Serum Levels of Vitamin D in Diabetic Patients With and Without Retinopathy

Purpose: To evaluate the levels of vitamin D in the serum of diabetic patients with and without diabetic retinopathy (DR). Methods: Thirty patients with DR and thirty diabetic patients without retinopathy were included in this cross-sectional study. Based on ophthalmic examination, patients with DR were categorized into having non-proliferative retinopathy (NPDR) and proliferative retinopathy (PDR). Patients were tested for fasting blood sugar (FBS), hemoglobin A1C (HbA1C), 25-hydroxy vitamin D (25 (OH) D), and creatinine levels in the serum, and for urine protein. Vitamin D deficiency was defined as a serum 25 (OH) D level < 20 ng/mL. Results: We found that all diabetic patients had mild vitamin D deficiency (serum 25 (OH) D level = 10–20 ng/mL). The mean serum 25 (OH) D concentration in patients with DR was lower than in those without DR (12.10 ± 14.62 ng/mL vs 15.61 ± 9.40 ng/mL, respectively, P = 0.012). Trace or more proteinuria was frequently present in patients with DR than in those without DR (56% in DR vs 30% in non-DR; P = 0.037). There were no significant differences in the FBS, HbA1C, and serum creatinine levels between patients with or without retinopathy. Conclusion: The present study demonstrated that patients with DR had lower levels of serum vitamin D compared with those without retinopathy

HD-tDCS over left supplementary motor area differentially modulated neural correlates of motor planning for speech vs. limb movement

The supplementary motor area (SMA) is implicated in planning, execution, and control of speech production and limb movement. The SMA is among putative generators of pre-movement EEG activity which is thought to be neural markers of motor planning. In neurological conditions such as Parkinson\u27s disease, abnormal pre-movement neural activity within the SMA has been reported during speech production and limb movement. Therefore, this region can be a potential target for non-invasive brain stimulation for both speech and limb movement. The present study took an initial step in examining the application of high-definition transcranial direct current stimulation (HD-tDCS) over the left SMA in 24 neurologically intact adults. Subsequently, event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded while participants performed speech and limb movement tasks. Participants\u27 data were collected in three counterbalanced sessions: anodal, cathodal and sham HD-tDCS. Relative to sham stimulation, anodal, but not cathodal, HD-tDCS significantly attenuated ERPs prior to the onset of the speech production. In contrast, neither anodal nor cathodal HD-tDCS significantly modulated ERPs prior to the onset of limb movement compared to sham stimulation. These findings showed that neural correlates of motor planning can be modulated using HD-tDCS over the left SMA in neurotypical adults, with translational implications for neurological conditions that impair speech production. The absence of a stimulation effect on ERPs prior to the onset of limb movement was not expected in this study, and future studies are warranted to further explore this effect

Challenges faced by women employees of Working from Home (WFH) during COVID-19: a case study in Honda Malaysia Sdn Bhd Alor Gajah Melaka / Anis Atihrah Karim Johari and Nur Aryannie Ahmad

Working from home has posed various challenges to those who experienced, especially women employees. This is due to burden of many responsibilities as a wife, mother, daughter and employees, inadequate working equipment or even no proper work-space at home. Because of that, this study aimed to discuss the challenges faced (psychological, physical, technological) by women employees of working from home and the impact on their wellbeing. Cross sectional design was employed to conduct the findings and simple random sampling has been used in collecting the data. The population involved in this study was women employees from Honda Malaysia Sdn Bhd, Alor Gajah Melaka. Around 148 valid responses were received from the survey and the results were analyzed by using descriptive statistic (mean, frequency, percentage) and simple linear regression. The outcome of the findings revealed, most women employees aware that they faced more challenges while working from home and they agreed on planning a proper working space to work comfortably at home as their coping strategies. However, this study shows that challenges of working from home (psychological, physical, technological) has no significant relationship towards the impact on employee wellbeing

Effect of deep brain stimulation on vocal motor control mechanisms in Parkinson's disease

