Effect of heat treatment on the antioxidant activities of two cultivars of sweet potatoes

Natural sources of antioxidants are derived from fruits, vegetables and wine, whilst artificial supplements are from teas and spices. Sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) is an excellent natural source of vitamins and minerals, and likely a great source of antioxidant. The objective of this study is to analyze the antioxidant activity of orange sweet potato (Vitato) and purple sweet potato (All purple), prepared as heat dry and moist heat for 30 minutes at 100oC. All the samples were obtained from Pasir Puteh and MARDI Telong, Bachok, Kelantan, respectively. Both samples were soaked into methanol to obtain the crude extract prior to analyzing for antioxidant activity by using 2, 2-diphenyl-1-picryl hydrazyl (DPPH). IC50 values of dry heat and moist heat Vitato were 0.40mg/L and 0.20mg/L while dry heat and moist heat, All purple were 0.32mg/L and 0.19mg/L, respectively. Both moist heat samples enjoyed higher scavenging activities compared to dry heat samples. However, the All purple sample of moist heat is the most superior one. Significant difference of IC50 values between dry heat and moist heat sample differ significantly. Thus, this study clearly demonstrated that moist heat sweet potato exhibited excellent increase in antioxidant activity

A DNA sequence design for DNA computation based on binary vector evaluated particle swarm optimization

Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA) has certain unique properties such as selfassembly and self-complementary in hybridization, which are important in many DNA-based technologies. DNA computing, for example, uses these properties to realize a computation, in vitro, which consists of several chemical reactions. Other DNA-based technologies such as DNAbased nanotechnology and polymerase chain reaction also depend on hybridization to assemble nanostructure and to amplify DNA templates, respectively. Hybridization of DNA can be controlled by properly designing DNA sequences. In this study, sequences are designed such that each sequence uniquely hybridizes to its complementary sequence, but not to any other sequences. This objective can be formulated using four objective functions, namely, similarity, H measure, continuity, and hairpin. Binary vector evaluated particle swarm optimization (Binary VEPSO) is employed to solve the DNA sequence design problem by minimizing the objective functions subjected to two constraints: melting temperature and GC content. Several set of good sequences are produced, which are better than other research works where only a set of sequences is generated

Optimizing assembly sequence time using particle swarm optimization (PSO)

Assembly sequence planning (ASP) plays an important role in the production planning and should be optimized to minimize production time and cost when large numbers of parts and sub-assemblies are involved in the assembly process. Although the ASP problem has been tackled via a variety of optimization techniques, these techniques are often inefficient when applied to larger-scale problems. In this study, an approach using particle swarm optimization (PSO) is proposed to tackle one of the ASP problems which are optimizing the assembly sequence time. PSO uses a number of agents (particles) that constitute a swarm moving around in the search space looking for the best solution. Each bird, called particle, learns from its own best position and the globally best position. Experimental results show that PSO algorithm can produce good results in optimizing the assembly time, has a powerful global searching ability and fast rate of convergence

Via-less Electromagnetic Band-Gap-Enabled Antenna based on Textile Material for Wearable Applications

A compact fabric antenna structure integrated with a miniature electromagnetic band-gap structures (EBGs) covering the desired frequency spectrum between 2.36 GHz and 2.40 GHz of the Medical Wireless Body Networks (MBANs), is introduced. To satisfy the needs of flexible system applications, the antenna is preferably low-profile, compact, directive, and robust to the loading effect towards human body. The EBGs are attractive solutions for such requirements and provide efficient performance. In contrast to earlier documented EBG backed antenna designs, here the EBG behave not only as a shielding from the antenna to the human body, but also as a radiator. Through the dispersion diagram the band gap features of the EBG structures are confirmed. The EBGs reduces the frequency detuning due to the human body and decreases the back radiation, hence improving the antenna efficiency. The proposed antenna system has overall dimensions of 46×46×2.4 mm3. The computed and experimental results suggested that it achieves a gain of 7.2 dBi, a Front to Back Ratio (FBR) of 12.2 dB and an efficiency of 74.8 %. The Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) demonstrates a reduction of more than 95 % compared to the antenna without EBGs. Moreover, the antenna performance robustness to human body loading and bending is also studied experimentally. Hence, the integrated antenna-EBG is a good candidate for many wearable applications including healthcare devices and its related applications

Achieving the Triple Bottom Line through Big Data Analytics

This handbook addresses the intersection between corporate sustainability and digital transformation. It analyzes the challenges and transformations required to be able to have sustainable businesses with a future orientation