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Aerobic granulation technology is applied to treat domestic and industrial wastewater. The Aerobic granular sludge (AGS) cultivated has strong properties that appears to be denser and compact in physiological structure compared to the conventional activated sludge. It offers rapid settling for solid:liquid separation in wastewater treatment. Aerobic granules were developed using sequencing batch reactor (SBR) with intermittent aerobic – anaerobic mode with 8 cycles in 24 hr. This study examined the settling velocity performance of cultivated aerobic granular sludge (AGS) and aerobic granular sludge molasses (AGSM). The elemental composition in both AGS and AGSM were determined using X-ray fluorescence (XRF). The results showed that AGSM has higher settling velocity 30.5 m/h compared to AGS.

Skin allografts have been used in medical practice for over a century owing to their unique composition as a biological dressing. Skin allografts can be obtained in several preparations such as cryopreserved, glycerol-preserved, and fresh allograft. A glycerol-preserved allograft (GPA) was introduced in the early 1980s. It has several advantages compared with other dressings such as ease of processing, storage and transport, lower cost, less antigenicity, antimicrobial properties, and neo-vascularisation promoting properties. Skin allografts are mainly used in the management of severe burn injuries, chronic ulcers, and complex, traumatic wounds. Published reports of the use of skin allografts in association with free flap surgery are few or non existent. We would like to share our experience of several cases of free tissue transfer that utilised GPA as a temporary wound dressing in multiple scenarios. On the basis of this case series, we would like to recommend that a GPA be used as a temporary dressing in conjunction with free flap surgery when required to protect the flap pedicle, allowing time for the edema to subside and the wound can then be closed for a better aesthetic outcome.

Recently, the usage of Magnesium (Mg) alloys has been hugely applied in the industrial application such as in automotive, marine, and electronic due to its advantages of recyclability and lightweight. This alloys required low heat input to be weld since it is easily evaporated due to the Magnesium Oxide (MgO) at the surface and it also possesses lower melting point compared to steel. Laser welding is more convenient to weld Mg alloys due to its high power and lower heat input. AZ31B was selected since it has strong mechanical properties among others Mg alloys due to the major alloying elements; Aluminium (Al) and Zinc (Zn). Low power fiber laser machine with wavelength of 900 nm was used in this experiment. The intention of this work was to investigate the effect of low power fiber laser parameters and effect of shielding gas on weld penetration and microstructure. Another aim in this work was to produce the joint for this thin sheets metal. Penetration depth and microstructure evaluation were emphasized in the analysis section. Bead-on-Plate (BOP) and laser lap welding was conducted on AZ31B with thicknesses of 1.0 mm and 0.6 mm for feasibility study using pulsed wave (PW) mode. Defocusing features was used in order to find better focal position, which has less occurrence of evaporation (underfill). The effect of different angle of irradiation was also investigated. Two types of shielding gases, Argon (Ar) and Nitrogen (N2) were used in order to study the effect of shielding gas. Lastly, the effect of pulsed energy on penetration types and depth of BOP welded samples was investigated. Focus point was found at focal length of 156 mm with 393.75 μm. For BOP experiment, higher pulsed energy used contributes to melt through defect. Meanwhile, Ns shielding gas proved to be better shielding gas in laser welding the AZ31B. Higher angle of irradiation could reduce the underfill defect. Fillet Lap joint of similar metal was successfully done where 2.0 J of pulsed energy reveals better weld joint compared to 2.4 J.

Diffusers transmitter modulation to reduce the effect of atmospheric turbulence in free space optical communication system is described in this paper. This technique uses dual transmitters and dual receivers which are using differential mode for detection. The combination of these components produce superior modulation method especially to reduce scintillation index, to overcome signal detection with fix zero threshold and improve power received. In order to improve the performance of free space optical system, these three elements play an important role. The analysis result show that for receiving power dual diffuser modulation at 3 km distance propagation is 4.59dBm compared to conventional OOK using diffuser which only −7.6dBm and equivalent to 3dBm improvement or up to 40 percent better.

The practices of social proof techniques to attract consumers to shop on social media have proliferated over time and been used extensively. The reviewed literature uncovers that social community recommendation, customers’ ratings and reviews, celebrity’s endorser and numbers of likes, affect consumers’ purchasing decisions. However, the effect of different types of social proof techniques on purchasing intention is unknown. This study empirically compares the effect of number of followers, celebrity endorser and social community recommendation on consumers’ purchasing intention. An experiment has been conducted and the results reveal that the consumers’ purchasing intention differs between groups. Further analysis discovers that the impact on consumers’ purchasing intention is different between high number of followers and low number of followers, and between having social community recommendation and not having social community recommendation. Though, the impact of these two techniques is equal wherein no technique is superior to other. In order to gain purchasing engagement and boost online sales, online businesses on social media are encouraged to use the power of social proof technique, either by increasing the number of followers or providing more social community recommendations.

An on-body location tracking system is developed and integrated with a wearable GPS antenna. Such system is beneficial in human location tracking of patients and elderly within a radius of 1 km. The system consists of a wearable antenna, a GPS module, a low cost microcontroller, two RF modules and a local monitoring system. A user equipped with the GPS antenna, GPS module and a RF transmitter is able send his/her location to the local monitoring system via a RF receiver. The proposed wearable antenna is validated to be safe for human use in terms of specific absorption rate (SAR). This antenna was then incorporated into the complete prototype and tested. Several suggestions for future improvements are also proposed and discussed.

