Recent evidence has exhibited dietary influence on the manifestation of depressive-like behaviour induced by stressor tasks. The present study examined the effects of Tualang honey supplement administered with the goal of preventing or attenuating the occurrence of depressive-like behaviour in male rats subjected to noise stress. Forty-eight adult male rats were randomly divided into the following groups: i) nonstressed with placebo, ii) nonstressed with honey, iii) stressed with placebo, and iv) stressed with honey. Tualang honey (200 mg/kg body weight) was administered for 28 days. Stressed rats were subjected to loud noise 100 dB(A) 4 hours daily for 14 days. Forced swimming test was performed to evaluate depressive-like behaviour. Stressed control rats displayed significant increase in depressive-like behaviour, serum adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), corticosterone, and brain oxidative stress markers levels, with significant decrease in antioxidant enzymes activities and total antioxidant status. Honey supplementation successfully counteracted the stress effects whereby the honey treated rats exhibited significant decrease in depressive-like behaviour and levels of ACTH, corticosterone, and oxidative stress markers, with significant increase in antioxidant enzymes activities and total antioxidant status. In conclusion, Tualang honey mediated antidepressant-like effects in stressed rats, possibly acting via restoration of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis through its antioxidant properties.
This paper aims to analyze the distinction of premium setting rates by taking into account the risk
taken by conventional and Family Takaful. This study employed the Net Single and Annual Level
Premium formula, and the data were analyzed using a numerical simulation. We found that the
conventional and Takaful insurance systems utilize similar methods in the calculation of insurance
premium when considering pure risk faced by the participant or insured. However, both systems have
their own unique characteristics. The conventional and Family Takaful utilize historical data, such as
mortality rate, expected return rate, expected costs and expected amount of claims. The conventional
insurance is calculated to mitigate or minimize the risk of the insurance company against an amount of
claim faced in the future as long as the insurance is enforced until the contract ends. On the other
hand, the Family Takaful is intended to share fair value among participants in determining
benevolence through Tabarru premium. Every participant must pay for Tabarru premium to support
one another so that there is sufficient amount to cover unexpected claims among them and to uphold
mutual fund as evidence for the sense of mutual co-operation and brotherhood among participants.
Mini purse seine has a major contribution in increasing production of small pelagic catches in Pelabuhan Perikanan Pantai (PPP) Muncar. This research aimed to investigate the effectiveness and efficiency of mini one-boat and two-boat purse seine in Bali Strait, Indonesia. This research was conducted in Mei 2018 in Muncar, East Java, Indonesia. In this study, survey was used to get the data by distributed the questioners to the fisherman. The primary data are total catch composition, fork length, individual weight of total catch and operation time of both fishing gears. Data were analysed by main catch and bycatch proportion, legal size proportion and catch rate. The results showed that the mini two-boat purse seine had a greater catch volume compared to the mini one-boat purse seine. The bycatch composition dominates in both fishing gear. The proportion of legal-size catching is 67% of the total. The fork length is not significantly different and for the total catches is significantly different. The catching rate of the mini purse seine one boat catch rate is lower at 4,048.67 kg/hour, compared to the mini two-boat purse seine which is 9,189.18 kg/hour.
In the current study, a total of 86 soccer’s players with mean age of 14 years drawn from Terengganu soccer academy were tested in performing 10 parameters aiming at determining the performance of those players based on assessing the contribution of each activity and its corresponding significant level. The 10 performance related parameters involved anthropometry (BMI), fitness test (agility, coordination, muscular endurance (push and sit up), power, YoYo level), and football skill test (dribbling with ball, dribbling without ball and juggling). All the parameters testing is carried out based on international standard and performed by well-trained staff. The Pearson correlation analysis was used to achieve the objective in this study. Result shows a positive correlation between the two types of muscular parameters; the power is influenced by BMI and coordination; the specific football tests are highly impacted by the power and agility. The coefficient of determination R^2 and the significance level p-values show that the parameters that can be significantly considered are the anthropometric BMI (0.020), agility (0.025), muscular endurance (0.039 and 0.043), power (0.039), special football test without the ball (0.041), and juggling (0.046). The coordination, YoYo, football special test with the ball were not found to be significantly accounted for preparing the young players to achieve the required performance. Based on the results of the coefficient of determination and the significance p-values of the parameters, a model was proposed to determine the highest and lowest parameters that play important roles in the selection of young players.
