MOTIVATION TO STUDY ENGLISH OF NON-ENGLISH MAJORED FRESHMEN

Motivation is regarded as an influential factor in the success of any activity. It plays a significant role in reaching the desired goals, including learning English. This research aims to analyze the students' motivation and factors affecting their motivation to learn English. The population of this study was 326 freshmen in nine faculties of natural sciences at Tay Do University. The quantitative data was collected through the questionnaire and analyzed by SPSS software. The results show that the students had motivation to learn English, but their motivation levels were not high. Additionally, the students had both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. However, the latter was higher than the former. Moreover, the results also indicate factors affecting learners’ motivation. The research findings contribute to improving English teaching and learning quality in Vietnam in general and in Tay Do University in particular. Article visualizations

Fundamental properties of Alkali-intercalated bilayer graphene nanoribbons

Along with the inherent remarkable properties of graphene, adatom-intercalated graphene-related systems are expected to exhibit tunable electronic properties. The metal-based atoms could provide multi-orbital hybridizations with the out-of-plane pi-bondings on the carbon honeycomb lattice, which dominates the fundamental properties of chemisorption systems. In this work, using the first-principles calculations, the feature-rich properties of alkali-metal intercalated graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) are investigated, including edge passivation, stacking configurations, intercalation sites, stability, charge density distribution, magnetic configuration, and electronic properties. There exists a transformation from finite gap semiconducting to metallic behaviors, indicating enhanced electrical conductivity. They arise from the cooperative or competitive relations among the significant chemical bonds, finite-size quantum confinement, edge structure, and stacking order. Moreover, the decoration of edge structures with hydrogen and oxygen atoms is considered to provide more information about the stability and magnetization due to the ribbon' effect. These findings will be helpful for experimental fabrications and measurements for further investigation of GNRs-based materials

THE DIFFICULTIES IN ORAL PRESENTATION OF ENGLISH-MAJORED JUNIORS AT TAY DO UNIVERSITY, VIETNAM

It could be broadly accepted that oral presentations are becoming important for students. It is required in almost every field and in the university environment. To succeed in the university environment and in their future jobs, these students need to improve their oral presentation skills. However, one of the drawbacks of using oral presentations in the language classroom is that students often find oral presentations extremely challenging. Therefore, the researcher conducted this research with the main goal of finding out common problems when giving an oral presentation to English-majored juniors at Tay Do University. Ninety juniors majoring in English at Tay Do University were selected to take part in the study. Data are gathered through questionnaires and interviews. The researcher used quantitative and qualitative methods to do the research. From the collected data, when they give a presentation, students usually make some mistakes such as problems in vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, psychological and background knowledge. Through this study, they would recognize their own problems when giving a presentation. Besides, understanding students' learning difficulties may also enable teachers to help students develop effective learning strategies and ultimately improve their presentation skills. It is hoped that this research can be helpful for not only students but also teachers in learning and teaching English.  Article visualizations

Antibacterial hydrogel containing Piper betle L. extract for acne treatment, an ex vivo investigation

The current treatments of acne vulgaris and acne-like disorders such as gram-negative folliculitis possess lots of unwanted side effects. Thus, alternative approach of utilizing natural plant extracts, specifically Piper betle L., have gained much attention. To this end, this work developed, characterized, and ex vivo evaluated novel antibiotics hydrogels containing P. betle L. leaf extract for acne treatment. Firstly, the design of experiments (DoE) D-optimal method was successfully developed, optimized, and validated, to investigate the relationship between P. betle L. extraction conditions and the extract properties. Secondly, the best extract was encapsulated in the hydrogel formulations composed of carbopol 940, propylene glycol, and cocamidopropyl betaine. Finally, the hydrogel was ex vivo determined its antibacterial activity on bacteria isolated from 15 patient acne samples. The optimal extraction condition being an extraction solvent/plant weight ratio of 4.034:1, an extraction time of 2.147 h, and a water extract volume of 91.4 mL. This condition yielded an extract total phenolic content of 3.337±0.034 g GAE/g, and minimum inhibitory concentrations of 32 µg/mL and 128 µg/mL on Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 25923 and Escherichia coli ATCC 25922, respectively. The hydrogel possessed suitable properties for a topical medication, including a viscosity of 6800 cps, a pH of 7.0, and a good foaming ability, at both 10°C, 25°C, and 40°C. The hydrogel showed higher antibacterial activity than the positive controls in both gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria. Conclusively, the hydrogel could become a potential pharmaceutical product for acne treatment

