Manuscript reviewer.

I was over the moon when I was invited to review a manuscript by the editor of Plant Pathology Journal. First thing that cross my mind was, at last my work has been acknowledge by an expert. Second thing that cross my mind was, OMG I have to read a lot as the other reviewer was a big shot in this molecular research. At least you don't want show any spark contrast between your report and his. Immediately, I started to feel a bit pressure mounting on my shoulder. Obviously, you want to do well for your first review as your reputation is at stake.

They gave me two weeks to review that paper. The recommendation that I should made were:

1. Accept with minor revision
2. Accept with major revision
3. Reject and resubmit
4. Reject

The thing was, the second reviewer made his review in one night!! Clearly, I'm not at his level but I told myself that I'm still learning and you'll reach that stage very soon. I think the most important thing are whether the basic work of the paper is sound, the display of results, the interpretation and overall writing style ( I'm not good at this; still working!!) and quality should be acceptable. One fact, about 70% of the paper submitted to journal were rejected. I guess you have to describe carefully what are you trying to interpret and reveal, you must not forget that every things need some clarifications. Otherwise, you'll be bombarded with questions, comments and possible rejection .

I remember, I took about 6 months before my first paper been accepted and more or less the same time for my second paper. So, you have to spend a lot of time writing a paper and I suggest when you do it, do it carefully with a critical thinking. You've got to make sure that you have enough information and be prepared to do more experiments if needed. I have to remind you that plagiarism is not a good idea as most reviewer can detect it. Remember they are the expert and I'm sure they are fully aware of previous and current papers in the area of their research expertise.

As a young researcher, you might ask whether to publish 2-3 papers of your research in low impact factor journal or higher impact factor journal. I think it depend to your work, in Malaysia the question is always how many papers have you published? In the UK, in which journal have you published? My strategy at the moment is......well it depend on my results really . I am aiming for at least 2 publications. I still think I can get another two publications from my Msc. thesis.

Anyway, back to the manuscript, sorry but I have rejected that paper. Ohh..the second reviewer also rejected that paper :-)

POTENTIAL PROBIOTICS FOR BIOCONTROL OF DISEASES IN OYSTER CULTURE

Aquaculture sustainability is an important key in the wake of fthe declining seafood supply in Malaysia. I think development of aquaculture industry through green technologies can drive the industry forward. However, some of the projects have come under scrutiny by environmentalists. Thus, this industry demands green technologies. I guess Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) along with the government agencies are the drivers to make these technologies become reality. Seafood should be viewed as the source of food to meet the ever increasing food demand in the future, said an official of the Asian Pacific Chapter of the World Aquaculture Society at a meeting in Kuala Lumpur recently.

Here I would like to share a study done by a young researcher Murni Karim, from UPM. Currently she is doing her PhD research at the University of Rhode Island, USA. Her interesting research is about biocontrol activity of bacterial against Roseovarius crassostreae. She won 2^nd place in World Aquaculture Conference this year. Congratulations and all the best Mrs. Murni Karim.

Murni Karim, David Rowley, Marta Gómez-Chiarri

Dept. of Fisheries, Animal and Veterinary Science

University of Rhode Island 169 CBLS,

120 Flagg Road,

Kingston, RI 02881, USA

msh_712@yahoo.com

Roseovarius crassostreae is a bacterial pathogen of oysters Crassostrea virginica that is responsible for juvenile or Roseovarius oyster disease (ROD). ROD causes high seasonal mortalities of juvenile C.virginica in the Northeast US. Several Vibrio spp. also have been reported as the cause of mortality in shellfish hatcheries. Increased concern about this problem has led to research for alternative disease prevention methods, including the use of microorganisms such as bacteria as biocontrol agents. The introduction of selected beneficial bacterial isolates for biocontrol of R. crassostreae and vibriosis might eventually replace the current use of antibiotics, which could reduce their ecotoxicological and ill effects on human health.

This study was undertaken to screen and characterize marine bacterial isolates as potential agents to control pathogenic R. crassostreae and V. tubiashii. Screening of 64 isolates from Rhode Island marine organisms using agar-based assay methods led to the isolation of candidates RIO6-95 and S4. Each isolate displayed strong antibiotic effect against pathogens tested. In an oyster challenge model, pretreatment of larval and seed oysters with RIO6-95 and S4 protected against mortality due to challenge with R. crassostreae and V. tubiashii. Oysters were treated with 10² to 10⁶cfu/ml of the test strains 24 to 48 hours prior to exposure of 10⁵ to 10⁶ cfu/ml of the pathogens. The results suggest the potential of marine isolates RI06-95 and S4 bacteria to serve as biocontrol agents to reduce ROD and vibriosis in C. virginica culture.

