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Knowledge creation enhancement in the Royal Malaysian Navy (RMN) FLeet / Shaftdean Lufty Rusland
Get PDFThis study aims to gauge the extent of knowledge creation processes in the Royal Malaysian Navy (RMN) fleet with the use of the SECI (socialization, externalization, combination, internalization) knowledge creation process model proposed by Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995). This is in order for the researcher to propose a knowledge creation enhancement framework to the organization. Case study method was utilized in this study and both descriptive and interpretive analyses were employed to achieve the research aims. The descriptive data were used to triangulate the interpretive data and documentation reviewed by dividing the findings in accordance to the SECI conversion process. 234 self-administered questionnaires were used to investigate to what extent the RMN fleet performs the SECI and 15 semi-structured face-to-face interviews provided insights about how the RMN fleet perform these activities. The survey data were analyzed by using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) Version 24 software to get descriptive statistics and transcriptions from the interviews were analyzed manually by content analysis method for interpretive data, to get the themes and sub-themes of the study. NVivo 12 software were also used to managed all the data from the interviews by identifying at the noticeable patterns to be connected to the study. The findings indicate that the SECI processes were used for knowledge creation in the RMN fleet. However, some limitations minimized the benefits in all creation of knowledge modes in SECI processes within the RMN. The externalization and internalization processes in creating knowledge were seen to be slightly prominent when compared to socialization and combination, revealing that in the RMN fleet all four modes of knowledge creation have almost equal importance. However, the use of each process is mostly subjected to the higher management support and some cultural contexts. The findings also suggest that the SECI processes, regardless it is a single or as a whole process, influence the creation of knowledge by increasing the generation of ideas, documentation of knowledge, updating the knowledge and sharing of knowledge for the benefit of the organization
Flexural behaviour of over-reinforced concrete beam using external steel plate / Shatha Sahib Kareem
Get PDFOver-reinforced concrete beam fails by crushing of the concrete compression zone before the yielding of steel reinforcement in the tension zone. An over-reinforced concrete beam may failed suddenly without warning before failure as the failure is instantaneous. Therefore, numerous codes of practices recommended a beam design to avoid brittle failure. However, in some situations, due to the limitation of spaces, using over-reinforced concrete beam is not avoidable. Previous researches showed that it is possible to design an over-reinforced concrete beam without brittle failure using the methods such as helical-reinforcement, short-stirrups, and hybrid-system. This study is an effort to investigate the performance of a new over-reinforced concrete beam section with ductile behaviour using steel plate on the beam compression zone. For this purpose, five full scale over-reinforced concrete beams with the same cross-section and length of 200×300×2400 mm, and the same concrete compressive strength and reinforcement ratio were constructed and tested. Steel plates with the same length but different in the thicknesses i.e. 6, 10 and 15 mm were used to fully cover the compression zone (a length of 1100 mm) of the beams. The steel plates were bolted on the beams. To investigate the effect of bolting arrangement, a beam with 6 mm steel plate but bolted with different spacing was also prepared. In addition, FE modelling was developed and verified against the results of the experimental works in this study. The FE modelling was also used to study the influence of the total number, diameter, length and spacing of the bolts, thickness and length of the steel plates, as well as the types of loading on the flexural behaviour of the beams. From this parametric study, the relationship between different parameters on the flexural behaviour of over-reinforced concrete beam was also deliberated. The results showed that all the bolt-compression steel plate (BCSP) beams failed in a ductile manner in contrast with the control beam. It was revealed that BCSP-system significantly improved the beams‟ spalled load and flexural capacity over the control beam. All the BSCP concrete beams showed higher flexural strength of about 74% to 158% over the control beam with an increase of energy absorption in the range of 247.5% to 458.3%. The stiffness was also improved with an increase in thickness of steel-plate. It was also found that the FE model which included the combined stiffness‟s of concrete, reinforcing steel and cracking of the concrete can predict the behaviour of the over-reinforced concrete beams. In general, the load-deflection curve from the experiment and the FEM analysis were in good agreement. It can be concluded that using steel-plate in compression zone of an over-reinforced concrete beam is an effective and practical method in retrofitting and/or strengthening of reinforced concrete beams
Impoliteness strategies in online discussions on cheating in a virtual reality game / Fong Chia Wen
