Overview of the national fisheries situation with emphasis on the demersal fisheries off the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia

The marine fisheries sector in Malaysia contributes significantly to the national economy in terms of income, foreign exchange and employment. In 1999, marine fisheries contributed 1.245 million t (90% of total fish production) valued at US$1.18 billion. The total value accounted for about 1.53$210 million. The sector provided employment to about 80 000 fishers. Fisheries management is currently guided by the Third National Agricultural Policy (NAP3 1998 - 2010). The NAP3 aims to maintain the coastal fisheries production while increasing the production from deep-sea fisheries within MalaysiaÆs Exclusive Economic Zone and the high-seas. Fisheries management of fisheries is centralized and is the primary responsibility of the Department of Fisheries. The key challenges identified for Malaysian fisheries are overfishing, excess fishing capacity and ensuring the well-being of coastal fishing communities. These are issues across the whole of Malaysia. The West Coast of Peninsular Malaysia produces 44% (1997) of total marine landings and 86% of this came from commercial (large scale) vessels. The landings in 1997 exceeded the estimated MSY and the biomass of demersal species in the region has been severely reduced. A national consultative workshop identified the primary aims for this region to improve production and efficiency of the fisheries, equitable distribution of the benefits, resources sustainability and the viability of the fishing communities. The workshop also identified key interventions needed. In terms of production and efficiency, overfishing and overcapacity must be addressed, including the illegal fishing. In terms of achieving greater equity, the workshop suggests greater involvement of small scale fishers in marketing of the catch. For resource sustainability, the serious decline in biomass must be addressed but there are also significant cross-sectoral issues. To achieve viable fishing communities, the workshop suggests the need for greater involvement and potentially a co-management approach for fisheries management.Fishery resources, Catch/effort, Population characteristics, Coastal fisheries, Marine fisheries, Ecosystems, Economic benefits, Fishery industry, Capture fishery economics, Fish consumption, Fishery policy, Legislation, Fishery management, Demersal fisheries, Pelagic fisheries, Socioeconomic aspects, Surveys, Marketing, Fishery organizations, Fishing gear, Cephalopod fisheries, ISEW, Malaysia,

The Role of Chemerin in Metabolic and Cardiovascular Disease:A Literature Review of Its Physiology and Pathology from a Nutritional Perspective

Chemerin is a novel adipokine that plays a major role in adipogenesis and lipid metabolism. It also induces inflammation and affects insulin signaling, steroidogenesis and thermogenesis. Consequently, it likely contributes to a variety of metabolic and cardiovascular diseases, including atherosclerosis, diabetes, hypertension and pre-eclampsia. This review describes its origin and receptors, as well as its role in various diseases, and subsequently summarizes how nutrition affects its levels. It concludes that vitamin A, fat, glucose and alcohol generally upregulate chemerin, while omega-3, salt and vitamin D suppress it. Dietary measures rather than drugs acting as chemerin receptor antagonists might become a novel tool to suppress chemerin effects, thereby potentially improving the aforementioned diseases. However, more detailed studies are required to fully understand chemerin regulation.</p

Predicting Broccoli Development: I. Development Is Predominantly Determined By Temperature Rather Than Photoperiod

Predictive models of broccoli (Brassica oleracea L. var. italica Plenck) ontogeny will aid farmers who need to forecast changes in crop maturity arising from variable climatic conditions so that their forward marketing arrangements can match their anticipated supply. The objective of this study was to quantify the temperature and photoperiod responses of development in a sub-tropical environment from emergence to floral initiation (EFI), and from floral initiation to harvest maturity (FIHM). Three cultivars, ('Fiesta', 'Greenbelt' and 'Marathon') were sown on eight dates from 11 March to 22 May 1997 and grown under natural and extended (16 h) photoperiods at Gatton College, south-east Queensland, under non-limiting conditions of water and nutrient supply. Climatic data, dates of emergence, floral initiation and harvest maturity were obtained. The estimated base (Tbase) and optimum (Topt) temperatures of 0 and 20 degrees C, respectively were consistent across cultivars, but thermal time requirements were cultivar specific. Differences in thermal time between cultivars during FIHM were small and of little practical importance, but differences in thermal time during EFI were large. Sensitivity to photoperiod and solar radiation was low in the three cultivars used. When the thermal time models were tested on independent data for five cultivars ('Fiesta', 'Greenbelt', 'Marathon', 'CMS Liberty' and 'Triathlon') grown as commercial crops over two years, they adequately predicted floral initiation and harvest maturity

