infections of stored cocoyam corms. A storage study was carried out to evaluate the efficacy of organic plant extracts of Aframomum melegueta (Alligator pepper), Piper nigrum (Black pepper), and Azadirachta indica (Neem) on the Shelf Life and post-harvest quality of cocoyam. The factors were arranged in a (2×3) + 2 factorial style, laid in a Completely Randomized Design with three replications. Freshly harvested cocoyam corms were harvested and dipped in crude aqueous extracts of Alligator pepper, Black pepper, and Neem at concentrations of 10% w/v and 20% w/v for 5 minutes, stored at ambient conditions. The temperatures and relative humidity of the storage room ranged from 24.4 o C to 33.0 °C and 62% to 84% respectively. Results from the experiment showed that the shelf life of cocoyam was extended by 8 weeks (10% w/v Neem), 8 weeks (20% w/v Neem), 8 weeks (20% w/v Black pepper), 10 weeks (Mancozeb), and 10 weeks (20% w/v Alligator pepper) at the end of the storage period as compared to the control with a shelf life of 4 weeks. Alkaloids, tannins, phenols, saponins, flavonoids, cardiac glycosides terpenoids, and Phytosterols were found in the aqueous plant extracts. Extracts of Alligator pepper, Black pepper, and Neem significantly reduced the decay of corms, post-harvest weight loss, sprouting index and extended shelf life of cocoyam, thus can be used in the preservation of cocoyam in storage and also as an alternative to synthetic fungicides.

Colocasia [Colocasia esculenta var. antiquorum (L.) schott.], which is also known as Taro, Arvi, Katchu and eddode belongs to the family Araceae is an important edible aroid. Africa ranks first in area and production of colocasia and in India colocasia is favourite among Gujarat, Konkan region of Maharashtra and several other parts of south India. The cormels, corms, leaves and petioles are used as a vegetable and considered as rich source of carbohydrates, proteins, minerals and vitamins. Due to increasing demand of taro, there is a need to increase its yield. Foliar application of plant growth regulators is reported to improve growth and tuber yield. Hence, the present investigation has been carried out in the the Horticulture Research unit, Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Birsa Agricultural University, Kanke, Ranchi during Kharif season of 2017. There were eleven treatments used namely T1- Naphthalene Acetic Acid (25 ppm), T2- Naphthalene Acetic Acid (50 ppm),...

A Colocasia Esculenta possui elevados teores de amido, proteinas, carboidratos e mucilagem. A mucilagem apresenta alto teor de carboidratos e proteinas que combinados formam a macromolecula AGP- glicoproteina arabinogalactana, podendo ser aplicada em diversas areas, como a alimenticia, farmaceutica, quimica, cosmetica, entre outras. Diante disso, a pesquisa teve por objetivo extrair e caracterizar por diversas tecnicas analiticas a mucilagem da Colocasia Esculenta variedade rosa, tambem conhecida como inhame rosa, ou inhame de porco. Estudar o potencial espessante, estabilizante e emulsificante, da mucilagem e aplica-lo em uma formulacao cosmetica a fim de compara-lo ao biopolimero comercial Goma Xantana, realizando o estudo de estabilidade e analise sensorial das amostras. As analises de caracterizacao por DRX mostraram que a mucilagem da Colocassia Esculenta possui caracteristicas semicristalinas padrao caracteristico para polimeros naturais. Estrutura de finas lâminas, e boa esta...

Received: 23/4/2021 The study was conducted to evaluate the regulatory effects enzyme glucose-6-phosphatase activity in the liver and kidney of Lasia spinosa stem extract on alloxan monohydrate-induced diabetes in mice. In this investigation, diabetes has been induced by intraperitoneal injection of alloxan monohydrate. Induction of diabetes increased the level of blood glucose and enzyme glucose-6phosphatase significantly (p<0.05). Administration of Lasia spinosa at 100, 200 and 400 mg/kg body weight doses to alloxan monohydrate induced diabetic mice resulted in a significant decrease (p<0.05) in blood glucose level of the extract administered groups as compared to the diabetic control group. The Lasia spinosa reduced the enzyme glucose-6-phosphatase activity in the liver, kidney was found to be ameliorated in diabetic mice. Histopathological alternations of the liver, kidney tissues were also found to be restored in Lasia spinosa treated diabetic groups. The results showed t...

