Kajian ini bertujuan menterjemahkan soalselidik Skala Konsep Kendiri Multidimensi (SKKM) edisi bahasa Inggeris ke dalam bahasa Malaysia, mendapatkan kesahan kandungan dan nilai kebolehpercayaan. SKKM dibina oleh Bracken (1992) bertujuan mengukur konsep kendiri berdasarkan Model Konsep Kendiri Multidimensi (MKKM). SKKM mempunyai 150 item (74 item positif dan 76 item negatif) yang mengukur enam sub skala konsep kendiri iaitu konsep kendiri sosial, kemampuan, perasaan, keluarga, fizikal dan akademik. Proses penterjemahan SKKM ke dalam bahasa Malaysia menggunakan kaedah back translation yang dicadangkan oleh Brislin, Lonner dan Thondike (1973). Item-item dalam SKKM diubahsuai mengikut nilai dan budaya masyarakat tempatan dan dinilai terjemahannya oleh tiga panel bahasa Melayu dan tiga panel bahasa Inggeris. Bagi analisis kesahan muka seramai lapan pelajar sekolah menengah dan tiga pakar bahasa Melayu terlibat dalam membaiki bahasa, struktur ayat dan kefahaman istilah-istilah dalam SKKM. Seterusnya, SKKM dinilai oleh tujuh panel pakar bagi menilai kesahan kandungannya. Seterusnya analisis kepercayaan dijalankan terhadap 214 pelajar di dua buah sekolah menegah di negeri Selangor, Malaysia. Dapatan kajian mendapati nilai kesahan kandungan oleh panel pakar memperoleh nilai koefisien yang tinggi iaitu = 0.822 dengan nilai minimum dan maksimum juga melebihi .60. Nilai koefisien terendah ialah bagi sub skala konsep kendiri keluarga iaitu .668 dan nilai tertinggi ialah bagi sub skala konsep kendiri sosial iaitu .964. Analisis kebolehpercayaan SKKM juga memuaskan dengan nilai keseluruhan ialah .757. Huraian berdasarkan subskala ialah Sosial α = .7.93, Kemampuan α = .770, Perasaan α = .744, Keluarga α = .680, Fizikal α = .791 dan Akademik α = .762. Bagi analisis nilai kebolehpercayaan berdasarkan item-item mendapati nilai kebolehpercayaan tertinggi ialah soalan nombor 103 subskala keluarga iaitu .902 dan nilai terendah ialah item soalan nombor 49 subskala kemampuan iaitu .762. Justeru kajian ini berjaya menterjemahkan SKKM yang mempunyai nilai kesahan dan kebolehpercayaan yang tinggi dan boleh diaplikasikan dalam kalangan remaja di Malaysia.
Pelaksanaan Pelan Strategik Pengajian Tinggi Negara (PSPTN) 2007 menuntut supaya kakitangan akademik berupaya menyesuaikan diri dengan persekitaran kerja universiti penyelidikan. Cabaran utama adalah untuk mengubah tabiat dan tingkahlaku kerja yang lazim kepada yang sepadan dengan keperluan universiti penyelidikan. Sehubungan itu, kajian ini bertujuan mengenalpasti pengaruh personaliti lima faktor terhadap penilaian prestasi kerja berkesan (PPKB) dalam kalangan kakitangan akademik UKM. Kajian Kuantitatif ini menggunakan pengukuran personaliti NEO FFI dan Personality Related-Position Requirement Form bagi mengukur prestasi kerja berkesan. Seramai 204 orang kakitangan akademik UKM terpilih sebagai sampel kajian. Keputusan kajian menunjukkan bahawa secara keseluruhan personaliti individu meramal prestasi kerja berkesan dalam kalangan kakitangan akademik kajian sebanyak 24 peratus. Keputusan kajian memperihalkan bahawa semua faktor personaliti individu yang diukur adalah penting dalam menggambarkan ciri kakitangan akademik kajian kecuali neurotisisme. Kesemua dimensi penilaian prestasi kerja berkesan sepadan dengan data kajian. Kajian ini berjaya mengenalpasti faktor personaliti dan dimensi penilaian prestasi berkesan sebagai kakitangan akademik UKM dalam era universiti penyelidikan.