Poor little pigeon

About 20 minutes ago, I found this poor pigeon struggling to fly. She just laid down calmly as I approached her. At first, I thought her neck was broken but apparently it was her left wing. I brought her to the Biodiversity Lab trying to seek their attentions. Nobody knew and some even suggested to kill her. I couldn't and obviously I didn't want to!! I didn't know what to do. Just now, she died. I hope she knew I wanted to save her.....Rest in peace my friend.....

Sampling and studying ants in the high canopy of a tropical rainforest by Kalsum M. Yusah

Entomology has always been special to me. It is one of my favorite subjects during my undergraduate study. This subject is mesmerizing and appealing. Its open a door to a diverse and complex nature of insects world. The list of entomologists through recorded history is enormous, and includes such notable figures as Charles Darwin, Jean-Henri Fabre, Vladimir Nabokov, Karl von Frisch (winner of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine) and two time Pultizer Prize winner E.O. Wilson.

Here I would like to share a study done by a young researcher Kalsum M. Yusah, from Sabah and currently she is in her 3rd year of her PhD research at the University of Cambridge,UK. Her interesting research is about ants.

Although research in the past few decades has established that the rainforest canopy harbours an exceptionally rich diversity of arthropods, we still know very little about the ecology of these important animals. This is principally because it is difficult to sample and study animals that live so high above the ground. We report here on methods that we have developed for studying ants, the dominant arthropod taxon, in the canopy of the dipterocarp forest of the Danum Valley Conservation Area in Sabah, Malaysia. We show that methods that work well on the ground need to be significantly modified before they can be applied in the challenging condition of the high canopy.

The most flexible method of accessing the tree crowns is to use the double-rope technique, and it is also essential that the scientist becomes sufficiently confident in using branch-walking techniques such that she is able not only to move freely but also to make rigorous observations within the canopy. For efficient sampling of canopy ants, fogging is a useful general method, but needs to be modified by raising the trays high into the crowns to produce a focused sample with little loss of the crown ant species or contamination by ants from lower in the canopy. Traditional baits work well in the canopy, but in order actually to collect ants at the baits, it is necessary to use a modified trap that can be closed without the disturbance caused by walking on the branch near the ants. We show in detail how this purse-string trap works. Pitfall traps can also be used in the canopy but are quite poor at collecting ants. For observing ant behaviour, we used video cameras which both reduces disturbance of the ants and minimizes the amount of time that the researcher needs to spend in the tree crown.

We present quantitative data on the effectiveness of these different sampling methods, and show that a combination of baiting and fogging appears to capture approximately 90% of the ant species in a tree crown.

p/s: Thanks for letting me share your research Kalsum. Great job! Here is a link to entomologist blogger from UKM.

I am falling in love with Borneo. Amazing photos by Malaysian photographer: Mr. Cede Prudente

Breath taking view of Crocker Range

I truly adore Borneo. Borneo has got many magnificent views of flora and fauna. Millions of visitors from all over the world came to witness one of the greatest places in earth. I'm speechless to see all these pictures. Of course there are a lot more than this. Mr. Cede has captured the best of Borneo. His works are breathtakingly beautiful. I would love to embrace into our own nature. They are just beautiful!! I hope we do appreciate what ever mother nature gives to us. We really need to conserve our exceptional and unique rain forest and wild animals. Therefore, start taking care of of them. Nobody else has got it except us.

I love it and I hope you all will love it too! It's our treasure!

Thanks to Mr. Cede for sharing your world with us. I think he has produced lots of books about Borneo. Check it out. I'm sure it's amazing! You can buy all his books here:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=ntt_athr_dp_sr_2?_encoding=UTF8&sort=relevancerank&search-alias=books&field-author=Cede+Prudente

Rhinoceros Hornbill


Orang Utan


Wild Bornean Elephants


Kinabatangan Crocodylus porosus


Red Giant flying squirrel


DANCE OF THE ARGUS


Proboscis Monkeys aka. The Flying Dutchman


Mr. Cede Prudente

Zetty Norhana Balia Yusof: Best Poster Award at the 14th International Conference on the Cell and Molecular Biology of Chlamydomonas

Zetty has done it again! She has been awarded The Best Poster Award at the 14th International Conference on the Cell and Molecular Biology of Chlamydomonas held in Wheaton College, Boston, USA. Congratulations dear!!

