THE CHALLENGES OF RAISING REVENUES AND RESTRUCTURING SUBSIDIES IN MALAYSIA

Malaysia has run deficit budgets in all but five years since 1970 but past deficits have been managed thanks to substantial oil revenues and high domestic savings. However, the slow growth or decline of several traditional sources of revenue and the rising subsidy bill since 2007 have given pause for reflection on the traditional approach to fiscal management. In this paper, it is argued that fiscal management must not only centre around reducing non-productive expenditures and wasteful leakages but must also confront the problem of reducing and restructuring subsidies, particularly to petrol and petroleum-related products. The global dip in petroleum process has fortuitously provided the respite needed for such an exercise and should not lull policy makersinto complacency. When the economy recovers from the currentdownswing, a solid revenue raising instrument such as the value-addedtax must be introduced in order to wean the economy away from thecurrent over reliance on petroleum-based taxes

Experimental study of quantization of Faraday effect in a two dimensional electron gas and electrostatic field screening in a superconductor

Dans cette thèse, nous présentons deux expériences originales que nous avons conçues et construites depuis le début. La première consiste à mesurer la rotation de Faraday quantique dans un gaz bidimensionnel d’électrons (2DEG) à des fréquences micro-ondes et la seconde à sonder la longueur d’écran électrostatique dans les supraconducteurs. L’expérience sur la rotation de Faraday nous a permis de réaliser une mesure quantitative de la rotation de Faraday micro-ondes sur le 2DEG AlGaAs/GaAs. Nous avons effectué des mesures avec plusieurs 2DEGs de différentes mobilités. Les mesures effectuées sur un échantillon à faible mobilité (μ ≃ 1×106 cm2 V−1 s−1) révèlent la quantification de l’angle de Faraday dans le régime de Hall quantique. L’angle de Faraday observé est quantifié en unités d’une constante de structure fine effective, α∗ > α. Cette augmentation est due au fait que nous effectuons nos mesures en présence d’un guide d’ondes et non en espace libre. Cependant, avec des 2DEGs de plus grande mobilité qui peuvent accueillir des états de Hall quantique fractionnels, aucun plateau n’est observé. Cette expérience présente également l’avantage de sonder les systèmes de Hall quantique par une approche non invasive. La deuxième expérience permet de sonder directement la longueur de l’écran électrostatique. Elle est basée sur l’idée que la capacité d’un condensateur est sensible au changement de la longueur d’écran électrostatique. Avec la configuration de mesure, nous pouvons mesurer des changements de capacités aussi petits que 0,3 ppm à notre fréquence de mesure de 400 Hz. Cela correspond à une sensibilité de mesure de 1 partie de 104 dans la longueur d’écran. En utilisant ce dispositif, nous avons réalisé des expériences pour mesurer le changement de longueur de blindage électrostatique associé à la transition supraconductrice dans le Ti et le Nb et nous avons observé un signal minuscule et reproductible pour lequel nous n’avons pas encore d’explication.Abstract : In this thesis, we present two original experiments that we have designed and built from the beginning. The first one is to measure quantum Faraday rotation in two dimensional electron gas (2DEG) at microwave frequencies and the second one to probe electrostatic screening length in superconductors. The experiment on the Faraday rotation allowed us to perform a quantitative measurement of microwave Faraday rotation on AlGaAs/GaAs 2DEG. We carried out measurements with several 2DEGs of different mobilities. The measurements carried out on a low mobility sample (μ ≃ 1×106 cm2 V−1 s−1) reveals the quantization of Faraday angle in the quantum Hall regime. The observed Faraday angle is quantized in units of an effective fine structure constant, α∗ > α. This enhancement is due to the fact that we do our measurements in the presence of a waveguide and not in free space. However, with 2DEGs of higher mobility which can host fractional quantum Hall states there are no observed plateaus. This experiment also provides the advantage of probing the quantum Hall systems in a non-invasive approach. The second experiment can directly probe the electrostatic screening length. It is based on the idea that the capacitance of a capacitor is sensitive to change in electrostatic screening length. With the measurement setup, we can measure change in capacitances as small as 0.3 ppm at our measurement frequency of 400 Hz. This corresponds to a measurement sensitivity of 1 part in 104 in screening length. Using this setup, we have performed experiments to measure the change in electrostatic screening length associated with superconducting transition in Ti and Nb and we observe a reproducible, tiny signal for which we have no explanation yet

Factors affecting the transition from university to work in selected Malaysian cities: is a public university degree a disadvantage?

