Cancer still presents enormous challenges in the medical world. Currently, the search for
anticancer compounds has garnered a lot of interest, especially in finding them from the natural
sources. In this study, by using Sulforhodamine B (SRB) colorimetric assay, compounds,
extracted from supermeal worm (Zophobas morio) larvae using two types of acidified organic
solvent (ethanol and isopropanol), were shown to inhibit the growth of a breast cancer line,
MCF-7. A comparative study of the effect was carried out on a normal cell line, Vero. Results
showed that, the two types of extracts inhibits growth of MCF-7 cell at varying degrees, on
the other hand, have much less effect on Vero cell. Extracts analysed by UV-vis spectroscopy,
showed peaks in the range of 260 to 280 nm, inferring the presence of aromatic amino acids,
whereas the highest peak of 3.608 AU at 230 nm indicates the presence of peptide bonds. By
Raman spectroscopy, peaks are observed at 1349 cm-1, 944 cm-1 and 841 cm-1 indicating the
presence of Tyr, Try and Gly, confirming the UV-vis analyses. All results of analyses implied
that the anticancer compounds contain peptides.
The oil quality parameters of the seed oil of Baobab (Adansonia digitata) were evaluated using standard methods of analysis. The Iodine value, Peroxide value, Saponification value were 86 g/100g, 4.08 mEq/Kg, 188 mg/g, respectively, for seed oil. The oil content of the kernel was higher 23% compared to the hulls that contain 5.4% oil. The kernel oil contains substantial quantities of calcium, potassium, and magnesium, which were found to be 4116, 2339 and 1629 mg/Kg, respectively. The fatty acid profile showed that oleic and linoleic were the major unsaturated fatty acids, whereas palmitic was the major saturated acid. The oil also, showed considerable amount of total phenolic content (TPC) and worthy antioxidant activity. Baobab oil has great nutritional and industrial potentials. It is therefore recommended that more and advanced research should be undertaken for this abundant source of natural nutritious oil.
Nowadays, food safety and quality have become critical issues of great concern throughout the world. The issue of Halal food particularly has attracted public attention in Malaysia. Muslim consumers should be sure about the food quality in Halal Food Products starting from the ingredients. The confidence can be gained when the whole processes from the production, processing and distribution of the products are traced and confirmed to be Shariah-compliant ones. One of the current important issues nowadays which set as a background of this research is feeding animals with unclean food or unnatural feed to the animals. According to Islamic Jurisprudence, these animals are termed as al-Jallalah or contaminated animals, they are called Coprophagia or Coprophagy. ‘Jalla’ means contaminant or impurity. There are several issues of aquatic animals which need a clear clarification on their status whether they are Halal or haram to be consumed. For example, catfish (Clariasbatrachus, Linnaeus), which is fed with filth or najs and catfish (Pangasiushypopthalmus) which is fed with derivatives of pig organs in several ponds at Batu Gajah, Tronoh and Papan, Perak. The mixture in animals feed with such impurities is applied to save the maintenance and fasten the growing of fish. This research aims to identify the concept of al-Jallalah and its characteristics. It also aims to develop the standard of the contaminated animals (al-Jallalah) and to create new mobile application on this issue for the future development of meat and poultry industry. This study helps to enhance the quality of meat and poultry, to provide consumers with informative choices and it can be used as a marketing tool for the Halal Industry in the future.
