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Malaysian National Center for Education estimates that students' enrolments will increase to 17.2 million by 2028. The conventional way of managing things around campus work can be improved by applying the smart campus concept. This study showcases the potential smart campus applications with different wireless IoT technologies and their application; LoRa for Internet of Bicycle (IoB), Sigfox for water quality monitoring, IEEE 801.11p for campus active safety application, and NB-IoT for remote mangrove conservation. The prototypes consist of various sensors and online dashboards to demonstrate the open-source IoT ecosystem. For IoB, a 0.5 km radius centered at LoRa gateway’s location, proved reliable for real-time e-bicycles location monitoring. It offers locking system security to avoid bicycles steal. The SigFox-based water quality monitoring system received signal performance is adequate (RSSI -80 to -90 dBm) with a tower location approximately 3 km from the lake area. For active safety application based on IEEE 801.11p, communication of braking force, car speed, and position of cars ahead of an obstacle make this application feasible to improve road safety around campus, with the real implementation expected to be achieved in the next five to ten years. Lastly, the application of remote mangrove conservation monitoring using NB-IoT on LTE mobile network from Celcom as an independent wireless platform. It allows researchers and students from the university to use this application for their research on sustainable conservation at remote mangrove sites worldwide. The results have shown that all the wireless IoT is promising for future smart campus deployment.

Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs) define as a scope of disability in the development of certain conditions such as social communication, imagination, and patients' capabilities to make some connection. In Malaysia, the number of ASD cases diagnosed is increasing each year. Typically, ASD patients are analyzed by doctors based on history and behavior observation without the ability to diagnose instantaneously. This research intends to study the ASD biomarker based on neuroimaging functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) images, which can aid doctors in diagnosing ASD. This study applies a deep learning method from Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) variants to detect either the patients are ASD or non-ASD and extract the robust characteristics from neuroimages in fMRI. Then, it interprets the performance of pre-processed images in the form of accuracy to classify the neural patterns. The Autism Brain Imaging Data Exchange (ABIDE) dataset was used to research the brain imaging of ASD patients. The results achieved using CNN models namely VGG-16 and ResNet-50 are 63.4% and 87.0% accuracy, respectively. This method also assists doctors in detecting Autism from a quantifiable method that is not dependent on the behavioral observations of suspected autistic children.

Zingiber zerumbet (Z. zerumbet) is recognized for decades for its usability as spice and condiment in food flavoring as well as having high medicinal properties. Up to date, there are limited literature on evaluation of the effects of multiple variables in details especially in pilot-scale subcritical water extraction (SWE) of Z. zerumbet. The aim for this study is to implement the fractional factorial design with five variables which are temperature (100-170°C), time (10-40 minutes), pressure (10-20 bar), particle size (0.89-3.56 mm) and solvent to solid ratio (20-40 ml/g) in SWE of Z. zerumbet. Analysis of variance for all responses stated that temperature, time, particle size and solvent to solid ratio are significant variables. Temperature is the most significant factor for zerumbone concentration and antioxidant activity with a p-value of

Ananas comosus (L.) Merr is one of many commercially popular fruits in the cannery food industry that contributes to the increasingly mounting agro-industrial waste. In this study, a four−factor−three−level Box−Behnken design (BBD) that comprised of sonication time (A), solvent ratio (B), amplitude (C) and liquid−solid ratio (D) for the ultrasound−assisted extraction (UAE) of pineapple peels (PP) was utilized to optimize the yield of total phenolic content (TPC). Under an optimized UAE condition [5 min; 50 % of ethanol: water; 65 % of amplitude; 35:1 mL/g of liquid−solid ratio], the highest TPC from PP of 708.10 mg gallic acid equivalent (GAE)/g DW was achieved. Antioxidant capacity analysis of PP revealed a high total flavonoid content (TFC) with the IC50 for 2,2−diphenyl−1−picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) of 1146.86 ± 11.83 mg QE/g, 11.83 mg/mL and 1578.07 ± 25.96 µM Fe (II)/100g, respectively. High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis revealed that the major flavonoid in the phenolic profile of PP extracts being catechin followed by quercetin and gallic acid. The UAE of PP extracts exhibited higher TPC than known conventional extraction techniques, thus indicating its efficacy to recover satisfactory quantities of phenolics in PP under optimized conditions.