Get PDFThis research study identifies the impoliteness strategies found in the forum’s post comments discussing accounts of grief play activities mainly spoofing in a social game, Pokemon Go, and discusses how impoliteness is accommodated in the interactions among forum members in the conveyance of their perceptions towards cheating in social gaming. Data is collected from five complaint posts in a subforum, r/pokemongo, that discusses topics and contents related to Pokemon Go which is part of a megaforum, Reddit. Culpeper’s (2011) Impoliteness Framework and the constructs of Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT) are used to analyse the data collected. The findings show that impoliteness occurrences found in online forums contains both the classic form of impoliteness formulae as well as adapted versions of classic impoliteness strategies to compensate the absence of impoliteness cues found through speech and face-to-face encounters. Based on CAT, impoliteness used by forum members in their interactions is shown to be non-accommodative towards the forum’s etiquette through the exhibition of maintenance, overaccommodation and divergence communication behaviours. Instead, impoliteness occurrences found in the interactions are accommodative towards the topic that has the tendency to spark impoliteness. Thus, it is shown that individuals will find ways to be impolite despite various sanctions to prevent conflict and hostility in virtual communities. In this case where voicing of violations against principles of justice in social gaming is prevalent based on the discussion topic, impoliteness is contextually justified
Kemahiran berfikir kritis dalam buku teks Bahasa Melayu kurikulum standard sekolah rendah tahap dua / Nurul Hasna Hasan
Get PDFCritical thinking is one of the most important aspects that students need to master as well as creative thinking, communication skills and collaborative learning in the 21st century learning environment. The aim of this study is to analyse critical thinking skills towards instruction in the activity and assessment of reading skills. The Directed Content Analysis method was used to test the sample of the study. The sample of the study consists of three Malay textbooks Year 4, 5 and 6 in the Primary School. Three experts were selected to verify the 'Code of Analysis in Critical Thinking Skills' instrument that has been developed. The experts consist of Malay curriculum specialists, content analysis specialists and Malay teacher‟s specialist. Instruments that have been modified by these experts are then tested by the reliability of two Malay language teachers before being used in the actual study. Analysis of the main categories in the three textbooks indicates that activity and assessment of reading skills are leads towards Collecting and Using Information Skills which are 49.1% and 64.3% respectively. The Inferential Instruction Skill ranked second the highest; activity is 46.8% and assessment is 32.1%. On the other hand, the Decision-Making Skills show less percentage; activity is 4.1% and assessment is 3.6%. However, there are no instruction in the activities and assessments that led to the Analogy Skill. Therefore, the implication of the study when the Analogy Skill is not exposed to the student is the students will be less able to use their knowledge and to think critically in beyond the classroom. Overall, this study can be benefit of the Text Books Division, KPM, publishers and authors, and teachers
Green synthesis of reduced graphene oxide for efficient adsorption-photocatalysis studies in methylene blue dye degradation / Valerie Siong Ling Er
Get PDFDyes are one of the major components of industrial effluents. Owing to the complex structures of these toxic organic compounds, the removal of dyes from effluents possesses a great challenge in wastewater treatment. In order to tackle this issue, one of the effective methods is to remove dyes via the combination of adsorption and photocatalysis processes. In the present work, reduced graphene oxide (rGO) was fabricated from graphene oxide (GO) by using an environmentally friendly solvothermal approach, whereby ethanol was employed as a non-toxic reductant. In order to investigate the formation of rGO, the reduction of GO was carried out at different reduction temperatures and durations. It was found that GO was successfully reduced at an optimum temperature of 160 °C and an optimum duration of 2 hours. This was due to the partial restoration of sp2 carbon network brought about by the elimination of oxygen functionalities from the surface. With an increase in surface area and a band gap reduction, the rGO-1602 sample was able to achieve the best adsorption (29.26%) and photoactivity (32.68%) towards the removal of methylene blue (MB) dye. The effects of catalyst dosage, initial concentration of dye, light intensity, and pH of solution were also evaluated against the performance of rGO-1602. The results demonstrated that an even higher MB removal by adsorption (87.39%) and photodegradation (98.57%) was successfully achieved when 60 mg of rGO-1602, double 95 W UV lamp, and initial dye solution of 50 ppm at pH = 11 were implemented as the operational conditions. The MB photodegradation efficiency of rGO-1602 was still maintained at more than 90% after five successive cycles, proving its good stability and recycling ability. This study provides a high-performance adsorbent-cum-photocatalyst for the decontamination of dyes from wastewater
Gendered discourses in the American TV sitcom F.R.I.E.N.D.S / Chin Ee Wern
