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Several studies in higher education have attempted to study the impact of quality management practices on organisational innovation processes and outcomes in higher education institutions (HEIs). However, there is relatively limited research examining the impact of multidimensional quality management practices (QM-practices) on academics' innovative behaviour and performance. This paper aims to explore the relationship between QM-practices and academics' innovative work behaviour and examine how innovative behaviour affects academics' innovative work performance. A total of 586 responses were collected from public and private universities with self-accreditation status in Malaysia. The results indicated a significant and positive relationship between Social QM-practices and academics' innovative work behaviour. Also, a significant and positive relationship was found between innovative work behaviour and work performance. However, there is no direct impact between Social and Technical QM-practices on academic work performance. The relationship between Social QM-practices and work performance is indirectly established through innovative work behaviour. The findings signified the importance of innovative work behaviour on academic's work performance and highlighted the indirect impacts of Social QM-practices on innovative performance through innovative work behaviour in Malaysian HEIs. Efforts to improve Social QM-practices especially in promoting leadership for quality management, developing strategic vision, and providing effective educational support, as well as training may facilitate innovative work behaviour and enhance work performance at Malaysian HEIs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study provides an overview of social media usage among researchers in Malaysia and examines factors affecting their use for science communication. The online questionnaire gathered the opinions of 425 researchers from over 20 science disciplines. The descriptive analysis highlighted usage preferences for 10 commonly used social media, while statistical analysis in particular MANOVA and correlation analysis, identified significant factors influencing researchers' social media use. Up to 62% of respondents believe that social media is more effective in reaching the public, compared to other media. WhatsApp, Facebook, YouTube, Google Scholar, and ResearchGate are routinely used or perceived as beneficial to use. However, Twitter, Instagram, WordPress, and LinkedIn are seldom used because they are less preferred for science communication. Seniority, perceived importance, and perceived credibility are significantly correlated with both intention and actual use. Meanwhile, age and experience are significantly correlated with actual use, but not the intention. Researchers are likely to post and share more on social media if they believe that science communication is important or if they are credible enough to present a scientific consensus. This study offered important insights into the perceptions, concerns, and factors influencing their use for science communication. By determining the perceptions, concerns and motivators affecting researchers, the findings shed light on effective ways to promote researchers' use of social media to communicate scientific knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The hollow activated carbon nanomesh (PCACM) with a hierarchical porous structure is derived from biowaste-poplar catkins by in-situ calcination etching with Ni(NO 3 ) 2 ·6H 2 O and KOH in N 2 flow combined with an acid dissolution technique. This procedure not only inherits the natural tube morphology of poplar catkins, but also generates a fascinating nanomesh structure on the walls. PCACM possesses a large specific surface area (S BET = 1893.0 m 2 g −1 ) and high total pore volume (V p = 1.495 cm 3 g −1 ), and displays an exciting meso-macoporous structure with a concentrated pore size distribution of 4.53 nm. The specific capacitance of PCACM is as high as 314.6 F g −1 at 1.0 A g −1 when used as the electrode materials for supercapacitor. Furthermore, the symmetric supercapacitor of PCACM with 1.0 M Na 2 SO 4 solution as the electrolyte displays a high energy density of 20.86 Wh kg −1 at a power density of 180.13 W kg −1 within a wide voltage rage of 0–1.8 V, which is comparable or even obviously higher than those of other biomass derived carbon reported. It is noteworthy that PCACM also exhibits superior cycling stability and coulombic efficiency. The excellent electrochemical behaviors enable PCACM to be a promising electrode material for supercapacitors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