The Chanson’s equation for distribution of air bubbles in vertical direction in the developing zone at self-air entrainment condition is used when the air bubbles concentration at the flow surface is 90%. Otherwise, if this condition is not satisfying, then the equations of Straub and Anderson can be used. The results of these two equations are not similar with experimental results. Therefore, these two equations need to be modified accordingly. These modification equations can also be used to predict the air bubbles distributions in vertical direction. Hence, the main objective of this study is to modify these equations for vertical air concentration distribution in the developing zone and validate them with experimental results. The steep channel in the form of flume with 10 m long, 0.2 m wide and 0.4 m high with slopes varies between 20° and 25° were used in this experimental work. The discharge water was 9 l/s, 12 l/s and 21 l/s with Froude numbers between 6.9 to 8.0. The Thomson weir (V Notch) was used to calibrate the discharge flow of water. A set of video cameras was used to record the motion pictures of the air bubbles. The air bubble was analyzed using Ulead Video Studio 11 software program equipped with Imagej software. The results of this study indicates that the modifications of equations of Straub and Anderson were the equation air concentration distribution (C) in the underlying zone value was 0.647 m at 20° slope of channel bed, the equation air concentration distribution (C) in the underlying zone the value was 0.542 m at 25° slope and the equation in the mixing zone remained the same. The original Chanson equation was modified mainly in terms of the hyperbolic tangent (tanh) equation which originally had a power of 2 while the modification was 0.8; and the Ce was 0.9 sin α, whereas at the modified Chanson’s equation, Ce was converted into Ce= 0.6 sin α.

Overvoltage phenomenon is the common problem that always occurs in the power system and can cause the electrical system network breakdown, and in some cases, it may explode. The frequent overvoltage also can affect and degrade the lifespan of the electrical power system components and network. Thus, the overvoltage sensor is needed to overcome this problem matter. The Rogowski coil (RC) is one of an inductive coil group, and it is suitable for measuring the alternating current (AC) and transient currents or overvoltage. This paper demonstrated the effect of RC magnetic flux density, B with difference cross-section, geometries sizing and the number of turns by using Finite Element Method (FEM). Commonly, there are three types of RC widely used; rectangular, circular and oval. Each of these cross-sections has different characteristics in term of performance. The results have shown that the rectangular cross-section is better than oval and circular cross-section based on the number of magnetic flux density.

Bisphenol A (BPA) has been utilised excessively at a global capacity of 2.9 billion kg/year. It is widely used in manufacturing polycarbonate polymers and epoxy resins. Hence, humans are potentially exposed to this chemical substance in their daily life. As a typical endocrine disruptor, BPA exhibits detectable hormone-like properties. Many studies have been linking BPA exposure in humans with the risk of developing cardiovascular disease, however the direct exposure of BPA on cardiomyocytes beating rates and morphology have not been entirely explored. Therefore, in this study, we aimed to investigate the effects of BPA on cells structure and function of neonatal rat cardiomyocytes culture. Cardiomyocytes were isolated from 0 to 2 days old newborn rats and treated with 0.001 to 100 µM concentration of BPA. All cardiomyocytes were subjected to immunostaining, beating frequency assessment assay, MTS assay and Scanning Electron microscopy (SEM). In immunostaining, cardiomyocytes showed positive staining for F-actin. This staining allows identification of the cells thus differentiate cardiomyocytes from other cell types. Significance effects of BPA on cardiomyocytes were observed in MTS assay (p

Tamoxifen is an effective treatment for estrogen receptor alpha positive (ERa+)-breast cancer, however patients who received the treatment for five years have greater mortality risk compared to those who did not receive tamoxifen. Furthermore, patients treated with tamoxifen developed resistance to the drug which mediated through p53 and PTEN. Therefore, the study is undertaken to determine the potential adjuvant properties of flavonoids, apigenin and rutin to promote the anticancer activity induced by tamoxifen using ERa+-breast cancer MCF-7 cell lines. MCF-7 and non-transformed breast MCF-10A cells were treated separately with apigenin, rutin, tamoxifen or the combination of each flavonoids with tamoxifen. Anti-proliferative activity and respective IC50 concentrations were determined using MTT assay. The respective IC50 concentrations obtained were used in the subsequent experiments. The anti-proliferative mechanism was determined using Annexin V-FITC morphological staining and DNA fragmentation assays. The effect on tumor suppressor (p53 and PTEN) and cell cycle related genes (p21, CDK1 and Cyclin B1) were determined by QuantiGene Plex assay. Our results showed that MCF-7 cells were more sensitive to both apigenin and rutin compared to MCF-10A cells. Both cells were sensitive to tamoxifen. Apigenin and rutin synergistically enhanced tamoxifen anti-proliferative effect in MCF-7. Meanwhile rutin protects MCF-10A against the toxicity of tamoxifen. Our results indicate that the anti-proliferative mechanism of apigenin and rutin is mediated by apoptosis signals. In MCF-7 cells, both tumor suppressor (p53 and PTEN) and cell cycle related genes (p21 and CDK1) were up regulated by apigenin and rutin, contrary to tamoxifen. Apigenin and rutin induced G2/M arrest and apoptosis in MCF-7 cells through p53-dependent pathway. Both flavonoids are suggested as potential adjuvant agents to enhance tamoxifen efficacy in ERa+-breast cancer treatment.