This study was designed to understand the experiences and emotions of teenage depression by attending to the metaphors described by the research participants. We examined the ways metaphor as a figurative language, help in the depression narrative which was understood as a state of despondency characterized by feeling of inadequacy, lowered activity, or pessimism about the future. Qualitative research design was implemented where narrative inquiry and in- depth interviews were conducted. A total of three participants were recruited in this study. Each participant was interviewed three times within a month where each session is approximately forty- five minutes to one hour. There were three metaphors found, namely Volcano, Black Hole, and Being Bitten by Big Fish. The thematic analysis revealed that the depression experience was described as passive, involuntary and painful; however, recovery process was triggered off by an “awareness†moment which was related to interpersonal relationship. Therefore this paper concluded that the expression of depression using metaphors has helped drawing out the profound specific emotions and it was insightful in the conceptualization experience, and a positive and supportive social context is helpful to enhance the recovery process of teenage depression.
Employee deviance has received increasing attention in the past decade. Past research have reported that work environment related factors such as organizational support, supervisory support, role conflict, and job demand were associated with deviant behavior The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between job demand (psychological job demand), and job resources (social support), and employee workplace deviant behavior. This study adopts a cross-sectional correlation study design. A total of 315 employees were selected using cluster sampling technique participated in this study. Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire using the drop and collect method. Data were analyzed using descriptive analysis (mean, standard deviation, frequency distribution) to describe the demographic profile and study variables. Correlation and regression analysis was performed to test the relationship between psychological job demand, and social support, and employee workplace deviant behaviors. The result revealed that lack of social support has significant positive influence on employee workplace deviant behavior. The findings suggest that lack of job resources such as social support may drive employees to engage in deviant work behavior. However, high job demand experienced by employees does not drive them towards engaging in deviant work behavior.
MeSH terms: Attention; Cross-Sectional Studies; Demography; Surveys and Questionnaires; Regression Analysis; Social Support; Workplace
This study was carried out to identify the differences of emotional intelligence and religious orientation between students in government secondary schools and religious secondary schools. This study involved 224 respondents that were chosen via purposive sampling technique. The emotional intelligence questionnaire used in this study was based on Bar-On’s emotional intelligence theory while religious orientation was measured using the Religion Orientation Scale. Data collected were analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) software version 19.0. T-test was used to observe the differences of emotional intelligence and religious orientation between students in government secondary schools and religious secondary schools. The results showed that there were differences in emotional intelligence but no difference was found in religious orientation between students from government secondary schools and religious secondary schools.
1Malaysia concept was introduced by Datuk Seri Mohd. Najib Tun Razak on April 3, 2009 with the theme, "People First, Achievement Is Priority", 1Malaysia seen as an attempt to foster unity among the various races in Malaysia with 8 important values as the catalyst for social transformation that leads to the growth and well-being of people. This descriptive study was conducted to investigate the source and extent of the understanding of 1Malaysia concept among the three groups of primary school (n = 100), secondary school (n = 100) and university students (n = 98). Data were collected through a survey method with the use of a set of questionnaires and were then analysed with SPSS software. The results showed that the main source of this concept for all three groups of students is through television, followed by the newspaper. For the understanding of the concept, it was found that almost 70% of the respondents do understand some basic aspects related to it. However, there are still aspects which respondents still do not know about. Thus there is a need for the educators to play an important role to explain in detail to the students so that the concept can be understood and appreciated, and that it is not misinterpreted to cause negative impact on race relations in Malaysia.
This study was carried out to determine the influence of LMX towards the SCB worker dimension in a national automotive company in Malaysia. There were 360 respondents from the automotive company involved in this study. Data collected from respondents were analysed using descriptive (demographic frequencies) and inferential statistics (correlation and regression analysis). The results showed that one of the four independent variables has a positive influence on SCB. In terms of the demographic factors, none of the variables (age, gender and period of service) made any significant difference on LMX and SCB, except the position category. Further suggestions regarding LMX and SCB are discussed based on the findings.
