Entomologic and molecular investigation into Plasmodium vivax transmission in Singapore, 2009

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Singapore has been certified malaria free since November 1982 by the World Health Organization and despite occasional local transmission, the country has maintained the standing. In 2009, three clusters of malaria cases were reported in Singapore.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Epidemiological, entomological and molecular studies were carried out to investigate the three clusters, namely Mandai-Sungei Kadut, Jurong Island and Sembawang.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A total of 29 malaria patients, with no recent travel history, were reported in the three clusters. Molecular analysis based on the <it>msp3α </it>and <it>msp1 </it>genes showed two independent local transmissions: one in Mandai-Sungei Kadut and another in Sembawang. Almost all cases within each cluster were epidemiologically linked. In Jurong Island cluster, epidemiological link remains uncertain, as almost all cases had a unique genetic profile. Only two cases shared a common profile and were found to be linked to the Mandai-Sungei Kadut cluster. Entomological investigation found <it>Anopheles sinensis </it>to be the predominant Anopheline in the two areas where local transmission of <it>P. vivax </it>was confirmed. <it>Anopheles sinensis </it>was found to be attracted to human bait and bites as early as 19:45 hrs. However, all <it>Anopheles </it>mosquitoes caught were negative for sporozoites and oocysts by dissection.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Investigation of <it>P. vivax </it>cases from the three cluster areas confirmed the occurrence of local transmission in two areas. Although <it>An. sinensis </it>was the predominant Anopheline found in areas with confirmed transmission, the vector/s responsible for the outbreaks still remains cryptic.</p

Entomologic and Virologic Investigation of Chikungunya, Singapore

Data from longitudinal analyses can be useful in the design and implementation of control strategies

Executive Functions of Six-Year-Old Boys with Normal Birth Weight and Gestational Age

Impaired fetal development, reflected by low birth weight or prematurity, predicts an increased risk for psychopathology, especially attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Such effects cut across the normal range of birth weight and gestation. Despite the strength of existing epidemiological data, cognitive pathways that link fetal development to mental health are largely unknown. In this study we examined the relation of birth weight (>2500 g) and gestational age (37–41 weeks) within the normal range with specific executive functions in 195 Singaporean six-year-old boys of Chinese ethnicity. Birth weight adjusted for gestational age was used as indicator of fetal growth while gestational age was indicative of fetal maturity. Linear regression revealed that increased fetal growth within the normal range is associated with an improved ability to learn rules during the intra/extra-dimensional shift task and to retain visual information for short period of time during the delayed matching to sample task. Moreover, faster and consistent reaction times during the stop-signal task were observed among boys born at term, but with higher gestational age. Hence, even among boys born at term with normal birth weight, variations in fetal growth and maturity showed distinct effects on specific executive functions

Social media sentiment analysis and topic detection for Singapore English

Social media has become an increasingly important part of our daily lives in the last few years. With the convenience built into smart devices, many new ways of communicating have been made possible via social-media applications. Sentiment analysis and topic detection are two growing areas in Natural Language Processing, and there are increasing trends of using them in social media analytics. In this thesis, we analyze various standard methods used in supervised sentiment analysis and supervised topic detection on social media for Colloquial Singapore English. For supervised topic detection, we created a naïve Bayes classifier that performed classification on 5000 annotated Facebook posts. We compared the result of our classifier against open source classifiers such as Support Vector Machine (SVM), Maximum Entropy and Labeled Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA). For supervised sentiment analysis, we developed a phrasal classifier that analyzed the polarity of 425 argumentative Facebook posts. Our naïve Bayes classifier gave the best accuracy result of 89% for supervised topic detection on two-class classification and 57% accuracy for our six-class classification. For our supervised sentiment analysis, our phrasal sentiment analysis classifier obtained an accuracy of 35.5% with negative polarity class achieving a high precision of 94.3%.http://archive.org/details/socialmedisentim1094538272Civilian, ST Engineering, SingaporeApproved for public release; distribution is unlimited

Ingroup-outgroup evaluations under threats to group’s distinctiveness and self’s social identity, and the moderating effect of social value orientation.

The current research aimed to investigate the effects on ingroup and outgroup evaluations when both the individual’s social identity and the individual’s ingroup are threatened simultaneously, as well as how individual differences in social value orientation moderates these ingroup-outgroup evaluations. Threats to ingroup and to the self were manipulated through false feedbacks. After manipulation, participants (N = 90) evaluated fellow NTU students of the same major of study as themselves (ingroup) and students of a different major of study (outgroup) on two measures. Results revealed that social value orientation significantly moderated the effects of threats to self and to ingroup on ingroup-outgroup evaluations in multiple ways, depending on social contexts and target of evaluation.Bachelor of Art

Sociocultural comparison of gender-role portrayals in Malaysia and Singapore television commercials.

This research is done to investigate the differences and similarities between the portrayal of males and females in the Television commercials of Singapore and Malaysia. A sample of commercials taped from 2 Malaysia and 2 Singapore channels were used in the research. The findings basically show that males are still the dominant party of the sexes in both Singapore and Malaysia but to a greater extent in Malaysia

Impact of subjective performance appraisal and bonus allocation on attitudes of lower level managers.

The present research attempts to provide a deeper understanding of these two areas by analysing the relationship existing between the performance appraisal process variables and employee affective reactions of trust and confidence, goal commitment as well as voluntary turnover intention. These reactions were investigated in a 2 X 3 factorial designed experiment, in which 105 subjects completed a questionnaire assessing the above dependent variables

Highly conductive graphene by low-temperature thermal reduction and in situ preparation of conductive polymer nanocomposites

Polydopamine-coated graphene oxide (DGO) films exhibit electrical conductivities of 11 000 S m−1 and 30 000 S m−1 upon vacuum annealing at 130 °C and 180 °C, respectively. Conductive poly(vinyl alcohol)/graphene and epoxy/graphene nanocomposites show low percolation thresholds due to the excellent dispersibility of the DGO sheets and their effective in situ reduction

Scatter plots of executive functions with adjusted birth weight and gestational age.

<p>Abbreviations: IED = intra/extra-dimensional shift task; SST = stop-signal task; DMS = delayed-matching-to-sample task.</p