Surface sediments collected from two transects (30 sampling points) in the Kerteh mangrove forest had been analyzed for Co, Cu, Pb, Zn and Cr concentrations with the Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS). The average concentration of Co was 8.91±1.89 µg/g dry weight, Cu was 29.0±12.8 µg/g dry weight, Pb was 11.7±6.85 µg/g dry weight, Zn was 22.3±13.7 µg/g dry weight and Cr was 13.2±9.07 µg/g dry weight. Their concentrations are significantly higher near the front mangrove and decline as the sampling points of each transect near the back mangrove area. The calculated enrichment factors (EF) obtained for Zn and Cr can be considered to have the terigeneous in sources while Co, Cu and Pb, which had slightly higher value, were probably influenced by anthropogenic input.
The concentrations of heavy metals (Mn, Co, Cu and Cr) were determined in the surface sediments from Kemaman River estuary using Inductively Coupled Plasma – Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS). The relationship of heavy metal content with sediment particles size was studied. The average concentration of heavy metals are 597.8 μg/g dry weight, 16.0 μg/g dry weigh, 48.8 μg/g dry weight and 100.4 μg/g dry weight for Mn, Co, Cu and Cr, respectively. All metals showed low Enrichment Factor (EF) values (EF<1) when compared with Al which indicates that the elements in the sediment originated predominantly from crustal material or terigenous in origin. This study shows that there is a positive correlation between the mean particle size and the studied elements.
Human show cruelty to fish during exploiting, culturing, killing, experimentation and amusement. Presently, overexploitation of marine fishes is a serious problem worldwide. More than 50% of total fish production is now raised in aquafarms where many fish suffer from parasitic infections, diseases, and debilitating injuries in culture systems. Every year, millions of fish are caught in nets and on hooks. Many of them are tortured just for sports. Fishes are also regularly used for scientific experiments. Many of them are killed by unethical ways. Among all animals, human is the main culprits in causing harms to animals including fishes by damaging their ecosystems. To secure animal rights, modern bio-ethics started to be developed in the last century. The principle of modern bio-ethics is very similar to the principle of Islamic bio-ethics. Therefore, modern bio-ethics might be guided by Islamic bio-ethics, which was well established in the 7thcentury. According to Islam, God gave the human being responsibility to look after animals, to protect them, and not to abuse or threaten them. Human is not permitted to kill animals just for sports or amusements. God created the universe in a perfect balance and human should not disturb this. Therefore, human may exploit and culture food (fish and other organisms) and ornaments without destroying aquatic ecosystems. Islam prescribes a set of rules to treat animals with the utmost kindness and compassion. However, Islamic direction can be integrated with science to ensure minimum stress, pain and suffering when killing animals including fishes.
It is important to monitor the concentration of toxic metals in the Sungai Kuantan as it serves many communities in terms of domestic, fisheries and agriculture purpose. In order to determine the distributions of dissolved and particulate As and Hg in Sungai Kuantan and evaluate its changes temporally and spatially, water samples were collected from the surface and bottom layers in a grid of 9 stations from estuary towards the upstream of Sungai Kuantan from May 2012 till October 2012. The dissolved metals were pre-concentrated using Chelex-100 while particulate metals were digested using Teflon bomb and subsequently were analyzed using ICP-MS. Dissolved As ranging from 4.650 to 36.894 µg L-1 while dissolved Hg ranging from BDL to 0.011 µg L-1. Particulate As and Hg varied from 0.650 to 86.087 mg L-1 and BDL to 5.873 mg L-1, respectively. Higher concentration of the dissolved elements were found mainly in October 2012 and particulate elements concentration mostly higher in May 2012. The source of the studied metals in the river may be the run-off from the effluent discharges and other natural sources. The toxic elements studied in Sungai Kuantan waters were still below the Interim Marine Water Quality Standard (INWQS) permissible limits.
Bottom sediment samples from 19 stations of Terengganu River estuary were analyzed for the concentration of Co, Cu, Zn and Pb. The average concentration of Co, Cu, Zn and Pb were 7.01 ± 1.26 µg/g dry weight, 36.7 ± 25.9 µg/g dry weight, 83.3 ± 52.4 µg/g dry weight dan 122.5 ± 25. 7 µg/g dry weight, respectively. Generally, the concentration of Co, Cu, Zn and Pb at present are not widespread enough as to have much influence on pollution of that area. The concentration of these metals increased with the decrease of mean size, suggesting their association with the fine fraction of the sediment.