Background. The pharmacists’ roles have been expanding around the globe in the recent years. In Malaysia, healthcare system is a two-tier system consisting of the public and private sectors. Pharmacy service in Malaysia came into existence in 1951 with the enactment of three main legislations governing its profession, namely, the Registration of Pharmacist Act 1951, Poison Act 1952 and Dangerous Drug Act 1952. However, the absence of dispensing right has limited the community pharmacists’ professional roles to deliver pharmaceutical care, optimise their clinical knowledge and utilise their skill. Aims. To describe the overview of pharmacy practice in Malaysia, by discussing on the history, challenges and future of this profession. Methods. Electronic databases MEDLINE and PUBMED were searched for articles published in English. The keywords community pharmacy, pharmacy practice, Malaysia and pharmaceutical care were used with each database. The articles were independently identified by each researcher. Results. A total of 8 full papers and 9 government reports were retrieved and critically summarised for this review. Conclusions. There is a need of transformation to bring improvement in pharmacy practice. Besides the policy makers, community pharmacists play a pivotal role to transform the current practice to a more comprehensive, clinically inclined and quality practice.
Comment on: Williams B, Sadasivan S, Kadirvelu A, Olaussen A. Empathy levels among first year Malaysian medical students: An observational study. Adv Med Educ Pract. 2014;5:149–156
The hemoglobinopathies include all genetic diseases of hemoglobin (Hb) and fall into two main groups: the thalassemias and structural hemoglobin variants (abnormal hemoglobins). Thalassemia is a public health problem in Malaysia. About 4.5% of the Malays and Chinese are β-thalassemia carriers. We performed hemoglobin analysis on a total of 499 patients from a Government Hospital and Health Clinics in the state of Perlis, Malaysia. About 91.4% of the patients were Malays. All patients had microcytic hypochromic anemia except for a few who went for thalassemia screening. Female patients outnumbered male patients in the ratio of 3.5:1. About 75.7% of the female patients were of childbearing age (17 - 40 years) and a majority of them were there for their antenatal checkup. Using our screen tests (full blood count, high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), and agarose gel electrophoresis), the common hemoglobinopathies detected were HbE trait (19.3%), β-thalassemia trait (14.6%), HbH disease (1.8%), Hb Constant Spring (1.6%), Homozygous HbE (1.4%), and HbE- β-thalassemia (1.4%). Thalassemia is preventable through screening and education programmes, and prenatal diagnosis. Thalassemia screening is provided free of charge at various government hospitals and health clinics throughout the country.
Key words: Hemoglobinopathies screening, β-thalassemia trait, HbE trait, Thalassemic diseases
MeSH terms: Adult; Ambulatory Care Facilities; China/ethnology; Female; Hemoglobin H; Hospitals; Humans; India/ethnology; Malaysia; Malaysia/ethnology; Male; Mass Screening; Prevalence; alpha-Thalassemia
Socioeconomic development in Malaysia, over the past few decades, has led to the improvement and expansion of the public healthcare system. This system has provided universal access to a low-priced package of comprehensive health care leading Malaysia to claim to have achieved universal health coverage (UHC). However, the Malaysian health landscape is changing rapidly. Provision of private care has grown especially in large urban towns, mainly in response to public demand. Thus far, private care has been predominantly bought and utilised by the rich but because of differentials in quality of care between the public and private sector, unabated expansion of the private health sector has the potential to adversely affect universal access to care. This effect may be accentuated in the coming years by demographic changes in the country specifically by the ageing of the population. This paper is intended to highlight challenges to UHC in Malaysia in the face of the changing health landscape in the country and to offer some suggestions as to how these challenges can be met.