Vinegar is very popular as traditional ingredient for cooking, pickling, and preservation. It is made from sugar or starch by an alcoholic and acetous fermentation and produces ethanol as a by-product. Alcohol is prohibited to be consumed for Muslim or used as ingredient if it is exceeding the allowable limit as stated by Islamic Council in Malaysia. According to Fatwa Committee National Council of Islamic Religious Affairs Malaysia, natural occurrences of ethanol in food products are acceptable if the ethanol contents are less than 1% in beverages and 0.5% for flavoring or coloring substances for the purpose of stabilization. On the other hand, for specific vinegar product, as stated by Malaysian Food Act and Regulation, acetic acid content must be at least 4%. According to FAO/WHO, a product is to be labelled as vinegar if the acetic acid content is 6% and with a maximum residual alcohol content of 0.5%v/v for wine vinegar and 1%v/v for other vinegars. This study investigated the physiochemical properties of the vinegar from different sources of raw materials. Total solubility (TA) by using Brix method, pH, and alcohol and acetic acid content by GC-TOF/MS of 12 commercial vinegars from Malaysia and abroad were studied. The result shown that for pH value of commercial vinegar are ranged from 2.51-3.14°Brix from 2.10-40.73°Brix, acetic acid is ranged from 0.0253-0.1276% and ethanol content from 0-0.5911%. Thus, this study will come out with the clear observation on ethanol content in fermented product which is vinegar in order to categories the halalness of the product that available in Malaysia market especially the ones that are produced internationally. Lastly, as shown by the profiling study, vinegar that are imported internationally may contain some amount of alcohol in contrast with the one that locally produced in Malaysia and has Halal certification.
The selection of landfill, which happens to be an environmental issue, has attracted
the attention of many researchers from the fields of waste management and
environmental sciences worldwide. Hence, in the attempt to overcome this problem,
some decision-making techniques, including Geographic Information Systems (GIS)
and Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA), have been widely utilized in prior studies,
where multiple criteria, particularly in site selection process, have been employed.
With that, this article identifies the selection criteria for landfill selection and presents
a review concerning decision-making techniques that have been used in past studies
for two important phases involved during the process of site selection, namely, (1)
preliminary site screening, and (2) assessment of site suitability. As such, some 82
articles chosen from 34 peer-reviewed journals had been investigated in detail. The
results showed that 42.68% of the selected articles integrated GIS and MCDA
techniques to solve the problem of landfill site selection, and this is followed by
integrating GIS and fuzzy MCDA technique (18.29%). Both these techniques are indeed
powerful tools that can guide decision-makers to solve problems in making decisions
on the basis of various criteria under certainty and uncertainty results, mainly involving
environmental issues.
MeSH terms: Attention; Decision Making; Decision Support Techniques; Waste Management; Patient Selection; Uncertainty; Geographic Information Systems; Waste Disposal Facilities
Production Sharing Contract (PSC) is one of the petroleum agreements mode that
are being utilized in many parts of the world in enabling exploration, development
and production of the petroleum resources at the respective locations. It was first
introduced in Indonesia in 1966, and followed by Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, and
Brunei. One of interesting aspects of PSC management is the operatorship
transferhandling when a PSC is nearing its expiry. When the time come, the
current PSC contractor as operator has the option to relinquish it to the host
authority to be handed over to other operator, farm it out to the other PSC
contractor to reduce the risk exposure or continue operating under a new PSC
terms. The most challenging will be to relinquish the operatorship to another
operator whereby several complexities will need to be adequately addressed to
ensure benefit preservation to the host authority, incoming operator and
outgoing operator. Therefore there is a need to adhere to key factors or enablers
to administer the operatorship transfer exercise if it occurs in the near future. The
key enablers would be able to address the operatorship transfer exercise
effectively with the objective to alleviate complications to the host authority,
outgoing operator and incoming operator. With the emphasized in the PETRONAS
Procedure & Guideline for Upstream Activities together with three case studies,
this paper proposed several key enablers to be considered for a PSC successful
operatorship transfer which is human resources, data management, asset
reliability and integrity management, supply chain management and good
relationship between parties. With identified key factors, it is hoped that any PSC
operatorship transfer will be able to be managed smoothly and will ensure
benefits to all parties concerned.
The purpose of this paper is to propose appropriate sustainable design solution for a
suitable housing architectural design that responds towards ecological needs vital for
a comfortable home living environment. This paper is vital as there are many arising
issue relating to middle income housing development involving comfort quality that
need much attention from various parties. Past literature on middle income housing
development in Malaysia focuses on limited areas of study. These are quality of
communal living in settlements; neighbourhood facilities and its effectiveness; crime
prevention through housing design; dwelling support services; policy making on
housing ownership; corporate social responsibility on housing development from
developer’s and buyer’s perspective; efficient housing construction system; waste
management in residential areas; the increment of housing price and related factors
as well as documentation on factors that hinders the implementation of sustainable
technology in middle income housing schemes. None of the above literature discusses
on how to implement ecological approach in home design. This research analyses the
home users’ perception from direct observation and questionnaires on two selected
case studies of middle income housing located in two major cities in Malaysia’s urban
context to establish appropriate ecological home design attributes for future
referencing. Findings indicate there are four key factors that contributed in the
development of ecology housing for the benefit of occupants which are suitable
structure usage, placement of building; proper openings, application of building
fenestration and appropriate landscape. The established referential guideline design is
of benefit for future designers, builders, developer and related authority to build
comfortable homes in the future.
