In the pursuit of advancing health and rehabilitation, the quintessence of human motion recognition technology has been underscored through its quantitative contributions to physical performance assessment. This research delineates the inception of a novel fuzzy comprehensive evaluation-based recognition method that stands at the forefront of such innovative endeavours. By synergistically fusing multi-sensor data and advanced classification algorithms, the proposed system offers a granular quantitative analysis with implications for health and fitness monitoring, particularly rehabilitation processes. Our methodological approach, grounded in the modal separation technique and Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD), effectively distills the motion acceleration component from raw accelerometer data, facilitating the extraction of intricate motion patterns. Quantitative analysis revealed that our integrated framework significantly amplifies the accuracy of motion recognition, achieving an overall recognition rate of 90.03 %, markedly surpassing conventional methods, such as Support Vector Machines (SVM), Decision Trees (DT), and K-Nearest Neighbors (KNN), which hovered around 80 %. Moreover, the system demonstrated an unprecedented accuracy of 97 % in discerning minor left-right swaying motions, showcasing its robustness in evaluating subtle movement nuances-a paramount feature for rehabilitation and patient monitoring. This marked precision in motion recognition heralds a new paradigm in health assessment, enabling objective and scalable analysis pertinent to individualized therapeutic interventions. The experimental evaluation accentuates the system's adeptness at navigating the dichotomy between complex, intense motions and finer, subtler movements with a high fidelity rate. It substantiates the method's utility in delivering sophisticated, data-driven insights for rehabilitation trajectory monitoring.
PIP: In Peninsular Malaysia, while the female population aged 15-19 years registered a growth of some 240,000 persons between 1966-1984, the number of births occurring to teenage mothers has decreased by 15,176 from 33,348 to 18,172 during the same period. In 1966, teenage births constituted some 10.8% of the total births but has declined to 4.7% by 1984. A breakdown of the 1984 data by detailed age groups shows that only 0.9% of the teenage births had actually occurred among those below 15 years of age. The declining trend in teenage births, particularly the higher order births among the very young mothers, augurs well for the improvement in family welfare. However, in order to safeguard the health and welfare of mothers and children, concerted efforts should continue to be undertaken to integrate population, family health and family life education into the school curriculum.
PIP: Knowledge about contraception was examined in relation to selected socioeconomic variables. A total of 2567 currently married women aged 15-49 years residing in Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya were interviewed. The majority of the women knew of at least 1 contraceptive method. An index termed Contraceptive Knowledge Score (CKS) was used to measure the level of knowledge about contraception. The CKS achieved differed significantly by age, area of residence and ethnic group. The other socioeconomic variables significantly associated with CKS are schooling, occupation, income, childhood residence and age at marriage. These relationships persisted even after adjusting for differences in age, ethnicity and area of residence. Overall the CKS attained have a wide range and there is no significant difference of the mean CKS attained, between users and non-users of contraceptives.
Objectives Ageing is often associated with deteriorating mental and physical health and the need for long-term care, creating a fear of ageing. We investigated what people fear most in terms of disabling chronic diseases and their concerns regarding having long-term illnesses. Methods Data were obtained from an online survey of 518 respondents aged 40 years and older residing in Malaysia, which was based on a convenience sample collected in May 2015 to January 2016. Data were analyzed using chi-squared tests and multinomial logistic regression. Results Of the most dreaded diseases, heart disease and cancer are life-threatening; however, dementia, diabetes, and hypertension persist and have a disabling effect for a long time. While there were variations in the diseases feared most across sex, ethnicity, and place of residence, the biggest worry for all respondents with regard to having a long-term illness was that they would become a burden to their family, a concern that superseded fear of dying. Conclusions We found our survey respondents had a fear of chronic diseases and placing a burden on others. Thus, there is a need to provide motivation for people to adopt a healthy lifestyle, to remain healthy.
