Research Projects

Maintaining the nutrient balance in agricultural soils is vital to ensure optimal physiological growth in crops and fulfill the food demands. Soils deficient in essential micronutrients produce crops with reduced nutrients and contribute to malnutrition or “hidden hunger”, affecting over 2 billion people globally. The traditional practice of micronutrient delivery in their inorganic form to alleviate their deficiency in soil has low use efficiency while their synthetic chelates have ecotoxicological concerns. In this proposal, we aim to develop a micronutrient containing bio-stimulant by their chelation with amino acids, which are environment friendly, and then encapsulate it with Neem oil. Through chelation, micronutrients would be shielded from adverse reactions, enabling increased bioavailability of micronutrients for plant uptake, while encapsulation with Neem-oil would help in improving longevity. Other than just acting as a chelator, amino acids have bio-stimulating, and neem oil has bio-pesticidal properties. At our facility, we have synthesized three micronutrients (Cu, Zn, and Mn) based complexes and characterized them through FTIR and AAS. The preliminary characterization results indicate the successful formation of targeted complexes with micronutrients. Further, we would synthesize other complexes (for Cu, Zn, Mn, and Fe) with three selected amino acids and conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the synthesized product i.e., its chemical characterization, stability analysis, release profile assessment, and explore its potential in terms of growth, bio-chemical response, yield and nutrient quality of Vigna radiata L. (mung bean). In this way, this technological bridging to develop a bio-stimulant containing both micro and nitrogenous components, required for plant growth, yield, and nutrient quality of the grain may find its efficacious applications in agri-food production systems.