Patterns of modern human population structure are helpful in understanding the history of human migration and admixture. We conducted a study on genetic structure of the Malay population in Malaysia, ...using 54,794 genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism genotype data generated in four Malay sub-ethnic groups in peninsular Malaysia (Melayu Kelantan, Melayu Minang, Melayu Jawa and Melayu Bugis). To the best of our knowledge this is the first study conducted on these four Malay sub-ethnic groups and the analysis of genotype data of these four groups were compiled together with 11 other populations' genotype data from Indonesia, China, India, Africa and indigenous populations in Peninsular Malaysia obtained from the Pan-Asian SNP database. The phylogeny of populations showed that all of the four Malay sub-ethnic groups are separated into at least three different clusters. The Melayu Jawa, Melayu Bugis and Melayu Minang have a very close genetic relationship with Indonesian populations indicating a common ancestral history, while the Melayu Kelantan formed a distinct group on the tree indicating that they are genetically different from the other Malay sub-ethnic groups. We have detected genetic structuring among the Malay populations and this could possibly be accounted for by their different historical origins. Our results provide information of the genetic differentiation between these populations and a valuable insight into the origins of the Malay sub-ethnic groups in Peninsular Malaysia.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Background
The impact of lockdown measures can be widespread, affecting both clinical and psychosocial aspects of health. This study aims to assess changes in health services access, self‐care, ...behavioural, and psychological impact of COVID‐19 and partial lockdown amongst diabetes patients in Singapore.
Methods
We conducted a cross‐sectional online survey amongst people with diabetes with the Diabetes Health Profile‐18 (DHP‐18). Hierarchical regression analyses were performed for each DHP‐18 subscale (Psychological Distress, Disinhibited Eating and Barriers to Activity) as dependent variables in separate models.
Results
Among 301 respondents, 45.2% were women, 67.1% of Chinese ethnicity, 24.2% were aged 40 to 49 years, 68.4% have Type 2 diabetes and 42.2% on oral medications alone. During the pandemic and the lockdown, nearly all respondents were able to receive care safely from the clinics they attend (94%) and obtain their medications and diabetes equipment and supplies (97%) when needed. Respondents reported less frequent engagement in physical activity (38%), checking of blood pressure (29%) and blood glucose (22%). Previous diagnosis of mental health conditions (β = 9.33, P = .043), Type 1 diabetes (β = 12.92, P = .023), number of diabetes‐related comorbidities (β = 3.16, P = .007) and Indian ethnicity (β = 6.65, P = .034) were associated with higher psychological distress. Comorbidities were associated with higher disinhibited eating (β = 2.49, P = .014) while ability to reach their doctor despite not going to the clinic is negatively associated with psychological distress (β = −9.50 P = .002) and barriers to activity (β = −7.53, P = .007).
Conclusion
Health services access were minimally affected, but COVID‐19 and lockdown had mixed impacts on self‐care and management behaviours. Greater clinical care and attention should be provided to people with diabetes with multiple comorbidities and previous mental health disorders during the pandemic and lockdown.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Clonal reproduction of oil palm by means of tissue culture is a very inefficient process. Tissue culturability is known to be genotype dependent with some genotypes being more amenable to tissue ...culture than others. In this study, genetic linkage maps enriched with simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers were developed for dura (ENL48) and pisifera (ML161), the two fruit forms of oil palm, Elaeis guineensis. The SSR markers were mapped onto earlier reported parental maps based on amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) and restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) markers. The new linkage map of ENL48 contains 148 markers (33 AFLPs, 38 RFLPs and 77 SSRs) in 23 linkage groups (LGs), covering a total map length of 798.0 cM. The ML161 map contains 240 markers (50 AFLPs, 71 RFLPs and 119 SSRs) in 24 LGs covering a total of 1,328.1 cM. Using the improved maps, two quantitative trait loci (QTLs) associated with tissue culturability were identified each for callusing rate and embryogenesis rate. A QTL for callogenesis was identified in LGD4b of ENL48 and explained 17.5% of the phenotypic variation. For embryogenesis rate, a QTL was detected on LGP16b in ML161 and explained 20.1% of the variation. This study is the first attempt to identify QTL associated with tissue culture amenity in oil palm which is an important step towards understanding the molecular processes underlying clonal regeneration of oil palm.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Public health authorities have been recommending interventions such as physical distancing and face masks, to curtail the transmission of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) within the community. Public ...perceptions toward such interventions should be identified to enable public health authorities to effectively address valid concerns. The Health Belief Model (HBM) has been used to characterize user-generated content from social media during previous outbreaks, with the aim of understanding the health behaviors of the public.