Brakes squeal has remained to be one of the major NVH challenges in brake system design and development. It has been a concern for automotive industry for decade. Brake researchers have proposed many brake squeal reduction and prevention methods in order to overcome and reduce the squeal that emanates from the brake disc systems. In this paper, the effectiveness of constrained layer dampers (CLD) in reducing disc brake squeal noise was investigated. CLD isolates the brake squeal noise through shear deformations of the viscoelastic materials. Two sets of brake tests were conducted using the brake test dynamometer with the application of CLD. Two different types of CLD were used which are three-layer constrained layer damper and four-layer constrained layer damper. Squeal tests were carried out using brake noise test rig based on the global standard procedure SAE J2521. From the test, four-layer CLD configuration works more efficient than three-layer CLD configuration. CLD made up of nitrile butadiene rubber, silicone rubber and mild steel proved to be the most effective noise insulator at hydraulic pressure range of 5 bar to 30 bar and temperature range of 50oC to 200oC with a maximum noise reduction of 11.3 dBA. Thus, CLD technique was proven to be an effective method in reducing brake squeal noise.

Typically, a mineral based oil from petroleum refining has been widely used as automatic transmission fluid (ATF) in the wet clutch application. However, it has two major disadvantages: (1) It causes pollution to the environment and (2) It is a non-renewable source. Thus, Palm Fatty Acid Distillate (PFAD) is explored as an alternative lubricant for the wet clutch application. In present study, tribological behaviour of PFAD is first sought using a pin on disk tribo-tester and then its behavior will be compared with the behavior obtained in the commercial ATF. It is found in the friction analysis that PFAD has good anti friction ability at low speeds. In addition, PFAD generates almost identical dynamic friction coefficients obtained in the commercial ATF at velocity of 0.4m/s to 0.9 m/s. A slight positive slope in the friction coefficient–velocity graph indicates that PFAD has tendency to have anti-shudder properties, which can improve engaging quality of the wet clutch. However, PFAD has two weaknesses; low viscosity index and less anti wear ability. Some additives should be added into PFAD so that it can give better friction level and less wear rate.

Synthetic haloalkanoic acids often applied as active components in herbicides are toxic to the environment and harmful to the living organisms. These compounds are widely released to the environment due to their routine use by agricultural activities. In recent years, accumulation of haloalkanoic acids was emerged in marine environment. In this study, a 3CP-degrading bacterium which designated as strain H4 was successfully isolated from marine sponge Gelliodes sp. that capable of degrading 3CP as the sole carbon and energy source. The bacteria growth on solid minimal media containing 3CP was the evident for the presence of dehalogenase enzyme. In liquid medium, the doubling time of the cells for strain H4 was 56.82 ± 0.1 h while the maximum chloride ion release was 2.03 ± 0.01 mM. The 16S rDNA sequence of strain H4 was obtained via 16s rRNA gene analysis (1000 bp) and it was closely related to Bacillus aryabhattai B8W22 (99% similarity). To the best of knowledge, this report is the first report detailing haloalkanoic acid degrading bacteria from marine sponge in coastal area of Malaysia.

