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Phytochemical investigations of Goniothalamus tapis and G. tapisoides, and kinetic mechanism studies of goniothalamin / Rosalind Kim Pei Theng
No full textPhytochemical studies on two species of Annonaceae; Goniothalamus tapis and Goniothalamus tapisoides have been carried out. Isolation and purification of the crude extract of stem bark of G. tapis and G. tapisoides yielded seventeen compounds. G. tapis gave nine compounds; goniothalamin 1, isoaltholactone 41, 3-acetylisoaltholactone 151, cheliensisin A 22, garvensintriol 4, goniopyyprone 26, 7-epi-goniofufurone 49, stigmasterol 133 and β-sitosterol 134. Out of nine compounds, 3-acetyl-isoaltholactone 151 was identified as a new styryl-lactone. The skeleton is similar as the major compound, isoaltholactone 41. But 3-acetylisoaltholactone 151 have different functional group compared to hydroxyl group in isoaltholactone 41, which is acetyl group. As for G. tapisoides, eight compounds were acquired; goniodiol 3, 7-epi-goniodiol 10, 8-epi-9-deoxygoniopypyrone 24, goniomicin A 147, goniomicin E 152, goniomicin F 153, goniomicin G 154 and goniomicin H 155. Compounds 152, 153, 154 and 155 were identified as new styryl-lactones. The structure of all compound was elucidated using various spectroscopic methods; 1D-NMR (1H, 13C, DEPT), 2D-NMR (COSY, HSQC, HMBC, NOESY), UV, IR and mass spectrometry. Goniothalamin 1 is a major compound isolated from dichloromethane extract of G. tapisoides. A spectrophotometric kinetic study of hydrolysis of 1 has been carried out in alkaline and acidic medium at various temperature to determine the reaction mechanism of the hydroxide ion-catalyzed reaction. Alkaline hydrolysis undergoes monotonic reaction and pseudo-first-order rate constant (kobs). It showed linear relationship with the increase of concentration of NaOH, giving goniomicin A 147 as a product. Hydrolysis of 1 in alkaline medium involved the ring opening of the lactone moiety. As to acidic medium, hydroxonium ions will catalysed the cleavage of lactone ring and the intermediate product further undergoes dehydration to form a product with three consecutive double bonds. The products of both alkaline and acidic hydrolysis were characterized by 1D-NMR, 2D-NMR and mass spectrometry
Assessment of landslide susceptibility at Canada Hill in Miri, Sarawak / Marelyn Telun Daniel
No full textLandslide occurrences have become a common sight in Miri, Sarawak due to the combination of unfavourable geological conditions, abundant rainfall and anthropogenic factors which leads to infrastructural damages following prolonged rainfall. Two of the major landslide events caused the demise of two lives and several damaged houses at Kampung Lereng Bukit. Events like this may recur if the landslide hazards are not effectively managed. Numerous studies on landslide susceptibility have been performed by researchers using different approaches. This study aims to evaluate the landslide susceptibility of Canada Hill area in Miri using a heuristic approach and bivariate statistical approach which could be helpful in future planning works. Nine landslide-controlling parameters consisting of planar failure susceptibility, slope gradient, geology, elevation, distance to lineament, slope curvature, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), slope aspect and cut and fill were analysed in this study, with the means of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The susceptibility maps produced from the two methods were classified into five zones of susceptibility; very low, low, moderate, high and very high. The results of the susceptibility map produced using the heuristic approach showed a 74% success rate while this is 80.8% in the case of the bivariate statistical approach. The comparison of the two susceptibility while highlighting the major planar failures showed that the landslide susceptibility map produced by the heuristic approach showed a better agreement for all the types of failure occurrences, including the major planar failures while the landslide susceptibility map produced using the bivariate statistical approach showed a better agreement for the translational and shallow rotational failures
Current efforts in sustaining Peranakan Chinese music in Melaka / Goh Zin Guan
No full textPeranakan Chinese (Straits-born Chinese) music such as dondang sayang may
not be a familiar folk music to the modernized Malaysian community, however, there
are associations and organisations that thrived on to sustain the musical culture in
Melaka. In the advanced influence of popular culture and modernity, efforts of
sustaining local culture and Peranakan Chinese music becomes more challenging. Thus,
this study aims to investigate the various efforts put on in sustaining the musical culture
and its consequences in terms of authenticity in present Melaka. The past literatures
reveal scholarship on Peranakan Chinese music in Malaysia came to a halt in the past