This study is aimed at developing and evaluating deep learning-based text classification models for classifying social media content posted during the COVID-19 outbreak, using the four key constructs of the HBM. We will specifically focus on content related to the physical distancing interventions put forth by public health authorities. We intend to test the model with a real-world case study.
The data set for this study was prepared by analyzing Facebook comments that were posted by the public in response to the COVID-19-related posts of three public health authorities: the Ministry of Health of Singapore (MOH), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Public Health England. The comments made in the context of physical distancing were manually classified with a Yes/No flag for each of the four HBM constructs: perceived severity, perceived susceptibility, perceived barriers, and perceived benefits. Using a curated data set of 16,752 comments, gated recurrent unit-based recurrent neural network models were trained and validated for text classification. Accuracy and binary cross-entropy loss were used to evaluate the model. Specificity, sensitivity, and balanced accuracy were used to evaluate the classification results in the MOH case study.
The HBM text classification models achieved mean accuracy rates of 0.92, 0.95, 0.91, and 0.94 for the constructs of perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, perceived benefits, and perceived barriers, respectively. In the case study with MOH Facebook comments, specificity was above 96% for all HBM constructs. Sensitivity was 94.3% and 90.9% for perceived severity and perceived benefits, respectively. In addition, sensitivity was 79.6% and 81.5% for perceived susceptibility and perceived barriers, respectively. The classification models were able to accurately predict trends in the prevalence of the constructs for the time period examined in the case study.
The deep learning-based text classifiers developed in this study help to determine public perceptions toward physical distancing, using the four key constructs of HBM. Health officials can make use of the classification model to characterize the health behaviors of the public through the lens of social media. In future studies, we intend to extend the model to study public perceptions of other important interventions by public health authorities.
Background: This article examines the state of the field of arts and health in Singapore and identifies the drivers that have shaped its development to date, adding new insights from Asia to the ...growing international literature in this area. Methods: Various methods, including an online survey and in-depth focus groups were used. Results: We find that the field in Singapore is rapidly growing, with a proliferation of activities across the arts and culture, healthcare, and social care sectors in recent decades fostered by various policy developments, increased funding and new peer-to-peer networking. Nevertheless, several issues persist, including inconsistent understanding and conceptualisation of the field as a whole across multiple stakeholders, limited research capacity and training platforms, and lack of professional recognition. Conclusions: We provide recommendations for further action, including developing arts and health literacy and research capacity, investing in efforts to bridge education and practice, and focusing on formalising and elevating professional standards.