Taro roots waste (Colocasia esculenta) was considered a starch material for the preparation of bioethanol. Conversion of starch into ethanol was conducted by enzymatic hydrolysis followed by fermentation. The hydrolysis process uses the catalyst of HCl 15% (1:10) at 100 oC for 2.5 hours and fermentation using Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The chemical composition was analyzed by using chromatography gas-mass spectrophotometry (GCMS). The active component of bioethanol was found as ethanol (41.14%) and glycerol (29.08 %). The other chemical compound were 2,3- dimethyloxirane, pentanal, propionic acid, and heptane-2-one. The fermentation using tape yeast resulted in the main component of glycerol (31.39%), cyclobutanol (15.26%), pentane (12.93%), and methyl 2-oxopropanoate (10.50 %). The taro roots waste were the potential to convert biomass into bioethanol, which is one of the environmentally friendly alternative fuels

The work was conducted to determine the incidence of microbial contaminants in two clones of taro (‘INIVIT MX-2007’ and ‘INIVIT MC-2012’) on the establishment and multiplication stages. The contaminated culture vials were counted and the percentage of microbial contamination was determined by clone in each subculture. Different contaminants were isolated and characterized morphologically and culturally. A high incidence of microbial contaminants in the two taro clones were found. Bacteria caused the greatest damage in the establishment and multiplication stages. Key words: bacteria, in vitro plants, taro

Colocasia esculentum (L) Schott and Xanthosoma sagittifolium (L) Schott, commonly called cocoyam is one of the orphan crops with great potentials, but neglected by researchers and growers despite their high demands by consumers in recent times. Consequently, some of the local varieties have become almost extinct; this calls for the need to revive interest in these crops. This study was undertaken to characterize six cocoyam accessions collected from Cross River and Akwa Ibom States, Nigeria, using 13 qualitative and 6 quantitative Agro-morphological descriptors as well as simple sequence repeat (SSR) primers. The crops were laid out in a field using the Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) in 4 replications. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) test showed that the 6 accessions were not significantly different (P>0.05) in crop span, crop height, number of leaves, leaf width and leaf length. This indicates that these features cannot be used to distinguish between Colocasia and Xanthoso...

Background. Taro (Colocasia esculenta) can be grown in a variety of environmental and edaphic conditions, but it is most typically grown in wetlands. The optimal conditions for its growth are two water regimes i.e., waterlogged or flooded conditions to dryland or unflooded conditions. An important criterion in crop yield is water use efficiency (WUE), and it has been suggested that crop production per unit of water used can be increased. Objectives. To determine the WUE of taro in Kenya’s sub-humid environment under different watering regimes and planting densities. Methodology. A study was conducted at the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO) – Embu Research Centre, during the long rains (LR) 2021, short rains (SR) 2021/2022, and long rains (LR) 2022. A factorial experiment with a split-plot layout arranged in a completely randomized block design was used. The main factor was the irrigation levels while the sub-factor was the planting density, with three r...

Taro (Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott) is one of the most underutilized crops in sub-Saharan Africa and an important staple food in the tropics. Understanding its growth response under selected watering regimes and planting densities underpins this research. A study was conducted at the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO), Embu Research Centre, during the long rains (LR) in 2021 and the short rains (SR) in 2021–2022. A factorial experiment with a split-plot layout arranged in a completely randomized block design was used. The main factor was the irrigation levels, while the subfactor was the planting density, with three replications. The three irrigation levels were at 100%, 60%, and 30% based on the field capacity (FC). The planting densities used were 0.5 m × 0.5 m (40,000 plants ha−1), 1 m × 0.5 m (20,000 plants ha−1), and 1 m × 1 m (10,000 plants ha−1), representative of high, medium, and low planting densities, respectively. Time and season ( P < 0...

