Monitoring urban green space (UGS) changes by using high resolution aerial imagery: a case study of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Urban green space (UGS) in a city is the foundation of natural productivity in an urban structure. It is also known as a natural cooling device that plays a vital role in the city as an urban lung, discharging oxygen to reduce the city heat and as a wall against harmful air pollution. When urbanization happens, UGS, including the gazetted areas, is essentially converted into an artificial surface due to the population’s demand for new development. Therefore, identifying its significance is a must and beneficial to explore. The purpose of this study is to identify the 10 years of UGS change patterns and analyze the UGS loss, particularly in the affected gazetted zone. The study used available aerial imagery data for 2002, 2012, and 2017, and database record of green space. The study had classified UGS by using the Support Vector Machine (SVM) algorithm. The training area was determined by visual interpretation and aided by a land use planning map as reference. The result validity was then determined by kappa coefficient value and producer accuracy. Overall, the study showed that the city had lost its UGS by about 88% and the total gain in built up area was 114%. The loss in UGS size in the city could be compared to a total of 2,843 units of football fields, transformed forever in just 10 years. The uncontrolled development and lack of advanced monitoring mechanism had negatively affected the planning structure of green space in KL. The implementation of advance technology as a new mitigation tool to monitor green space loss in the city could provide a variety of enhanced information that could assist city planners and urban designers to defend decisions in protecting these valuable UGS

The Edible Mushroom Pleurotus spp.: II. Medicinal Values

Mushrooms health benefit was recognized in the Orient from several thousand years ago as globally consumption and has third largest commercially production. The genus Pleurotus (oyster mushroom) is an organoleptic fast growing fungus which belongs to basidiomycota group. Although 70 species is discovered until now for this genus, but only few of them are available in market such as Pleurotus florida, P. sajor-caju and P. ostreatus. They have been used in human diet throughout the world due to their rich nutrients such as protein, fiber carbohydrate, minerals, vitamins and lipid. It should be noted that low amount calories, Sodium, fat and cholesterol is reported in this genus. Many pharmaceutical companies in the Far East and China are viewing the medicinal mushrooms as a rich source of innovative biomedical molecules. These molecules can be extracted from different part of oyster mushroom such as fruiting body, mycelia and culture broth. Mainly they are biopolymers including polysaccharides, proteins and nucleic acids as they are more variable to carry biological information. The medicinal properties of Pleurotus spp studied by several authors, as a result antitumor, immunomodulating, antiviral, antibacterial, antigenotoxic, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, hypocholesterolamic, antihypertensive, antiinociceptive, anti-hyperglycaemic, anti-platelet-aggregating, antihepatoma, anti poliferative and antiatherosclerotic. In this chapter, biodivertsity of genus Pleurotus will be discussed regarding nutritional and bioactive compounds. Furthermore the prospective of oyster mushroom for therapeutic application and concept will be highlighted

The many benefits of urban green spaces

Recently, the ideology of greenery city has received global attention, whichaimed to address the issues of rapid urbanization, population growth,andclimate change. Urban green spaces (UGS) seem like the essentialasset that could help cities to mitigate the adverse effects of rapid urbanization and urban sprawl in a sustainable way. It plays a vital role in our cities as an urban lung, discharging oxygen to reduce the city’s heat, the wall for harmful air pollution and offersmost significantbenefits in term of the environment, social and economy to a city. However, the presence of UGS as one of the criticalsectors in urban planning are always neglected.Nevertheless, UGS is loved by everyone however when it turns to the need; thenit is often apparent as a liability and claim as non-commodity goods in a planning development process. Hence, this paper aims to understand the many benefits of urban green space development in the contemporary of urban sustainability thought. The systematic review has been carried out through scientific online atabase,documentation and relevant related papers