The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of newly proposed bicycle’s crank to crank angle setting on the Vastus Lateralis (VL) and Bicep Femoris (BF) muscle activity during cycling. Procedures of Conconi Test were used throughout the experiment for the data collection purpose. The muscles activities were recorded using surface electromyography and software LabChart7. The raw data were further processed in time (Root-Mean-Square, RMS) and frequency (Mean Power Frequency, MPF) domain. It was found that 0° crank to crank setting (similar to conventional crank to crank angle setting) caused the prime mover VL (Normalized RMS = 0.119) to fatigue more than BF (Normalized RMS = 0.102). This setting is expected to decrease the cycling performance. In addition, −5° is the best crank to crank angle setting that causes least fatigue to both VL and BF. In short, to increase the cycling performance by avoiding the fatigue to the main muscles, −5° is the suggested as setting angle for the proposed crank design.

The purpose of this study was to identify the effects of three initial crank positions and jaw clenching activities on seated cycling performance. 10 normal subjects (5 females, 5 males) completed six separate occasions of Wingate Test with three different initial crank positions (0°, 47°, 71°) and two modes of jaw activities (jaw clenching and jaw loose). The findings suggest that, crank angle of 71° has the highest power output compare to other angles. The combination of 71° crank angles and jaw loose the jaw shows the best cycling performance.

This paper is evaluating the factors effecting the increasing in the numbers of foreign workers on site. A critical review of the literature was abstract because of the Malaysian economics is booming and the characteristics of the construction industry itself make the foreigners comfortable works on site. This paper discusses the results from the conducted questionnaire survey among the contractors in Selangor. Based on the average index, there are several factors identified by the respondents such as shortage of manpower, reluctant of local labour, project increased the demand for labour and accelerating economic development. This factor will improve the decision making process in recruiting labour on site.

This paper aims to identify major emergencies that have the potential to place Malaysian hotels in emergency and disaster situations; investigate how hotels were prepared for emergencies, how they manage and overcome emergencies when occurred; and limitations and factors influencing successful emergency planning and adoption emergency management in Malaysian hotels. Face-to-face interview with managers from three, four and five star hotels from different backgrounds: local; regional; and International in Kuala Lumpur, Subang, and Putrajaya are undertaken. The result revealed that Malaysian hotels are exposed to a wide range of natural and man-made disasters. Malaysian hotels lack proactive emergency planning and a lot of constraints which impede successful emergency planning for disasters in the hotel industry in Malaysia, with emphasizing on the relevant authority’s role to demonstrate emergency management to hotels convincing them to adopt such practices, so they can be able to cope with emergencies effectively.

The unstable environment of hotel industry which is driven by the fluctuation of tourism demand has motivated this study to look into the best diversification strategy for firm performance betterment. 42 hotel firms are investigated across 4 Asian economies, from year 2001 to 2012. Our results suggest that unrelated industrial diversification is the only alternative to improve hotel firm performance. Unrelated international diversification instead has a significant negative effect towards firm performance. Our results further show that board of directors implies a significant link to the relationship between diversification and firm performance, only in a crisis period.

Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems is part of the overall management system that facilitates the management of the OS&H risks associated with the business of the organization. This includes the organizational structure, planning activities, responsibilities, practices, procedures, processes and resources for developing, implementing, achieving, reviewing and maintaining the organization’s OS&H policy. The purpose of this research is to determine the level of awareness of contractors on OSH management systems. A total of 34 numbers of class A contractors in Kelantan registered with Pusat Khidmat Kontraktor (PKK) were randomly selected. Data was collected using self-administered questionnaire. The findings indicate that most of the Class A Contractor in Kelantan aware that the occupational safety and health management system are important and should be practiced to achieve zero accident and death on site

Tourists are now more open in selecting tourist destination. The number of holiday trips were growing rapidly. There were various promotions available to attract tourists to travel either within or outside the country. Travel distance is not an obstacle for tourists to travel, regardless of local and foreign destination. This study will be conducted to identify the motivation of long journey travel that involves push and pull factors. The long journey involves distance, cost and the type of transportation used to get to the destination. For this purpose a comprehensive review and discussion on previous sources which involved a variety of secondary data sources will be used to meet every need of the study objectives. The finding showed that the travel distance was dependent on the motivation for tourists to travel and the type of transport they want to use. Mode of transport used has advantages and disadvantages for long journey travel depending on traveller choice.

This paper aims to identify major emergencies that have the potential to place hotels in emergency and disaster situations; investigate how hotels were prepared for emergencies, how they manage and overcome emergencies when occurred; and limitations and factors influencing successful emergency planning and adoption emergency management in Malaysian and Jordanian hotels. Face-to-face interview for managers from three, four and five star hotels from different backgrounds: local; regional; and International in Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Amman and Petra were undertaken. Results revealed that hotels are exposed to a wide range of natural and man-made disasters, Occurred globally affected locally. Hotels lack proactive emergency planning and a lot of constraints which impede successful emergency planning for disasters in the hotel industry, with emphasizing on the relevant authority’s role to demonstrate emergency management to hotels convincing them to adopt such practices, so they can be able to cope with emergencies effectively.

In most economies, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) consitute a variety of different firms encom­passing a wide range of industries. SMEs are heterogeneous: they differ at least in terms of their capabilities, stage of development, resources as well as requirements. The heterogeineity ofSMEs suggests that any systematic and rigorous attempt. to understand, explain and predict their behaviour should begin with the development of a taxonomy for them. A taxonomy provides a means for grouping and defining heterogenous SMEs - understand­ing their similarities and differences, their strengths and weaknesses. In the literature, several attempts to develop SMEs taxonomies have been made. Upon examining three of these taxonomies, it is found that SMEs can be classified in a number of different ways. Nonetheless, whilst this review of taxonomies literature is insightful in developing our own SMEs taxonomy, a careful study of the various features of SMEs is awaited if we were to develop a comprehensive taxonomy for the Malaysian SMEs.