THỰC VẬT PHÙ DU VÙNG BIỂN VEN BỜ ĐÀ NẴNG

Phytoplankton, especially community characteristics, in coastal waters of Da Nang have not been well studied. This present study analyzed data of phytoplankton for diversity and abundance from surveys from 2002 to 2016 at 44 stations in the coastal Da Nang waters. A total of 316 taxa from 9 classes were identified: Dinophyceae (134 taxa), Mediophyceae (77 taxa), Coscinodiscophyceae (44 taxa), Bacillariophyceae (36 taxa), Cyanophyceae (3 taxa), Dictyochophyceae (2 taxa), Bacillariophyta classis incertae sedis (1 taxon), Conjugatophyceae (1 taxon) and Thecofilosea (1 taxon). A list of 36 species of potentially harmful microalgae was recorded in coastal waters of Da Nang. In which, Pseudo-nitzschia spp. often had higher cell densities in some locations during the northeast monsoon. Analyzing diversity indices in different locations showed that there were significance differences of Margalef and Shannon indices, low in estuarine area (CS) and higher in the south of Son Tra peninsula (NST). Meanwhile no strong differences of Pielou and Simpson indices were found among the locations. However, there were strong differences of Margalef, Simpson and Pielou indices, which were found over the three studied years (2004, 2005, and 2006), mainly in NST, the northeast of Son Tra peninsula (DBST) and Da Nang bay (VDN). Analysis of species accumulation curves indicated that only 56–95% of species  was found compared to maximal expected species richness in all studied locations. DMS analysis showed that there was year-based similarity among the years (ca. 50% of similarity) of phytoplankton communities. Among the studied years, average phytoplankton cell densities in Da Nang bay and the northeast of Son Tra were higher than those in other years and locations. This present study on species richness, expected species richness and variation in phytoplankton abundance suggested that there is a need of increasing sampling efforts, especially in riverine area and DBST for better understanding of characteristics of phytoplankton communities in coastal Da Nang waters.Thực vật phù du là đối tượng ít được nghiên cứu ở vùng biển ven bờ Đà Nẵng, nhất là những đặc trưng về thành phần loài và cấu trúc quần xã. Trong bài báo này, chúng tôi phân tích số liệu về đa dạng loài và sự phong phú của thực vật phù du thu thập được trong các chuyến khảo sát từ năm 2002 đến năm 2016 ở 44 trạm trong vùng biển ven bờ Đà Nẵng. Kết quả phân tích đã xác định được 316 loài và dưới loài thuộc 9 lớp tảo khác nhau. Trong các loài thực vật phù du ghi nhận được, có 36 loài tảo có khả năng gây hại, trong đó mật độ của Pseudo-nitzschia spp. cao hơn tại một số khu vực trong thời kỳ gió mùa Đông Bắc. Phân tích các chỉ số theo từng khu vực, có thể thấy chỉ số giàu có loài Margalef và chỉ số đa dạng Shannon khác nhau đáng kể giữa các khu vực, thấp ở cửa sông trong vịnh Đà Nẵng và cao ở nam bán đảo Sơn Trà. Trong khi các chỉ số cân bằng Pielou và đa dạng Simpson lại không khác biệt giữa các khu vực. Tuy nhiên, sự đa dạng và độ giàu có loài lại có sự khác biệt giữa các năm 2004, 2005 và 2016, chủ yếu ở nam bán đảo Sơn Trà, đông bắc bán đảo Sơn Trà và vịnh Đà Nẵng. Phân tích độ giàu có loài cho thấy hầu hết các khu vực đều chỉ ghi nhận được từ 56% đến 95% số loài mong đợi. Phân tích cấu trúc quần xã thực vật phù du thu thể hiện sự biến động giữa các năm nghiên cứu với mức độ tương đồng trong năm xấp xỉ 50%. So sánh trung bình mật độ thực vật phù du thu của từng khu vực cho thấy mật độ vào năm 2005 cao hơn hẳn so với các năm khác ở vịnh Đà Nẵng và đông bắc Sơn Trà. Các phân tích về độ giàu có loài, loài mong đợi và biến động mật độ thực vật phù du thu cho thấy dù vùng biển nghiên cứu được ghi nhận thành phần loài thực vật phù du thu cao, nhưng số lượng trạm và thời gian thu mẫu ở vùng biển Đà nẵng nhất là khu vực cửa sông cần được thu thập nhiều hơn, vẫn cần thu thập thêm vật mẫu ở tất cả các khu vực, nhất là vùng cửa sông trong vịnh Đà Nẵng và đông bắc bán đảo Sơn Trà

Kinetics of cardiovascular and inflammatory biomarkers in paediatric dengue shock syndrome