International students usually experience a change in body weight and eating behaviour after
migrating to a host country. The aim of this study is to determine the factors associated with body
weight changes among Nigerian postgraduate students at Unversiti Sultan Zainal Abidin (UniSZA),
Malaysia. A prospective study was conducted for six months to determine the association between
body weight changes and socio-demographic, eating behavior, physical activity, dietary intake and
quality of life. A total of 82 students (76 male and six females) completed a set of self-administered
questionnaires, and their weight and height were measured. Descriptive statistic and paired t-test were
carried out to analyze the data (IBM SPSS Version 20.0). Multiple linear regression analysis was
conducted to determine the factors. Body weight significantly increased by 2.3 ± 0.5 kg after 6 months.
Being an art student (β=1.67, p=0.006), being a female (β=-2.68, p=0.009), consuming breakfast once
a week (β=5.10, P=
Piper betel is a member of the family Piperaceae, commonly known as Sirih (Malaysia and
Indonesia), Paan (India and Bangladesh), Betel (English) and Phlu (Thailand). It is widely found and
grown in India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, other Southeast Asian and East African
countries. Piper betel is widely used throughout the world even in modern days due to its known
medicinal properties. Betel plant contains various biologically active compounds, which are
responsible for its numerous pharmacological actions. The therapeutic profile reveals Piper betel to
have a high potential for treating many diseases and conditions such as chronic renal disease,
atherosclerosis, and diabetes mellitus. Further studies of betel plant are recommended to focus on
the variety of metabolic activities in human, thus, improving its usage medically that will be beneficial
to humanity.
Extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) is categorized as expensive oil due to high-quality nutritional value. Unfortunately, EVOO is easily adulterated with other low-quality edible oils. Therefore, this study was done to differentiate and analyze the adulteration of EVOO with other edible oils using Attenuated Total Reflectance-Fourier Transform Infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy. The study was used several edible oils included canola oil, corn oil, sunflower oil, and soybean oil as an adulterant for EVOO. The adulterant EVOO samples were prepared by mixing with dissimilar concentrations of the solely edible oils (20 %, 40 %, 60 % and 80 % (v/v)). The main functional groups of EVOO and other edible oils are O-H, C-H, C=C and C=O groups were assigned around 3500 cm-1, 2925 cm-1, 3006 cm-1 and 1745 cm-1 wavenumbers, respectively. From the comparison of EVOO and other adulterant edibles oil spectra, it showed that the EVOO has the lowest absorbance intensity at around 3006 cm-1 represented double bond which is closely related to the composition of oil sample. The adulteration of EVOO was evaluated by analysing the changes in the absorbance based on the linear regression analysis graph of the bands at 3006 and 2925 cm-1 and the limit of detection (LOD) was measured. The graph of A3008/A2925 with good relative coefficients (R2) and lower LOD is more favourable than the linear regression graph of A3006 versus percentage of edible oils added in EVOO. This study showed that ATR-FTIR spectroscopy is a convenient tool for analysing the adulteration of EVOO.
This study describes the review on maintenance related issues during design and construction stage
within construction industry. The paper highlights the causes and errors made during design and
construction stage and their impact during the operation/production/occupancy stage as well as the
maintenance costs associated with it. The study identifies the mistakes in the working processes within
design and construction stage leading to the errors that affect the durability, performance, reliability,
maintainability, availability and safety of the systems. The paper presents a comprehensive review of
the published literatures, journals, technical papers in the related areas in the construction field. The
review highlights the new approaches and decision framework which link the designers and
construction personnel that could reduce the errors and defects in construction which then lead to
maintenance issues and asset management. The factors of accessibility, materials, design and
documentation standardization have been discussed thoroughly for better understanding in improving
maintenance and physical asset management in project commissioning.