This paper provides a qualitative overview of different Optical Fiber Sensors (OFS),
which play important role in the field of sensors due to their excellent
characteristics, spontaneous response and easy handling system. The current
state of the art of optical fiber technology is reviewed, namely based on its main
characteristics and sensing advantages. In addition, the working principle of OFS
and their applications are discussed, particularly for sensor employment.
Dividend policy is one of the most important element to measure changes in stock
prices. The relationship between dividend policy and stock price volatility shows
different results based on different studies. This paper focuses on the relationship
between dividend policy and stock price volatility through seminal literature on both
theoretical and empirical evidences from 1989 to 2016. The various consequences of
this relationship depend upon each country specific characteristics, different data
sample and different methodology techniques which utilized by researchers in
developed and developing countries. Most of the studies found negative relationship
between dividend policy and stock price volatility, while developed countries have
more impact on this relationship as compared to developing countries. Based on the
prior literature, this paper argues that the relationship between dividend policy and
stock price volatility is inconsistent and the organization needs to decide the dividend
policy according to their capability and organizational culture.
MeSH terms: Commerce; Developing Countries; Organizations; Volatilization; Organizational Culture; Developed Countries; Dissent and Disputes; Policy
Among athletes, endurance is one of the key elements to victory. In addition to
training, athletes normally used supplement to prevent fatigue during the event. With
prolonged and intense activity, our body started to experience decrease in muscle
performance due to several factors such as oxidative stress, dehydration and
accumulation of lactic acid in the body fluids. The free radicals generated during
intense exercise will expose the cells to oxidative damages. In the event of
dehydration, there will be significant losses of water and functional electrolytes during
intense exercise which affected the body fluid balance. Fatigue will also occur during
reduced oxygen in aerobic metabolism which later caused accumulation of lactic acid
in the muscle. This will change the pH balance toward more acidic and caused the
muscles to lose contractile efficiency. In addition, fatigue can also be studied using rats
as model organism. Results from this activity can be useful to analyse cellular
metabolism and physiology effects of the tested rats toward physical exercise.
Therefore, this review aims to discuss the causes of fatigue through oxidative stress,
dehydration and lactic acid accumulation. In addition, the effectiveness of using rats as
a model system in measuring fatigue is also included in illustrating examples on fatigue
assessment in vivo.
Urban Transit Network Design Problem (UTNDP) focuses on deriving useful set of
routes, manageable timetabling for each transit route and transit scheduling based on
available resources. UTNDP is commonly subdivided into Urban Transit Routing
Problem (UTRP) and Urban Transit Scheduling Problem (UTSP), respectively. There are
various approaches applied to solve the UTSP. The aim of this paper is to give a
comprehensive list of studies on UTSP that deals with metaheuristic approaches such
as Tabu Search, Simulated Annealing, Genetic Algorithm and their hybrid methods. This
review also addressed possible gaps of the approaches and the limitations of the
overall problem. It can be concluded that only some of the metaheuristic approaches
and sub-problems are highly studied in UTSP. This review will be useful for researchers
who are interested in expanding their knowledge and conduct research in UTSP using
metaheuristic approaches.
MeSH terms: Algorithms; Health Resources; Research; Research Personnel; Knowledge
Hypertension is a condition associated with adverse vascular complications. Its
prevalence is on the increase globally and same is true for Nigeria. Very few studies
have assessed the prevalence, awareness, treatment and blood pressure control
among hypertensive patients in Nigeria. The few available studies generally show
figures less than 50% for all the three indicators of success with regards to
hypertension. These studies are however deficient in their coverage, country
representativeness and methodology, and as such, they fail to provide the evidence
for which conclusions can be drawn. There is need to intensify blood pressure
screening at both hospital and community levels. More comprehensive research with
wider coverage and sound methodologies are also needed to determine those
associated factors and to discover better treatment options for hypertension in
Nigeria. These findings would guide health promotion activities and policy making.