The occurrence of Setaria digitata in a horse is reported for the first time in Malaysia. An 8-year-old Thoroughbred cross mare was referred to the University Veterinary Clinic with the primary complaint of corneal opacity and excessive eye discharge. After initial treatment with Terramycin eye ointment, corneal opacity cleared partially to reveal a moving thread-like cylindrical worm in the anterior chamber of the eye. The parasite was successfully removed surgically, and examination under the light microscope revealed that the isolated worm (length = 45 mm) was a 5th stage larva of S. digitata based on morphological criteria. Confirmation of the species of the worm was through molecular methods. The 12S rRNA gene was PCR-amplified, and the purified amplicon was directly sequenced. Phylogenetic analyses revealed that the isolated roundworm showed 100% sequence similarity with that of S. digitata in NCBI GenBank database (Accession no.: KY284626.1). This report is the first confirmed case of equine ocular setariasis by S. digitata in Malaysia. The current study provides evidence that S. digitata is an etiological agent of ocular infection and its presence in Malaysia.
The objective of this study is to investigate the feasibility of formaldehyde catcher as termites repellent. Single-layered UF-bonded particleboard was post-treated with formaldehyde catcher and heat respectively. Besides that, some boards were also produced with the formaldehyde catcher was added into the resin during the blending process, called add-in method. Particleboard post-treated with formaldehyde catcher reported the most severe attack. Heat-treated particleboard showed slightly better durability than the control blocks while the add-in catcher showed the best durability among three methods. A valid test was obtained as the termites survived the first week of the test. However, all the termites were found dead at the end of the test.
Ticks exert a significant economic impact on the livestock industry, particularly in Asian regions. Presently, chemical acaricides constitute the primary method employed to combat tick infestations in livestock, but their use carries adverse environmental consequences. Overreliance on acaricides has contaminated milk and meat products with chemical residues while fostering tick resistance to these agents due to improper and intensive application. Various alternative methods have been explored, including using vaccines to manage tick populations. However, the efficacy of these treatments varies and is often limited when applied separately. Among these alternatives, entomopathogenic fungi like Metarhizium anisopliae appear to be a promising candidate for tick population control. This fungus can be used independently and in conjunction with other products. This review article explores the current and future prospects of M. anisopliae, where the existing gaps and future directives for using this fungus to control hard ticks in Asian countries are highlighted.
One species of lace bug Cochlochila bullita Stål (Heteroptera: Tingidae) was found heavily infested Orthosiphon aristatus Blume Miq., an important medicinal plant in Malaysia. A morphological re-description of C. bullita was done in order to facilitate the identification of this oligophagous insect pest. Five variables, body length and width, antenna length, tibia length and head width were measured from 15 samples from each stage. Among these variables, body length and width were used to construct the ratio for species identification; while body lengths with the other three variables were used to distinguish the nymphs from each developmental stage. The measurements of four traits except the antenna length showed significant differences between the development stages. And thus suggest the body width, tibia length and head width were suitable parameters used to distinguish the nymphal stages. However, the result on the growth factor showed only the sizes of the head followed a more constant growth rate with growth ratios (1.21-1.39) lie between the Dyar's ratio. Body length and width ratio for the adult female and male was 1.51 +/- 0.00 and 1.59 +/- 0.01, respectively. These data are pertinent for identifying developmental stages and to distinguish the species of the lace bug.
This study used functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to measure aspects of the speech discrimination ability of sleeping infants. We examined the morphology of the fNIRS response to three different speech contrasts, namely "Tea/Ba," "Bee/Ba," and "Ga/Ba." Sixteen infants aged between 3 and 13 months old were included in this study and their fNIRS data were recorded during natural sleep. The stimuli were presented using a nonsilence baseline paradigm, where repeated standard stimuli were presented between the novel stimuli blocks without any silence periods. The morphology of fNIRS responses varied between speech contrasts. The data were fit with a model in which the responses were the sum of two independent and concurrent response mechanisms that were derived from previously published fNIRS detection responses. These independent components were an oxyhemoglobin (HbO)-positive early-latency response and an HbO-negative late latency response, hypothesized to be related to an auditory canonical response and a brain arousal response, respectively. The goodness of fit of the model with the data was high with median goodness of fit of 81%. The data showed that both response components had later latency when the left ear was the test ear (p
Some of Vibrio species is well known as pathogenic bacteria in aquaculture and the marine industry. Its infection is able to generate a massive outbreak and affect the fish population, especially for net caged fish such as seabass. This study was conducted to investigate the prevalence of Vibrio spp. isolated from seabass (Lates calcarifer) in Sri Tujuh Lagoon, Tumpat, Kelantan. Then, to determine the antibiotic resistance in Vibrio isolates. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was used to detect Vibrio species using specific primer VR169 and VR744 with estimation base pair size band, 597 bp and further identified by sequencing. On the other hand, antibiotic susceptibility tests were continued by using 13 types of antibiotics; kanamycin (K30), chloramphenicol (C30), neomycin (N10), ampicillin (AMP10), nitrofurantoin (F300), tetracycline (TE30), streptomycin (S10), norfloxacin (NOR10), ciprofloxacin (CIP5), nalidixic acid (NA30), gentamicin (CN10), doxycycline (DO30) and sulfamethoxazole (SXT100). As a result, 14 Vibrio isolates were identified, including Vibrio fluvialis (n=6), Vibrio parahaemolyticus (n=3), Vibrio harveyi (n=2) and each isolate for Vibrio vulnificus, Vibrio alginolyticus and Vibrio spp. The results showed that all isolates were sensitive to most antibiotics except ampicillin, neomycin and streptomycin. The MAR index value was ranging from 0 to 0.31. This study demonstrates the prevalence of Vibrio spp. in seabass and the report on multidrug resistance strains that could be of concern to the fish farmers. In addition, data from this study can be further used in fish disease management plans.