Sponges (Porifera) harbour diverse microorganisms which can be the potential source for microbial enzymes such as lipase. In this study, moderately halophilic lipase producing bacteria were isolated from sponges tissues collected near Balok, at Pahang coastal water. Out of 70 isolates that grew on tributyrin agar plate, only 7 isolates had produced clear zones surrounding their colonies. Out of these, 5 isolates appeared to be gram-positive rod; meanwhile, the other 2 isolates were gram-negative rod in morphologies. These isolates were subjected to several biochemical tests i.e., oxidase, gelatin hydrolysis, lactose fermentation, citrate and motility test, and 16S rRNA gene amplification and sequencing. The results from 16S rRNA sequencing showed that 2 isolates (NHTH 6B and NHTH 28A) were highly similar (>97%) with Paenibacillus illinoisensis; isolate NHTH 26A with Stenotrophomonas pavanii; and isolate NHTH 29A with Enterobacter aerogenes. Phylogenetic analysis on selected isolates (NHTH 6B, NHTH 26A, NHTH 28A and NHTH 29A) with other species from the database showed high bootstrap values of above 50%. This showed that diverse phyla of lipase producing bacteria were isolated from the sponge collected from Pahang coastal water. In the isolation of industrial important species, the presence of pathogenic group of microorganism in this sponge could indicate issues on water quality and safety in this area.

Microbial electrolysis cell (MEC) is an innovative and green technology to generate hydrogen from a wide range of renewable energy sources and wastewater. At current stage, the performance of these systems is still far from real-world applications. The most likely limiting factors for successful commercialization of this technology are the large internal resistance, high fabrication and operational costs. The aim of the present study was to enhance hydrogen production, reduce the construction and operational costs in MECs via development of a novel MEC design. A single-chamber membrane-free MEC was designed and successfully produced hydrogen from organic substrate using a pure culture: Geobacter sulfurreducens PCA . The MEC system was operated with Platinum ( Pt ) cathode at applied voltage range of 0.6 V to 1.1 V. Geobacter sulfurreducens PCA strain and sodium acetate used as inoculum and a fuel sources, respectively. The conductivity of electrolyte solution in the MEC was 4.5 mS/cm. Due to an improved the MEC reactor architecture, the maximum hydrogen production rate (HPR) of 3.67 ± 0.03 m 3 H 2 /m 3 d with volumetric current density ( I V ) of 293.73 ± 1.18 A/m 3 was achieved under an external applied voltage (E ap ): 1.1 V. The highest overall hydrogen recovery ( ) and overall energy efficiency ( ) were 91.80 ± 1.06% and 66.97 ± 0.09%, respectively.

Ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA) is known as a therapeutic agent in treating cholestasis and liver diseases. Recently, UDCA has been suggested as a therapeutic drug for heart related diseases. Cardioprotective effect of UDCA against the development of ischemia has been studied. Yet, the mechanism of UDCA-cardioprotection is not clearly understood. Therefore, this study aimed to elucidate the mechanisms of UDCA cardioprotection against hypoxia by investigating the expression of caspase -3/-9 and ROS generation using an in vitro hypoxic heart model. A newborn (0-2 days old) rat heart was isolated for primary cell culture of cardiomyocytes. Hypoxia was chemically induced by using CoCl2. Cardiomyocytes were then incubated with UDCA. The treated cardiomyocytes were subjected for ROS generation detection assay, QuantiGene Plex assay for caspase-3/-9 gene expression and ELISA for caspase-3/-9 protein expression. The data were analyzed by using sample paired t-test and One-way ANOVA. Our results showed that UDCA abolishes the effects on CoCl2 in ROS production and UDCA downregulates caspase-9 protein expression in CoCl2 treated cardiomyocytes. This study provides an insight of UDCA in protecting cardiomyocytes against hypoxia mediated by anti-apoptosis mechanism.

The sample size and distributions of covariate may affect many statistical modeling techniques. This paper investigates the effects of sample size and data distribution on parameter estimates for multinomial logistic regression. A simulation study was conducted for different distributions (symmetric normal, positively skewed, negatively skewed) for the continuous covariates. In addition, we simulate categorical covariates to investigate their effects on parameter estimation for the multinomial logistic regression model. The simulation results show that the effect of skewed and categorical covariate reduces as sample size increases. The parameter estimates for normal distribution covariate apparently are less affected by sample size. For multinomial logistic regression model with a single covariate study, a sample size of at least 300 is required to obtain unbiased estimates when the covariate is positively skewed or is a categorical covariate. A much larger sample size is required when covariates are negatively skewed.