Published online: March 07, 2019motor symptoms in Parkinson's disease (PD); however, its effect on vocal motor function has yielded conflicted and highly variable results. The present study investigated the effects of STN-DBS on the mechanisms of vocal production and motor control. Methods: A total of 10 PD subjects with bilateral STN-DBS implantation were tested with DBS ON and OFF while they performed steady vowel vocalizations and received randomized upward or downward pitch-shift stimuli (±100 cents) in their voice auditory feedback. Results: Data showed that the magnitude of vocal compensation responses to pitch-shift stimuli was significantly attenuated during DBS ON vs. OFF (p = 0.012). This effect was direction-specific and was only observed when subjects raised their voice fundamental frequency (F0) in the opposite direction to downward stimuli (p = 0.019). In addition, we found that voice F0 perturbation (i.e. jitter) was significantly reduced during DBS ON vs. OFF (p = 0.022), and this DBS-induced modulation was positively correlated with the attenuation of vocal compensation responses to downward pitch-shift stimuli (r = +0.57, p = 0.028). Conclusions: These findings provide the first data supporting the role of STN in vocal F0 motor control in response to altered auditory feedback. The DBS-induced attenuation of vocal compensation responses may result from increased inhibitory effects of the subcortical hyperdirect (fronto-subthalamic) pathways on the vocal motor cortex, which can help stabilize voice F0 and ameliorate vocal motor symptoms by impeding PD subjects’ abnormal (i.e. overshooting) vocal responses to alterations in the auditory feedback

Berjaya Painting Enterprise / Mohd Fikri Ab Rahman ... [et al.]

We choose the name Berjaya Painting Enterprise because "Berjaya" means successful and we are very assured that this business will success excellently after we exist and enter into its market. Painting here shows our main activity of business which is car painting service. By this, customers already know the main service that Berjaya Painting Enterprise offers to them. Lastly, "Enterprise" here means our form of business which is partnership business. Factor of choosing the name of business is one of the important things that must be considered in introducing and expanding a new business. The chosen name must be easy to be remembered by customer so that they will always find the business company that they remember. This also indirectly involves the promotion activity when they tell other people about Berjaya Painting Enterprise. Berjaya Painting Enterprise is planning to offer services to improve, change colors, modify or design, install, sale or supply vehicle accessories and the other needs for vehicle modifications. Nature of this business is automotive services and repairs shop. The services and products offered is very unique which are cheaper than competitors' price with high quality painting and repairing services. At the same time, Berjaya Painting Enterprise also displaying accessories that will be used in painting and repairing activities for customers' choices and arso offering service that based on customers' wants where Berjaya Painting Enterprise will design any graphic that following customers'preferrence. Both of these services are still have not been offered by other Berjaya Painting Enterprise's competitors. Besides this, paints that will be used in producing these services are very quality paints which can produce exactly car image like in the car game graphic

Tocotrienol rich fraction supplementation improved lipid profile and oxidative status in healthy older adults: A randomized controlled study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Vitamin E supplements containing tocotrienols are now being recommended for optimum health but its effects are scarcely known. The objective was to determine the effects of Tocotrienol Rich Fraction (TRF) supplementation on lipid profile and oxidative status in healthy older individuals at a dose of 160 mg/day for 6 months.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Sixty-two subjects were recruited from two age groups: 35-49 years (n = 31) and above 50 years (n = 31), and randomly assigned to receive either TRF or placebo capsules for six months. Blood samples were obtained at 0, 3^rdand 6^thmonths.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>HDL-cholesterol in the TRF-supplemented group was elevated after 6 months (p < 0.01). Protein carbonyl contents were markedly decreased (p < 0.001), whereas AGE levels were lowered in the > 50 year-old group (p < 0.05). Plasma levels of total vitamin E particularly tocopherols were significantly increased in the TRF-supplemented group after 3 months (p < 0.01). Plasma total tocotrienols were only increased in the > 50 year-old group after receiving 6 months of TRF supplementation. Changes in enzyme activities were only observed in the > 50 year-old group. SOD activity was decreased after 3 (p < 0.05) and 6 (p < 0.05) months of TRF supplementation whereas CAT activity was decreased after 3 (p < 0.01) and 6 (p < 0.05) months in the placebo group. GPx activity was increased at 6 months for both treatment and placebo groups (p < 0.05).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The observed improvement of plasma cholesterol, AGE and antioxidant vitamin levels as well as the reduced protein damage may indicate a restoration of redox balance after TRF supplementation, particularly in individuals over 50 years of age.</p

A Survey on 6G Enabled Light Weight Authentication Protocol for UAVs, Security, Open Research Issues and Future Directions

