Khan et al Int. J. Pure App. Biosci. 5 (2): 556-562 (2017) ISSN: 2320 – 7051 Copyright © April, 2017; IJPAB 556 Physical Properties of Pigeon Pea Grains at Different Moisture Content Kalay Khan 1* , S.C. Moses 1 , Ashok Kumar 1 , Devesh Kumar 2 and Abhishek Upadhyay 2 1 Department of Farm Machinery and Power Engineering, Sam Higginbottom University of Agriculture, Technology and Sciences, Allahabad, UP, India 2 Department of Agriculture Doon (PG) College of Agriculture Science & Technology, Selaqui, Dehradun, UK, India *Corresponding Author E-mail: khan.kalay93@gmail.com Received: 30.01.2017 | Revised: 12.02.2017 | Accepted: 13.02.2017 INTRODUCTION Pigeon pea (Cajanus cajan (L.) millsp.) is a multipurpose leguminous crop that can provide food fuel wood and fodder for the small-scale farmer in subsistence agriculture and is widely cultivated in Nigeria 20 . Pulses along with cereals play a vital role in human nutrition, especially for the vegetarian population as a cheap source of protein 14 . Pigeon pea (Cajanus cajan) is the most commonly consumed pulse in the Indian subcontinent. These are cultivated in more than 25 tropical and subtropical countries, either as a sole crop or intermixed with cereals, such as sorghum, pearl millet or maize or with other legumes, such as peanuts. Pigeon peas are cultivated for both as food crop (dried peas, flour or green vegetable peas) and forage/cover crop. They contain high levels of protein and important amino acids like methionine, lysine, and tryptophan 17 . Sprouting enhances the digestibility of dried pigeon peas via the reduction of indigestible sugars that would otherwise remain in the cooked dried peas. The study of physical, aerodynamic and mechanical properties of food grain is important and essential in the design of processing machines, storage structures and processes. The shape and size of grains are important in the design and development of grading and sorting machineries for the separation of foreign material as well as for the thermal processing calculations. Available online at www.ijpab.com DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18782/2320-7051.2534 ISSN: 2320 – 7051 Int. J. Pure App. Biosci. 5 (2): 556-562 (2017) ABSTRACT Physical properties of grains plays play important role in the design of seed hopper, conveyers and seed metering device. The physical properties of pigeon pea grains at different range of moisture content from 10.3 to 20.3 d.b. were investigated. The pigeon pea grains dimensions such as length, width thickness and diameter increase linearly with increase moisture content. An increase in bulk density and true density was observed at different moisture content 10.3, 13.6, 16.8 and 20.3 % d.b. Key words: Pigeon pea, Moisture content, Physical properties, Bulk density Research Article Cite this article: Khan, K., Moses, S.C., Kumar, A., Kumar, D. and Upadhyay, A., Physical Properties of Pigeon Pea Grains at Different Moisture Content, Int. J. Pure App. Biosci. 5(2): 556-562 (2017). doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.18782/2320-7051.2534