Physicochemical properties and thermal behavior of binary blends of Madhuca longifolia seed fat and palm oil as a lard substitute

Fat extracted from pork is prohibited under halal and kosher food regulations. A study was carried out on Madhuca longifolia seed fat and palm oil to compare their physicochemical, solidification and melting characteristics to formulate halal alternative lipid substitutes. Various blends of Madhuca longifolia (ML) and palm oil (PO) was formulated in order to become similar to lard (LD). A total of three binary blends were prepared: ML:PO (97:3; w/w), ML:PO (95:5), ML:PO (93:7), and identified by the mass ratio of ML to PO. The fat blends were compared with LD in terms of the fatty acid and triacylglycerol compositions using gas chromatography and high performance liquid chromatography, respectively. In addition, the fat blends also being studied for thermal properties using differential scanning calorimetry and solid fat content using p-nuclear magnetic resonance. Although there were considerable differences between LD and the fat blends with regard to fatty acid and triacylglycerol compositions, some similarities were seen regarding to thermal properties and solid fat content profiles. The blend of ML:PO (97:3) displayed closer similarity to LD with respect to melting transition at -3.59°C and its solid fat content profile showed the least difference to that of LD throughout the temperature range measured

Effect on Operating Parameters Towards Metastable Zone Width of Carbamazepine-Saccharin Co-Crystal

Co-crystal is believed can improved physicochemical properties of an Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APis). Understanding in co-crystallization process is needed in order to have desirable crystal habits for materials. One of the studies that are important in designing co-crystallization process is kinetics study. In this research, carbamazepine (CBZ) and co-former saccharin (SAC) has been used to study the metastable zone width (MSZW) of the CBZ-SAC co-crystal in ethanol solution. The MSZW is studied by varying concentration of CBZ, mo) ratio values of SAC to CBZ and cooling rates used by polythermal method. Crystallization temperature and dissolution temperature is used to determine the maximum temperature difference ~Tmax using N)'vlt's equation

Assessing safety level of UTM campus based on safe city concepts

Safety is an important aspect in today's living, in urban city, residential area, and also in campus area. Several initiatives were introduced to increase the safety level, and to prevent crime from happening in the campus area, known as Safe City Concept. These initiatives included the Safe City Index, Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED), behavioural model, safe city urban area, safe city of smart city, and resident safety assessment. Some of this initiative focus on urban city area, or residential, besides only focus on crime prevention and not focus on the assessment of safety level for campus area. This study aims to assess the safety level for campus area, with case study of UTM Campus. To assess the safety level, a set 4 indicators, which is crime, environment, public health and emergency response, with 9 sub-indicators was identified in this study. These indicators and sub-indicators used to determine the safety level of campus area based on the Safe City Concept. The analysis used is spatial analysis on the indicator, and using weighted criteria matrix to evaluate safety level for each building in UTM campus. The results show that most the buildings in UTM are in good and high safety level, with 65% of buildings score more than 70%. For buildings was detected with highest score of 95% of safety level, while 3 buildings score lowest percentage of 53.7%.These results indicated that UTM campus area is a safe area, based on the Safe City Concept. These results can help authorities to use these indicators of Safe City Concept to assess the education campus area safety level

Manta ray foraging optimization with quasi-reflected opposition strategy for global optimization

This paper proposes an extension of Manta Ray Foraging Optimization (MRFO) using Oppositional-based Learning (OBL) technique called Quasi Reflected Opposition (QRO). MRFO is a new algorithm that developed based on the nature of a species in cartilaginous fish called Manta Ray. Manta ray employs three foraging strategies which are chain, cyclone and somersault foraging. Nonetheless, MRFO is tends to getting trap into local optima due to the redundant of intensification of the search agents in the search space. On the other side, OBL is a prominent technique in reducing chance of local optimum while increasing the convergence speed. Thus, QRO is synergized into MRFO to form QR-MRFO, in objective to improve MRFO in term of finding better accuracy of solution and faster convergence rate. Latter, QR-MRFO was performed on a series of benchmark functions and analyzed using statistical non-parametric test of Wilcoxon to measure the significant level of improvement. Results from the test shows that MRFO is undoubtedly defeated by QR-MRFO in term of accuracy

Review of Polymer, Dye-Sensitized, and Hybrid Solar Cells

The combination of inorganic nanoparticles semiconductor, conjugated polymer, and dye-sensitized in a layer of solar cell is now recognized as potential application in developing flexible, large area, and low cost photovoltaic devices. Several conjugated low bandgap polymers, dyes, and underlayer materials based on the previous studies are quoted in this paper, which can provide guidelines in designing low cost photovoltaic solar cells. All of these materials are designed to help harvest more sunlight in a wider range of the solar spectrum besides enhancing the rate of charge transfer in a device structure. This review focuses on developing solid-state dye-synthesized, polymer, and hybrid solar cells