Graphene: A Pseudochiral Fermi Liquid

Doped graphene sheets are pseudochiral two-dimensional Fermi liquids with abnormal electron-electron interaction physics. We address graphene's Fermi liquid properties quantitatively using a microscopic random-phase-approximation theory and comment on the importance of using exchange-correlation potentials based on the properties of a chiral two-dimensional electron gas in density-functional-theory applications to graphene nanostructures.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures, submitte

Angiopoietin-like 4: a decade of research

The past decade has seen a rapid development and increasing recognition of ANGPTL4 (angiopoietin-like 4) as a remarkably multifaceted protein that is involved in many metabolic and non-metabolic conditions. ANGPTL4 has been recognised as a central player in various aspects of energy homoeostasis, at least in part, via the inhibitory interaction between the coiled-coil domain of ANGPTL4 and LPL (lipoprotein lipase). The fibrinogen-like domain of ANGPTL4 interacts and activates specific integrins to facilitate wound healing, modulates vascular permeability, and regulates ROS (reactive oxygen species) level to promote tumorigenesis. The present review summarizes these landmark findings about ANGPTL4 and highlights several important implications for future clinical practice. Importantly, these implications have also raised many questions that are in urgent need of further investigations, particularly the transcription regulation of ANGPTL4 expression, and the post-translation cleavage and modifications of ANGPTL4. The research findings over the past decade have laid the foundation for a better mechanistic understanding of the new scientific discoveries on the diverse roles of ANGPTL4

Modeling electrolytically top gated graphene

We investigate doping of a single-layer graphene in the presence of electrolytic top gating. The interfacial phenomena is modeled using a modified Poisson-Boltzmann equation for an aqueous solution of simple salt. We demonstrate both the sensitivity of graphene's doping levels to the salt concentration and the importance of quantum capacitance that arises due to the smallness of the Debye screening length in the electrolyte.Comment: 7 pages, including 4 figures, submitted to Nanoscale Research Letters for a special issue related to the NGC 2009 conference (http://asdn.net/ngc2009/index.shtml

Optical Hall conductivity of systems with gapped spectral nodes

We calculate the optical Hall conductivity within the Kubo formalism for systems with gapped spectral nodes, where the latter have a power-law dispersion with exponent n. The optical conductivity is proportional to n and there is a characteristic logarithmic singularity as the frequency approaches the gap energy. The optical Hall conductivity is almost unaffected by thermal fluctuations and disorder for n=1, whereas disorder has a stronger effect on transport properties if n=2

Electromagnetic properties of graphene junctions

A resonant chiral tunneling (CT) across a graphene junction (GJ) induced by an external electromagnetic field (EF) is studied. Modulation of the electron and hole wavefunction phases $\varphi$ by the external EF during the CT processes strongly impacts the CT directional diagram. Therefore the a.c. transport characteristics of GJs depend on the EF polarization and frequency considerably. The GJ shows great promises for various nanoelectronic applications working in the THz diapason.Comment: 4 pages 3 figure

Development of LoRaWAN-based IoT system for water quality monitoring in rural areas

This article delineates the design and deployment of an innovative real-time water quality monitoring system tailored for rural regions, focusing on monitoring the water resource quality parameters. We propose a solar-powered, waterproof, portable, and Internet of Things (IoT)-enabled solution that leverages Long Range Wide Area Network (LoRaWAN) technology. Central to this system is a sophisticated LoRa node outfitted with an array of sensors for capturing key water parameters, such as pH, total dissolved solids, turbidity and temperature. A conjunction of an Arduino microcontroller-based board and a LoRa shield facilitates real-time data capture and transmission to a LoRaWAN gateway. The acquired data is transmitted to The Things Network server, which is seamlessly integrated with a ThingSpeak web-based IoT server and ThingView mobile applications. We incorporate a solar cell with a solar shield to ensure sustainable energy provision for powering the entire system through a rechargeable battery. This allows users to access vital water quality information online simultaneously and continuously in real-time. As a testament to its robustness, the system was empirically tested at Gambang Lake to demonstrate its effectiveness, functionality, buoyancy, and waterproof capabilities. We further validated the results by comparing them with laboratory sample analysis findings. Experimental evaluations confirmed the system's reliability, as evidenced by the strong agreement between the water conditions measured using our solution and those obtained from laboratory instruments. Moreover, our system efficiently and remotely updated data across multiple IoT platforms using the LoRa radio interface over the LoRaWAN gateway