The Edible Mushroom Pleurotus spp.: I. Biodiversity and Nutritional Values

Mushrooms are macrofungi with numerous varieties and widely known as food and medicine in many ancient cultures. They are considered as potential source of many essential nutrients as well as therapeutic bioactive compounds and thus became one of the main components in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and in Japanese herbal medicine since more than two thousand years. The genus Pleurotus (widely known as oyster mushroom) is fast growing fungus belongs to basidiomycota group and considered as one of the famous species with many health benefits. Nowadays, seventy species of this genus has been discovered, but solely a few of them such as P. florida, P. sajor-caju and P. ostreatus are available in the market. The rich nutrients such as proteins, fibers, carbohydrates, minerals, vitamins, and lipids present this mushroom as famous healthy food. Furthermore, Bioactive compounds such as polysaccharides, proteins and nucleic acid are extracted from various species of Pleurotus tends the researcher to investigate more on this beneficial genus. This work is focused on reviewing the recent work published in the biodiversity and nutritional content of Pleurotus spp

Preliminary screening of plant proteases as a potential source for the development of an inhibitive assay for heavy metals

Heavy metals pollution has become a great threat to the world. Since instrumental methods are expensive and need skilled technician, a simple and fast method is needed to determine the presence of heavy metals in the environment. In this work, a preliminary study was carried out on the applicability of various local plants as a source of protease for the future development of the inhibitive enzyme assay for heavy-metals. The crude proteases preparation was assayed using casein as a substrate in conjunction with the Coomassie dye-binding assay. The crude protease from the kesinai plant was found to be the most potent plant protease. The crude enzyme exhibited broad temperature and pH ranges for activity and will be developed in the future as a potential inhibitive assay for heavy metals

Comparison of 3D reconstruction of mandible for preoperative planning using commercial and open-source software

3D printing of mandible is important for pre-operative planning, diagnostic purposes, as well as for education and training. Currently, the processing of CT data is routinely performed with commercial software which increases the cost of operation and patient management for a small clinical setting. Usage of open-source software as an alternative to commercial software for 3D reconstruction of the mandible from CT data is scarce. The aim of this study is to compare two methods of 3D reconstruction of the mandible using commercial Materialise Mimics software and open-source Medical Imaging Interaction Toolkit (MITK) software. Head CT images with a slice thickness of 1 mm and a matrix of 512x512 pixels each were retrieved from the server located at the Radiology Department of Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia. The CT data were analysed and the 3D models of mandible were reconstructed using both commercial Materialise Mimics and open-source MITK software. Both virtual 3D models were saved in STL format and exported to 3matic and MeshLab software for morphometric and image analyses. Both models were compared using Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test and Hausdorff Distance. No significant differences were obtained between the 3D models of the mandible produced using Mimics and MITK software. The 3D model of the mandible produced using MITK open-source software is comparable to the commercial MIMICS software. Therefore, open-source software could be used in clinical setting for pre-operative planning to minimise the operational cost

Turnover intention among Malaysian operators in electrical and electronics sub-sector: Leadership style perspective

Job turnover is traditionally faced by organizations in many industries.Resource wastage and low productivity can be derived from turnover issue.Turnover intention was found to be a reliable predictor of actual turnover in previous studies.Consequently, this cries for some insights on turnover intention issue, especially within Malaysian context.This paper will concentrate on determining the relationship of leadership style on turnover intention among manufacturing operators in focusing on Electrical and Electronics sub-sector.The survey was taken amongst the operators of manufacturing industry in Peninsular Malaysia (N=800).Considering that Malaysia manufacturing industry has recorded a substantial economic growth through heavy investment in economic activities, it is significant for all manufacturing companies to retain talented employees and reduce turnover problem in order to be more competitive.The findings had accepted the research hypothesis. Dimensions of leadership style (i.e.transactional) had significantly correlated and contributed to the turnover intention.The findings had contributed to the theoretical significance through the examination of direct relationships between leadership style on turnover intention among local operators in manufacturing sector based on the high turnover rate in Malaysia manufacturing sector between the years 2008 until early of 2011

Optimization and maximization of hexavalent molybdenum reduction to Mo-blue by Serratia sp. strain MIE2 using response surface methodology