Family support has a strong impact on individuals and there is no exception in substance abuse
recovery process. Family support manages to play a positive role in substance abuse problems. The
present study deals with the developing model of family support substance abuser with the
combination method of Geographic Information System (GIS) and statistical models. The data used
for this study was collected from seven districts in Terengganu with a constant number of
respondents. 35 respondents for each district were involved in this study. It was then processed using
factor analysis (FA) to develop index of family support. By using the developed indices, GIS tool was
used to plot the distribution map of family support indices according to each form of family support.
The result indicated that the highest index for all form of family support abuser was located in Besut
district. High level of family support is essential as an effort for rehabilitation process of substance
abusers.
Assessing the repeat rate is crucial to reduce unnecessary dose to the patient by identifying the major cause for repeating the x-rays exposure to the patient and apply corrective measures. To analyse the repeat rate of routine lower limb projections in direct digital radiography (DR) from general radiology department of Pantai Klang Hospital. 26 months retrospective repeated radiograph was acquired from Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS) at Hospital Pantai Klang. The retrieved radiographs were grouped based on the reason for the i radiographs being rejected which are incorrect positioning, incorrect collimation, patient movement, incorrect exposure factors, artefact, and other reasons. Total repeated radiographs retrieved for basic lower limbs projections were 13616. Knee was the highest repeted examination and the lowest repeat rate was tibia fibula. (repeat rate: knee = 1.04%, tibia fibula = 0.57%). incorrect positioning is the major causes for repeat exposure for all examinations type, followed by incorrect collimation, other categories, centring ray error, incorrect exposure factors and artifact.
The hydrology hydraulic model is established to assess environmental information on hydrology which
can be used to investigate causes of various environmental problems at the river and natural lake
catchment. This study reports on sediment concentrations at a river using a gravimetric method to
investigate the hydrology system at a lake catchment. The measurement was carried out at the
upstream, midstream, and downstream stations on the river in normal, rainy and post-rainy seasons.
The stations are located along the Chini River, which are connected to a catchment lake (located at
latitude 3°26’36.41”E-3°27’03.26”E and longitude 102°54’31.94”N-102°53’35.49”N). From the
measurements, it is estimated that on average 787.621 tonne/km2 of sediment is transferred into the
natural lake via Chini River annually. The correlation of statistical analysis between the sediment load
and discharge study was very significant (R2 = 0.980). There is a linear relation between the area of
the catchment and sediment load of the connecting river as supported by other studies in Malaysia.
The outcome of the study suggests that the high sedimentation is due to land use activity, existence of
the dam at the downstream of Chini River that traps the sediment, reverse flow from the Pahang River
into Chini River and riverbank erosion factors. From this study, the sediment control steps are
suggested such as creating conservation partially at the lake catchment, modifying the dam system,
riverbank erosion control, and application of “Monkey Cheek” system. These sediment control steps
may help to clean up the high suspended sediment at the whole lake system area, hence solving and
mitigating the environmental problems in the natural lake catchment.
The current and escalating extent of soil degradation, water scarcity and environmental concern
plaguing agricultural productivity, demands re-assessing the direction of food production. Aquaponics
is a concept relatively new to modern food production methods and can contribute to food security.
This study was conducted to establish sustainable aquaculture systems that maximize benefits and
minimize the accumulation of detrimental compounds and other types of negative impacts on both
natural and social environments. This study carried out at an average inflow rate of 1.28 m/day to
evaluate the operation of the aquaponics recirculation system (ARS) on nutrients removal and growth
and yield of African catfish as well as water spinach. A special design of ARS was used to provide
nitrification of fishery wastewater, where the combination of sands and gravels in hydroponics trough,
providing both surfaces for biofuel development and cultivation area for plants. Removal efficiencies
of 5-day biochemical oxygen demand (BOD5), total suspended solids (TSS), total ammonia nitrogen
(TAN), nitrite-nitrogen (NO2-N), nitrate-nitrogen (NO3-N), and orthophosphate (PO4
3-
) were 82%, 89%,
93%, 94%, 81%, and 80%, respectively. The feed conversion ratio (FCR) and specific growth rate
(SGR) of African catfish were 1.08 and 3.34% day-1
, respectively. The average water spinach
production was 3.56 kg per m2
. This study showed that ARS is a method of producing crop along with
a healthy protein source and among the best alternatives for achieving economic and environmental
sustainability.