3D nitrogen-doped graphene aerogel nanomeshes (N-GANMs) with hierarchical porous structures were facilely synthesized from graphene oxide and urea using iron nitrate as the etching agent. The resulting materials were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Raman spectroscopy, and N2 adsorption–desorption. The supercapacitor performance was characterized by cyclic voltammetry, galvanostatic charge discharge, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, respectively. Compared with the bare graphene aerogel (GA), N-GANMs showed higher specific surface area, more abundant meso-macroporous pores, and much better electrochemical properties. The specific capacitance of N-GANMs was as high as 345.8 F g−1, which was much higher than that of GA and most of the reported carbon-based materials, and the value remains at about 321.0 F g−1 over 2000 cycles at 1.0 A g−1 in 2.0 M KOH. In addition, the N-GANMs demonstrated a high energy density of 20.82 W h kg−1 at a power density of 449.97 W kg−1 and their cycle performance remained approximately 100% after 10 000 cycles at 5.0 A g−1 in 1.0 M Na2SO4. The excellent behaviors might have originated from their hierarchical porous structures and the incorporation of nitrogen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of dietary organic acid (butyrate and lactate) supplementation on the growth, nutrient digestibility and intestinal histology of the giant grouper Epinephelus lanceolatus that was fed a diet containing soybean meal. The diet that included soybean meal, which replaced 40% fish meal protein, was used as the control. One percent butyrate and lactate were added to the control diet to form the two experimental diets. Also, the all fish meal diet without organic acid was also included for comparison. A total of four experimental diets were each fed to three groups of giant grouper (initial wt: 17.37 ± 0.18 g) in a recirculating rearing system for 8 weeks. After the growth trial, the nutrient digestibility by the fish was determined by using 0.5% chromic oxide as an inert indicator. The fish fed the all fish meal diet gained more ( P < 0.05) weight than fish fed the control and the 1% lactate diets. The hepatic thiobarbituric acid reactive substance (TBARS) value was higher in the fish fed the control diet than that in other dietary treatments. Dry matter, lipid, copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), calcium (Ca) and phosphorus (P) digestibility were higher in fish fed the all fish meal diet, the 1% butyrate and lactate supplemented diets than the fish fed the control diet. The fish fed the control diet showed disordered lamina epithelialis and extended lamina propria comparing to the fish fed the all fish meal diet and 1% butyrate-diet. The results indicated that growth, nutrient digestibility and intestinal histology were adversely affected by replacement of the fish meal by soybean meal in giant grouper. The diet supplemented with 1% butyrate improved the negative effects excluding growth for the fish. Statement of relevance To evaluate feed additives on growth, nutrient digestibility and intestinal histology of giant grouper fed diets with soybean meal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – By exploring the patterns of co-authorship, this paper aims to identify the degree and type of research collaboration in Malaysia. Design/methodology/approach – A total of 22,244 publication records from five research universities in Malaysia were retrieved from Scopus database. Journal articles published for the period between 2008 and October 2011 were collected. Indicators such as number of authors, subject areas, number of local institutions and foreign countries, were analysed using simple statistical tools to identity the degree and type of collaboration. Findings – The findings reveal that in Malaysia, researchers tend to work in teams but collaboration is more dominant in science-based research than social sciences. Academics published extensively with their colleagues from the same university or from other academic institutions, but there is little collaboration with researchers from public research institutes or industry. In terms of international collaboration, Iran, India, UK, Japan and the USA are the top five collaborating countries. Disciplines with significant international collaboration are physics and astronomy; chemistry; agricultural and biological sciences; engineering; health profession and computer sciences. Originality/value – This paper is among the few that study the patterns of co-authorship in Malaysia and most probably the first to examine the patterns in the Malaysian research universities. The study highlights the skewed distribution of co-authorship patterns where there is limited evidence of cross sectors collaboration in journal publication. The findings call for policy makers as well as universities to look into the constraints as well as drivers that would enhance the linkage of different actors in the national research system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Malaysia is becoming an increasingly active player in international education and ranks as the 11th largest exporter of education in the world. Malaysia’s recognisable advantages