No full textThe current research concentrates on analysing the gendered discourse in the television (TV) series of F.R.I.E.N.D.S, investigating how gender is portrayed as it depicts a representable degree of society today. The proposed findings are information as to how this sitcom reflects the gendered discourses that were common in that time and are still relevant today. This paper considers how sitcom creators want their audiences to be able to relate to what is shown on their programme, making it relatable to the audience, creating the problem of possible bias from the creators supporting stereotypes that only encourages the same mindset amongst society, bringing a need to analyse the sitcoms for discourses presented to the audience. The research utilises 4 episodes chosen from F.R.I.E.N.D.S, based on criteria of number of audience views, TV ratings upon airing, and presence of comments with traces of gender in clips of episodes posted on Youtube. The episodes were analysed with scenes containing traces of gendered discourses extracted as data, the data is then categorised with the identified gendered discourses. The data is then compared to case studies and examples from journal articles and official news websites to determine if the presented discourses in the sitcom supports or challenge stereotypes held by society. 4 main gendered discourses identified were the Gender Differences discourse, Hegemonic Masculinity discourse, the Compulsory Heterosexuality discourse, the Gender equality discourse, and other discourses also identified were the Dumb Blonde discourse, “the being a woman is an insult” discourse, the Positive Masculinity discourse, and the “women love to gossip” discourse. From the analysis of the data done, it has shown that majority of the discourses found reinforces the normative perceptions of gender, which explains its relatability to many audiences around the world that made it a worldwide success upon airing, though it is worth nothing that there instances found to also challenge some of the normative perceptions as well, indicating a slow but sure movement towards a more accepting society
In vitro bioactivities of single or combined extracts from three selected Asian vegetables / Norfaizah Mahmud
No full textThree underutilized folklore oriental-based vegetables Acalypha indica (AI), Centella asiatica (CA), and Sesbania grandiflora (SG) have been investigated for pharmacological activities relevant to wound healing process and synergistic actions. Single and combination of aqueous (A) and methanol (M) extracts of the three vegetables namely AI-A, CA-A, SG-A, AI-M, CA-M, SG-M, AI-A+CA-A, AI-A+SG-A, CA-A+SG-A, AI-M+CA-M, AI-M+SG-M, and CA-M+SG-M were assessed for stimulation of wound closure by normal human dermal fibroblast (NHDF) cells, antioxidant, protection against hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), stimulation of nitric oxide (NO) from RAW264.7 macrophages and antimicrobial activities. The combined vegetable extracts AI-A+CA-A (90.76%) showed the highest percentage of wound closure, followed by single extract CA-A (89.52%). Pre-treatment of NHDF cells with CA-M at 100 μg/ml offered the best protection against H2O2. At 500 μg/mL, CA-A and combination of CA-A+SG-A successfully induced RAW264.7 cells to produce NO of 17.85 μM and 40.84 μM, respectively. All single and combined vegetable extracts showed weak antibacterial properties against gram-negative (E. coli and S. marcescens) and gram-positive bacteria (B. cereus, B. subtilis, M. luteus, S. aureus, and S. epidermidis). The single and combined vegetable extract showed antifungal-demelanizing activities against Aspergillus niger. AI-A exhibited the highest total phenolic content (TPC) (82.94 mg GAE/g) and moderate reducing activity (61.63 mM Fe (II)/mg) when assessed by ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) assay. Free radical scavenging activity was assessed by 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and 2,2'-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid) (ABTS) assay with AI-A+CA-A exhibited good scavenging activity at IC50 = 379.75 μg/ml and IC50 = 578.7 μg/ml, respectively. Furthermore, identification and characterization of all the single vegetable extracts via UHPLC (LC-MS/MS) system revealed the major components present might be responsible for all the tested bioactivities. The identified major components were phenolic groups such as simple polyphenols, flavonoids (flavones and flavonols), polysaccharides, and triterpenes (asiaticoside and madecassosides). AI-A+CA-A demonstrated synergism (CI < 1) for migration of fibroblast, DPPH free radical scavenging activity and production of NO. AI-A+SG-A and CA-A+SG-A showed synergism for DPPH free radical scavenging activity and production of NO. AI-M+CA-M and AI-M+SG-M demonstrated synergistic interaction for FRAP reducing activity and production of NO. CA-M+SG-M showed synergism for production of NO. These findings demonstrate the potential formulation by one vegetable or combining extracts from two vegetables with multiple functions of accelerating the migration of fibroblast, an excellent source of antioxidants, antimicrobial, and stimulation of NO production for optimum wound healing properties
Identification of potential biomarkers of oral squamous cell carcinoma using integrated proteomics and glycoproteomics and glycoproteomics analyses / Wong Yin Ling
No full textOral cancer is one of the major health concerns worldwide. The 5-year survival rate of
oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) has remained at approximately 50% over the past
decades. Most OSCCs are diagnosed at an advanced stage due to the delay in diagnosis,
suggesting an imperative need in identifying reliable biomarkers to improve the
diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment of OSCC. This study aimed to identify potential
biomarkers that are involved in the development and progression of OSCC using
integrated proteomics and glycoproteomics analyses. Proteomics analysis was performed
on serum samples of 10 patients with oral potentially malignant disorder (OPMD), 40
patients with OSCC, and 10 healthy volunteers as control using two-dimensional gel
electrophoresis (2-DE) followed by silver staining. Based on the analysis, 5 proteins
(AAT, APOA1, IGKC, SAMP, and VDBP) were up-regulated and 5 (AMBP, CLU, HP,
PRDX2, and RBP4) down-regulated in OPMD when compared with control (p < 0.05).
