The Role of Mentoring Program in Enhancing Mentees’ Academic Performance

According to institutions of higher learning literature, mentoring program has two important features: communication and support. The ability of mentors to appropriately implement comfortable communication and provide adequate support may ehance positive mentee outcomes, especially academic performance. Although the nature of this relationship is crucial, little is known about the role of mentoring program as an important predictor of mentees’ academic performance in the higher education mentoring research literature. Therefore, this study was conducted to measure the relationship between mentoring program and mentees’ academic performance using self-administered questionnaires gathered from undergraduate students in Malaysian institutions of higher learning in Sarawak. The results of SmartPLS path model showed two important outcomes: firstly, communication positively and significantly correlated with academic performance. Secondly, support positively and significantly correlated with academic performance. The result demonstrates that mentoring program does act as an important predictor of mentees’ academic performance in the organizational sample. Thus, discussion, implications and conclusion are elaborated

Effect of number of baffles on flow and pressure drop in a shell side of a shell and tube heat exchangers

The effect of number of baffles on flow and pressure drop on a shell side of shell-andtube heat exchangers was studied. In the present study, a set of CFD simulations using FLUENT version 17.0 from ANSYS were used to analyze the flow in the single shell and single tube pass heat exchangers consists of 20 mm diameter of tubes in staggered configuration with a variable number of baffles. The simulations were undertaken to inform on how the fluid flowed within the shell side of shell-and-tube heat exchangers. The results show that the variable number of baffles and baffle spacing in a heat exchanger strongly affect the flow pattern and pressure drop. This is consistent with other published data

Effect of number of baffles on flow and pressure drop in a shell side of a shell and tube heat exchangers

The effect of number of baffles on flow and pressure drop on a shell side of shell-andtube heat exchangers was studied. In the present study, a set of CFD simulations using FLUENT version 17.0 from ANSYS were used to analyze the flow in the single shell and single tube pass heat exchangers consists of 20 mm diameter of tubes in staggered configuration with a variable number of baffles. The simulations were undertaken to inform on how the fluid flowed within the shell side of shell-and-tube heat exchangers. The results show that the variable number of baffles and baffle spacing in a heat exchanger strongly affect the flow pattern and pressure drop. This is consistent with other published data

Stringency of the 2-His–1-Asp Active-Site Motif in Prolyl 4-Hydroxylase

The non-heme iron(II) dioxygenase family of enzymes contain a common 2-His–1-carboxylate iron-binding motif. These enzymes catalyze a wide variety of oxidative reactions, such as the hydroxylation of aliphatic C–H bonds. Prolyl 4-hydroxylase (P4H) is an α-ketoglutarate-dependent iron(II) dioxygenase that catalyzes the post-translational hydroxylation of proline residues in protocollagen strands, stabilizing the ensuing triple helix. Human P4H residues His412, Asp414, and His483 have been identified as an iron-coordinating 2-His–1-carboxylate motif. Enzymes that catalyze oxidative halogenation do so by a mechanism similar to that of P4H. These halogenases retain the active-site histidine residues, but the carboxylate ligand is replaced with a halide ion. We replaced Asp414 of P4H with alanine (to mimic the active site of a halogenase) and with glycine. These substitutions do not, however, convert P4H into a halogenase. Moreover, the hydroxylase activity of D414A P4H cannot be rescued with small molecules. In addition, rearranging the two His and one Asp residues in the active site eliminates hydroxylase activity. Our results demonstrate a high stringency for the iron-binding residues in the P4H active site. We conclude that P4H, which catalyzes an especially demanding chemical transformation, is recalcitrant to change

Lightweight IoT based indoor positioning for guard touring system

An Indoor Positioning System (IPS) with Internet of Things (IoT) platform for a Guard Touring System (GTS) application is developed to track in real-time the guards’ whereabouts in an indoor setting when they perform their patrolling duties. The developed system comprises of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons, mobile application and Node-RED IoT platform. BLE beacons are used to collect position data. The position information from the beacons captured by the developed mobile phone application is then transmitted using MQTT broker service to reach the Node-RED cloud platform for analysis of the information and generating a real-time end-user display dashboard. The real-time position data is also stored in MongoDB database platform for future reference. Two methods are used to estimate the indoor positioning of the guards which are machine learning using Linear Regression model and BLE Media Access Control (MAC) Identifier. The findings show the BLE MAC Identifier method provides a high accuracy of 98% and the least delay in decision time, which can be as fast as 0.5 s. The method is also more cost-effective as it uses lesser number of devices to achieve high accuracy indoor positioning estimation

Astaxanthin: A Marine Drug That Ameliorates Cerebrovascular-Damage-Associated Alzheimer’s Disease in a Zebrafish Model via the Inhibition of Matrix Metalloprotease-13

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a major type of dementia disorder. Common cognitive changes occur as a result of cerebrovascular damage (CVD) via the disruption of matrix metalloproteinase-13 (MMP-13). In diabetic cases, the progress of vascular dementia is faster and the AD rate is higher. Patients with type 2 diabetes are known to have a higher risk of the factor for AD progression. Hence, this study is designed to investigate the role of astaxanthin (AST) in CVD-associated AD in zebrafish via the inhibition of MMP-13 activity. CVD was developed through the intraperitoneal and intracerebral injection of streptozotocin (STZ). The AST (10 and 20 mg/L), donepezil (1 mg/L), and MMP-13 inhibitor (i.e., CL-82198; 10 μM) were exposed for 21 consecutive days in CVD animals. The cognitive changes in zebrafish were evaluated through light and dark chamber tests, a color recognition test, and a T-maze test. The biomarkers of AD pathology were assessed via the estimation of the cerebral extravasation of Evans blue, tissue nitrite, amyloid beta-peptide aggregation, MMP-13 activity, and acetylcholinesterase activity. The results revealed that exposure to AST leads to ameliorative behavioral and biochemical changes. Hence, AST can be used for the management of AD due to its multi-targeted actions, including MMP-13 inhibition

Functionalization of single-layer Pmma-CO by adatoms: A first-principles study of electronic, magnetic and structural properties

A stable single layer Pmma-CO with direct bandgap and excellent mechanical stability has been predicted recently by Teng et al. (Nanoscale. 2017, 9, 5445). Motivated by this finding, we have carried out first-principles calculations based on DFT to systematically investigate the structural, electronic and magnetic properties of a monolayer Pmma-CO functionalized by Al, B, N, P, S or Si atoms. We found that S is weakly adsorbed on the monolayer Pmma-CO. For the adsorption of Al or B adatom, both relaxed systems exhibit metallic characteristics with electron transfer from the adatom to the monolayer Pmma-CO. On the other hand, the monolayer Pmma-CO remains semiconducting upon the adsorption of Si, N or P atom. Additionally, the adsorption of Al, N or P atom induces ferromagnetism in the single-layer Pmma-CO