The importance of rapid ambulance response to emergency medical crises is undeniable. An early
access to advanced care is crucial to saving a life. Modern computerised call centre and the hospitalbased ambulance services are believed to enhance the quality of service delivery. However, whether
it will further reduce the ambulance response time is still debatable. A cross-sectional study was
conducted in June 2012 until July 2012 at three selected tertiary hospitals in Malaysia. The
ambulance response time was expressed in a median and interquartile range (IQR) and MannWhitney U test was used to determine the associations between types of ambulance and
computerised call centre system versus voice only. Wilcoxon Rank Sign Test was used to assess
the significance of means difference. A hospital-based ambulance had the median time of 0.19
minutes while community-based ambulance had the median time of 0.20 minutes (The Z score -
0.916, p-value - 0.360). The hospital with computer call centre had the median time of 0.19 minutes
while hospital without computer call centre had the median of 0.20 minutes (The Z score - 0.816, P
value - 0.414).The response time of hospital-based ambulance equipped with computerised call
centre system was comparable in three selected tertiary hospitals in Malaysia.
In this work, a new model for federation data grid system called Sub-Grid-Federation was designed to
improve access latency by accessing data from the nearest possible sites. The strategy in optimising
data access was based on the process of searching into the area identified as ‘Network Core Area’
(NCA). The performance of access latency in Sub-Grid-Federation was tested based on the
mathematical proving and simulated using OptorSim simulator. Four case studies were carried out and
tested in Optimal Downloading Replication Strategy (ODRS) and the Sub-Grid-Federation. The results
show that Sub-Grid-Federation is 20% better in terms of access latency and 21% better in terms of
reducing remotes sites access compared to ODRS. The results indicate that the Sub-Grid-Federation
is a better alternative for the implementation of collaboration and data sharing in data grid system.
This paper proposes the use of bootstrap, robust and fuzzy multiple linear regressions method in
handling general insurance in order to get improved results. The main objective of bootstrapping is to
estimate the distribution of an estimator or test statistic by resampling one's data or a model estimated
from the data under conditions that hold in a wide variety of econometric applications. In addition,
bootstrap also provides approximations to distributions of statistics, coverage probabilities of confidence
intervals, and rejection probabilities of hypothesis tests that produce accurate results. In this paper, we
emphasize the combining and modelling using bootstrapping, robust and fuzzy regression methodology.
The results show that alternative methods produce better results than multiple linear regressions (MLR)
model.
Ahmad Fuad Ab Ghani, Mohamad Kamarul Anwar Sahar, Muhammad Ridzuan Husyairi Azmi, Nurul Izzati Medon, Muhammad Syazwan Samsuri, Muhammad Syurabil Abdani
There are several types of grating, such as platform, bridge decks and filters. In design process, there
are several important terms that have to be prioritised; engineering design, strength to weight ratio, cost,
maintainability, reparability etcetera. Advanced materials, such as composite materials offer great
strength to weight ratio and high mechanical properties for grating fabrication. Furthermore the
reparability and maintenance problems could be solved as it is anti corrosion and the long service life
attribute of composite makes it a great design material for replacement of conventional steel or
aluminium. Bio composites, such as bamboo and coir fiber yield advantage in terms of less cost and
abundance availability compared to commercial unidirectional composite materials, such as glass fiber
reinforced polymer (GFRP) and carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) which is considerably
expensive yet possess higher mechanical properties. This papers presents a conceptual design of
grating design utilizing bamboo composite as material. Pugh method has been chosen as design criteria
selection matrix in finalizing the design of industrial grating for scaffolding (Pugh, 1991).