In OSCC, 4 proteins (IGHA2, IGHG2, IGKC, and TF) were up-regulated and 5 (ALB,
AMBP, CLU, HP, and LRG1) down-regulated in the early stage of OSCC, whereas 5
proteins (AAT, APOA1, C3, IGHG2, and VDBP) were up-regulated and one (PRDX2)
down-regulated in the advanced stage of OSCC when compared with control (p < 0.05).
As for glycoproteomics analysis, the serum samples were subjected to 2-DE coupled with
Concanavalin A and Jacalin lectin for the detection of N- and O-glycosylated proteins,
respectively. A total of 5 glycoproteins (AAT, AHSG, APOA1, CLU, and HP) that
exhibited tumour-specific glycosylation changes in OPMD and OSCC were identified.
Most of these identified proteins and glycoproteins were acute-phase proteins, which
indicated the presence of chronic inflammation in OSCC. Furthermore, bioinformatics
iv
analysis revealed the involvement of the identified proteins in platelet degranulation,
activation of classical complement pathway, LXR/RXR activation, and acute phase
response signalling pathways during development and progression of OSCC. Based on
these findings, AAT, AHSG, APOA1, CLU, and HP were selected for further validation
using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and immunohistochemistry (IHC).
In the ELISA analysis, AAT, AHSG, APOA1, CLU, and HP showed consistent findings
with the proteomics and glycoproteomics analyses. However, based on the IHC results,
only CLU and HP were found to be corroborated with the findings. These identified
potential biomarkers may play important roles to improve the detection of OSCC.
Nevertheless, further investigation is warranted to determine their roles in OSCC.
Keywords: Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma, Biomarker, Proteomics, Glycoproteomics,
Lecti
A process model for designing performance dashboard using visualization techniques / Muhammad Nasim Bahar
No full textData visualization is the presentation of data in a pictorial or graphical format. It enables decision-makers to see data analysis presented visually, so they can observe difficult concepts or identify new patterns. With interactive visualization, we can take the concept a step further by using technology to drill down into charts and graphs for more detail, interactively changing what data see and how it is processed. With the help of data visualization, it is expected to promote creative data exploration. A performance dashboard is one of the most common use cases for data visualization, and it enables decision-makers such as executives and managers to monitor the performance of an organization at one glance. It is essential to go through a proven process model that includes all aspects of designing a performance dashboard. To date, there is a lack of systematic process to design a performance dashboard that using the right performance metrics to measure the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and selecting appropriate visualization techniques for visualizing the performance analysis in a dashboard. This research aim is to propose a new process model for designing a performance dashboard using the visualization technique. A case study was conducted to evaluate the functional suitability and usability of the proposed process model by developing a taxation performance dashboard. The evaluation results show that it is feasible to apply the proposed process model to design am effective and usable performance dashboard for analyzing and monitoring the performance of a department
Design of a single-carrier pulse width modulation with submodule fault-tolerant capability for modular multilevel converter / Tuanku Badzlin Hashfi
No full textMultilevel converters are attracting a lot of attention and becoming one of the energy conversion choices for new topologies and control in industry applications and research fields. Modular multilevel converters (MMCs) are considered very promising among converter topologies for future medium-voltage and high-power applications compared to NPC, FC and CHB topologies.
The improved phase disposition pulse width modulation (PDPWM) technique control for MMCs, which has a fault-tolerant capability, is presented. This study presents two methods to distribute pulses into submodules (SMs) by using PDPWM which has drawback to distribute the power equally among the submodules (SMs). First method, this study used conventional PDPWM to distribute the power equally among the SMs. Second, this study utilized one single carrier that can improve modulation strategy that has flexibility for fault-tolerant capability. Fault tolerance can enhance converter reliability, which is one of the essential issues of half-bridge MMCs with substantial switching devices. An excellent overall control system is also required for MMCs to rebalance the capacitor after a fault.
An understanding of the basic operating principle is essential in order to find the dimensioning factors of modular multilevel converter (MMC). The dimension of MMC was designed in MATLAB/Simulink by ensuring the performance is well governed in circulating current and energy balance for closed-loop control. The improvement of modulation technique was tested in a simulation platform and hardware implementation.
In this study, an MMC with a fault condition was analyzed. Afterward, a modulation control for the fault-tolerant method was proposed and described in detail. The proposed method bypassed the faulty SM when a faulty switching device occurs in an SM. The proposed method was tested in MATLAB/Simulink platform to verify the proposed method in the simulation platform. Experimental results were included to verify the fault-tolerant capability of the proposed modulation strategy for MMCs