MeSH terms: Delivery of Health Care; Malaysia; Primary Health Care; Universal Coverage
During March 2011 to June 2012, 50 banana plants of cultivar Musa × paradisiaca 'Horn' with Moko disease symptoms were randomly sampled in 12 different locations of 5 outbreak states in Peninsular Malaysia comprising Kedah, Selangor, Pahang, Negeri Sembilan, and Johor, with disease incidence exceeding 90% in some severely affected plantations. The disease symptoms observed in the infected plants included yellowing and wilting of the oldest leaves, which became necrotic, and eventually led to their dieback or collapse. The pulp of banana fruits also became discolored and exuded bacterial ooze. Vascular tissues in pseudostems were discolored. Fragments from symptomatic plant samples were excised and cultured on Kelman's-tetrazolium salt (TZC) medium. Twenty positive samples produced fluidal colonies that were either entirely white or white with pink centers after incubation for 24 to 48 h at 28°C on Kelman's-TZC medium and appeared as gram-negative rods after Gram staining. They were also positive for potassium hydroxide (KOH), Kovacs oxidase, and catalase tests, but negative for utilization of disaccharides and hexose alcohols, which are characteristics of biovar 1 Ralstonia solanacearum. For the pathogenicity test, 30 μl of 108 CFU/ml bacterial suspension of three selected virulent strains were injected into banana (Musa × paradisiaca 'Horn') leaves explants grown in plastic pots of 1,440 cm3 volume in a greenhouse, with temperature range from 26 to 35°C. Leaves that were infiltrated with sterile distilled water served as a negative control. Inoculations with all isolates were performed in three replications, as well as the uninoculated control leaves explants. The inoculated plants produced the same symptoms as observed on naturally diseased samples, whereas control plants remained asymptomatic. Strain cultures were re-isolated and possessed the morphological and biochemical characteristics as previously described. PCR amplification using race 2 R. solanacearum primers ISRso19-F (5'-TGGGAGAGGATGGCGGCTTT-3') and ISRso19-R (5'-TGACCCGCCTTTCGGTGTTT-3') (3) produced a 1,900-bp product from DNA of all bacterial strains. BLAST searches resulted that the sequences were 95 to 98% identical to published R. solanacearum strain race 2 insertion sequence ISRso19 (GenBank Accession No. AF450275). These genes were later deposited in GenBank (KC812051, KC812052, and KC812053). Phylotype-specific multiplex PCR (Pmx-PCR) and Musa-specific multiplex PCR (Mmx-PCR) were performed to identify the phylotype and sequevar of all isolates (4). Pmx-PCR showed that all isolates belonged to phylotype II, whereas Mmx-PCR showed that they belonged to phylotype II sequevar 4 displaying 351-bp amplicon. Although there were previously extensive studies on R. solanacearum associated with bacterial wilt disease of banana crops in Malaysia, none related to Moko disease has been reported (1,2). The result has a great importance to better understand and document R. solanacearum race 2 biovar 1, since banana has been identified as the second most important commercial fruit crop with a high economic value in Malaysia. References: (1) R. Khakvar et al. Plant Pathol. J. 7:162, 2008. (2) R. Khakvar et al. Am. J. Agri. Biol. Sci. 3:490, 2008. (3) Y. A. Lee and C. N. Khor. Plant Pathol. Bull. 12:57, 2003. (4) P. Prior et al. Pages 405-414 in: Bacterial Wilt Disease and the Ralstonia solanacearum Species Complex. The American Phytopathological Society, St. Paul, MN, 2005.