two decades. Methodology in this study were observation, video recording and semistructured
interview that focused on three active associations in Melaka and
documentation of some less-active ones that takes the form of a qualitative enquiry. The
outcomes of this study reveal how the associations and community revive interest and
sustain the cultural form in new and innovative approaches that adapt to modernity and
where sight of glocalization was witnessed. Furthermore, issues of authenticity were
discussed
Exploring the teaching of values in Soka Kindergarten: A case study / Cheong Pooi San
No full textThe Malaysian Ministry of Education (MOE) has put so much attention into increasing the quality of preschool values education. However, when it comes to the teaching and implementation of values education in preschool, there are gaps existing between the aspiration and implementation in the preschool in our current system. The purpose of this study to explore preschool teachers’ teaching of values education in a Soka Preschool. This study uses case study research design to discover strategies of teaching values education used by preschool teachers in Soka Preschool. This study also aims to understand how preschool teachers in Soka Preschool are motivated and trained to teach values education effectively to young children. Data was collected for descriptive analysis through the researcher’s observation, interviews, and documents review. Seven participants from Soka Preschool were involved in this study. Participants revealed that values education in Soka Preschool is not being taught in a specific subject but integrating values into the preschool curriculum and classroom activities regardless of what subjects they taught. Majority of the participants also revealed similar teaching strategy of integration of values education into their teaching such as circle time, role-play, storytelling, teamwork activity, class discussion, class leader of the day, exchange programme, dialogue, real-life situation and wall decoration. In addition, this study revealed that preschool management plays an important role in enhancing the teaching of values education. The participants expressed that they increase motivation of teaching values education through strong collaboration between teachers and the preschool management. Observational analysis showed that the all the participants worked in a very positive and value-driven environment and were implementing the teaching of values education diligently. The practice of dialogue between teachers, children and parents that was adopted by iv
participants sustained the teaching of values education in Soka Preschool as well. The results illustrated that weekly training by the preschool management, teachers’ exchange programmes and the promotion of teacher’s self-study helped increase and enhanced the participant’s professionalism of teaching values education. Therefore, this research suggests that preschool management needs to promote the integration of values education into preschool curriculum in order to provide quality teaching of values education to young children in the preschool. The role of preschool management is crucial in stimulating and motivating preschool teachers to enhance the teaching of values education effectively through creating a positive working environment in the preschool
e-Portfolio as a formative assessment tool to promote self regulated learning in an ESL writing classroom / Meerita Kunna Segaran
No full textePortfolio is thought to be valuable in promoting learning and formative assessment.
Although the use of ePortfolio is essential in developing a self-regulated learner, the
exposure to this stream could not be seen in secondary schools in Malaysia. To date,
ePortfolio has only been introduced in higher learning institutions but less is known in
the secondary school setting. This study aims to explore the use of self-regulated
learning through ePortfolio as a formative assessment tool in the ESL writing
classroom. Framed within Zimmerman’s model of self-regulated learning and social
cognitive perspective, this study adopts an interpretive paradigm with action research
as its methodological approach. The data collection method consisted of observation,
documents, survey and interview. In using the ePortfolio, it was identified that the
nature of feedback given was largely focusing on grammatical accuracy. The absence
of formative feedback and feedforward impeded the self-regulated learning process
thus explaining the need for the provision of ongoing professional development in
writing instructions, formative assessment, and self-regulated learning strategies. The
findings also revealed that students employ a range of self-regulated learning strategies
where the most prominent strategy used is seeking social assistance in their writing.
Regrettably, very little evidence of text-based changes found in students' essays.
