ABSTRACT Ammonia volatilisation causes major nitrogen losses from the soil and applied urea which results in low urea-N usage efficiency. Incubation experiment and pot experiment were conducted to assess the effect of enriched rice straw biochar on ammonia volatilisation, soil pH, exchangeable ammonium, available nitrate, and rice plant growth in comparison to the urea without additives under waterlogged conditions. During the incubation study, urea was amended with different rates of enriched rice straw biochar (5, 10, 15, and 20 t ·ha-1). Urea amended with biochar at 5 to 10 t·ha-1 had successfully minimized ammonia loss compared to urea without biochar. Besides, application rate of 5 to 10 t·ha-1 of biochar also preserved more ammonium ions (65.37% and 66.54%, respectively), while at the same time, the retention of nitrate ions was 50.9% and 45.3% over urea without biochar. Similarly, 5 to 10 t·ha-1 of enriched rice straw biochar increased soil N level and improved rice plant growth significantly in pot experiment. Precisely, incorporation of enriched rice straw biochar at rate of 5 and 10 t·ha-1 offers wide variety benefits to soil amendments and rice plant nutrient uptake. Hence, the findings suggest that urea amended with enriched rice straw biochar altered the nutrients level in soil by improving rice plant growth.

Abstract Maitake (Grifola frondosa) mycelia contain high dietary and medicinal values that have gained great attentions from consumers. Proper drying can preserve their bio-availabilities prior to subsequent processing or consumption. Pure Maitake (Grifola frondosa) strain was cultivated in Mushroom Complete Medium (MCM) using submerged fermentation for 14 days. Maitake mycelia were harvested and treated respectively by vacuum, oven drying treatments while the fresh mycelia were assigned as control. All the samples were tested for Total Phenolic Content, DPPH radical scavenging assays and nutritional contents. Submerged fermentation produced mycelia biomass (1.3 ± 0.1 g/L) within 14 days of fermentation. Both the pH and reduced sugar content had decreased (P < 0.05) throughout fermentation. Vacuum dried mycelia had shown higher (P < 0.05) total phenolic (20.0 ± 0.4 mg GAE/g), DPPH radical scavenging activity (84.7 ± 0.1%), and soluble protein content (283.6 ± 7.1 µg/mL) as compared to other treated samples. The crude protein (39.1 ± 0.2), fat (5.7 ± 0.7), ash (11.1 ± 0.3%) of mycelia were well preserved using vacuum drying as compared to oven dried samples. The study has suggested that vacuum drying at 70 °C, 1000mBar has the advantage to preserve the nutritional and radical scavenging activity of high value maitake mycelia effectively at lower cost.