Hylocereus undatus widely grows in southern China. Some varieties are planted for their fruits, known as dragon fruits or Pitaya, while some varieties for their flowers known as Bawanghua. Fresh or dried flowers of Bawanghua are used as routine Chinese medicinal food. Since 2008, a serious anthracnose disease has led to great losses on Bawanghua flower production farms in the Baiyun district of Guangzhou city in China. Anthracnose symptoms on young stems of Bawanghua are reddish-brown, sunken lesions with pink masses of spores in the center. The lesions expand rapidly in the field or in storage, and may coalesce in the warm and wet environment in spring and summer in Guangzhou. Fewer flowers develop on infected stems than on healthy ones. The fungus overwinters in infected debris in the soil. The disease caused a loss of up to 50% on Bawanghua. Putative pathogenic fungi with whitish-orange colonies were isolated from a small piece of tissue (3 × 3 mm) cut from a lesion margin and cultured on potato dextrose agar in a growth chamber at 25°C, 80% RH. Dark colonies with acervuli bearing pinkish conidial masses formed 14 days later. Single celled conidia were 11 to 18 × 4 to 6 μm. Based on these morphological characteristics, the fungi were identified as Colletotrichum gloeosporioides (Penz.) Penz. & Sacc (2). To confirm this, DNA was extracted from isolate BWH1 and multilocus analyses were completed with DNA sequence data generated from partial ITS region of nrDNA, actin (ACT) and glutamine synthetase (GS) nucleotide sequences by PCR, with C. gloeosporioides specific primers as ITS4 (5'-TCCTCCGCTTATTGATATGC-3') / CgInt (5'-GGCCTCCCGCCTCCGGGCGG-3'), GS-F (5'-ATGGCCGAGTACATCTGG-3') / GS-R (5'-GAACCGTCGAAGTTCCAC-3') and actin-R (5'-ATGTGCAAGGCCGGTTTCGC-3') / actin-F (5'-TACGAGTCCTTCTGGCCCAT-3'). The sequence alignment results indicated that the obtained partial ITS sequence of 468 bp (GenBank Accession No. KF051997), actin sequence of 282 bp (KF712382), and GS sequence of 1,021 bp (KF719176) are 99%, 96%, and 95% identical to JQ676185.1 for partial ITS, FJ907430 for ACT, and FJ972589 for GS of C. gloeosporioides previously deposited, respectively. For testing its pathogenicity, 20 μl of conidia suspension (1 × 106 conidia/ml) using sterile distilled water (SDW) was inoculated into artificial wounds on six healthy young stems of Bawanghua using sterile fine-syringe needle. Meanwhile, 20 μl of SDW was inoculated on six healthy stems as a control. The inoculated stems were kept at 25°C, about 90% relative humidity. Three independent experiments were carried out. Reddish-brown lesions formed after 10 days, on 100% stems (18 in total) inoculated by C. gloeosporioides, while no lesion formed on any control. The pathogen was successfully re-isolated from the inoculated stem lesions on Bawanghua. Thus, Koch's postulates were fulfilled. Colletotrichum anthracnose has been reported on Pitaya in Japan (3), Malaysia (1) and in Brazil (4). To our knowledge, this is the first report of anthracnose disease caused by C. gloeosporioides on young stems of Bawanghua (H. undatus) in China. References: (1) M. Masyahit et al. Am. J. Appl. Sci. 6:902, 2009. (2) B. C. Sutton. Page 402 in: Colletotrichum Biology, Pathology and Control. J. A. Bailey and M. J. Jeger, eds. CAB International, Wallingford, UK, 1992. (3) S. Taba et al. Jpn. J. Phytopathol. 72:25, 2006. (4) L. M. Takahashi et al. Australas. Plant Dis. Notes 3:96, 2008.
Rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis) is an important crop in tropical regions of China. In October 2013, a new stem rot disease was found on cv. Yunyan77-4 at a rubber tree plantation in Hekou, Yunnan Province. There were about 100 plants, and diseased rubber trees accounted for 30% or less. Initially, brown-punctuate secretion appeared on the stem, which was 5 to 6 cm above the ground. Eventually, the secretion became black and no latex produced from the rubber tree bark. After removing the secretion, the diseased bark was brown putrescence, but the circumambient bark was normal. Upon peeling the surface bark, the inner bark and xylem had brown rot and was musty. The junction between health and disease was undulate. On the two most serious plants, parts of leaves on the crown were yellow, and the root near the diseased stem was dry and puce. The pathogen was isolated and designated HbFO01; the pathogenicity was established by following Koch's postulates. The pathogen was cultivated on a potato dextrose agar (PDA) plate at 28°C for 4 days. Ten plants of rubber tree cv. Yunyan77-4 were selected from a disease-free plantation in Haikou, Hainan Province, and the stem diameter was about 7 cm. The bark of five plants was peeled, and one mycelium disk with a diameter of 1 cm was inserted into the cut and covered again with the bark. The other five plants were treated with agar disks as controls. The inoculation site was kept moist for 2 days, and then the mycelium and agar disk were removed. On eighth day, symptoms similar to the original stem lesions were observed on stems of inoculated plants, while only scars formed on stems of control plants. The pathogen was re-isolated from the lesions of inoculated plants. On PDA plates, the pathogen colony was circular and white with tidy edges and rich aerial hyphae. Microscopic examination showed microconidia and chlamydospores were produced abundantly on PDA medium. The falciform macroconidia were only produced on lesions and were slightly curved, with a curved apical cell and foot shaped to pointed basal cell, usually 3-septate, 16.2 to 24.2 × 3.2 to 4.0 μm. Microconidia were produced in false heads, oval, 0-septate, 6.2 to 8.2 × 3.3 to 3.8 μm, and the phialide was cylindrical. Chlamydospores were oval, 6.4 to 7.2 × 3.1 to 3.8 μm, alone produced in hypha. Morphological characteristics of the specimen were similar to the descriptions for Fusarium oxysporum (2). Genomic DNA of this isolate was extracted with a CTAB protocol (4) from mycelium and used as a template for amplification of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region of rDNA with primer pair ITS1/ITS4 (1). The full length of this sequence is 503 nt (GenBank Accession No. KJ009335), which exactly matched several sequences (e.g., JF807394.1, JX897002.1, and HQ451888.1) of F. oxysporum. Williams and Liu had listed F. oxysporum as the economically important pathogen of Hevea in Asia (3), while this is, to our knowledge, the first report of stem rot caused by F. oxysporum on rubber tree in China. References: (1) D. E. L. Cooke et al. Fungal Genet. Biol. 30:17, 2000. (2) J. F. Leslie and B. A. Summerell. The Fusarium Laboratory Manual, 2006. (3) T. H. Williams and P. S. W. Liu. A host list of plant diseases in Sabah, Malaysia, 1976. (4) J. R. Xu et al. Genetics 143:175, 1996.
Dendrobium (Dendrobium candidum Wall. ex Lindl.) is a perennial herb in the Orchidaceae family. It has been used as traditional medicinal plant in China, Malaysia, Laos, and Thailand (2). Fungal disease is one of the most important factors affecting the development of Dendrobium production. During summer 2012, chocolate brown spots were observed on leaves of 2-year-old Dendrobium seedlings in a greenhouse in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, China, situated at 30.26°N and 120.19°E. Approximately 80% of the plants in each greenhouse were symptomatic. Diseased leaves exhibited irregular, chocolate brown, and necrotic lesions with a chlorotic halo, reaching 0.8 to 3.2 cm in diameter. Affected leaves began to senesce and withered in autumn, and all leaves of diseased plants fell off in the following spring. Symptomatic leaf tissues were cut into small pieces (4 to 5 mm long), surface-sterilized (immersed in 75% ethanol for 30 s, and then 1% sodium hypochlorite for 60 s), rinsed three times in sterilized distilled water, and then cultured on potato dextrose agar (PDA) amended with 30 mg/liter of kanamycin sulfate (dissolved in