Determination of Flavonoid and Caffeine Content in Black and Oolong Teas

The world is blessed with tea for its health benefits and the hundreds of flavours to be chosen from. Flavonoid and caffeine is the most abundant type of phenolic compound and alkaloid found in tea respectively. These compounds can be extracted using various solvents, resulting in various concentration when compared with water as the solvent. This study was conducted by preparing tea infusion from both distilled water and organic solvents to observe the effect of solvents on the content of flavonoid and caffeine. Using spectrophotometric method, the content of flavonoid and caffeine in commercial black (Boh, Sabah, Lipton) and oolong (Oo Long Kee Zhong, Montea, Ten Ren) teas obtained from Malaysian market were determined. Sabah and Montea has the highest flavonoid (0.044 g/L) and caffeine (3.585 g/L) content in distilled water respectively. The final content of flavonoid and caffeine was found to be higher in organic solvents compared to distilled water, as well as when the steeping time is increased

Current Outlook of Livestock Industry in Malaysia and Ways Towards Sustainability

This paper reviews the current status of livestock industry in Malaysia and the measures taken to direct this industry towards sustainability. The statistics related to the number of animals and farms, self-sufficiency ratio, and consumption of livestock products are presented. The largest population of livestock in Malaysia goes to non-ruminant where chicken dominates by 95.9%. However, the largest percentage of registered livestock farms in West Malaysia is dominated by ruminant farmers of which 56.3% are beef cattle farms. The meat consumption in Malaysia is inclined towards white meat where poultry meat has self-sufficiency ratio of over 100% for the past five years.  The manure excreted from the livestock in Malaysia is estimated to be 17.745 million tons for the year 2020 which is largely contributed by chicken, followed by cattle. The current practices and policies adopted to emphasize sustainability in this industry are also reviewed. Current policies in Malaysia that are related to livestock industry adopt sustainable practices which is important to expand the livestock industry without harming the environment

The synthesis of gold nanoparticles and its extensive applications

Gold nanoparticles (GNP) have been extensively investigated within these few decades for their unique electronic, optical and catalytic properties. Nanosized gold or GNP exhibits different physico-chemical properties from bulk gold where GNP exhibits various vivid colors depending on the particle size and shape. GNP is highly reactive, and highly stable against oxidation, making it an exciting material for interdisciplinary research especially in photocatalysis and biomedical field. This chapter provides an insight on the historical discovery of GNP, and its unique properties as opposed to bulk and gold cluster, together with its applications in the advancing world of science and technology. Although variety of research on GNP had been reported especially on its biomedical applications there are still many setbacks and parameters that need to be tuned. The lack of sufficient stability of GNP due to its facile aggregation, and its biocompatibility concern to be used within living cells have impeded development of its applications in the real world. Also discussed in this chapter are the conventional and green methods employed by scientists in the synthesis for stable and biocompatible GNP. This chapter also concludes with a short overview on the future scientific miracles we may achieve with GNP