Genaro M. Soto-Zarazúa’s research while affiliated with Autonomous University of Queretaro and other places

The large-scale conversion of forests to agriculture has caused biodiversity loss, climate change, and disrupted dietary fatty acid balances, with adverse public health effects. Wild edibles like pine nuts, especially Pinus cembroides, provide sustainable solutions by supporting ecosystems and offering economic value. However, variability in seed quality limits market potential, and lipidomic studies on P. cembroides remain sparse. This paper underscores the ecological, social, and nutritional value of P. cembroides while advocating for advanced research to enhance its use as a non-timber forest resource in Mexico’s communal areas. It explores various analytical techniques, such as nuclear magnetic resonances (NMR), chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS, GC-MS) and GC coupled with flame ionization detector (GC-FID), highlighting extraction methods like derivatization, purification, and thin-layer chromatography. Likewise, some considerations are addressed for the treatment of data obtained in the detection of fatty acids from bioformatics and the evaluation of the data through statistical methods and artificial intelligence and deep learning. These approaches aim to improve fatty acid profiling and seed quality assessments, fostering the species economic viability and supporting sustainable livelihoods in rural communities, encouraging researchers across the country to explore the fatty acid composition of different P. cembroides populations can drive valuable insights into its nutritional and ecological significance. Such efforts can enhance understanding of regional variations, promote sustainable use, and elevate the specie’s economic and scientific value.

The dehydration process modifies the physical and chemical characteristics of certain crops, thereby increasing their shelf life and consequently reducing the organic waste generated. This process is contingent upon maintaining optimal temperature and humidity levels to prevent deterioration of the product. As indirect dehydrators have a high energy demand, new designs are required that facilitate the uniform distribution of air with a high-volume capacity of 100 kg per day. In the present study, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques were employed to assess the drying performance of two dehydrator models. The simulations were executed in Solidworks 2020 and Flow Simulation, and they examined temperature distribution and velocity within the interior of the dehydrators. In Model 1, an inlet volume flow of 0.08 m³ s⁻¹ and a heat source of 3.5 kW are considered, within a volume of 2.11 m³. In Model 2, an inlet volume flow of 0.03 m³ s⁻¹ and two heat source of 2.5 kW are considered, within a volume of 2.02 m³. Model 1 was unable to achieve uniform air distribution within the drying chamber. In contrast, Model 2 demonstrated uniform velocity and temperature across the majority of the drying chamber, making it a superior option.

The current state of the 9 planetary boundaries coupled with the growth rate of the world population has alerted us to reconsider how resources are used to meet food demand through sustainable agro-industrial systems. With only 0.01% of the world's total volume, freshwater plays a fundamental role in the stability and functioning of any biosystem. The inadequate handling of this extremely valuable resource has caused its operating space to be on the threshold of safety and is about to enter the zone of uncertainty. The actions presented by the United Nations in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development are a strategy to reduce and correct some of these interrelated problems. Objective 6 of this document - Clean Water and Sanitation - seeks to guarantee the availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all, however, this has not yet been fulfilled. Therefore, it is essential to continue exhausting proposals for possible solutions to these issues. Aquaponics, a sustainable food production system, is based on the upcycling of water, the reuse of nutrients, and the reduction of wastewater in an organic sense. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to analyze the benefits that can be obtained from the use of aquaponic systems to partially accelerate the fulfillment of objectives 6.3, 6.4, 6.5, and 6.a in improving water quality by reducing pollution, eliminating landfills, and minimizing the release of harmful products, halving the proportion of untreated wastewater and substantially increasing recycling and safe reuse.

Meeting the demand for food through sustainable agro-industrial systems has become a concern due to the current state of the planet’s natural resources, population growth, and climate change. To address this, the 2030 Agenda has laid out several strategies to enhance human well-being and protect the planet. This paper focuses on Goal 2, which aims to end hunger, achieve food security, improve nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture. The first three targets of this goal are as follows: 2.1, ending hunger and ensuring access to nutritious food; 2.2, ending all forms of malnutrition; and 2.3, doubling the agricultural productivity of small-scale food producers. The purpose of this manuscript is to demonstrate how aquaponics can positively impact these three targets by guaranteeing food security through the production of high-quality protein. Aquaponic crops are enriched with organic nutrients from the water they grow in. This not only increases their nutrient content but also their bioactive molecule content, making them excellent for fighting hunger and malnutrition. Moreover, these practices can be adjusted to different scales, making them a viable option for small farmers, women, and rural communities to produce their own food. Consequently, aquaponics can play a crucial role in achieving Zero Hunger locally, with appropriate support.

Aquaculture waters can be associated with the modification of the phytochemical profile in plants when they are used for irrigation; thus, Integrated Agri-Aquaculture Systems such as aquaponics represent a strategy to improve the bioactive content of medicinal plants. This study aimed to analyze the effect caused by cultivation using aquaponics on the modification of the content of bioactive compounds such as phenols, flavonoids, and apigenin in Cuphea hyssopifolia and Cuphea cyanea irrigated with Cyprinus carpio waters. The results of each culture method showed unique differences (p ≤ 0.05) in the concentrations of bioactive compounds and antioxidant activity in Cuphea spp. For C. hyssopifolia in aquaponics, 76% (61.08 ± 7.2 mg g⁻¹ GAEq) of phenols and 50% (5.62 ± 0.5 mg g⁻¹ CAEq) of flavonoids were maintained compared to 20% (16.99 ± 0.4 mg g⁻¹ GAEq) of phenols and 76.5% (8.19 ± 1.6 mg g⁻¹ CAEq) of flavonoids in conventional culture. For C. cyanea in aquaponics, 91% (15.36 ± 0.8 mg g⁻¹ GAEq) of phenols and 47% (3.52 ± 0.6 mg g⁻¹ CAEq) of flavonoids were maintained compared to 24% (14.11 ± 1.3 mg g⁻¹ GAEq) of phenols and 82% (1.79 ± 0.1 mg g⁻¹ CAEq) of flavonoids in conventional culture. An increase of more than 60% in the apigenin content of C. hyssopifolia in aquaponics confirms a eustress effect related to the use of organically enriched waters. The results indicate that aquaponics can promote the biostimulation/elicitation of medicinal plants and increase their bioactive compounds, but this effect does not occur in the same way between species.