Sampel sedimen dasar yang diperolehi daripada 19 stesen penyampelan di muara Sungai Terengganu telah dianalis is untuk mendapatkan taburan kepekatan Co, Cu, Zn dan Pb. Purata kepekatan bagi Co, Cu, Zn dan Pb adalah masing-masing 7.01 ± 1.26 µg/g berat kering, 36.7 ± 25.9 µg/g berat kering, 83.3 ± 52.4 µglg berat kering dan 122.5 ± 25.7 µg/g berat kering. Secara kesimpulannya, tahap pencemaran Co, Cu, Zn dan Pb adalah masih terkawal dan tidak menunjukkan tahap pencemaran logam berat yang serius. Kepekatan Logam didapati meningkat dengan pengurangan niLai min saiz partikel dan ini mengesyorkan hubungan logam yang baik terhadap sedimen yang lebih halus.
This study aimed at documenting the potentially toxic metal levels in oysters from the aquaculture area of Peninsular Malaysia east coast. Concentrations of essential (Zn and Cu) and non-essential (Pb and Cd) heavy metals were analyzed in total soft tissue, different sex, selected organs and shells of Crassostrea sp. from cultured and wild area of Setiu Wetlands. The heavy metal contents among the sampling sites are statistically not significant (p>0.05) indicating no systematic and site-specific trend between cultured and wild environment. Zinc was the highest metal detected in total soft tissue, sex and shells with the mean concentration of 28.55±6.76, 30.55±3.89 and 8.22±2.98 μg/g, respectively. The analysed metals were highly accumulated in gills than other organs with the mean value of 74.11±13.03 μg/g of Zn, 4.82±0.82 μg/g of Cu, 0.61±0.06 μg/g of Pb and 0.45±0.1 μg/g of Cd. The varying metals content in the different soft tissues might be due to the different affinity of metals that bind with metallothioneins. The metal levels measured in oysters did not exceed the maximum permissible limits for Zn, Cu, Pb and Cd. The measured metal levels may represent baseline values reflecting background conditions that contain a certain degree of human impact.
Bottom sediment samples from 30 stations of Pahang River estuary collected in April 2008 were analyzed for the concentration of Pb and Cu using the Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS). The average concentrations of Pb and Cu were 74.31 ± 22.97 μg/g dry weights and 18.65 ± 7.65 μg/g dry weights, respectively. In this study, the concentrations were significantly higher near the mouth river and declined as the sampling points were further away from the estuary. Generally, the concentrations of heavy metals were relatively low when compare with other studies in Malaysia. However, the calculated enrichment factors (EF) obtained for Pb, has a slightly higher value, and was probably influenced by anthropogenic input. The concentration for both metals increased with the decrease of mean size, suggesting their association with the fine fraction of the sediments.
Bottom sediment samples from the Kuala Sepetang River, Taiping, Perak were analysed for the grain size in order to understand better the sedimentation processes in the estuary and along the river. The mean, standard deviation and skewness value of each sample were calculated by the moment’s method where each of every grain plot data was used to obtain the statistical information concerning the sedimentary population. In this study, there is no significant (p<0.05) relationship between sediment characteristic with the seasonal changes, but the mean particle size became a relatively smaller size during the monsoon season. Finer sediments (7.4 Ø) were dominated during monsoon season while coarser sediments (6.2 Ø) dominated during the dry season. The characteristics of deposited sediments at each station are much dependent upon the combination of physical forces such as freshwater runoff, tidal currents and waves.
Morphometric analysis was carried out to find out changes in the growth pattern of male and female stomatopod, Harpiosquilla raphidea. Six morphometric relationships were examined on 105 males and 105 females, ranging in size from 103 to 207 mm and from 104 to 222 mm in total length, respectively. In both the sexes, the relative growth of carapace length, propodus length of raptorial claw and total weight in relation to total length was found positively allometric. Telson width in both the sexes and abdomen width in males showed slightly negative allometry, while the abdomen width of females showed slightly positive allometry, indicating some variation in the growth between sexes which could be attributed to the energy requirement for maturation in females. The propodus of females was also found to be bigger than that of males. It is quite interesting as males only have larger chela in other crustaceans. It has a functional significance in that it is of immense help at the time of intense feeding during maturation of oocytes which requires higher energy.
The selected trace metals in the soft tissue of Thais clavigera from 11 sampling sites along the coastal waters of the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia were studied. Significant inter-spatial variations in trace metals were recorded. Sites with relatively high concentrations of the contaminant metals Hg, Cd, Pb and Zn are correlated to their close proximity to industrial and urban sites or to boating and aquaculture activities. This could possibly be contributed by the high growth of industrial activities like port and sewage release. Interspatial comparison with previous studies indicated lower measurement. Meanwhile, comparison with other studies around the world also designated lower values except for Zn. The metal accumulation patterns indicated an enrichment of essential metals over non-essential metals. Comparison of metal concentration with maximum permissible limits of toxic metals in food established in different countries, as well as Malaysian Food Act 1983 and Food Regulations 1985 Fourteen Schedule, indicated the values were well within safety levels.