The open design of disc brake and its location close to the road surface may lead the road particles of various sizes and shapes to enter in between brake pads and disc rotor. This study presents an experimental approach to determine the particle shape effect on friction and wear characteristics of OEM disc brake under different operating condition. Two types of external particles which are road particles and silica sand with two range of size of 200 µm and 400 µm were used. Testing was conducted for variable load and sliding speed. Presence of external particle with various size and shape affect the wear rate, friction coefficient and surface topography of the brake pad. Smaller particle generated more wear. Moreover, the particles which have sharped shape or high angularity resulted in higher weight loss of the pad and contribute to greater formation of compacted wear debris. Wear rate and friction coefficient also increase with contact pressure.

Disturbance in brain oscillations is observed in many neuropsychiatric disorders. Any tool that has the potential to restore abnormal brain oscillations is therefore beneficial to patients with neuropsychiatric illnesses. Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) is one such tool. It is a non-invasive brain stimulation technique, which is able to alter brain oscillations depending on its parameters of stimulation and is used in clinical setting because of its potential therapeutic effects on the brain. However, the optimum stimulation parameters to induce the therapeutic effect of rTMS remains elusive. Therefore, it is important to investigate the differential effects between high versus low frequency of magnetic stimulation on the mechanism of brain oscillations in human subjects. Here we show, using combined rTMS and surface electroencephalography (EEG) that low and high frequencies of magnetic stimulation would induce dichotomy effects in EEG brain oscillatory activity. In particular, high-frequency rTMS 10Hz induces a synchronised oscillations for theta brain rhythm. In contrast, low-frequency rTMS 1Hz desynchronises neural oscillations on the same brain rhythm. Taken together, our results show that the desynchronisation effect of low-frequency rTMS 1Hz may potentially reverse the interference of altered neural oscillations. More extensive basic and clinical research using combined rTMS and EEG are needed to determine the optimum parameters of rTMS stimulation to restore adequate neural oscillations.

Steroidal hormones such as 17β-estradiol produced by humans and animals are regularly being released into the environment in their active forms. As the demand of chicken is increasing nowadays, there is a need to evaluate and assess the concentration of hormones in the poultry wastewater. In this study, a simple ultrafiltration membrane was fabricated to extract the hormones in the poultry wastewater from Kuala Garing, Rawang Selangor. Self-doped, sulfonated forms of polyaniline-polyvinylpyrrolidone (PANi-PVP) are blend into polysulfone (PSf) and N- methyl-2-pyrolidone (NMP) ultrafiltration membranes to enhance the hydrophilicity and fouling resistance. The Sulfonated Polyaniline-Polyvinylpyrrolidone (SPANi-PVP) polymer was dedoped at varying concentrations of PANi-PVP additive. Their concentrations vary from 0.5% of PANi-PVP, 1% PANi-PVP, 1.5% PANi-PVP, 2% PANi-PVP to 2.5% PANi-PVP. These newly fabricated ultrafiltration flat sheet membranes which containing increasing amounts of PANi-PVP was than tested for tap water permeability and hormone 17β-estradiol filtration from the poultry wastewater. The result of the study justify that, as the PANi-PVP concentration increased, the rejection of solute increased while the permeate flux decreased. The highest rejection of 17β- estradiol (E2) from the poultry wastewater was 92.5% with the mass of 17β- estradiol retained is 0.37ng/L. This was obtained from the highest amount of PANi-PVP concentration in the membrane which is 2.5wt%. However, the permeate flux for this 2.5wt% of PANi-PVP membrane was to slow compared to other membranes that has lower amount of PANi-PVP concentration. This is due to the higher the PANi-PVP concentration, a thicker and denser membrane skin layer was formed.

There are several pollutants that can harm our environment. Oil and grease are one of the examples of a pollutant that can cause a severe environmental problem. The highest concentration of oil and grease inside the sewer system can cause the sewer to clog that can lead to overflow. It can affect not only to the environment but can also affecting our health. There are various methods of oil and grease removal that one of the examples is by using adsorption method. This method commonly uses activated carbon that is one of the effective adsorbents. Although effective, the cost for activated carbon is expensive thus a study was conducted by using agricultural residues as alternative adsorbents for oil and grease removal. This study objective is to determine the ability of two adsorbents, which are sugarcane bagasse and banana pith as an adsorbent in removing oil and grease from wastewater. It involved the characterization of adsorbent and the performance studies of the adsorbent. The adsorbent was characterized in term of physical and chemical characterization. Dosage and contact time are the parameter used for performance studies, to see the ability of adsorbents in removing oil and grease.