Massive investments in higher education have witnessed a proliferation of public and private universities in Malaysia. A parallel development of concern is the view that public university graduates are finding it more difficult than their private university counterparts in transiting from university to work. To test the empirical veracity of this widely expressed belief, data from 441 currently employed graduates from three major urban centres were analysed to determine factors that increased the probability of securing permanent employment within six months of graduation, the officially used cut-off period. While the findings indicated that the transition is eased largely by personal endeavours (other than being Chinese) such as mastering English, attaining a high GPA, and participating in extracurricular activities, we also found a negative association between having a public university qualification and the length taken to secure the first permanent job. We discuss the implications of these findings for Malaysian education policy. If a public university degree indeed disadvantages a graduate in transiting to work, it would undermine the role of public universities as avenues for the upward social mobility of students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Additionally, the large expenditures on public universities would appear to be misallocated

Tunable Assembly of Gold Nanorods in Polymer Solutions to Generate Controlled Nanostructured Materials

Gold nanorods grafted with short chain polymers are assembled into controlled open structures using polymer-induced depletion interactions and structurally characterized using small angle x-ray scattering. When the nanorod diameter is smaller than the radius of gyration of the depletant polymer, the depletion interaction depends solely on the correlation length of the polymer solution and not directly on the polymer molecular weight. As the polymer concentration increases, the stronger depletion interactions increasingly compress the grafted chains and push the gold nanorods closer together. By contrast, other structural characteristics such as the number of nearest neighbors and fractal dimension exhibit a non-monotonic dependence on polymer concentration. These parameters are maximal at intermediate concentrations, which are attributed to a crossover from reaction-limited to diffusion-limited aggregation. The control over structural properties of anisotropic nanoscale building blocks demonstrated here will be beneficial to designing and producing materials \emph{in situ} with specific direction-dependent nanoscale properties and provides a crucial route for advances in additive manufacturing

An improved light dark box test by using a real-time video tracking system

In the behavioral science field, many of the oldest tests have still most frequently been used almost in the same way for decades. The subjective influence of human observer and the large inter-observer and interlab differences are substantial among these tests. This necessitates the possibility of using technological innovations for behavioral science to obtain new parameters, results and insights as well. The light-dark box (LDB) test is a characteristic tool used to assess anxiety in rodents. A complete behavioral analysis (including both anxiety and locomotion parameters) is not possible by performing traditional LDB test protocol, as it lacks the usage of a real-time video recording of the test. In the current report, we describe an improved approach to conduct LDB test using a real-time video tracking system

The utility of beta 2 microglobulin (B2M) as an initial diagnostic tool for oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) : evidence from a Malaysian sample

Background The delay in diagnosis of oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is a factor in rendering the poor prognosis, and recent research has explored the use of serum tumour markers such Beta 2 Microglobulin (B2M), to aid early diagnosis. However, despite a high incidence of OSCC in Southeast Asia, no studies on the clinical use of B2M in the region were found. Objectives: To determine if serum B2M level can serve as an initial diagnostic tool to indicate if a biopsy is warranted, and if so, to propose a local B2M serum reference value to identify OSSC patients Methodology: Twenty-one patients diagnosed with OSCC were seen at Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia (HUSM) over a one-year period, between June 2016 and June 2017, and an equal number of healthy controls participated in the study. Apart from patient history, venous blood of approximately 5ml volume was collected from each subject at the pre-treatment stage and analysed by an Abbot ARCHITECT c8000 analyser using the immunoturbidometry method.The results were analysed using ROC analysis and the Mann Whitney test. Results: Serum B2M levels showed a statistically significant increase (p<0.001) in patients compared to controls. The test was shown to have 90.5% sensitivity and 90.5% specificity. It was found to be a sensitive and specific serum tumour marker at a cut off value of 1.57 mg/l to differentiate cases from controls. Conclusion: B2M is a sensitive and specific tumour marker to differentiate OSCC cases from controls. It is cost effective and minimally invasive, making it a potentially useful adjunct diagnostic tool in a high-risk patient pool