One of the main concerns in precision agriculture (PA) is the growth of weeds within a crop field. Currently, to prevent the spread of weeds, automatic techniques and computational tools are used to help to identify, classify, and detect the different types of weeds found in agricultural fields. One of the technologies that can help us to process digital information gathered from the agricultural fields is high-performance computing (HPC); this technology has been adopted to carry out projects requiring extra processing and storage in order to execute tasks with a large computational cost. This paper shows the implementation of an HPC cluster (HPCC), in which image processing (IP) and analysis are executed using deep learning (DL) techniques, specifically, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) with the VGG16 and InceptionV3 models, to classify different weed species. The results show the great benefits of using high-performance computing clusters in PA, specifically for classifying images. To apply distributed computing within the HPCC, the Keras and Horovod frameworks were used to train the CNN models, obtaining the best time with the InceptionV3 model with a value of 37 min 55.193 s using six HPCC cores, obtaining an accuracy of 0.65 as a result.

Aquaculture wastewaters are associated with modifying the phytochemical profile in plants when watered with them, thus, aquaponics is a way to improve medicinal plants' quality. This study aimed to analyse the effect caused by a small-scale aquaponic system integrated with Koi carp in the growth performance and modification of bioactive compounds in Cuphea hyssopifolia and Cuphea cyanea . The results showed the aquaponic system design is suitable for keeping Cuphea spp. in a greenhouse or indoor conditions. No statistically significant differences were found in the growth performance in both Cuphea spp. The results for C. hyssopifolia in aquaponic showed that approximately 76% of phenols and more than half of the flavonoids remained in the dry basis of the plant cultivated in aquaponics compared to conventional culture. The apigenin content increased by > 60% (1.63 mg g ⁻¹ ). The results for C. cyanea in aquaponic showed that the phenolic content remained above, and the flavonoids decreased by 53%. The apigenin content decreased by 40% (0.89 mg g ⁻¹ ). The outcomes indicate that aquaponics can promote biostimulation of medicinal plants and increase their bioactive compounds, however, this effect does not occur in the same way between species.

The technology for reproducing orchids in vitro has had to evolve due to the demand for these plants and the high cost of the biotechnology used due to the agar, the gelling agent. Consequently, research has tended to search for natural substitutes for agar. Our work describes the use of pectin and mucilage hydrocolloids extracted from the local waste matter of two species of Opuntia (O. ficus-indica and O. robusta) to study as a gelling agent in vitro culture media for Cattleya sp. These hydrocolloids were obtained by alkaline hydrolysis. Subsequently, these were used in proportions of 0.8%, 0.6%, 0.4%, and 0.2% in combination with agar to study the gelation time, texture profile analysis (TPA), seed germination under light and dark conditions, and a phenological study, including orchid analyses of leaves and roots, root and leaf length, seedling height, and width of the best-designed treatment were studied. Our results demonstrate that the treatment composed of 0.4% O. ficus-indica pectin and 0.4% agar improves the germination time, plant growth, and the number of leaves and roots, resulting in a biostimulant formula for optimal in vitro growth of Cattleya sp.

El presente modelo de utilidad es una cámara de crecimiento que usa sistemas pasivos de climatización gracias a su diseño, materiales y elementos constitutivos, y en la cual se generan las condiciones para que en su interior se lleve a cabo la producción continua de forraje verde fresco a través del método de hidroponía destinado a la alimentación de animales. La cámara de crecimiento está compuesta por una estructura metálica con tratamiento anticorrosivo que le brinda solidez y rigidez, cubierta con material aislante para conservar las condiciones internas sin importar las del medio exterior circundante, con rieles para la ubicación de bandejas de cultivo que contengan semilla forrajera germinada, las cuales encontrarán las condiciones de temperatura, humedad, ventilación, iluminación y riego que hacen posible su crecimiento y desarrollo en forraje verde fresco que será empleado como complemento alimenticio en la dieta de animales. Esta cámara de crecimiento integra el concepto de uso de energías renovables con la instalación preferiblemente en el techo de boiler solar; paneles fotovoltaicos; baterías fotovoltaicas; y extractor eólico. De un modo preferido la cámara de crecimiento tendrá las conexiones que le permitan recircular la solución de riego con el objetivo de rehusar y de esta manera ahorrar.

In Vitro culture is a technique commonly used for plant research. Nevertheless, it is more expensive than traditional methods of production, due to the use of the culture medium gelling agent called agar. Recent studies have been searching for alternative substances in raw materials with the same characteristics but which can be extracted easier than agar. The dietary fiber of the nopal cactus (Opuntia) is a rich source of hydrocolloids (pectin and mucilage). These hydrocolloids have the ability to gel in combination with the indicated solution. In this chapter, we will focus on the study of the hydrocolloids from nopal cactus to replace agar partially and/or totally as a gelling agent using in vitro culture media benefiting from the molecular structure and mechanical properties of the compounds.