Majority of the changes made were surface-based changes. It was also found that
students engagement with ePortfolio were relatively low and there is a need to upgrade
facilities. Although ePortfolio demonstrates great potential in the educational process,
it is apparent that self-regulated learning through ePortfolio as formative assessment
cannot be enacted into classroom practice without the support from teachers, schools
and the ministry of education
Effectiveness of flipped classroom in learning science at a National Type Chinese School in Klang Valley / Shirley Po
No full textThis study has identified the implementation of a flipped approach to learn science in the classroom. The goal of this project is to determine if there is an improvement in terms of learning and progressions through the implementation of a flipped classroom on the topic of Science. In this investigation, the researcher wants to find out the way flipped classroom results in six constructs of Bloom’s Taxonomy Cognitive Domain as compared to the traditional classroom in learning Science in Klang Valley. This research is intended to contribute a new academic resource for educators and researchers to overcome the limitation of the traditional education system. The flipped classroom is a philosophy of learning that reverses the traditional concept of school lecturing. Through the engagement of a 1more challenging and higher-order thinking contexts in-class activities, it applies both autonomy and collaborative learning which support individual needs and stimulates maximum individual potential. This study compared the process of learning the flipped classroom and the traditional learning process in a National Type Chinese School located in Klang Valley, Malaysia. The research was carried out for 3 months in the school to ensure data validity. All student participants were selected as a sample of the research from the 4 selected classes in a school in Klang Valley, Malaysia. One group was selected as a treatment group where all students were taught using the flipped classroom approach. Another group, the control group remained with the traditional learning approach. This research was conducted using a quantitative methodology where research data had been investigated for both descriptive and inferential statistical using SPSS tools. This has been done to decide whether the outcome of the flipped classroom method is significantly different than the traditional classroom method. The flipped classroom is successful in growing the academic achievements of the students in all six constructs of Bloom’s Taxonomy Cognitive Domain for Science
Optimal distribution system reconfiguration incorporating distributed generation based on simplified network approach / Mohammad Al Samman
No full textNetwork Reconfiguration (NR) and Distributed Generation (DG) are well-accepted strategies to minimize power loss and voltage deviation in the Electrical Distribution Network (EDN). Since the NR problem contains a huge combinational search space, most researchers applied meta-heuristic methods to attain optimal NR solution. However, meta-heuristic methods do not always guarantee optimal solution and furthermore they consume huge processing time. This occurs mainly due to (1) random solution’s initialization and (2) the verification of solution in each iteration to fulfill the operation constraints during the optimization process. Besides, solving the NR problem simultaneously with DG placement and sizing increases the computational burden due to increase of the search space. With the aim of reducing the computational time and improving the consistency in obtaining the optimal solution as well as minimizing power loss and voltage deviation of the EDN, this work proposes a new method based on a two-stage optimization. This method introduces a technique to simplify the network into a simplified network graph. Then, the simplified network is utilized for guided initializations and generations of the population as well as for the proper population’s codification. The proposed method is employed to solve the NR problem and DG integration separately and simultaneously. In addition, this work considered non-dispatchable renewable energy resources and load variations for daily operation. The selected meta-heuristic techniques in this research involve the Firefly Algorithm (FA) and Biogeography-Based Optimization (BBO). To verify the efficiency of the proposed method, simulations were carried out on 33-bus, 69-bus, and 118-bus IEEE test systems. Furthermore, comparisons were performed between the proposed method along with the conventional evolutionary programming, particle swarm optimization, FA and BBO as well as the previous works. The obtained results of the NR problem as well as DG placement and sizing demonstrate the superiority of the proposed method in obtaining a fast and high-quality solution that minimize the power loss and voltage deviation in different case studies
A partition based feature selection approach for mixed data clustering / Ashish Dutt
No full textPresently, educational institutions compile and store huge volumes of data, such as student enrolment and attendance records, as well as their examination results. Mining such data yields stimulating information that serves its handlers well. Rapid growth in educational data points to the fact that distilling massive amounts of data requires a more sophisticated set of algorithms. This issue led to the emergence of the field of Educational Data Mining (EDM). Traditional data mining algorithms cannot be directly applied to educational problems, as they may have a specific objective and function. This implies that a pre-processing algorithm has to be enforced first and only then some specific data mining methods can be applied to the problems. One such pre-processing algorithm in EDM is clustering. It is a widely used method in data mining to discover unique patterns in underlying data. It finds patterns by analysing the features in data. A feature contains a measured value. A value can be of an atomic type like categorical (text only) or numerical (number only). A categorical data type can be ordinal (ordered) or nominal (unordered). In either case, the feature is of univariate data type. Often in real-world environment, data consist of both categorical and numerical valued features. Such datasets are called mixed data. In literature, several clustering methods exist for analysing numerical or categorical data. There are a few clustering algorithms for handling mixed data. Clustering mixed data is dependent on the dissimilarities of its constituent features. This dependability on data types may influence a clustering solution. Assigning appropriate weights to the feature, such that it diminishes the data type influence may improve the performance of a partition clustering algorithm. In this thesis, a novel weighted feature selection approach on nominal features is proposed, for a partition. clustering algorithm that can handle mixed data. The proposed approach exploits the pre-processing nature of the partition clustering algorithm in the selection of weight assignment for nominal features. The benefits of weighting are demonstrated on both simulated and real-world mixed datasets. The experimental results yield better results for weighted nominal features in mixed data clustering
A computable general equilibrium modeling of the economic effects of reducing non-tariff measures in the Malaysian food sector / Yew Siew Hoon
No full textThe Malaysian food processing sector is highly regulated with non-tariff measures (NTMs), and particularly with standard NTMs applied to imports. Though these measures are used for legitimate reasons such as health and safety, some appear to have been instituted for political reasons and serve as “hidden” barriers to trade, given this sector is highly import intensive. This sector is therefore considered to be over regulated and it is argued that a reduction of restrictive NTMs and non-tariff barriers (NTBs) is needed to facilitate trade. Since NTMs, in general, are opaque and less transparent relative to tariffs, they pose a significant challenge to assess their direct and indirect effects on the economy. There is an ongoing effort in contemporary economic literature to provide improved theoretical methodologies, and empirical studies to better measure the actual impact of NTMs.