The aim of the current study was to produce groundwater spring potential maps using novel ensemble weights-of-evidence (WoE) with logistic regression (LR) and functional tree (FT) models. First, a total of 66 springs were identified by field surveys, out of which 70% of the spring locations were used for training the models and 30% of the spring locations were employed for the validation process. Second, a total of 14 affecting factors including aspect, altitude, slope, plan curvature, profile curvature, stream power index (SPI), topographic wetness index (TWI), sediment transport index (STI), lithology, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), land use, soil, distance to roads, and distance to streams was used to analyze the spatial relationship between these affecting factors and spring occurrences. Multicollinearity analysis and feature selection of the correlation attribute evaluation (CAE) method were employed to optimize the affecting factors. Subsequently, the novel ensembles of the WoE, LR, and FT models were constructed using the training dataset. Finally, the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves, standard error, confidence interval (CI) at 95%, and significance level P were employed to validate and compare the performance of three models. Overall, all three models performed well for groundwater spring potential evaluation. The prediction capability of the FT model, with the highest AUC values, the smallest standard errors, the narrowest CIs, and the smallest P values for the training and validation datasets, is better compared to those of other models. The groundwater spring potential maps can be adopted for the management of water resources and land use by planners and engineers.
Anaplasma species are obligate rickettsial intraerythrocytic pathogens that cause an important tick-borne disease of economic importance in livestock production in many countries. Anaplasma species have been detected from farm animals worldwide, there is a paucity of information on Anaplasma infections in goats from Malaysia. Thus, this study aimed to assess the infection rate and identify Anaplasma species and some selected risk factors in goats across selected districts in Kelantan, Malaysia. A total of 411 blood samples were collected from goats and analysed for Anaplasma species targeting the msp4 gene using conventional PCR and sequencing. The infection risk was determined by breed, age, management system and location. Our results indicate an overall infection rate of 30.9% for Anaplasma species detected. Interestingly, sequencing of selected amplicons revealed the presence of Anaplasma ovis and A. marginale. Data analysis revealed a marked statistically significant association between Anaplasma infection and some variables such as location (district), farm management system, breed, and age (P < 0.05). Specifically, goats raised on intensive management had the highest prevalence of 46.25% (37/80) compared to other management types. Also, with regards to district, goats raised in the coastal region had a higher prevalence of 39.23% (71/181) compared to those raised in inland region 24.35% (56/230). Regarding breed, goats that were of the pure breed had a higher prevalence of Anaplasma species infection 38.19% (97/254) compared to crossbreeds with a prevalence of 19.11% (30/157). Lastly, goats 3 years had the least prevalence 18.99% (34/179). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of A. marginale and A. ovis in goats from northeastern Peninsular Malaysia. The infected goats were clinically healthy; this revealed the role of goats as a potential reservoir for A. marginale and the presence of A. ovis in goats in Malaysia. Continuous efforts towards tick control must be sustained to ensure high productive yield and reduced disease burden associated with TBPs of goats in the study area.