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- PublicationSubcloning of influenza a ha-na synthetic gene in bacterial system.(2017)Avian influenza A H5N1 virus continues to cause outbreaks around the globe since its first emergence in 1997 in Hong Kong. The highly pathogenic virus is capable of undergoing antigenic drifts and antigenic shifts as mechanisms enabling it to evade any immunity induced against it raising the alarm of potential pandemics and outbreaks. These mechanisms were found to influence two pathogenic determinants of Influenza A H5N1, which are the surface glycoprotein heamagglutinin HA and surface protein neuraminidase NA. These molecules are a principal target when it comes to vaccines production to eradicate the potentially deadly virus. In this project, highly immunogenic/hydrophilic regions of HA and NA were constructed and characterized through cloning. The synthetic gene HA-NA was successfully cloned where the assembling with the authentic synthetic gene sequence displayed 100 % similarity. The successfully cloned gene can be utilized for the production of highly immunogenic vaccine which is capable of producing sustainable immunity across generations of the virus, thus lightening the strain of producing annual vaccine in order to combat the newly arising variant. Additionally, it can be used as a tool to understand the immunogenic features of the hybrid gene which can assist in further understanding of the body mechanism in tackling the viral infections.
- PublicationCross professional team characteristics, translation and construct validation of teamwork survey questionnaire (TSQ) at Malaysian east coast public Hospital(2023-03)Cross professional teamwork in healthcare refers to the interaction between individuals with different expertise and training backgrounds, working together towards shared patient care goals. Cross professional teamwork is necessary to support integrated service delivery. However, cross professional teamwork has not been given sufficient attention in Malaysia’s developing country context. There is a lack of tools to assess cross professional teamwork for Malaysian settings. This study aimed to translate the English version teamwork survey questionnaire (TSQ) into Malay and perform tool construct validation at a Malaysian east coast public hospital. The TSQ assesses teamwork on domains of integration, climate and efficiency; the tool has been previously used in Swedish and Australian settings. This study’s aim was achieved through a cross-sectional mixed methods study in three phases. Phase 1 and Phase 2 were carried out through qualitative approaches while Phase 3 utilized a quantitative approach. Phase 1 focused on translating the TSQ into Malay language using forwardbackward translation together with the committee approach. Next, a qualitative interview study was conducted in Phase 2 to explore fulfillment of cross professional team characteristics at the hospital’s 16 inpatient wards. A total of 35 interviews were conducted with medical, nursing and allied health professionals; the sample is sufficient for qualitative data saturation. Recordings from interview sessions were transcribed and thematically analyzed. The construct validity and reliability of the Malay version TSQ was determined in Phase 3. In Phase 3, 150 respondents were recruited from wards found to have cross professional team characteristics during Phase 2. A response rate of 98.24% was obtained in filling in the Malay version TSQ, the percentage of recruited respondents being sufficient for statistical analysis. Construct validity was assessed through Principal Component Analysis with Varimax rotation and reliability was tested through the analysis of internal consistency. Findings from Phase 1 indicate the translated Malay version TSQ to have equivalence with the English version. Phase 2 interview findings reveal that inpatient wards generally fulfill cross professional team criteria related to team composition, patient care objectives and professional interactions. Phase 3 construct validation results indicate that three constructs namely team climate, team efficiency and team integration, without any item deletion are valid for the Malay version TSQ. The Cronbach’s alpha value is 0.917 for the translated whole TSQ scale, while the three scale constructs also have reliable Cronbach’s alpha values in the range of 0.703-0.946. Discrepancies for particular words used from the forward backward translation process were resolved without affecting meaning of the original items. Health professionals in this study acknowledge the different professions involved in patient care. However, disciplinary diversity at the respective wards varies depending on patient care specialties and treatment objectives. The Cronbach’s alpha values for the Malay version TSQ factors reflect better team climate and integration values and comparably similar team efficiency value when contrasted with the original tool. In conclusion, the results support usage of the tool as a reliable instrument for assessing cross professional teams in other similar Malaysian public healthcare services. Further research could test the reliability and validity of the Malay version TSQ in other Malaysian regions.
