Teachers’ perceptions of lessons using computer assisted language learning

The present study was designed to investigate the teachers’ perceptions of CALL lessons. The objectives of this study are to find out the problems faced by the teachers when conducting CALL lessons, to identify the perceptions teachers have on such lessons and also to investigate teachers’ perceptions of the effectiveness of the lessons using CALL on students. Questionnaires were distributed to 16 teachers who are currently teaching English at secondary schools in Johor Bahru. The data collected were analyzed using qualitative data. The problems identified in using CALL lessons were problems with facilities and problems with teachers’ attitudes. However, teachers had positive perceptions of CALL lessons as it helps teachers to attract students’ attention in the classroom and CALL lessons promote enhanced language acquisition

Implementation of DNA Pattern Recognition in Turing Machines

Pattern recognition is the act of takingin raw data and taking an action based on thecategory of the pattern. DNA pattern recognitionhas applications in almost any field. It hasapplications in forensics, genetic engineering, bioinformatics, DNA nanotechnology, history and soon. The size of the DNA molecules can be verylarge that it is a tedious task to perform patternrecognition for the same using commontechniques. Hence this paper describes the patternrecognition for DNA molecules using the conceptof Turing Machines. It also performs a simulationof the standard Turing Machine that performsDNA pattern recognition on the Universal TuringMachine

A wood effort

Universiti Putra Malaysia woodworking academic Dr Jegatheswaran Ratnasingam, in collaboration with German professor Dr Frieder Scholz. scored a first in the global woodworking community recently

Hepatoprotective Activity of Aegle marmelos in CCl4 Induced Toxicity - An In-vivo Study

Medicinal plants are of great importance for healthy living of an individual. Aegle marmelos is one of the Indian medicinal plant, which has enormous medicinal values against various diseases / disorders and it has traditionally been used by ayurvedic people for the treatment of liver problems. This study is aimed to investigate the hepatoprotective effect of crude ethanolic extract of the leaves of A. marmelos (AMEE) in carbon tetrachloride (CCl4) induced toxicity in mice. The ethanolic extract at a dose of 500mg/kg body weight when given orally exhibited a significant (

Macro and microscopic evaluation of Gmelina arborea Roxb. – A botanical pharmacognostic approach for quality control of raw drug material

Gmelina arborea Roxb. of family Verbenaceae, is one of the highly valued medicinal plant used in numerous traditional medical formulations. It belongs to the ‘Dasamoola’ group of ayurvedic medicinal plants and hence widely exploited. Pharmacognostic techniques involving macroscopic, microscopic and also dry powder analysis serve as botanical methods which help in the correct identification of the crude drug. Leaf constants such as stomatal number, stomatal index, vein islet number, vein termination number also have been determined. Better quality control practices in nutraceutical and pharmaceutical industries demand the correct identification of the dried plants or powdered drug thereby detects and prevents the adulterations, if any. The challenge ahead of this investigation is to validate the therapeutic efficacy and safety of the plant following standard methodology

Congestion control algorithms of TCP in emerging networks

In this dissertation we examine some of the challenges faced by the congestion control algorithms of TCP in emerging networks. We focus on three main issues. First, we propose TCP with delayed congestion response (TCP-DCR), for improving performance in the presence of non-congestion events. TCP-DCR delays the conges- tion response for a short interval of time, allowing local recovery mechanisms to handle the event, if possible. If at the end of the delay, the event persists, it is treated as congestion loss. We evaluate TCP-DCR through analysis and simulations. Results show significant performance improvements in the presence of non-congestion events with marginal impact in their absence. TCP-DCR maintains fairness with standard TCP variants that respond immediately. Second, we propose Layered TCP (LTCP), which modifies a TCP flow to behave as a collection of virtual flows (or layers), to improve eficiency in high-speed networks. The number of layers is determined by dynamic network conditions. Convergence properties and RTT-unfairness are maintained similar to that of TCP. We provide the intuition and the design for the LTCP protocol and evaluation results based on both simulations and Linux implementation. Results show that LTCP is about an order of magnitude faster than TCP in utilizing high bandwidth links while maintaining promising convergence properties. Third, we study the feasibility of employing congestion avoidance algorithms in TCP. We show that end-host based congestion prediction is more accurate than previously characterized. However, uncertainties in congestion prediction may be un- avoidable. To address these uncertainties, we propose an end-host based mechanism called Probabilistic Early Response TCP (PERT). PERT emulates the probabilistic response function of the router-based scheme RED/ECN in the congestion response function of the end-host. We show through extensive simulations that, similar to router-based RED/ECN, PERT provides fair bandwidth sharing with low queuing delays and negligible packet losses, without requiring the router support. It exhibits better characteristics than TCP-Vegas, the illustrative end-host scheme. PERT can also be used for emulating other router schemes. We illustrate this through prelim- inary results for emulating the router-based mechanism REM/ECN. Finally, we show the interactions and benefits of combining the different proposed mechanisms

A computational model of space-variant vision based on a self-organised artificial retina tessellation

Abstract available: p.i-iii

PHARMACOLOGY OF NOVAL CANNABINOIDS

Cannabis is a plant rich in various compounds that have a variety of impacts on the physiology of humans and the effects of these metabolites have a significant role in managing a variety of clinical diseases. A substantial increase in the use of SC (synthetic cannabinoids) had seen in the last few years especially infrequent cannabis users. The SCs will generate psychoactive effects that were similar to cannabis. However, the composition and pharmacological characteristics of these drugs make them possibly hazardous. Like all drugs, cannabis’ pharmacokinetics depends on the route of administration. Several studies showed that the bioavailability is less in oral administration when compared to inhalation. The main reason for this decrease in oral bioavailability is that cannabinoids undergo the first-pass metabolism before entering into the systemic circulation whereas in inhalation, it enters the circulation directly through the lungs. Cannabis sativa is a psychoactive plant that contains more than 500 components of which 104 cannabinoids had been identified. Of these, 2 components such as Δ9-THC (Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol) and CBD (cannabidol) were under the scientific investigation. Δ9-THC is the primary cannabinoid which was responsible for the consequences of psychotrophy. The potency of cannabis is assessed based on the THC concentration of a sample that is the main psychoactive cannabinoid in cannabis. The adverse effects are in direct relation to the concentration of THC in the product after regular cannabis use. It can be assumed that several cannabinoids will find their way into the pharmacies from preclinical research within a century

Development and Assessment of Discrimination Exercises for Faculty Calibration in Preclinical Operative Dentistry

The purpose of this research was to develop and assess methods for faculty calibration in a preclinical operative dentistry course, to evaluate intra- and interexaminer agreement based on the information provided during calibration sessions, and to evaluate intra- and interexaminer reliability 6 months after initial calibration. The average intraexaminer agreement among the course faculty was 74(+/-5) %. The overall interexaminer reliability improved after calibration. The use of an instrument (UNC 15 periodontal probe) was introduced, for objective measurement of a component. Visual discrimination exercises were developed and tested for their ability to1) initially aid in increased faculty calibration while assessing the Class II preparation and 2) provide sustained calibration among the same faculty over a period of approximately 3 months. The results showed that, the objective use of an instrument (UNC 15 periodontal probe) and the use of discrimination exercises increased interexaminer reliability.Master of Scienc