Non-dominated sorting manta ray foraging algorithm with an application to optimize PD control

This paper presents a multi-objective (MO) version of Manta Ray Foraging Algorithm (MRFO) by using components in Non-Dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm (NSGAII). MFRO is a recent developed algorithm which was inspired from behavior of a cartilaginous fish called Manta Ray. MRFO search solution by using three strategies of manta ray which are chain foraging, cyclone foraging and somersault foraging. However, this algorithm solves only single-objective problem and can be improved to solve multi-objective problem. Thus, non-dominated sorting (NS) strategies including crowding distance (CD) were adopted into MRFO. NS is a sorting technique based on Pareto’s game. It is a fast strategy to develop a good characteristic of Pareto’s front (PF). Meanwhile, CD is a strategy to preserve good distribution of solutions along the PF. This proposed algorithm is called NSMRFO. It is tested using several benchmark functions and its performance is compared to its parent by using statically analysis of hypervolume indicator. Then, it is applied to a Proportional-Derivative (PD)-controller for an Inverted Pendulum System (IPS) in order to know its performance on real-world application. Result of the NSMRFO on benchmark functions shows that it outperforms NSGAII and satisfactorily optimizes PD-control for the IPS

Multi objective barnacle mating optimization for control design of a pendulum system

This paper presents a MultiObjective Barnacle Mating Optimization (MOBMO) and its application to optimize controller parameters for an inverted pendulum system. The algorithm is an extended version of a single-objective Barnacle Mating Optimization (BMO). In terms of solving a complex problem that has two conflicting objectives, a multiobjective type BMO is needed. Therefore, in the proposed MOBMO, nondominated sorting and crowding distance approaches are incorporated into BMO as a technique to formulate the multiobjective algorithm. The proposed algorithm is tested on various multiobjective benchmark functions. Its performance in terms of accuracy and diversity attainment to find a theoretical pareto front solution is analyzed. Moreover the proposed MOBMO is applied to optimize control parameters for PD controls of a pendulum system. The performance of the proposed MOBMO is compared with Multiobjective Water Cycle Algorithm (MOWCA). Result of the benchmark functions test shows that the proposed algorithm has attained a higher accuracy and a competitive diversity in locating the theoretical front solution. For its application to optimize PD control parameters, both MOWCA and MOBMO have successfully attained a good pareto front solution and controlled the pendulum sufficiently good. Overall performance, the proposed MOBMO has outperformed MOWCA for accuracy attainment and achieved the same level of diversity performance

Spiral-based manta ray foraging optimization to optimize PID control of a flexible manipulator

This paper presents a Spiral-based Manta Ray Foraging Algorithm (SMRFO). It is an improvement of Manta Ray Foraging Algorithm (MRFO). The original MRFO has a competitive performance in terms of its accuracy in locating an optimal solution. Its performance can be improved further provided the balanced exploration and exploitation strategies throughout a search operation are improved. A modification in the Somersault phase of the MRFO is proposed. A spiral strategy is incorporated into the Somersault phase of the MRFO. This is to guide all agents toward the best agent in spiral-based trajectory in every iteration. The spiral strategy also offers a dynamic step size scheme for all search agents during the operation. The proposed algorithm is tested on a set of benchmark functions that consist of various fitness landscapes. In terms of solving an engineering application, the proposed algorithm is applied to optimize a PID controller for a flexible manipulator system. Result of the accuracy performance test on benchmark functions shows that the proposed algorithm outperforms the original MRFO significantly. In solving the engineering problem, both SMRFO and MRFO optimize the PID control adequately good. The SMRFO-PID control tracks the bang-bang test input better than the MRFO-PID. It confirms the superiority of the SMRFO over the MRFO