Glycocalyx disruption and hyperinflammatory responses are implicated in the pathogenesis of dengue-associated vascular leak, however little is known about their association with clinical outcomes of patients with dengue shock syndrome (DSS). We investigated the association of vascular and inflammatory biomarkers with clinical outcomes and their correlations with clinical markers of vascular leakage. We performed a prospective cohort study in Viet Nam. Children ≥5 years of age with a clinical diagnosis of DSS were enrolled into this study. Blood samples were taken daily during ICU stay and 7–10 days after hospital discharge for measurements of plasma levels of Syndecan-1, Hyaluronan, Suppression of tumourigenicity 2 (ST-2), Ferritin, N-terminal pro Brain Natriuretic Peptide (NT-proBNP), and Atrial Natriuretic Peptide (ANP). The primary outcome was recurrent shock. Ninety DSS patients were enrolled. Recurrent shock occurred in 16 patients. All biomarkers, except NT-proBNP, were elevated at presentation with shock. There were no differences between compensated and decompensated DSS patients. Glycocalyx markers were positively correlated with inflammatory biomarkers, haematocrit, percentage haemoconcentration, and negatively correlated with stroke volume index. While Syndecan-1, Hyaluronan, Ferritin, and ST-2 improved with time, ANP continued to be raised at follow-up. Enrolment Syndecan-1 levels were observed to be associated with developing recurrent shock although the association did not reach the statistical significance at the P < 0.01 (OR = 1.82, 95% CI 1.07–3.35, P = 0.038). Cardiovascular and inflammatory biomarkers are elevated in DSS, correlate with clinical vascular leakage parameters and follow different kinetics over time. Syndecan-1 may have potential utility in risk stratifying DSS patients in ICU

Identification of Pathogenic Factors in Klebsiella pneumoniae Using Impedimetric Sensor Equipped with Biomimetic Surfaces

K. pneumoniae is an opportunistic pathogen that causes nosocomial infections, such as, pneumonia, urinary tract infections, septic shock, and gastro intestinal disease. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS), capsular polysaccharide, and fimbriae are recognized major virulence factors of K. pneumoniae and play key roles during early stages of infections. In this study, we functionalized the surface of gold electrode with mannose and mucin to monitor the adhesion-associated virulence factors of K. pneumoniae. The binding characteristics of K. pneumoniae 2242 wild type and of its isogenic mutants lacking outer-core LPS (∆wabG) or fimbriae (∆fimA) were investigated using Faradaic impedance spectra. The results obtained showed fimbriae are responsible for K. pneumoniae adhesion to the mannose of glycoprotein on the surfaces of epithelial cells, whereas outer-core LPS and capsular polysaccharide are associated with specific binding to mucous. These results concurred with those of a conventional in vitro assay using human ileocecal epithelial cell (HCT-8 cells) and a human bladder epithelial cell (T-24), indicating that the devised method could be useful for investigating virulence-associated interactions of pathogenic bacteria with specific host cells and organs

Current situation of Bitcoin management and use: perspectives from the world and recommendations for Vietnam

The research aimed to evaluate suitability of Bitcoin and its platform in emerging markets such as Vietnam. We used qualitative analysis combined with data collection method published, statistics, analysis, synthesis, comparison, to generate qualitative comments and discussion; evaluate results, the article analyzed and evaluated the impacts of Bitcoin and virtual currency on society of Vietnam, both positive and negative sides. It was found that virtual currency not accepted in Vietnam as means of payment yet, while many nations in the world accept it. We need to complete the legal framework for virtual currencies in general, Bitcoin in particular. The State should continue to have policies to improve information technology infrastructure, build and improve the capacity of the contingent of financial experts, encryption, and security experts and give warning risks in virtual currency transactions. The scientific value of paper is using experiences from previous studies in other countries to generate recommendations for conditions of Bitcoin development in merging markets. Last but not least, the research was limited to the case of Vietnam; hence, we can expand research to other Asian countries or other emerging markets

Diversity of phytoplankton in lower Thu Bon river and Cu Lao Cham

Data on characteristics of phytoplankton communities is important scientific information in marine ecosystem, especially in assessment of environmental impacts on biodiversity in a specific waters. In the present study, two-year phytoplankton data was analyzed for species diversity, community structure changes and variation in 4 adjacent waters:  Lower Thu Bon river  (TB), transition waters (CT), Cu Lao Cham island (CLC) and offshore site (BM) to provide basic scientific data of phytoplankton communities, compare and assess seasonal changes and possible linkage of these adjacent waters. A total of 364 phytoplankton taxa of 12 classes were identified, showing high diversity and with seasonal variation of the investigated waters. There was strong difference of phytoplankton communities among the adjacent waters with low similarity index and the change of dominant species seasonally in each area. The species richness and diversity in the lower Thu Bon river were lower than in other areas. Variation of phytoplankton abundance and diversity along the river transect showed changes in species composition between the dry and rainy seasons but with similar trend in abundance. The low community similarity between the adjacent waters and the transition waters may indicate low impacts of river flow on phytoplankton communities in the coastal waters