I guess this has been a very significant award for her. An international award which every young scientist craving to achieve. I remember she told me that her supervisor said to her just to use the old poster or just updated or added a little bit more data using her previous poster template. However, being her (as I know), she was very determined to do a new poster. She knows what she wants and she always do and IT'S WORTH THE EFFORTS! She won $300 sponsored by Genetics Society of America (GSA). Superb!

I think her poster was excellent and all rounded! Lots of of informations but simple and easy to understand with those cartoons. I bet she explained it really well to the judges as well as the visitors. I am very proud of you dear! I think there will be many more achievements to come from her. She always ask me can she be a good scientist errr...YES YOU CAN!!

Attached is her poster's abstract.

The effect of a single base change in THI4 riboswitch on TPP binding in C. reinhardtii

Zetty Norhana Balia Yusof, Michael Moulin, Haruka Tamura and Alison G. Smith

Department of Plant Sciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EA, UK

In bacteria, many genes involved in the biosynthesis of cofactors such as TPP are regulated by riboswitches. Riboswitches are genetic control elements located mainly within the 5’ untranslated regions of messenger RNAs. Upon binding of regulatory signals, which include vitamins, amino acids, nucleobases and uncharged tRNA, these RNA elements undergo conformational changes that modulate gene expression. The thiamin pyrophosphate (TPP)-binding riboswitch is found in all three kingdoms of life and can regulate gene expression via premature termination of transcription, initiation of translation and mRNA splicing. In the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, we have found that TPP riboswitches are found in THI4 and THIC, the genes encoding the first enzymes of the thiazole and pyrimidine branches respectively of the thiamine biosynthesis pathway. In this study we report an in vivo expression analysis of the effect of mutations in conserved bases located in P2 and P4 stems of the C. reinhardtii THI4 riboswitch. We performed an analysis of mutants with single base substitutions in the riboswitch linked with a luciferase gene and observed the expression with the absence or presence of thiamin. We observed high expression of luciferase activity without the presence of thiamin and low expression with the presence of thiamin in the non-mutated riboswitch. When a single base located in the P2 stem was changed to mimic the pyr1 mutant (pyrithiamine resistant mutant), the luciferase activity was maintained even in the presence of thiamine. A single base change of one the conserved residues in the P4 stem also resulted in a stable luciferase activity in the presence of thiamine. The results confirm the participation of bases located in P2 and P4 stems in the recognition of TPP as well as the consequence of binding of TPP towards the expression of THI4 gene in C. reinhardtii.

Mr. Scary Looking Policeman

Obviously the most popular topic in Malaysia at the moment is about the murders of cosmetics queen Datuk Sosilawati Lawiya and three others. I'm not going to talk about that really as many reporters or bloggers have done so. Funnily for me (not sure whether you guys aware or not), its quite interesting really to see all those policemen. They are all quite scary aren't they?! Then, I was thinking 'ini kalau tak bersalah pon, terketaq-ketaq nak jawap soalan depa'. Non-nonsense faces!



Anyway, I still remember several years ago, somebody has broke into my house (shared with friends). We made a police report and lazily there was one forensic police 'drop by' and tried to detect any finger print on our door knob. By the way, it was early morning. Then, unforgettable incident happen, he forgot to bring back with him his forensic stuffs. We were like WTH!!! Therefore, we realized that we didn't have even a slim chance to get our stolen stuffs back. Tsk tsk tsk...After that incident, another encounter with Mr. Policeman were when I lost my motorcycle and Zetty lost her car (sigh). Lots of saman ekor and bla bla bla...

p/s: Siapalah yang bijak kaitkan kes ini dengan perkauman. tsk tsk....

Road casualties: A disease to Malaysian?

I will start with an interesting fact: The world’s first road traffic death involving a motor vehicle is alleged to have occurred on 31 August 1869. An Irish scientist Mary Ward died when she fell out of her cousins' steam car and was run over by it. Hundred and forty one years later, millions of people died in traffic accidents.

I guess in a few days, Malaysia Road Safety Department will release a new road casualty’s statistics for this year Hari Raya. Since 2001, an average of 15 people died each day on the road. What a remarkable stat for 28 million inhabitants. In general, Malaysian road fatalities are at 10 for every 100,000 population. If we compare with UK, with 62,041,708 of population, in 2006 they had one of the lowest road death rates in the EU, at 5.4 per 100,000 populations. Malaysia rate was also higher than the rates for other industrialised nations such as the United States (14.3 per 100,000 populations), Australia (7.8 per 100,000 populations) and Japan (5.7 per 100,000 populations).