Offering inexpensive, widely available and safe method to evaluate the bone condition
as a prevention step to predict bone fracture which caused by Osteoporosis disease
makes ultrasound becomes an alternative method beside X-ray based bone
densitometry. Conventional quantitative ultrasound (QUS) applies the analysis of
attenuation and velocity to estimate bone health with several measurement
techniques which analyzes different types of ultrasound waves and bones. However,
most of the QUS results still does not match the accuracy of the Dual X-ray
absorptiometry due to the interaction of ultrasound and bone microstructure are not
fully exploited. The Biot’s theory has predicted that, porous medium like a cancellous
bone supporting two types of longitudinal wave known as fast and slow wave which
depends on the type of medium travelled. Both experiment and simulation were
conducted to investigate the correlation of fast and slow waves individually with a
variety of cancellous bone condition. Some of the analysis methods are based on
conventional QUS methods. The fast and slow wave relates more to the microstructure
of the cancellous bone compared to overall waves. In addition, overall waves had been
proven to consist of fast and slow wave and can be separated using Bayesian methods.
Overall waves also found to suffer artifact such as phase cancellation and negative
dispersion that could cause confusion in analyzing the parameters of ultrasound wave
with bone structure. In vivo application based on fast and slow wave analysis is able to
produce results based on mass density which can be compared directly and have high
correlation with X-ray based bone densitometry. The recent backscattered simulation
result indicates that, fast and slow waves can be reflected inside the cancellous bone
might offer a new method to evaluate bone especially in crucial skeletal parts.
Fibrous concrete composite (FCC) have been applied in numerous civil engineering
structures, such as pavements, dams, runway, hydraulic structures, aircraft parking,
and runway. The desire for their usage as being due to their unique properties
compared with other materials. The stability of fibres in cement concrete appears to
be good enough, but further long term tests are necessary to evaluate their durability
and performance under mechanical sustained load. This is owing to the dearth in
knowledge on the fibrous concrete particularly bio fibrous concrete composites (BFCC)
behaviour and response to compressive, flexural and uniaxial tensile sustained loads.
Therefore, an in-depth study into the creep performance of BFCC is necessitated to
understand the long term behaviour of this biodegradable and environmental friendly
construction product. This will avail the structural engineers and builders’ adequate
understanding and data for design construction purpose of this green concrete
product.
Medicinal properties of Malaysian Curcuma caesia have not been studied extensively, even though it has been used as a traditional remedy. This study examined the effects of various extraction temperatures (30, 40, 50, 60, 70oC) using a high frequency (40 kHz) ultrasonic extraction method, time (30,60,90 and 120 minutes), pH (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10) on the extraction yield of total phenolics and DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl) scavenging activities from C. caesia rhizome. Extraction was most efficient at pH 6.0, while the extraction time of 30 minutes and temperature of 60oC was the best in terms of total phenolics content and DPPH scavenging activity. This study is important due to its ability to improve extraction of total phenolics compound using ultrasonic extraction method while maintaining a relatively high DPPH scavenging activity of the extracts.
Lycopene is a well-known carotenoid, causing red color of fresh tomatoes. The significance of lycopene as antioxidant agent and coloring in the cosmetics, and its use in pharmaceutical and food industries has expanded in the recent years. Extraction of lycopene was improved effectively under solid state fermentation process; whereby, cellulase produced from the fermentation process was employed to degrade the cell-wall constituents, which facilitated the release of intracellular contents. The optimum conditions for the fermentation process were determined using Response Surface Methodology (RSM). The Facecentered Central Composite Design (FCCD) was employed to investigate the effects of three independent factors: moisture content in the range of 60 to 80 %, inoculum size ranging between 5 to 15% while the incubation time was set at 2, 3 and 4 days. Twenty runs of experiment were conducted and each one was repeated three times. The obtained data was analyzed using the Design Expert software v.6.0.8. Regression analysis showed that 94.56% of the variation was explained by the software. Under the optimized conditions, the highest lycopene yield was 307.2 µg/g when the moisture content was 80%, the inoculum size was 15% in 4 incubation days. The experimental values agreed with the predicted values, thus proving stability of the model used and the success of RSM. This study showed as to how fermentation can improve the extraction process by comparing the result with the control (extraction without fermentation) which was 0.8 µg/g.