Filamentous fungi are able to accumulate significant amount of metals from their environment. The potential of fungal biomass as agents for biosorption of heavy metals from contaminated sediments is ...currently receiving attention. In the present study, a total of 41 isolates of filamentous fungi obtained from the sediment of the Langat River, Selangor, Malaysia were screened for their tolerance and uptake capability of copper (Cu) and lead (Pb). The isolates were identified as
Aspergillus niger, A. fumigatus, Trichoderma asperellum, Penicillium simplicissimum and
P. janthinellum. A. niger and
P. simplicissimum, were able to survive at 1000 mg/L of Cu(II) concentration on Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA) while for Pb, only
A. niger survived at 5000 mg/L concentration. The results showed that
A. niger, P. simplicissimum and
T. asperellum have a better uptake capacity for Pb compared to Cu and the findings indicated promising biosorption of Cu and Pb by these filamentous fungi from aqueous solution. The present study was also determined the maximum removal of Cu(II) and Pb(II) that was performed by
A. niger. The metal removal which occurred at Cu(II) 200 mg/L was (20.910 ± 0.581) mg/g and at 250 mg/L of Pb(II) was (54.046 ± 0.328) mg/g.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
This study aims to describe Facebook users’ beliefs toward physical distancing measures implemented during the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic using the key constructs of the health belief ...model. A combination of rule-based filtering and manual classification methods was used to classify user comments on COVID-19 Facebook posts of three public health authorities: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of the United States, Public Health England, and Ministry of Health, Singapore. A total of 104,304 comments were analyzed for posts published between 1 January, 2020, and 31 March, 2020, along with COVID-19 cases and deaths count data from the three countries. Findings indicate that the perceived benefits of physical distancing measures (n = 3,463; 3.3%) was three times higher than perceived barriers (n = 1,062; 1.0%). Perceived susceptibility to COVID-19 (n = 2,934; 2.8%) was higher compared with perceived severity (n = 2,081; 2.0%). Although susceptibility aspects of physical distancing were discussed more often at the start of the year, mentions on the benefits of intervention emerged stronger toward the end of the analysis period, highlighting the shift in beliefs. The health belief model is useful for understanding Facebook users’ beliefs at a basic level, and it provides a scope for further improvement.
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NUK, OILJ, SAZU, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VSZLJ
Andrographis paniculata (AP) has been stated as a low-diverse, endangered and red-listed plant species. Self-pollinated mating system, being an introduced species and experiencing a bottleneck as ...well as over exploitation cause such a consequence. Inter and intra-specific hybridizations have been suggested as essential techniques for generating genetic diversity. To test the effect of intra-specific hybridization on diversification and heterosis of AP, seven accessions were outcrossed manually in all 21 possible combinations. Three types of markers including morphological, phytochemical and RAPD markers were employed to evaluate the mentioned hypothesis. The results revealed that hybridization acted as a powerful engine for diversification of AP as it caused heterotic expression of the studied traits, simultaneously. Initially, it seems that additive and non-additive gene effects both can be considered as the genetic basis of heterosis in AP for the investigated traits. Agronomic and morphological traits were differentiated from each other, while positive heterosis was recorded mainly for agronomic traits but not for the morphological traits. Intra-specific hybridization increased the genetic diversity in AP population. Nevertheless, a part of this variation could also be attributed to the negative heterosis. The current exploration demonstrated the first ever conducted manual intra-specific hybridization among AP accessions in a mass scale. However, the 17 RAPD primers produced a monomorph pattern, but perhaps increasing the number of markers can feature a new genetic profile in this plant.
► Studying the heterosis phenomenon in the species. ► Studying the diversification of the species caused by manual-hybridization effect. ► The genetic basis of heterosis (gene effect) has been studied accordingly. ► Studying the relationship between genetic distance and heterosis. ► Impact of negative and positive heteroses on breeding and conservation.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
Enroute to mapping QTLs for yield components in oil palm, we constructed the linkage map of a FELDA high yielding oil palm (Elaeis guineensis), hybrid cross. The parents of the mapping population are ...a Deli dura and a pisifera of Yangambi origin. The cross out-yielded the average by 8-21% in four trials all of which yielded comparably to the best current commercial planting materials. The higher yield derived from a higher fruit oil content. SSR markers in the public domain - from CIRAD and MPOB, as well as some developed in FELDA - were used for the mapping, augmented by locally-designed AFLP markers. The female parent linkage map comprised 317 marker loci and the male parent map 331 loci, both in 16 linkage groups each. The number of markers per group ranged from 8-47 in the former and 12-40 in the latter. The integrated map was 2,247.5 cM long and included 479 markers and 168 anchor points. The number of markers per linkage group was 15-57, the average being 29, and the average map density 4.7 cM. The linkage groups ranged in length from 77.5 cM to 223.7 cM, with an average of 137 cM. The map is currently being validated against a closely related population and also being expanded to include yield related QTLs.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
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