This paper demonstrates a broad exploration of existing authentication and secure communication of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in a ‘6G network’. We begin with an overview of existing surveys that deal with UAV authentication in 6G and beyond communications, standardization, applications and security. In order to highlight the impact of blockchain and UAV authentication in ‘UAV networks’ in future communication systems, we categorize the groups in this review into two comprehensive groups. The first group, named the Performance Group (PG), comprises the performance-related needs on data rates, latency, reliability and massive connectivity. Meanwhile, the second group, named the Specifications Group (SG), is included in the authentication-related needs on non-reputability, data integrity and audit ability. In the 6G network, with blockchain and UAV authentication, the network decentralization and resource sharing would minimize resource under-utilization thereby facilitating PG targets. Furthermore, through an appropriate selection of blockchain type and consensus algorithms, the SG’s needs of UAV authentication in 6G network applications can also be readily addressed. In this study, the combination of blockchain and UAV authentication in 6G network emergence is reviewed as a detailed review for secure and universal future communication. Finally, we conclude on the critical identification of challenges and future research directions on the subjec

KERANGKA KERJA BERASASKAN INTERNET PELBAGAI BENDA (IPB) BAGI INDUSTRI GULA APONG = (INTERNET OF THINGS-ENABLED FRAMEWORK FOR GULA APONG INDUSTRY)

Sektor pertanian makanan kini bergerak ke arah pemodenan dengan menggunakan Internet Pelbagai Benda (IPB) untuk memenuhi permintaan yang semakin meningkat. Oleh itu, matlamat artikel ini adalah untuk mereka bentuk kerangka kerja terbantu IPB untuk rantaian bekalan gula apong bagi meningkatkan pembangunan ekonomi industri desa. Ini termasuk peranti IPB, protokol rangkaian, teknologi pemprosesan data, platform dan antara muka pengguna untuk menyokong pengeluar gula apong dan pihak berkepentingan lain. Artikel ini boleh menjadi titik permulaan untuk mewujudkan kerangka kerja terbantu IPB bagi industri gula apong untuk merapatkan jurang bekalanpermintaan dengan memastikan hasil yang tinggi, keuntungan, dan pemeliharaan alam sekitar, di samping meningkatkan kehidupan masyarakat setempat dengan menyediakan perkhidmatan yang mampan

Hyperparameter tuning and pipeline optimization via grid search method and tree-based AutoML in breast cancer prediction

Automated machine learning (AutoML) has been recognized as a powerful tool to build a system that automates the design and optimizes the model selection machine learning (ML) pipelines. In this study, we present a tree-based pipeline optimization tool (TPOT) as a method for determining ML models with significant performance and less complex breast cancer diagnostic pipelines. Some features of pre-processors and ML models are defined as expression trees and optimal gene programming (GP) pipelines, a stochastic search system. Features of radiomics have been presented as a guide for the ML pipeline selection from the breast cancer data set based on TPOT. Breast cancer data were used in a comparative analysis of the TPOT-generated ML pipelines with the selected ML classifiers, optimized by a grid search approach. The principal component analysis (PCA) random forest (RF) classification was proven to be the most reliable pipeline with the lowest complexity. The TPOT model selection technique exceeded the performance of grid search (GS) optimization. The RF classifier showed an outstanding outcome amongst the models in combination with only two pre-processors, with a precision of 0.83. The grid search optimized for support vector machine (SVM) classifiers generated a difference of 12% in comparison, while the other two classifiers, naïve Bayes (NB) and artificial neural network—multilayer perceptron (ANN-MLP), generated a difference of almost 39%. The method’s performance was based on sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, precision, and receiver operating curve (ROC) analysis

Development of custom lead shield and strainer for targeted irradiation for mice in the gamma cell chamber

We presented a development of a custom lead shield and mouse strainer for targeted irradiation from the gamma-cell chamber. This study was divided into two parts i.e., to (i) fabricate the shield and strainer from a lead (Pb) and (ii) optimize the irradiation to the mice-bearing tumour model with 2 and 8 Gy absorbed doses. The lead shielding was fabricated into a cuboid shape with a canal on the top and a hole on the vertical side for the beam path. Respective deliveries doses of 28 and 75 Gy from gamma-cell were used to achieve 2 and 8 Gy absorbed doses at the tumour sites