ddH2O). Petri plates were incubated in darkness at 25 ± 0.5°C, and a grey mycelium with a white border developed after 4 days. Fast-growing white mycelia were isolated from symptomatic leaf samples, and the mycelia became gray-brown with the onset of sporulation after 5 days. Conidia were unicellular, black, elliptical, and 11.4 to 14.3 μm (average 13.1 μm) in diameter. Based on these morphological and pathogenic characteristics, the isolates were tentatively identified as Nigrospora oryzae (1). Genomic DNA was extracted from a representative isolate F12-F, and a ~600-bp fragment was amplified and sequenced using the primers ITS1 and ITS4 (4). BLAST analysis showed that F12-F ITS sequence (Accession No. KF516962) had 99% similarity with the ITS sequence of an N. oryzae isolate (JQ863242.1). Healthy Dendrobium seedlings (4 months old) were used in pathogenicity tests under greenhouse conditions. Leaves were inoculated with mycelial plugs (5 mm in diameter) from a 5-day-old culture of strain F12-F, and sterile PDA plugs served as controls. Seedlings were covered with plastic bags for 5 days and maintained at 25 ± 0.5°C and 80 ± 5% relative humidity. Eight seedlings were used in each experiment, which was repeated three times. After 5 days, typical chocolate brown spots and black lesions were observed on inoculated leaves, whereas no symptoms developed on controls, which fulfilled Koch's postulates. This shows that N. oryzae can cause leaf spot of D. candidum. N. oryzae is a known pathogen for several hosts but has not been previously reported on any species of Dendrobium in China (3). To our knowledge, on the basis of literature, this is the first report of leaf spot of D. candidum caused by N. oryzae in China. References: (1) H. J. Hudson. Trans. Br. Mycol. Soc. 46:355, 1963. (2) Q. Jin et al. PLoS One. 8(4):e62352, 2013. (3) P. Sharma et al. J. Phytopathol. 161:439, 2013. (4) T. J. White et al. PCR Protocols: A Guide to Methods and Applications. Academic Press, San Diego, 1990.
On May 9, 2013, symptoms reminiscent of bacterial leaf streak (BLS) caused by Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzicola were observed on rice plants at the panicle emergence stage at Musenyi, Gihanga, and Rugombo fields in Burundi. Affected leaves showed water-soaked translucent lesions and yellow-brown to black streaks, sometimes with visible exudates on leaf surfaces. Symptomatic leaves were ground in sterile water and the suspensions obtained were subjected to a multiplex PCR assay diagnostic for X. oryzae pathovars (3). Three DNA fragments (331, 691, and 945 bp) corresponding to X. oryzae pv. oryzicola were observed after agarose gel electrophoresis. Single bacterial colonies were then isolated from surface-sterilized, infected leaves after grinding in sterile water and plating of 10-fold dilutions of the cell suspension on semi-selective PSA medium (4). After incubation at 28°C for 5 days, each of four independent cultures yielded single yellow, mucoid Xanthomonas-like colonies (named Bur_1, Bur_2, Bur_6, and Bur_7) that resembled the positive control strain MAI10 (1). These strains originated from Musenyi (Bur_1), Gihanga (Bur_2), and Rugumbo (Bur_6 and Bur_7). Multiplex PCR assays on the four putative X. oryzae pv. oryzicola strains yielded the three diagnostic DNA fragments mentioned above. All strains were further analyzed by sequence analysis of portions of the gyrB gene using the universal primers gyrB1-F and gyrB1-R for PCR amplification (5). The 762-bp DNA fragment was identical to gyrB sequences from the Asian X. oryzae pv. oryzicola strains BLS256 (Philippines), ICMP 12013 (China), LMG 797 and NCPPB 2921 (both Malaysia), and from the African strain MAI3 (Mali) (2). The partial nucleotide sequence of the gyrB gene of Bur_1 was submitted to GenBank (Accession No. KJ801400). Pathogenicity tests were performed on greenhouse-grown 4-week-old rice plants of the cvs. Nipponbare, Azucena, IRBB 1, IRBB 2, IRBB 3, IRBB 7, FKR 14, PNA64F4-56, TCS 10, Gigante, and Adny 11. Bacterial cultures were grown overnight in PSA medium and re-suspended in sterile water (1 × 108 CFU/ml). Plants were inoculated with bacterial suspensions either by spraying or by leaf infiltration (1). For spray inoculation, four plants per accession and strain were used while three leaves per plant and four plants per accession and strain were inoculated by tissue infiltration. After 15 days of incubation in a BSL-3 containment facility (27 ± 1°C with a 12-h photoperiod), the