A whole genome analyses of genetic variants in two Kelantan Malay individuals

The sequencing of two members of the Royal Kelantan Malay family genomes will provide insights on the Kelantan Malay whole genome sequences. The two Kelantan Malay genomes were analyzed for the SNP markers associated with thalassemia and Helicobacter pylori infection. Helicobacter pylori infection was reported to be low prevalence in the north-east as compared to the west coast of the Peninsular Malaysia and beta-thalassemia was known to be one of the most common inherited and genetic disorder in Malaysia.By combining SNP information from literatures, GWAS study and NCBI ClinVar, 18 unique SNPs were selected for further analysis. From these 18 SNPs, 10 SNPs came from previous study of Helicobacter pylori infection among Malay patients, 6 SNPs were from NCBI ClinVar and 2 SNPs from GWAS studies. The analysis reveals that both Royal Kelantan Malay genomes shared all the 10 SNPs identified by Maran (Single Nucleotide Polymorphims (SNPs) genotypic profiling of Malay patients with and without Helicobacter pylori infection in Kelantan, 2011) and one SNP from GWAS study. In addition, the analysis also reveals that both Royal Kelantan Malay genomes shared 3 SNP markers; HBG1 (rs1061234), HBB (rs1609812) and BCL11A (rs766432) where all three markers were associated with beta-thalassemia.Our findings suggest that the Royal Kelantan Malays carry the SNPs which are associated with protection to Helicobacter pylori infection. In addition they also carry SNPs which are associated with beta-thalassemia. These findings are in line with the findings by other researchers who conducted studies on thalassemia and Helicobacter pylori infection in the non-royal Malay population.Wan Khairunnisa Wan Juhari, Nur Aida Md Tamrin, Mohd Hanif Ridzuan Mat Daud, Hatin Wan Isa, Nurfazreen Mohd Nasir, Sathiya Maran, Nur Shafawati Abdul Rajab, Khairul Bariah Ahmad Amin Noordin, Nik Norliza Nik Hassan, Rick Tearle, Rozaimi Razali, Amir Feisal Merican and Bin Alwi Zilfali

Antimicrobial resistance among migrants in Europe: a systematic review and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: Rates of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) are rising globally and there is concern that increased migration is contributing to the burden of antibiotic resistance in Europe. However, the effect of migration on the burden of AMR in Europe has not yet been comprehensively examined. Therefore, we did a systematic review and meta-analysis to identify and synthesise data for AMR carriage or infection in migrants to Europe to examine differences in patterns of AMR across migrant groups and in different settings. METHODS: For this systematic review and meta-analysis, we searched MEDLINE, Embase, PubMed, and Scopus with no language restrictions from Jan 1, 2000, to Jan 18, 2017, for primary data from observational studies reporting antibacterial resistance in common bacterial pathogens among migrants to 21 European Union-15 and European Economic Area countries. To be eligible for inclusion, studies had to report data on carriage or infection with laboratory-confirmed antibiotic-resistant organisms in migrant populations. We extracted data from eligible studies and assessed quality using piloted, standardised forms. We did not examine drug resistance in tuberculosis and excluded articles solely reporting on this parameter. We also excluded articles in which migrant status was determined by ethnicity, country of birth of participants' parents, or was not defined, and articles in which data were not disaggregated by migrant status. Outcomes were carriage of or infection with antibiotic-resistant organisms. We used random-effects models to calculate the pooled prevalence of each outcome. The study protocol is registered with PROSPERO, number CRD42016043681. FINDINGS: We identified 2274 articles, of which 23 observational studies reporting on antibiotic resistance in 2319 migrants were included. The pooled prevalence of any AMR carriage or AMR infection in migrants was 25·4% (95% CI 19·1-31·8; I2 =98%), including meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (7·8%, 4·8-10·7; I2 =92%) and antibiotic-resistant Gram-negative bacteria (27·2%, 17·6-36·8; I2 =94%). The pooled prevalence of any AMR carriage or infection was higher in refugees and asylum seekers (33·0%, 18·3-47·6; I2 =98%) than in other migrant groups (6·6%, 1·8-11·3; I2 =92%). The pooled prevalence of antibiotic-resistant organisms was slightly higher in high-migrant community settings (33·1%, 11·1-55·1; I2 =96%) than in migrants in hospitals (24·3%, 16·1-32·6; I2 =98%). We did not find evidence of high rates of transmission of AMR from migrant to host populations. INTERPRETATION: Migrants are exposed to conditions favouring the emergence of drug resistance during transit and in host countries in Europe. Increased antibiotic resistance among refugees and asylum seekers and in high-migrant community settings (such as refugee camps and detention facilities) highlights the need for improved living conditions, access to health care, and initiatives to facilitate detection of and appropriate high-quality treatment for antibiotic-resistant infections during transit and in host countries. Protocols for the prevention and control of infection and for antibiotic surveillance need to be integrated in all aspects of health care, which should be accessible for all migrant groups, and should target determinants of AMR before, during, and after migration. FUNDING: UK National Institute for Health Research Imperial Biomedical Research Centre, Imperial College Healthcare Charity, the Wellcome Trust, and UK National Institute for Health Research Health Protection Research Unit in Healthcare-associated Infections and Antimictobial Resistance at Imperial College London