This study contributes to the empirical literature in the following manner. First, it provides a quantitative assessment of the economic impacts of the reduction of NTMs in the food processing sector of Malaysia, by means of a disaggregated sectoral analysis. Such a methodology is used given that the Malaysian food industry is highly heterogeneous in terms of its trade intensity, labour usage and wage levels. Second, the indirect effects of a reduction in NTMs on employment are revealed when comparing local and foreign labour. In this context it is noted that the Malaysian food industry is labour intensive and dominated by small and medium-sized firms. The study estimates the production, trade, labour market (employment, wages and wage inequality) and welfare effects, which follow from a reduction of NTMs in 11 sub-sectors of the food processing industry. This empirical analysis uses the computable general equilibrium (CGE) model to simulate the impact of a reduction of NTMs based on three scenarios. They include a baseline scenario with no changes in NTMs, a 10 percent and a 50 percent reduction in NTMs, which are introduced as exogenous shocks into the model. The calibration based on the data is generated from the Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) of Malaysia.
The core findings of the study are as follows. First, the change in production and trade following NTM cuts are substantial, especially in the long-run. The sub-sectors that are highly dependent on imported inputs in their production, benefit the most, as they are able to gain access to cheaper imported inputs since business compliance costs are reduced with reductions in NTMs. Second, NTM reductions incur positive indirect effects on employment, with employment gains most notable in the export oriented sub-sectors. Interestingly, the dependency on unskilled labour (both local and foreign) increases with the NTM cuts, but the wages for this group decreases. Third, the overall welfare in the economy increases, albeit minimally, with NTM cuts.
The study supports a reduction of NTMs in the food processing industry to enhance production, trade and welfare of the economy. This, in turn, underlines the presence of existing restrictive NTMs or NTBs in this industry. To reduce the incidence of restrictive measures, policymakers need to address the design and method of adoption of NTMs across the food industry’s sub-sectors. Policymakers may also need to regulate unskilled foreign labour to ensure that an upgrading of the industry is not compromised following its expansion
Development of a module to address interest and anxiety in learning science for female secondary pupils in Nigeria / Tukur Muhammad
No full textThe purpose of this study was to develop a Module for female secondary pupils to help increase interest and anxiety (FSSMIA) in learning science at a selected public day senior secondary school in Zamfara, Nigeria. The study further intended to create awareness for parents to perceive the importance of their daughters learning science. A Type 1 Developmental Research Design was used in the study based on the ADDIE Model. First, a needs analysis with selected female pupils was conducted through a focus group interview. Analysis of related curriculum documents and textbooks was also done to establish the need for this study. Second, Gagne’s nine events instructional approach was adopted in designing the delivery of the lessons in the module. Two rounds of consensus by experts in the field of science education were obtained to design the elements, content, and framework of the module. Third, the development of the module (FSSMIA) was finalised after a workshop with a group of selected science teachers and parents together with officers from the Ministry of Education according to the design that was agreed upon. Fourth, six lessons from the module and five home projects were executed. Fifth, the impact of the module on the teacher, female pupils, and parents was evaluated through data collection techniques such as interviews, videos and observations field notes. Overall, there were two phases to the study. The first phase was the execution of the six lessons in the module by a selected female teacher. The second phase was conducting the home projects using local materials with the involvement of the parents. In-depth thematic qualitative analysis revealed that the module influenced the teacher by improving her confidence level and assisted her to be more effective in teaching. It was found that the module also helped the pupils to be less anxious in learning science as they were fully engaged in the learning process through role-play activities. The female pupils also felt increased interest because the lessons are linked with elements related to daily life infused in the module. The home projects helped the parents perceive the importance of science, which stimulated them to change their attitudes about their daughters learning science at the higher secondary and tertiary levels for their future careers. The above positive findings from using FSSMIA could be due to the involvement of parents in the home projects, the role play activities in class, and four main elements that distinguish the present study’s module FSSMIA from other modules, which contributes to existing literature. The four elements included in the module are (i) stories and achievements of women scientists, (ii) religious beliefs, (iii) cultural activities, and (iv) everyday health. The study has significant implication for embedding elements of culture and religion in science curriculum development and science teacher education, and parents’ perspectives of female pupils learning science in Nigeria