Bioactive compounds are one of the natural products used especially for medicinal, pharmaceutical and food application. Increasing research performed on the extraction, isolation and identification of bioactive compounds, however non to date has explored on the identification of flavonoids classes. Therefore, this study was focused on the development of algorithm for rapid identification of flavonoids classes which are flavanone, flavone and flavonol and also their derivatives. Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy coupled with multivariate statistical data analysis, which is Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was utilized. The results exhibited that few significant wavenumber range provides the identification and characterization of the flavonoids classes based on PCA algorithm. The study concluded that FTIR coupled with PCA analysis can be used as a molecular fingerprint for rapid identification of flavonoids.
Although one of the major users of flocculants are water and wastewater treatment industries, flocculants are also used in various food industries. The chemical flocculants are preferred widely in these industries due to low production cost and fast production ability. However, the negative effects of the chemical flocculants should not be neglected to gain the economic benefits only. Therefore, the researchers are working to discover efficient and economical flocculants from biological sources. Several attempts have been made and are still being made to extract or produce bioflocculants from natural sources such as plants, bacteria, fungi, yeast, algae, etc. The review revealed that significant amount of work have been done in the past, in search of bioflocculant. However, commercially viable bioflocculants are yet to be marketed widely. With the advent of new biotechnologies and advances in genetic engineering, the researchers are hopeful to discover or develop commercially viable, safe and environmentfriendly bioflocculants.
In recent years, the search for natural, safe and effective therapies for the management of obesity has become important. The present study investigated the potential of brown seaweeds Sargassum oligocystum and Padina australis from Malaysian waters as natural alternatives for the management of obesity. Both seaweeds were macerated using acetone at room temperature for ten hours. The S. oligocystum extracts (SE) and P. australis extracts (PE) were then applied to 3T3-L1 cells during the differentiation stage and during the mature stage of the adipocyte life cycle to assess the effects of extracts on adipogenesis and adipolysis. Application of SE at 12.5 and 50 µg/ml to the cells decreased adipogenesis by 71.7%, and 84.8%, respectively, while cells treated with 12.5 and 50 µg/ml PE showed 85.7%, and 89.0% adipogenesis respectively, compared to control. Application of SE and PE to mature lipid cells stimulated adipolysis and the release of glycerol into the culture media. Application of SE at 12.5 and 50 µg µg/ ml in the cell media induced glycerol release by up to 88.6 and 93.0%, respectively, while PE increased glycerol release up to 92.9 and 95.6% respectively, compared to isoproterenol. This study demonstrates the potential of whole brown seaweed extracts from S. oligocystum and P. australis collected from Malaysian waters as natural anti- obesity agents. Incorporation of the brown seaweed into the diet as a functional food will be useful for prevention and treatment of obesity.
In nature, environmental factors highly influence the carotenoid composition in pumpkin plants and these factors were difficult to control; thus, carotenoid content is varied quantitatively and qualitatively. However, certain parameters can be controlled and this can be conducted in the laboratory through biogenesis manipulation. This approach uses environmental stress as a tool to alter the carotenoid pathway in the plants. The main objective of this study was to observe the inhibiting and enhancing effect of abiotic stress on individual carotenoid accumulation in pumpkin plants under light and dark conditions. The abiotic stresses used were plant elicitors which consisted of Ultra Violet light exposure, Polyethylene Glycol 4000, Salicylic Acid, and half strength nutrients using Murashige and Skoog Salt. After two weeks of treatments, the pumpkin leaves and stems were harvested, freeze dried and extracted to determine the carotenoids compound using High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC). Results showed that there was a significant difference (p