An article entitle OVERVIEW OF CURRENT ROAD SAFETY SITUATION IN MALAYSIA by Mohamad Nizam Mustafa Highway Planning Unit Road Safety Section Ministry of Works stated that the increase of road accidents were in link with the rapid growth in population, economic in development, industrialisation and motorisation encountered by the country. I agree with some of his points but other countries are also developing but with less road casualties. There were a lot of safety campaign strategized by the governing bodies but I guess none has worked. Road accidents in Malaysia cost the country's economy 9.3 billion ringgit (2.97 billion dollars) last year, equivalent to 1.5 per cent of the gross domestic product.

According to statistic, the highest fatality ages of victims were between ages of 21-25 and the highest fatality mode of transport was motorcycle. This isn’t a surprise as we know that most of our youth use motorcycle as their main transportation. How are we going to stop motorcyclists from become one of the statistics? I don’t know! Maybe stop selling Honda cup, RXZ 125-Z etc etc. and start selling only scooter or low risk motorcycles. Maybe... I’m not going to talk about public transportations or road regulations yet as those topics deserved another entry I guess.

Has this become a culture to us? If you turn to other pages instead of reading those terrifying reports then I think we agree that it has become a culture. To me, road accidents have become a disease. A disease that has neither cure nor ending in our society. My fellow road users, I think it’s not because of the cars, roads, signboards or anything else. It’s all because of you! Think wisely and carefully before you drive. We have always known every Malaysian are smarter when they’re off the roads.If you can do the same on the roads, I think your family and friends will appreciate it.

I will end this entry by uploading one shocking video that I've took from my friend FB wall. You can see it on my FB wall.

Kennedy Scholarship

I think this is a great opportunity to study at the two of the world's finest universities - Harvard and MIT.

Check it out if you're eligible: http://www.kennedytrust.org.uk/

Madness in Jakarta....

"Menteri Pengajian Tinggi, Datuk Seri Mohamed Khaled Nordin, berkata kerajaan tidak perlu melenting sehingga mengambil keputusan sedemikian atas perbuatan golongan tertentu yang bertindak atas matlamat tersendiri."

Idiots in Indonesia burned our Jalur Gemilang and they threw shits to our embassy!! Last year these idiots set up road blocks to 'sumpit' any passing Malaysian!! I had enough of this madness. I expect our government to be more FIRM and STRINGENT!!

I think comment from this minister is a slap in our face. Our grandfathers and grandmothers fought with their life for our Independence!!

Actions need to be taken. We give them jobs and supports but it seems they don't really appreciate what we have done for them....

Perlis is going no where with them.....

It's time for all of them to retire! All of you have done enough for our beloved state but what we need right now is not an old school politicians. We need somebody who can bring Perlis forward.

For so long Perlis has been held ransom by old school politicians. Dare to change if you want to see the world!!

IMC9 (Edinburgh, Scotland)

Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. elaeidis

Detection, control and resistance expression in oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) of vascular wilt disease caused by Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. elaeidis

Vascular wilt disease caused by Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. elaeidis (Foe) invades the host xylem and causes a devastating disease of oil palm in West and Central Africa and parts of South America. Nevertheless, this disease has not been reported in South East Asia, in spite of long term importation for breeding purposes of African seed and pollen, now known to be contaminated with Foe. Malaysia is the largest palm oil producer in the world and Foe remains a major threat to this industry. Therefore, this study is being conducted in order to help Malaysia avoid and/or be prepared for this potential problem. Molecular diagnostic tools are being developed for rapid detection and quantification of Foe in diseased plant tissue, soil, seed and pollen. These tools can be used for quarantine purposes of any imported materials and to test infection of putative resistant palm genotypes. However, it is not simple to develop the molecular diagnostic tools for this disease, as Fusarium is a very complex genus. Recent phylogenetic studies reported many sections of Fusarium that based on their shared anamorphic features are non-monophyletic as expected (O’Donnell, 1996). In general, when a Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. consisted of several clonal lineages, these lineage are not monophyletic (Michielse and Rep, 2009). A f.sp. is often assumed to have a single common ancestor from which all vegetative compatibility groups (VCGs) (monophyly). However, multiple VCGs and races within a given f.sp. could have multiple independent origins, with pathogenicity and virulence evolving more than once through mutation or transposition or spreading to distantly related strains through parasexuality or horizontal gene transfer (Baayen et al., 2000). Thus, it is difficult to design specific primers to identify F. oxysporum species complex as they may share high DNA sequence similarity in the aligned region. Nevertheless, we have managed to develop F. oxysporum specific primers using translation elongation factor 1-α (TEF) gene which only amplified F.oxysporum and excluded other Fusarium species which are closely related within the Section Elegans and through other phylogentic studies.

Hefni Rusli