Colocasia [Colocasia esculenta var. antiquorum (L.) Schott.], which is also known as Taro, Arvi, Katchu and eddode belongs to the family Aracea is an important edible aroid. Africa ranks first in area and production of colocasia and in India colocasia is favourite among Gujarat, Konkan region of Maharashtra and several other parts of south India. The cormels, corms, leaves and petioles are used as a vegetable and considered as rich source of carbohydrates, proteins, minerals and vitamins. Due to increasing demand of taro, there is a need to increase its yield. Foliar application of plant growth regulators is reported to improve growth and cormel yield. Hence, the present investigation has been carried out in the Horticulture Research unit, Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Birsa Agricultural University, Kanke, Ranchi during Kharif season of 2017. There were eleven treatments used namely T1Naphthalene acetic acid (25 ppm), T2Naphthalene acetic acid (50 ppm), T3Indol...

Colocasia [Colocasia esculenta var. antiquorum (L.) schott.], which is also known as Taro, Arvi, Katchu and eddode belongs to the family Araceae is an important edible aroid. Africa ranks first in area and production of colocasia and in India colocasia is favourite among Gujarat, Konkan region of Maharashtra and several other parts of south India. The cormels, corms, leaves and petioles are used as a vegetable and considered as rich source of carbohydrates, proteins, minerals and vitamins. Due to increasing demand of taro, there is a need to increase its yield. Foliar application of plant growth regulators is reported to improve growth and tuber yield. Hence, the present investigation has been carried out in the the Horticulture Research unit, Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Birsa Agricultural University, Kanke, Ranchi during Kharif season of 2017. There were eleven treatments used namely T1- Naphthalene Acetic Acid (25 ppm), T2- Naphthalene Acetic Acid (50 ppm),...

In this study, the effect of ultrasound pretreatment (UP) and drying methods (convective hot air [CHAD] and microwave oven [MOD]‐assisted foam mat drying [FMD]) on the drying time, behavior and rate, diffusion coefficient, moisture content, color, bulk and tapped densities, flow properties, and reconstitution behavior of taro (Colocasia esculenta) flour were assessed. For this purpose, the taro foams with and without ultrasonic pretreatment (35 kHz, 80°C for 25 min) were dried in a convective oven (70°C, 20% ventilation rate) and microwave oven (460 W). The UP resulted in a higher drying rate, diffusion coefficient, moisture content, Hausner ratio (HR), and wettability time, and a lower drying time compared to the nontreated samples. Combined CHAD and MOD‐assisted FMD improved the disadvantages of the CHAD method for example: long drying time (decreased around 63.33% for CHAD and 59.16% for UP + CHAD), low drying and diffusion rates, high moisture content, low brightness (L*) values...

Introduction: Flash tablet is one of the newer technologies that recently have been focused on flash tablet offers many advantages such as fast disintegration and dissolution. However, it has many issues and drawbacks such as fragility of the final tablet and difficult manufacturing process. In this work valsartan (the antihypertensive medication) was fabricated as lyophilized tablets to improve its dissolution profile and bring about all the advantages of this drug delivery system, such as rapid disintegration. Materials and Methods: Mannitol, hydroxylpropyl methyl cellulose (HPMC 5E) and tween 80 were used as matrix, binder, and dissolution enhancer; respectively. The effect of their concentrations on physiochemical properties were evaluated in vitro by conducting mechanical strength test, content uniformity, weight variation test, and the dissolution profile. Results: The hardness and friability have shown using HPMC 5E at concentration 5% will yield a better mechanical property ...

Relay cropping is a method that increases total productivity through maximum utilization of resources. In this study, we planned a field experiment, which was conducted at the Regional Agricultural Research Station, Ishwardi, Pabna during 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 to find out the most suitable way of relaying mukhikachu (MU) with hybrid maize to get the maximum benefit. Seven treatments: T1= Relay at silking stage (100 DAS), T2 = Relay at the blister stage (110 DAS), T3 = Relay at the milk stage (120 DAS), T4 = Relay at the dough stage (130 DAS), T5 = Relay at the dent stage (140 DAS), T6 = Sole hybrid maize, T7 = Sole mukhikachu, were compared in the study. It was found that among the treatments (relay cropping and sole stand), there was no significant difference in terms of yield and attributes of both base (maize) and relay crop (mukhikachu). In the entire treatment, maize yielded 10.54-11.30 t ha-1 with results of 3.28-3.66 MJ m-2day-1 light energy interception (120 DAS), 2.68-2.8...