Molybdenum has long been known to be toxic to ruminants, but not to humans. However, more recently it has been increasingly reported that molybdenum shows toxic effects to reproductive organs of fish, mouse and even humans. Hence, its removal from the environment is highly sought after. In this study, response surface methodology (RSM) was successfully applied in the optimization and maximization of Mo6+ reduction to Mo-blue by Serratia sp. MIE2 for future bioremediation application. The optimal conditions predicted by RSM were 20 mM molybdate, 3.95 mM phosphate, pH 6.25 and 25 g l−1 sucrose with absorbance of 19.53 for Mo-blue production measured at 865 nm. The validation experimental run of the predicted optimal conditions showed that the maximum Mo-blue production occurred at absorbance of 20.87, with a 6.75 % deviation from the predicted value obtained from RSM. Molybdate reduction was successfully maximized using RSM with molybdate reduction before and after optimization using RSM showing Mo-blue production starting at the absorbance value of 10.0 at 865 nm going up to an absorbance value above 20.87. The modelling kinetics of Mo6+ reduction showed that Teissier was the best model, with calculated Pmax, Ks and Ki values of 1.97 Mo-blue per hour, 5.79 mM and 31.48 mM, respectively

Optimization of exopolysaccharide production by pleurotus ostreatus using diffrent cultivation strategies

Pleurotus ostreatus or known as oyster mushroom was regarded as one of the most cultivated mushroom around the world. One of the qualities it has is it able to produced exopolysaccharide called pleuran which secreted into the medium during submerged fermentation. The polysaccharide composed mainly of ß-(1/3)-D glucose and ß-(1/6)-D glucose linked by glycosidic bond. It has molecular weight of 2.4 X 104 Da with molecular formula of (C6H10O5)x The importance of pleuran is that it has the immunomodulatory properties that associated in triggering our immune system response. Nowadays, submerged fermentation is considered as the best method in cultivation this kind of mushroom. However, the production process of this kind of mushroom and its exopolysaccharide production especially in term of medium component is still unclear. In this research, the objectives were to optimize the medium composition and to find the optimum carbon to nitrogen (C: N) ratio for high exopolysaccharide production. Eight different media was screened and followed by factor by factor optimization of the medium component. The factors that been studied were ideal concentration of glucose, yeast extract, ammonium sulfate and dipotassium phosphate. Media number six which contain glucose 60.0 g L-1, yeast extract 2.0 g L-1, (NH4)2SO4 5.0 g L-1, MgSO4.7H2O 0.2 g L-1, K2HPO4 1.0 g L-1 was selected as best media production for P. ostreatus cultivation . The experiment then was further with different concentration of each component in the medium six excluding magnesium sulfate heptahydrate which maintained at 0.2 g L-1 throughout all the experiment stage. The range concentration for glucose, yeast extract, ammonium sulfate and dipotassium phosphate was setup between 0 – 120 g L-1, 0 – 4 g L-1, 0 – 5 g L-1 and 0 – 2 g L-1 respectively. In order to get the best C: N ratio for highest exopolysaccharide production, eleven ratio of carbon to nitrogen was experimented ranging from 15:1 to 65:1.Result shown that the optimum concentration for glucose, yeast extract, ammonium sulfate and dipotassium phosphate was 80.0, 4.0, 2.5 and 1.0 g L-1 respectively whiles the optimal C: N ratio recorded was 40: 1. The optimized medium also produced 2.83 g L-1 of exopolysaccharide increasingly up to 49 % when compared with un-optimized medium which only produced 1.9 g L-1 of exopolysaccharide

ZnO Nanorods Coated Microfiber Loop Resonator For Relative Humidity Sensing

This paper reported a new humidity sensor, employing microfiber loop resonator (MLR) coated with Zinc Oxide (ZnO) as a probe. The MLR was constructed from a silica tapered fiber with a waist diameter of 7 µm, which was prepared using flame brushing technique. The self-touching loop was coated by ZnO using sol–gel method. A significant response to humidity changes from 35%RH to 85%RH was observed due to the changeable refractive index of the ZnO coating material which modified the light propagation at the output of the MLR. The result shows that the sensitivity of the proposed sensor increases by a factor of 2 as compared to the uncoated MLR. The output power of the ZnO coated MLR drops linearly from −29.3 dBm to −43 dBm when relative humidity increases from 35%RH to 85%RH. The linearity and resolution of the ZnO coated MLR also outperformed the uncoated MLR with 99.4% and 0.013%RH respectively