The number of students pursuing science and engineering is reducing drastically over the years which is of great concern to the country. Hence, in 2011, the Malaysia Education Blueprint was initiated emphasizing on the role of STEM for establishing a scientific and innovative society. The National STEM Movement has taken the step forward to make the blueprint a reality by initiating the STEM Mentor-Mentee program in schools facilitated by universities. Universiti Selangor (Unisel) contributed actively through the participation of lecturers as facilitators and students as mentors. Fondly known as the Unisel Fun with STEM program, the team has shared their modules with seven schools in Selangor. This particular study is focusing on one of the schools, SMK Sungai Burong involving 60 students and 3 teachers, assessing the effectiveness of the module and the impact of mentoring approach. A five Likert scale survey was conducted at the end of the program with each of the four domains received positive feedback. The program itself was well-executed with the mean score of 4.24. The response towards the mentoring approach was very favourable, resulting in the mean score of 4.61. This outreach program is considered effective as students demonstrated positive attitude towards the module and STEM field.
Fermented tilapia (Tilapia nicoliticus) is one of the famous fermented food in Malaysia. Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) which well known as GRAS (Generally Regarded as Safe) are present in most fermented foods and they are well-known non-pathogenic bacteria that play an important role in everyday life. Apart from LAB, spices have also been used for centuries across different regions of the world to improve aroma, flavour and food preservative. This research was aimed to explore a potential natural food preservative using LAB isolated from fermented Tilapia nicoliticus incorporated with various spices (9% turmeric, 6% chilli and 9% black pepper) against foodborne pathogens. The isolation of LAB in different media (MRS, MRS+CaCO3, M17 and Tomato Juice Agar) showed the highest LAB count on day-9 and day-15 during the fermentation period in fermented Tilapia incorporated with black pepper, turmeric and chilli. The highest antimicrobial activity by LAB against Bacillus cereus was observed in fermented tilapia incorporated with black pepper. On the other hand, fermented fish incorporated with chilli showed the highest antimicrobial activity against Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli and Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium. Higher antimicrobial activity was detected in fermented Tilapia in the presence of LAB together with the spices, in comparison to the presence of LAB alone, suggesting synergistic effects between LAB in fermented fish with spices could enhance stronger antimicrobial activities against food pathogens and therefore, served as a natural food preservative.
The halal industry is growing, and there is an increasing recognition of its importance among academics, practitioners, and other industry stakeholders. However, there is limited scientometric research using CiteSpace analysis on halal research. This study is the first to report on scientometric research that used CiteSpace analysis to identify the extent of halal publications. The Web of Science Core Collection databases were queried, and CiteSpace was used for co-citation analysis, while Microsoft Excel was used for descriptive analysis. Our analysis included 1139 publications available in WOSCC between 1987 and 2021. We found a fifteen-fold increase in halal-related publications between 2010 (10) and 2021 (150). Malaysia (37%) and Indonesia (15%) were the top two countries with combined publications more than 50% of published papers. Our literature co-citation cluster analysis identified eleven clusters, with the most prominent being halal tourism, halal certification, pig adulteration, and halal logistics. The major fields with the highest number of halal-related publications were: (i) “Veterinary, Animal Science”, (ii) “Psychology, Education, Health”; and (iii) “Economics, Economic, Political”. Scientometric analysis of halal research can identify the focal points and frontiers of the field. This study offers valuable theoretical and real-world references, recent developments, and opportunities for collaboration.
STEM education emphasizes the integrated study of science passing the boundaries of traditionally labelled disciplines while demonstrating its application in real life. Science forensic is an eye-catching subject for students, which implements the knowledge of biology, physics, and chemistry. The purpose of this study was to identify students’ interest towards STEM through science forensic module and the impact of the near-peer mentoring approach in the module for STEM outreach. This pilot study was conducted for the students of Sekolah Berasrama Penuh Integrasi (SBPI) Gombak with 36 participants. By using the Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS), the analysis revealed that 94.5% of students found the module interesting and 77% of participants agreeing that the module increased their interest to pursue their future study in the STEM-field. Focusing on demographics, this module received more positive responses from females and pure science stream students as compared to males and Islamic science stream, respectively. This result is consistent with the higher number of female students and pure science stream students in STEM-field study at university level. The near-peer mentoring approach showed a promising impact with 88% of students giving positive feedback on the credibility of mentors. The science forensic modules consisted of 8 main stations with the Fingerprinting station being the most popular (94.5%) and DNA profiling being the least popular (77.8%). One possible explanation of this is that the level of understanding for DNA profiling is harder with larger amounts of knowledge needed to be learned in a short period of time. Overall, the outcomes of this study suggest that exposing secondary school students to science forensic has a positive impact on their level of interest towards STEM education.
Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) have been extensively explored as potential biopreservants. They could produce substances with antimicrobial properties such as bacteriocins and organic acids which can also be the cause of antagonistic activity shown by LAB. Thus, the objective of this study is to assess the antagonistic activity of LAB isolated from fermented Oreochromis niloticus against foodborne pathogens and to determine the potential of LAB as a surface decontaminant of raw chicken breast and Tilapia fish fillet. The antagonistic activity of LAB has been shown to affect Escherichia coli, Salmonella typhimurium, and Staphylococcus aureus. When LAB was introduced to the mixed cultures of E. coli, S. typhimurium, and S. aureus, the growth of those pathogens drastically reduced and this has proven that LAB grows stronger and more stable while eliminating the pathogens. LAB and their cell-free supernatant (CFS) were also introduced into the raw chicken breast and fresh Tilapia fish fillet, where E. coli growth was recorded. Both cell cultures and CFS of LAB showed inhibition of E. coli on chicken breast and Tilapia fish fillet in the range of 0.16 to 1.28 log10 reduction and 0.12 to 1.12 log10 reduction, respectively. In conclusion, the results above suggest that LAB isolated from fermented O. niloticus has the potential to be a surface decontaminant. Additionally, both LAB and their CFS can also be used as biopreservative for both chicken breast and fish fillet due to a very good antagonistic activity shown by the LAB toward the foodborne pathogens.
A total of 70 isolates of Escherichia coli O157:H7 isolated from beef samples were examined with respect to plasmid profiles and random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) patterns. All isolates carried the 90 kb pO157 plasmid alone or in combination with other smaller plasmids. Using Gen1-50-02 (5'-CAATGCGTCT-3'), Gen1-50-09 (5'-AGAGGCGATG-3') and Gen1-50-10 (5'-CCATTTACGC-3') as primers, respectively, we obtained DNA polymorphisms which allowed us to discriminate the E. coli O157:H7 isolates into one, six and five RAPD patterns; providing bands ranging in size from 0.25 to 4.0 kb. Our results demonstrate that both plasmid profiling and RAPD-PCR fingerprinting methods are suitable tools for a fast and reliable molecular typing of E. coli O157:H7. The RAPD-PCR method is more sensitive with respect to the individualization of isolates and that RAPD-PCR assay could be a valuable technique for epidemiological studies.
Nowadays, the foodborne outbreaks associated with fresh produces, including ulam, are increasing worldwide. The biofilm formation or bacterial attachment to plant surface is the initial step towards the contamination in fresh produce. The biofilm phenotype of bacteria grown on congo red agar is termed as red, dry and rough (rdar) morphotype. The binding of congo red dye with both biological proteins and inert surfaces is due to the presence of curli fimbriae and cellulose as the main extracellular components. The objective of this study was to determine the rdar morphotypes, biofilm ability and the role of csgA gene of Escherichia coli and Salmonella spp. isolated from ulam or Malaysian herbs. A total of 29 isolates, including 23 E. coli and 6 Salmonella spp. were analyzed for their ability to produce biofilm by colony morphology test, microtiter plate biofilm assay and qualitative biofilm test (pellicle formation). The presence of the csgA gene of E. coli was identified by PCR, which demonstrated the potential gene that able to produce curli fimbriae. Results revealed that 16 (69.6%) E. coli isolates were categorized as strong biofilm producers, 2 (8.7%) as moderate biofilm producers, 3 (13%) as weak biofilm producers, whereas 2 (8.7%) as negative biofilm producers (did not produce biofilm). While 4 (66.7%) Salmonella spp. isolates were identified as strong biofilm producers, 1 (16.7%) as moderate biofilm producers and 1 (16.7%) as negative biofilm producers. Majority of the E. coli strains (69.6%) were identified as strong biofilm producers and able to express rdar morphotypes. The ability of the of E. coli and Salmonella spp. isolates to form biofilm reveals the ability of these isolates to persist on the fresh vegetables and become hosts for the disease transmission to humans or/and animals.
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