in the international education market include its strategic location between the East and the West, cultural diversity, and a relatively stable socio-economic environment. In addition to these natural advantages, it is important for the Malaysian Government and its higher education institutions to develop a holistic strategy to create a conducive learning environment and to build a regional higher education hub. By taking a demand-side approach, this study highlights factors attracting foreign students to study in Malaysia. Rich information about the country and learning institution and referral by family and friends appear to be the most important sources of influence for foreign students to choose Malaysia. Other considerations include cost and quality of educational programmes, while geographical and cultural proximity are less important than expected. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Recent developments have witnessed the emergence of a new economy where knowledge has become a valuable resource and asset. The dynamism of the new economy requires us to not only quickly create knowledge, but also to acquire and apply knowledge quickly. One possible way to do so is to share our knowledge effectively. Knowledge sharing is envisaged as a natural activity of the academic institutions as the number of seminars, conferences and publications by academics is far exceeding any other profession, signifying the eagerness of academics to share knowledge. However, instead of knowledge sharing, "knowledge hoarding" could be more prevalent in academic institutions. This paper examines knowledge sharing behavior among academics in a private university in Malaysia. Factors affecting the willingness to share knowledge, broadly classified as organizational, individual and technology factors, are examined. The overall findings revealed that incentive systems and personal expectation are the two key factors in driving academics to engage in knowledge sharing activity. "Forced" participation is not an effective policy in cultivating sharing behavior among academics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nitrogen-doped graphene aerogel nanomesh (N-GANM) has been hydrothermally prepared from graphene oxide and ammonium hydroxide using iron nitrate as the etching agent. The results showed that N-GANM with an interesting nanomesh structure on the graphene sheets maintained the 3D architecture of graphene aerogel (GA). Furthermore, it exhibited excellent electrochemical capacitive behavior and the specific capacitance value (290.0 F g −1 at 1 A g −1 ) remained approximately 90.3% after 2000 cycles in the three-electrode system. In addition, N-GANM displayed an energy density of 30.9 Wh kg −1 at the power density of 450.3 W kg −1 and excellent cycling stability retention (98%) after 10,000 cycles in the two-electrode symmetric device. The resulting N-GANM was expected to be a much favorable supercapacitor electrode material due to the heteroatom-doping and its unique porous structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Potyviral coat protein (CP) is involved in the replication and movement of potyviruses. However, little information is available on the roles of CP-coding sequence in potyviral infection. Here, we introduced synonymous substitutions to the codon C574G575C576 coding conserved residue arginine at position 192 (R192) of tobacco vein banding mosaic virus (TVBMV) CP. Substitution of the codon C574G575C576 to A574G575A576 or A574G575G576, but not C574G575A576, C574G575T576, or C574G575G576, reduced the replication, cell-to-cell movement, and accumulation of TVBMV in Nicotiana benthamiana plants, suggesting that C574 was critical for replication of TVBMV. Nucleotides 531 to 576 of the TVBMV CP-coding sequence were predicted to form a stem-loop structure, in which four consecutive C-G base pairs (C576-G531, C532-G575, C574-G533, and C534-G573) were located at the stem. Synonymous substitutions of R178-codon C532G533C534 to A532G533A534 and A532G533G534, but not C532G533A534, C532G533T534, or C532G533G534, reduced the replication levels, cell-to-cell, and systemic movement of TVBMV, suggesting that C532 was critical for TVBMV replication. Synonymous substitutions disrupting base pairs C576-G531 and C534-G573 did not affect viral accumulation. After three serial-passage inoculations, the accumulation of spontaneous mutant viruses was restored, and codons A532G533A534, A532G533G534, A574G575A576, or A574G575G576 of mutants were each separately changed to C532G533A534, C532G533G534, C574G575A576, or C574G575G576. Synonymous mutation of R178 and R192 also reduced viral accumulation in N. tabacum plants. Therefore, we concluded that the two consecutive C532-G575 and C574-G533 base pairs played critical roles in TVBMV replication via maintaining the stability of the stem-loop structures formed by nucleotides 531 to 576 of the CP-coding sequence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]