The study of Representative Volume Element (RVE) on Composite Material has been performed in the aim to obtain the relation and effect of fiber volume fraction on its tensile properties which is one of the important mechanical properties for composite designers in automotive and aerospace community.The properties such as fibre content, orientation, dimension of constituent fibres (diameter), level of intermixing of fibres, interface bonding between fibre and matrix, and arrangement of fibres between different types of fibres, influences the mechanical properties of hybrid composite.Representative Volume Element (RVE) for each constituent Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) and Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymer (GFRP) assumed isotropic behavior for carbon fibre, glass fibre and epoxy resin matrix and assumed to be perfectly bonded interface between fibre and matrix region i.e. strain compatibility at the interface. The scope of study on the micro mechanical modelling via representative volume element (RVE) is limited only to unidirectional composites.The result of parametric study performed deduces that incremental volume fraction of carbon and glass respectively will increase the E11 (Modulus of Elasticity in Tensile Direction) and enhance the tensile properties of both CFRP and GFRP.
Nanofiltration membranes technology commonly used for wastewater treatment especially
wastewater containing charged and/or uncharged species. Commonly, textile wastewater
possesses high chemical oxygen demand (COD) and non-biodegradable compounds such as
pigments and dyes which lead to environmental hazard and serious health problem. Therefore, the
objective of this study was to investigate the effects of hydrophilic surfactant on the preparation and
performance of Active Nanofiltration (ANF) membrane. The polymeric ANF membranes were
prepared via dry/wet phase inversion technique by immersion precipitation process. The
Cetyletrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) as cationic surfactant was added in casting solution at
concentrations from 0 to 2.5 wt%. The synthesized membrane performance was evaluated in terms
of pure water permeation (PWP) and dye rejection. The experimental data showed that the
membrane demonstrated good increment of PWP ranging from 0.27 to 10.28 L/m2
h at applied
pressure from 100 to 500kPa, respectively. Meanwhile, the ANF membranes achieved high
removal of Methyl Blue and Reactive Black 5 dye up to 99.5% and 91.6%, respectively.
The purpose of this study is to determine spatial pattern recognition of school performance based on
children’s anthropometric and motor skills component. This study involved 94 primary schools with a
total 2237 male students aged 7.30±0.28 years in Pahang, Malaysia. The parameters of anthropometric
(weight and height) and motor component included lower muscular power (standing broad jump),
flexibility (sit and reach), coordination (hand wall toss) and speed (20 meter run) were selected. Cluster
Analysis (CA) and Discriminant Analysis (DA) under Multivariate Method and technique of Kriging
Interpolation in Geographic Interpolation Software (GIS) were used. CA revealed two clusters of school
performance. There are a total 34 high performance schools (HPS) and 60 low performance schools
(LPS). Then, the assigned groups were treated as independent variable (IV) while anthropometric and
motor parameters were treated as dependent variable (DV) in DA. Standard mode of DA obtained
95.74% correctness of classification matrix with three discriminated variables (height, standing broad
jump and 20 meter run) out of six variables. Meanwhile, forward and backward stepwise mode of DA
discriminated only one (standing broad jump) out of six variables with 96.81% of classification
correctness. The map output of Kriging interpolation has shown graphically the pattern of discriminated
variables that greatly influence school performance. It exposed the ability of children motor skills
development in particular region is higher than another region.
The study attempts to use multivariate analysis to evaluate the profile of male player for developments of Long-Term Talent in Sports (LT-TiS) model based on anthropometric and motor fitness components. Data of anthropometric and motor fitness included power, flexibility, coordination and speed were obtained from 2019 respondents aged 7.32±0.52 year. Data interpretations were carried out using multivariate analysis of Principle Components Analysis (PCA) and Discriminant analysis (DA). The adequacy of sampling has been measured using Bartletts tests on sphericity and Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) has been used, with this conformance of running the Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Then, Discriminant Analysis (DA) were used to validate the correctness of group classification by LT-TiS model. Then, Discriminant Analysis (DA) were used to validate the correctness of group classification by LT-TiS. As a result, two factors with eigenvalues greater than 1 were extracted which accounted for 55.00% of the variations present in the original variables was found. The two factors were used to obtain the factor score coefficients explained by 27.86% and 27.21% of the variations in player performance respectively. Factor 1 revealed high factor loading on motor fitness compared to factor 2 as it was significantly related to anthropometrics. A model was obtained using standardized coefficient of factor 1. Three clusters of performance were shaped in view by categorizing; LT−TiS≥65%, 40%≤LT−TiS