Food Consumption Pattern and Weight Gain of Albino Rats Fed with Irradiated and Non-irradiated Diet

Food is vital for human existence or conservation and preservation of food is pre-requisite for food security and it provides economic stability and self-reliance to a nation. Food irradiation has been described as a versatile, efficacious and safe process. The Soya mix was formulated and subjected to radiation processing at 0.75kGy, to know the effect of radiation processing on food consumption patterns and weight gains. The ten days old Wister albino rats were selected for experiment, the feeding was given for 5 weeks. In I and II week the intake of control diet was more than the experimental diet, where as in III and IV week the intake of experimental diet was more than the control diet. In V week there was only slight difference in control and experimental diet food intake. The weekly weights of control diet rats gain more when compared with experimental diet rats except in II and III week. In experimental diet rats there was slight increase in II and III week. However there was no much difference in the weight gain of control and experimental diet rats. Hence, the study concluded that there was a significant difference at 1% level in the food consumption pattern and weight gain of albino rats fed with control and experimental Soya mix. No much difference was observed in the irradiated and non-irradiated diets.