The commutativity degree of a finite group is the probability that a random pair of elements in the group commute. Furthermore, the n-th power commutativity degree of a group is a generalization of the commutativity degree of a group which is defined as the probability that the n-th power of a random pair of elements in the group commute. In this paper, the n-th power commutativity degree for some dihedral groups is computed for the case n equal to 2, called the squared commutativity degree.

Researchers in normative multi-agent systems have emphasized the importance of equipping agents with the ability to detect and learn the norms of a new environment. They propose active learning approaches and prove that agents are capable of detecting norms using these approaches. However, most of their works entail agents that detect one norm in an event. We argue that these approaches do not help agents to decide in cases of norms coexistence is detected in an event. To solve this problem, we introduce the concept of norms trust to help agents decide which detected norms are credible in a new environment. In this paper, we propose a conceptual norms trust framework by inferring norms trust through two-tier assessment; credible agent evaluation and norms trust assessment. Norms trust assessment is based on filter factors of norm adoption ratio, norm adoption risk, and norms salience. The framework assesses norms trust value for each detected norm. This value is then used by the agent to decide either to only emulate or fully internalize the detected norms.

Due to the importance of the quality management system implementation in construction project, the current study was conducted to identify the set of Project Quality Management System (PQMS) practices for its successful implementation in construction field through a systematic review of literature. Critical success factor (CSF) to implement PQMS in construction project were stated as ‘Client Commitment’, Measurement and Improvement’, ‘Integration of quality Plan’, ‘Education and Training’, Teamwork and Communication’ and ‘Use of ICT’. However, these CSF need to be explored more in terms of its practices and there is an urgent need. A research approach was carried out on the selected papers published between 2004 and 2014. An appropriate database was chosen and seven research papers were identified through a screening process and reviewed for this study. There are 20 important practices in PQMS were identified and has been categorized into six CSF namely; Client’s Commitment (5 practices); Integration of Quality Plan (3 practices); Education and Training (3 practices); Measurement and Improvement (4 practices); Teamwork and Communication (3 practices) and the use of ICT (2 practices).This paper concluded with a numbers of recommendations for future researchers to discuss, develop, and work upon in order to achieve better precision and generalization

The continuous growth and demand for our textiles and textile products have resulted in the generation of highly polluted and coloured wastewater emanating from the textile industries. These are detrimental to the environment and pose health threats to the human population if not properly treated. The treatment of colour is a great challenge over the last decades and until now, there is no single and economical treatment process. As effective treatment plant is generally expensive and unaffordable; a good alternative and timely solution is the utilisation of specialised group of microbes called Microclear. These microorganisms have the abilities to decolourise and transform coloured compounds into simpler and non-hazardous compounds without the use of chemicals. Intensive fundamental studies and also the application of the Microclear at the bench and pilot scale (sequential 1000 L and 2000 L) reactors to treat real wastewater were carried out. The microbes can also be applied directly into the existing treatment plant or ponding systems without the use of a commercial reactor. . Under the UTM-MTDC symbiosis program, Microclear Sdn. Bhd. was set up and work is in progress for large scale production of microbes to treat real textile wastewater in a demo plant of 150,000 L capacity located at the textile industry.

Swarming robots basically consist of a group of several simple robots that interact and collaborate with each other to achieve shared goals. A single robot system is not suitable to be used as an agent for the navigation usually covers a wide range of area. Therefore, a group of simple robots is introduced. A group of robots can perform their tasks together in a more efficient way compared to a single robot; hence develop a more robust system. In order to interact, a wireless communication strategy is implemented to enable the group of mobile robots to perform their tasks. This project implements the swarming algorithm by supplementing the ability of mobile robot platforms with autonomy and odour detection. The work focused on the localization of chemical odour source in the testing environment and the leader and follower swarm formation through wireless communication. To enable the mobile robots to communicate with each other and able to perform leader and follower designation once the target has been found, the RSSI value of X-Bee module is used.

