Course profiling system

Course Profiling System (CPS) is a document management system for self-evaluation of first degree programmes at Private Higher Education Institutions (PHEIs). The framework provides systematic compliancy-checking of curriculum design with the Malaysian Qualifications Agency (MQA)Minimal Standards; and a more holistic view of the programme and its constituent courses.The novelty is the system’s design that reduces efforts and errors inherent in manual process.Apart of serving as a repository and retrieval of course profiles, CPS is also a platform for managing and monitoring the quality of PHEI’s programme for application and upkeep of MQA accreditation or renewa

How Confident are we With Polarisation Based Diagnostics for Transformer Condition Assessment?

Preventative diagnosis of transformers has become an important issue in recent times in order to improve the reliability of electric power systems. A number of diagnostic techniques such as Return Voltage (RV), Polarization/Depolarisation Current (PDC) and Dielectric Dissipation Factor (tan .) measurements at low frequency are currently available for practicing engineers. This paper outlines the summary of these techniques and a case study with all these measurements. Then the difficulties with the interpretation techniques are highlighted along with the recommendation of an expert system previously developed by the first author of this paper

Experience With Dielectric Response Measurements On Oil-Paper Insulated Cables

Deterioration of the underground power cables insulation has been established to be caused by electrical, thermal and environmental stresses. With the degradation of dielectric strength of the insulation, the underground cables will not be able to function optimally or as planned. As a supplement to the existing dissipation factor and other conventional cable diagnostic measurements, the Decay Voltage (DV) and the Return Voltage (RV) measurement technologies are currently being proposed for nondestructive diagnosis of cable insulation. The main purpose of this paper is to present results from laboratory measurements of DV, RV and Polarisation and Depolarisation Current (PDC) on a number of samples of oil-impregnated paper insulated cables. Comparison of these results has also been made with the conventional dissipation factor measurement data for the same cables

Are L-myc genotypes prognostic markers in non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) in our Chinese patients?

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P53 intron 2 polymorphisms and mutations in non-small cell lung carcinoma in Hong Kong

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Effect of worksheet scaffolds on student learning in problem-based learning

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of worksheets as a scaffolding tool on students’ learning achievement in a problem-based learning (PBL) environment. Seventeen PBL classes (N = 241) were randomly assigned to two experimental groups—one with a worksheet provided and the other without. Students’ learning of the topic at hand was evaluated by comparing results from pre- and post-lesson concept recall tests. We also obtained information about students’ perceptions of factors impacting their learning using a Learning Impact Questionnaire. The data was analyzed by means of analyses of variance. Results of the study indicated that there was no statistically significant difference between the levels of understanding for both groups of students. In addition, survey results revealed that the strongest factor perceived by students to impact their learning in a PBL context is the tutor followed by team and class dynamics, while the influence of the worksheet was rated lowest. These findings suggest that scaffolds such as worksheets may not play a significant role in enhancing students’ learning within the social constructivist framework of problem-based learning. On the other hand, the importance of the role of tutor and collaborative small group learning which are key features of PBL is reinforced

Process study of verbal interactions in problem based learning

The goal of this study was to increase our understanding of the learning-oriented verbal interactions taking place between students during the entire problem-based learning (PBL) process, and to identify the relationships between what students say with their learning outcomes. The verbal interactions of one PBL group of five students throughout an entire PBL process were recorded in this data-intensive case study consisting of more than 1000 utterances. Our results show that a large proportion of students' learning-oriented verbal interaction focused on stating or recalling facts with a much lower percentage involving constructive statements, arguments, evaluation, proposals and critical questions. Simple correlation analysis indicated that percentages of questions, verification questions and requests correlated negatively with student achievement while critical questions, arguments and evaluations positively. At the practical level, suggestions that are relevant to educational practice can be derived from our observations. Furthermore, this study gives insight to the different types of group interactions during the entire PBL process, including those during the self-directed study time, to help us better understand the learning processes involved in PBL

Effects of leadership types on job satisfaction among Malaysian higher education institutions

Employee job satisfaction is an important component of any job and could be influenced by different types of leadership. Keeping employees happy and satisfied while at the same time being a great leader is an extremely difficult balance, especially in educational leadership, where there are two different types of employees, mainly administrators, and educators. It requires a leader who can balance between the lines and choose the proper leadership style to motivate different types of employees. This study looks at three different leadership types: laissez-faire, transformational and transactional leadership. A purposeful sampling of 393 participants was utilized to sample educators from Malaysia's private and governmental education institutions. Data were collected using questionnaires. The findings indicated that transformational leadership and laissez-faire have a significant relationship to job satisfaction where laissez-faire (β = 0.608, t = 16.576, p = 0.000) and transformational leadership (β = 0.865, t = 8.498; p = 0.000), while transactional leadership has an insignificant relationship with job satisfaction (β = -0.019, t = 0.747, p = 0.227)

The future of enterprise groupware applications

This paper provides a review of groupware technology and products. The purpose of this review is to investigate the appropriateness of current groupware technology as the basis for future enterprise systems and evaluate its role in realising, the currently emerging, Virtual Enterprise model for business organisation. It also identifies in which way current technological phenomena will transform groupware technology and will drive the development of the enterprise systems of the future

Eradication of large solid tumors by gene therapy with a T cell receptor targeting a single cancer-specific point mutation

PURPOSE: Cancers usually contain multiple unique tumor-specific antigens produced by single amino acid substitutions (AAS) and encoded by somatic non-synonymous single nucleotide substitutions. We determined whether adoptively transferred T cells can reject large, well-established solid tumors when engineered to express a single type of T cell receptor (TCR) that is specific for a single AAS. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: By exome and RNA sequencing of an UV-induced tumor, we identified an AAS in p68 (mp68), a co-activator of p53. This AAS seemed to be an ideal tumor-specific neoepitope because it is encoded by a trunk mutation in the primary autochthonous cancer and binds with highest affinity to the MHC. A high-avidity mp68-specific TCR was used to genetically engineer T cells as well as to generate TCR-transgenic mice for adoptive therapy. RESULTS: When the neoepitope was expressed at high levels and by all cancer cells, their direct recognition sufficed to destroy intra-tumor vessels and eradicate large, long-established solid tumors. When the neoepitope was targeted as autochthonous antigen, T cells caused cancer regression followed by escape of antigen-negative variants. Escape could be thwarted by expressing the antigen at increased levels in all cancer cells or by combining T cell therapy with local irradiation. Therapeutic efficacies of TCR-transduced and TCR-transgenic T cells were similar. CONCLUSIONS: Gene therapy with a single TCR targeting a single AAS can eradicate large established cancer but a uniform expression and/or sufficient levels of the targeted neoepitope or additional therapy are required to overcome tumor escape