Laboratories

At present the Complex has developed well-equipped laboratories for plant, soil and water analysis and natural resource management.

Soil and Water Analysis laboratory: The laboratory is equipped with state-of the-art equipment for micro and macro nutrient analysis like atomic absorption spectrometer, particle size analyzer, automatic nitrogen analyzer, flow injection analyzer, time domain reflectometer for soil moisture measurement, neutron probe analyzer, pressure plate apparatus and soil penetrometer besides basic laboratory facilities.

Plant Science laboratory: The laboratory has sophisticated facilities like portable photosynthesis measuring system, PAM chlorophyll fluorometer, porometer, pressure chamber apparatus, thermocouple psychromotor, sap flow meter, automatic leaf area meter, crop canopy analyzer, line quantum sensors, tube solarimeters, UV-VIS double beam spectrophotometer, theta probes and portable chlorophyll meters.

Pressurized irrigation laboratory: The laboratory was developed under Team of Excellence Project funded by NATP on “Pressurized Irrigation” and is equipped to undertake the indoor and outdoor testing of various pressurized irrigation system components. It also has a plastic injection moulding machine for in-house fabrication of various components of pressurized irrigation system for research and development work.

Livestock and Fisheries laboratory: The laboratory is equipped with modern equipments like Automatic Milk Analyzer, Kjeltech, Trinocular Research Microscope with digital photographic system, Trinocular Stereo Zoom Microscope, Water Analyzing Kit beside basic laboratory facilities for conducting research in Animal and Fishery Sciences. An Eco-hatchery has been installed as a facility for breeding of fishes.

Other facilities: Besides laboratories, the institute has good facilities for recording meteorological parameters like automatic weather stations at Patna and Pusa. The institute has developed an excellent workshop with basic facilities for fabricating farm implements and items required for day to day research activities. All the scientists and technical personnel are provided with computers connected through a Local Area Network for information exchange. Internet access is provided to all the scientists through Ernet. The institute has developed GIS facilities by procuring latest versions of software packages like Geomatica, TNTmips, ENVI, ArcView, ArcGIS etc.

Library: The institute library has a total of 10,256 books covering different areas of agriculture and allied areas. The institute subscribes to 44 Indian and 23 foreign journals and periodicals and has procured electronic scientific reference databases like CAB abstracts, Agricola etc. for easy information retrieval.

Research Farm: The institute has two research farms one of 4.0 ha at WALMI Complex and another of 17.0 ha at Sabajpura (about 2 km from WALMI Complex) at Patna. The research farms have basic facilities for supporting field experimentation and demonstrations. The facilities are being strengthened.

Guest House: The complex has two VIP suits (air-conditioned) in Kisan Bhawan and 16 rooms (2 AC) in Chhatravas (Hostel) in WALMI Complex, Patna.

Residential Quarters: At present the staff of ICAR-RCER staff at Patna is accommodated in 37 residential quarters available in the WALMI Campus and 13 new residential quarters are completed at new campus of the complex near airport.

Research Centres

Horticulture and Agroforestry Research Programme (HARP): The HARP, Ranchi is located at Plandu, 17 km away from Ranchi on Ranchi-Tata Road (NH-33). The center is housed in a spacious building. The laboratories are well equipped with Atomic absorption spectrophotometer, UV-VIS Double Beam spectrophotometer, Plant canopy analyzer, Soil moisture meter, Neutron probe, Flame photometer, PCR machine, electrophoresis apparatus, phase-contrast stereo zoom microscope, wood microtome apparatus etc. to support soil and plant analysis, plant pathology, mushroom research and micro propagation and seed testing. The center has 16 greenhouses for large-scale multiplication of different horticultural crops. The other infrastructural facilities available include Cool chamber for research on storage of horticultural crops, seed storage facility, automatic weather station etc. The research farms of HARP are located at four places namely Plandu (70.4 ha), Churu (99.2 ha), Garake (7.5 ha) and Lalkhatanga (41.7 ha) and have excellent facilities for field experiments on horticultural crops. The facilities are being strengthened.

Horticulture and Agro-forestry Research Programme, Plandu, Ranchi

Centre for Makhana: Center for Makhana, is housed in the leased top floor of European guest house belonging to Mithila University. The 25 acres farm at Basudevpur in Darbhanga district is being developed. Basic facilities are created including small laboratory, furniture and equipments.