- PublicationEffects of 8-week medicine ball training on physical and skill performance among basketball players(2023-03)Medicine ball training has been studied to determine if it can help to improve physical performance and skills performance of basketball players. This study investigated the effects of eight weeks of medicine ball training on physical performance and basketball skill performance among male basketball players aged 18 to 24 years. 28 subjects were recruited into two groups, namely the experimental group (EG) and the control group (CG), with 14 subjects in each group (EG: mean age was 21.25 ±1.34 and CG: mean age was 20.52 ±1.77). To detect differences within and between the study groups, repeated-measures ANOVA was used. The analyses demonstrated significant pre-test, mid-test and post-test effects on physical performance. All the physical performance fitness variables examined were significant with p<0.01 and the skill performance analyses showed significant differences in all variables with p<0.01. The experimental group (EG) that received medicine ball training showed improvements in physical performance, which was expressed in the form of percentage in the following variables: Overhead Medicine Ball Throw (OHMBT) (5.11%), Standing Long Jump (SLJ) (4.52%), Sprinting 20 m (SPRINT) (1.34%), Agility T-Test (AGILITY) (3.49%), Vertical Jump (VJ) (6.45%), and Back and Leg Dynamometer (BLD) (16.40%). Moreover, this study found that the experimental group that received medicine ball training showed improvement in basketball skill performance as well, which was expressed in the form of percentage in the following measures: Control Dribble (CD) (2.14%), Defensive Movement (DM) (3.22%), Passing (PASS) (6.83%), and Speed Spot Shooting (SSS) (13.29%). This research suggests that incorporating medicine ball training into regular exercise routines can significantly increase physical performance and basketball skills. Coaches are advised to include medicine ball workouts into players' daily training regimes. The incorporation of medicine ball workouts that align with specific skill work can improve basketball skill performance. The recommended medicine ball workout program provides a useful framework for evaluating improvements in physical performance and basketball skill performance among basketball players.
- PublicationInvestigating archery stance performance based on geometric morphometrics.(2017)Geometric morphometries (GMM) is a method to quantify the size and shape of organisms with the application of multivariate statistics. In this project, the participants’ archery stance was examined by landmark-based GMM analysis. The goal of this study was to correlate demographic factors of participants’ archery stance in related to score. The factors that had been explored in the study was age, height, weight, hand grip strength as well as back and leg strength. Two cameras were utilised to record video of 20 participants' archery stance and take picture of the target board, separately. Still screenshots images of participants' archery stance analysed using three available softwares: tpsUtil, tpsDig2 and MorphoJ. The result of this project suggests that GMM assessment of archery stance by hand grip strength as well as back and leg strength are more reliable indicator compared to score, age, height and weight. However, the level of significance is not really high at only 33.1% for hand grip strength and 23.1% for back and leg strength. The results from Principle Component Analysis suggest that the total variance of five axes: PC1, PC2, PC3, PC4 and PC5 summarises 84.7% of the observed shape variation. Therefore, it can be concluded that GMM can be utilised in archery studies as to provide better understanding and information on archery. It is recommended for other scholars or researchers to conduct a study of sport science by employing GMM as their method of analysis.
- PublicationEffects of interval training on health-related fitness among sedentary university students.(2017)The present study compared the effect of interval training on health-related fitness and its effect over time. Responses in body composition, cardiorespiratory endurance, muscular strength, muscular endurance and flexibility was examined. Thirty-seven healthy, sedentary female participants from Universiti Sains Malaysia Health Campus were recruited in this study. Interval training consisted of 18 sessions were completed over six weeks. Results indicated significantly improved cardiorespiratory endurance, muscular strength, muscular endurance and flexibility after intervention. It is concluded that interval training can be used as an alternative for endurance training for untrained population.