In this preliminary studies, friction and wear properties of banana peel as a natural additive in paraffin oil was performed and evaluate using four-ball tester. Inverted microscope then was used to measure the wear scar diameter on ball bearing. Coefficient of friction, µ and wear significantly reduced at high load, temperature and speed. At 100 ºC, the load of 500 and 1000 N, the COF values reduces from 0.1163 to 0.1012 and 0.1235 to 0.1174 respectively. At the same condition, WSD was found to decrease from 4.81 x 10-4 mm3 to 2.33 x 10-4 mm3 and 4.99 x 10-4 mm3 to 2.75 x 10-4 mm3 at 500 and 1000 rpm respectively.

Cloud computing has made a significant transformation of information technology environment as well as the way the business is conducted in any organizations. While its advantages are obvious, its challenges need to be clearly addressed to ensure successful adoption. This article provides an insights of cloud computing adoption in Malaysia at the national level as well as a review of cloud adoption from various fields and domains in Malaysia which led to research direction in the future. Malaysia is being dedicated towards cloud adoption nationally, and keep its good progress to equip itself as a cloud-friendly country. However, security challenges seem to slow down the effort, thus these need to be dealt with properly.

Many occupational noise exposure studies have been conducted in various occupational sectors. However, in Malaysia, there are limited numbers of study on grass cutter workers and there is no study on leaf blower workers. Thus, this preliminary study was conducted to assess both occupational noise exposure among leaf blower and grass cutter workers by measuring occupational noise exposure, determining sound power level of the machines and conducting interview session. A total of 20 workers were selected from a public university as study subjects. Noise dosimeter and sound level meter were used to measure the occupational noise exposure and sound pressure level of all machines in determining their sound power levels respectively. Most of the workers were exposed to daily noise dose and time-weighted average (TWA) noise level which exceed the permissible limits. All machines recorded a high sound power level and several workers showed prevalence symptoms of hearing loss. This preliminary study revealed that most of the workers are exposed to excessive occupational noise exposure and at high risk of acquiring noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL).

Environmental noise problems have increased every year and have brought negative effects to the neighbouring communities. Educational areas, such as university, college and school, are the places for learning and gaining knowledge. However, students feel stressed and annoyed when they are exposed to noisy environments. The main objective of this research is to investigate the current environmental noise problem in Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM). It is a preliminary study of environmental noise problem and a total of 24 measurement locations were selected based on the working zones in UTM. Each location was measured in an hour during the working period. About 95.8 percent of the measurement results exceeded the permissible limit of the guideline by the Department of Environment (DOE). Besides, the UTM noise zones have been established by referring to the measurement results. The findings of this study could assist the UTM management in deciding the noise abatement strategy. Also, the noise zones could be disseminated to the public in order to increase the public awareness towards the environmental noise problems in UTM.

The quality of Magnetic Resonance Image (MRI) determines the accuracy of clinical diagnosis. It provides information about the human soft tissue anatomy. MRI of spine is used by the physicians to evaluate any presence of diseases including slipped disk, herniated disk, trauma and disk degeneration. Existence of noises and artifacts can degrade the quality of the MR images. Thus, appropriate image processing techniques may help to improve the quality of the acquired image. Preprocessing is usually done to remove the noise, enhance an image boundary and adjust the image contrast. Current techniques to enhance and reduce noise in MRI human spine are discussed and a method using discrete wavelet transform to enhance the MRI of human spine is proposed. The resultant images are evaluated quantitatively. This study shows that the proposed method has better results as compared to other existing method based on evaluation tests.

Speech segmentation is a process to segment speech utterances into small chunks, where each chunk represents a phoneme. The phoneme is an essential unit in any speech which is recognizable. In this paper, a segmentation speech approach was proposed to segment consonant and vowel phonemes from speech utterances of Arabic basic syllables, in order to analyze the consonant production of a group of Malay-speaking normal hearing children and adults. The approach is a combination of zero-crossing counts and signal energy. The zero-crossing counts were used to extract the noise signals, whilst the signal energy was utilized for identifying the speech signals. The spectrogram was used to determine the frequencies with the most intense energy.

The needs of having locations identification are so important in this technological era. Locations identification has been implemented in so many areas nowadays. The challenge in this system is to identify location in real-time. Here, real-time refers to the process of capturing the location and recognize it at the same time. This research proposes a location identification system using Kinect, which is a high speed vision sensor that has been used for Xbox 360 video games. This research is to evaluate the optimum image detection distance, image size and processing time in identifying the locations that have been trained. The algorithm uses the Point Matching Features from the MATLAB software. From here, features are generated from both real time and training images being compared and the matching points between them will be used to identify the locations.