Surface sediment samples from 2 transects (20 sampling points) of Tanjung Lumpur mangrove forest were analyzed for the concentrations of Pb, Cu, Co and Mn. In this study, the average concentrations of Pb, Cu, Co and Mn were 44.41 μg/g dry weight, 32.79 μg/g dry weight, 5.79 μg/g dry weight and 117.73 μg/g dry weight, respectively. The calculated enrichment factors (EF) obtained for Co and Mn can be considered to have the terigeneous in sources while Pb and Cu are considered to have anthropogenic input.
A spatial distribution study was carried out to investigate the influence of some environmental factors to planktons using collected samples from the Sungai Pulai estuary, near to the Singapore boarder. Six stations chosen for the field sampling were Port Tanjung Pelepas (S1), Tanjung Bin Charcoal Plant (S2), seagrasses of Pulau Merambong (S4) and SecondLink Bridge (S5) and mangrove areas (S3, S6). There is no significant difference of phytoplankton abundance (p>0.05) between stations. Instead, it differs significantly at the level of p<0.05; p= 0.0001 (Two tailed, t=14.10 df=34) between sampling session. In contrast, there is a significant difference of zooplankton abundance (p<0.05) in the sampling stations (χ2 = 17.3,(5)), but there is no significant difference (p>0.05; p=0.8966) between the sampling session (Two tailed, t=0.1310, df=34). Biplot analysis shows that most species are associated with the stations except for Protoperidinium sp., Lithodesmia sp. and Alexendrium sp. Copepod species including Microcalanus sp., Calanus sp. and Temora sp. are associated with S5. Paracalanus sp., Euterpina sp., Tigriopus sp., Oithona sp. and Pseudocalanus sp. are associated with S1, S2 and S4. The planktons are correlated with the temperature (Pearson’s correlation, r2=-0.897) and salinity (Pearson’s correlation, r2=0.9416) in March but no correlation is found in November sampling session. The results indicated the important role of certain environmental factors, namely the salinity and temperature to the distribution of the planktons in Sungai Pulai estuary.
In this work, batch adsorption experiments were carried out to investigate the suitability of prepared acid activated carbons in removing heavy metal ions such as nickel(II), lead(II) and chromium(VI). Acid activated carbons were obtained from oil palm and coconut shells using phosphoric acid under similar activation process while the differences lie either in impregnation condition or in both pretreatment and impregnation conditions. Prepared activated carbons were modified by dispersing hydrated iron oxide. The adsorption equilibrium data for nickel(II) and lead(II) were obtained from adsorption by the prepared and commercial activated carbons. Langmuir and Freundlich models fit the data well. Prepared activated carbons showed higher adsorption capacity for nickel(II) and lead(II). The removal of chromium(VI) was studied by the prepared acid activated, modified and commercial activated carbons at different pH. The isotherms studies reveal that the prepared activated carbon performs better in low concentration region while the commercial ones in the high concentration region. Thus, a complete adsorption is expected in low concentration by the prepared activated carbon. The kinetics data for Ni(II), Pb(II) and Cr(VI) by the best selected activated carbon fitted very well to the pseudo-second-order kinetic model.
The aim of this study was to prepare a model protein, bovine serum albumin (BSA) loaded double-walled microspheres using a fast degrading glucose core, hydroxyl-terminated poly(lactide-co-glycolide) (Glu-PLGA) and a moderate-degrading carboxyl-terminated PLGA polymers to reduce the initial burst release and to eliminate the lag phase from the release profile of PLGA microspheres. The double-walled microspheres were prepared using a modified water-in-oil-in-oil-in-water (w/o/o/w) method and single-polymer microspheres were prepared using a conventional water-in-oil-in-water (w/o/w) emulsion solvent evaporation method. The particle size, morphology, encapsulation efficiency, thermal properties, in vitro drug release and structural integrity of BSA were evaluated in this study. Double-walled microspheres prepared with Glu-PLGA and PLGA polymers with a mass ratio of 1:1 were non-porous, smooth-surfaced, and spherical in shape. A significant reduction of initial burst release was achieved for the double-walled microspheres compared to single-polymer microspheres. In addition, microspheres prepared using Glu-PLGA and PLGA polymers in a mass ratio of 1:1 exhibited continuous BSA release after the small initial burst without any lag phase. It can be concluded that the double-walled microspheres made of Glu-PLGA and PLGA polymers in a mass ratio of 1:1 can be a potential delivery system for pharmaceutical proteins.