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- ItemPrediction of pm10 concentration using multiple linear regression and support vector machine(2018-06)Particulate matter with an aerodynamic diameter less than 10µm (PM10) is one of the most air pollutants that can give negative effect on human health and environment. The purpose of this research is to predict the particulate matter concentration for the next day (PM10D1) by using Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) and Support Vector Machine (SVM) models. The meteorological and gaseous parameters that are used in this study are particulate matter for today (PM10D0), wind speed (WS), temperature (TEMP), relative humidity (RH), sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone (O3) and carbon monoxide (CO). The daily mean data that are used in this study are divided into training data (70%) and validation data (30%) and are used from 2013 until 2015. Four monitoring stations were selected in this study to predict the PM10 concentration for the next day (PM10D1) which are Jerantut which act as background station, Nilai (industrial area), Seberang Jaya (sub-urban area) and Shah Alam (urban area). The results of overall data that are obtained from this study has shown that Nilai monitoring stations contributed the highest mean value of PM10 concentration compared to the other monitoring stations. This indicated that Nilai is a more polluted area as it is known as a highly industrialised area. The results shows that Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) is the best model in predicting PM10 concentration for the next day compared to Support Vector Machine (SVM) model.
- PublicationBottleneck simulation in mems manufacturing process(2021-12-01)The rate of increase of consumer demands and global competition between companies forced the industry to increase productivity by increasing the production capacity to meet the monthly throughput demand. The presence of a bottleneck is common theme faced by every industry that will reduce the throughput of a machine. Thus, to increase the throughput while at the same time reducing the impact bottleneck, one needs to look for the best model to accurately represent the production process. In this thesis, the utilization rate and machine capacity for the manufacturing system of different topologies simulation; that includes series and parallel framework, taken in consideration the bottleneck in the workstation being studied. By building the simulation model of the production line, the bottleneck process can be monitor and analyse in the simulation to use it to reduce the impact of bottleneck. Scheduling in the simulation model integrated in the model for the propose of obtaining the accuracy between simulated result and the actual production result with deviation differences below than 10% for controlling the bottleneck, thus, increasing machine utilization rate and meet the targeted results based on the capacity planning.
- ItemEffects of school malt drink ingestion pre-exercise on exercise performance in young males /(Pusat Pengajian Sains Kesihatan, Univerisiti Sains Malaysia, 2013-06)INTRODUCTION: Chocolate malt drink which contains carbohydrate is believed able to enhance exercise performance. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of chocolate malt drink (CMD) ingestion pre-exercise on exercise performance compared to sports drink (SPD) and plain water (PW) in physically active young males. METHODOLOGY: Twenty male subjects with age between 19 to 25 years old were recruited in this study. Each subjects were required to undergo three randomized cross over 2.4 km running trials with three different test drinks (Chocolate malt drink, sports drink or plain water) on three different days, with one week apart. The subjects were required to refrain from any strenous exercise for 24 hours. There were also required to fast (water intake was permitted) for 8 hours prior to the running trial. In addition, the subjects were required to record the daily dietary intake 3 days before the 2.4 km run for the first trial. After that, the subjects were asked to follow the daily dietary intake as in the first trial 3 days before the second and the third trial. On the test day, subjects were asked to ingest the test drink (300 ml) 15 minutes pre-exercise. After the test drink ingestion, they were required to answer the fluid sensation scale. Subjects were advised to run as fast as possible to achieve the best timing in each trial. Subjects’ post-exercise heart rate, BORG’s scale, rate of perceived exertion (RPE) and fluid sensation scale were recorded at the end of the running trials.RESULT: The result revealed that there were no significant (p>0.05) difference in running time performance between all the three test drinks. The running time in each test drink was SPD (11.33 ± 1.15 min), PW (11.44 ±1.15 min) and CMD (11.59 ± 1.34 min). Besides that, there were no significant (p>0.05) difference in post-exercise heart rate and rate of exertion between all the three test drinks. In term of fluid sensation scale. there were significant (p<0.05) higher value on thirst, nausea and stomach upset significant (p>0.05) difference in fullness sensation in post-exercise compared to preexercise in all the three test drinks. There were significantly higher values (p<0.05) of sweetness sensation in both Cmd and Spd compared to Pw in pre-exercise. CONCLUSION: The results revealed that pre-exercise Cmd ingestion produced almost the similar effects than that in Spd and Pw in term of running time, post-exercise heart rate and rate of perceived exertion. Meanwhile slight higher value of thirsty, nausea and stomach upset sensations were observed following exercise with Cmd, Spd and Pw.