spray-inoculated plants showed water-soaked lesions with yellow exudates identical to those seen in the field. For syringe-infiltrated leaves, the same symptoms were observed at the infiltrated leaf area. Re-isolation of bacteria from symptomatic leaves yielded colonies with the typical Xanthomonas morphology that were confirmed by multiplex PCR to be X. oryzae pv. oryzicola, thus fulfilling Koch's postulates. Bur_1 has been deposited in the Collection Française de Bactéries Phytopathogènes as strain CFBP 8170 ( http://www.angers-nantes.inra.fr/cfbp/ ). To our knowledge, this is the first report of X. oryzae pv. oryzicola causing bacterial leaf streak on rice in Burundi. Further surveys will help to assess its importance in the country. References: (1) C. Gonzalez et al., Mol. Plant Microbe Interact. 20:534, 2007. (2) A. Hajri et al. Mol. Plant Pathol. 13:288, 2012. (3) J. M. Lang et al. Plant Dis. 94:311, 2010. (4) L. Poulin et al. Plant Dis. 98:1423, 2014. (5) J. M. Young et al. Syst. Appl. Microbiol. 31:366, 2008.
Malaria is the most important parasitic disease with global concern. Plasmodium knowlesi recently has emerged from its natural simian host as a significant cause of human malaria, particularly in Malaysian Borneo. Therefore, it has been added as the fifth human Plasmodium specie which is widely distributed in Southeast Asia. Recent developments of new molecular tools enhanced our understanding about the key features of this malaria parasite. Here, we review some of the ways in which molecular approaches might be used for epidemiology of P. knowlesi and finally lead to an efficient control of malaria.
Biodiversity continues to decline in the face of increasing anthropogenic pressures such as habitat destruction, exploitation, pollution and introduction of alien species. Existing global databases of species' threat status or population time series are dominated by charismatic species. The collation of datasets with broad taxonomic and biogeographic extents, and that support computation of a range of biodiversity indicators, is necessary to enable better understanding of historical declines and to project - and avert - future declines. We describe and assess a new database of more than 1.6 million samples from 78 countries representing over 28,000 species, collated from existing spatial comparisons of local-scale biodiversity exposed to different intensities and types of anthropogenic pressures, from terrestrial sites around the world. The database contains measurements taken in 208 (of 814) ecoregions, 13 (of 14) biomes, 25 (of 35) biodiversity hotspots and 16 (of 17) megadiverse countries. The database contains more than 1% of the total number of all species described, and more than 1% of the described species within many taxonomic groups - including flowering plants, gymnosperms, birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, beetles, lepidopterans and hymenopterans. The dataset, which is still being added to, is therefore already considerably larger and more representative than those used by previous quantitative models of biodiversity trends and responses. The database is being assembled as part of the PREDICTS project (Projecting Responses of Ecological Diversity In Changing Terrestrial Systems - http://www.predicts.org.uk). We make site-level summary data available alongside this article. The full database will be publicly available in 2015.
This paper proposes a new multidimensional graphical model to monitoring the GDP
growth rates in real prices behavior and the GDP formation accumulation from any
country in the short and long run through the uses of “the Multi-Dimensional Radar
Mapping Model (MDRM- Model).” Hence, the MDRM-Model is based on the plotting of
different coordinates that represents a large number of GDP growth rates in real prices
on the top of a large number of perimeters. Each perimeter represents different periods
of time in our analysis. In our case, we are using the Multi-Dimensional Radar Mapping
coordinate system (MDRM-Coordinate System) to build the MDRM-Model respectively.
Moreover, the MDRM-Model can facilitate the visualization of different GDP growth rates
in real prices simultaneously in different periods of time (years) or spaces (countries) that
follows a logical order into the same graphical space. The MDRM-Model was applied on
the economies of People’s Republic of China (PRC) and U.S. to analyze the process of
GDP formation accumulation in the last past forty years in both economies.