- PublicationAnalysis of the staggered crossbeam of pier designed based on deep beam design concept(2021-07-01)The deep beam concept has different load transferring behaviour from the simple beam concept. Deep beam develops diagonal tension zone extends from loading point to support point, causing the shear cracking and leading to failure of the structure. The staggered crossbeam in the pier in an existing completed project had occurred the deep shear cracking due to lack of consideration of deep beam concept during the design stage, resulting in the heavy and complicated remedial works. Therefore, this study focuses on analysing the staggered crossbeam of pier designed based on established design philosophy. In this study, two staggered crossbeams of the pier with similar geometrical dimensions were designed based on the STM and simple beam concept, respectively. The reinforcements provided by these two methods were compared and evaluated. The result showed that the reinforcement provided by the STM is more than that designed based on simple beam concept. Moreover, the finite element analysis was conducted for staggered crossbeam pier with varied crossbeam elevation differences to assess the behaviour of reinforced concrete and the adequacy of reinforcement provided when subjected to concentrated vertical loads. The models were divided into five categories with a different elevation of right crossbeam and provided six reinforcement groups for each model. The models were analysed with ABAQUS finite element analysis software. The analysis result indicated that the adequacy of reinforcement for staggered crossbeam of the pier is reduced when the variation of crossbeam elevation increases. The adequacy of reinforcement for the staggered crossbeam of the pier was obtained based on the model with the least tension zone in the stress distribution pattern.
- ItemHepatoprotective And Pharmacology Studies Of Standardized Ethanolic Extract Of Curcuma Xanthorrhiza Roxb.(2012-02)The hepatoprotective and pharmacology properties of C. xanthorrhiza rhizome extracts were investigated using in vivo and in vitro model assays. Prior to the bioassays, C. xanthorrhiza rhizome ethanolic extract (CXRE) were subjected to liquid-liquid extraction resulting in hexane, ethyl acetate and water fractions. Xanthorrhizol was employed as the marker to standardize the CXRE and fractions respectively. The presence of terpenoids, flavonoids, cardiac glycosides and saponin were observed in the standardized CXRE through qualitative phytochemical screening analysis. The acute oral toxicity of standardized CXRE showed an LD50 of greater than 5,000 mg/kg, indicating CXRE is relatively safe for preclinical investigation in animals. Further, the standardized CXRE and its fractions (hexane, ethyl acetate and water) were tested for antioxidant activity. In FRAP, DPPH and ABTS assay, the highest antioxidant activity was found in hexane fraction compared to the CXRE, ethyl acetate fraction and water fractions in line with their total phenolics and flavonoids content. The total phenolics and flavonoids content of hexane fraction were 61.00 mg GAE/g and 92.80 mg CAE/g respectively. The standardized C. xanthorrhiza rhizome hexane fraction (CXRH) at doses 125, 250 and 500 mg/kg was further tested for hepatoprotective activity against CCl4- induced hepatic damage in rats. The liver enzymes (ALT, AST, and ALP), triglycerides, total serum protein showed significant decrease with a substantial increase in the antioxidative enzyme levels (SOD, CAT, GPx, and GR) and total protein content of the liver in standardized CXRH treated rats as opposed to CCl4–treated groups. Standardized CXRH was also found to ameliorate the lipid peroxidation activity and showed a good recovery of the CCl4 damaged hepatic tissues. The pharmacological activity of standardized CXRE was further studied for its antinociceptive activity in rats using three different models, namely the hot plate test, tail flick test and formalin-induced pain test. CXRE did not show significant antinociceptive in acute pain model but was able to suppress the early phase (central acting mechanism) and neurogenic inflammation (peripheral acting mechanism) which requires further investigation to elucidate the exact mechanism involved.