My thoughts on BMY3001 overall

Assalamualaikum and Hi everybody. This may be my last reflective journal for this course. BMY 3001 Microbiology. I personally feel that I started to develop my love for this course. At the beginning, it was quite difficult for me to catch up with the syllabus, but as time goes by, I realised that this course is not that hard. The way Dr Wan Zuhainis taught me really help me to understand and try to look for more information by myself. Learning is all about striving to become the better you, thus, I really appreciate Dr Wan’s effort by forcing to BYOD (bring our own device) to class. Dr Wan uses a lot of interactive teaching tools that make the class interesting and cheerful. I can say that I laughed a lot during Dr Wan’s class because her joke is very funny. I just can’t stop laughing. But at the same time, I did not neglect my studies. I tried to understand I tried to read the notes before class. And I also will try to answer questions asked by Dr Wan in the class.

 One of the teaching tools that I remember is Kahoot.it. Wow I never knew the existence of such interesting online game. I will surely recommend Kahoot.it to my friends. Other than that, Dr Wan also asked us to create a game about chosen topic. We must think creatively to make the game fun but educational at the same time. As my group chose musical chair game, I hope my fellow classmates enjoy the game as much as I do.

Well, Dr Wan is not going to teach me forever, until Week 7, Dr Fairol came by and taught us. Dr Fairol was also as interesting as Dr Wan. Dr Fairol will try her best to not make the class look boring. She will ask us what we want to do to wash away our sleepy head. Doing a group mind map is very good actually. It boost our mind and forced us to brainstorm about the whole topic. By doing a mindmap actually helps me a lot. I learned a lot from the mindmap that I do. It is a group mindmap thus each of us will contribute to the mind map. I love mind map. Mind map is very useful when I want to study at the last minute. I can just refer to the mind map and understand the whole topic.

Overall, thanks to both lecturers, Dr Wan Zuhainis and Dr Fairolniza for your efforts and everything to me along this semester. I will surely remember you two as you always encourage me to love microbiology as much as Drs do. I love Dr Wan and Dr Fairol to the moon and back. :) 

Adopted Microbe

Assalamualaikum Dr Wan and Dr Fairol! :) This is my entry for adopted microbe.

I am very pleased to say that I am happy to be given a chance to adopt a microbe. I am so excited to start this assignment. There are sooo many microorganism in this biosphere that I hardly choose one. But after a thorough research on various sources such as the internet mainly on scoop.it ,on books and articles, I choose Vibrio parahaemolyticus as my adopted microbe. 

As we can see from the name itself, "vibrio" shows the shape of the microbe. It is a curved rod shape. Vibrio parahaemlyticus is in the domain of bacteria due to its lack of nucleus and also membrane bound organelles. This is a Gram-negative bacteria. Vibrio parahaemolyticus is and obligate halophilic organism meaning it requires salt to live. Commonly it can be found free swimming, latched onto underwater surfaces. However, this bacterium can also found in high concentrations in areas of large seafood consumption. 

What makes me interested to choose Vibrio parahaemolyticus is the fact that this bacterium is the leading causative agent of seafood related illlness in the United States. This fact surprised me and eventually triggered me to explore on this kind of bacterium. This species is naturally occurring and found worldwide. It can also survive in both liquid environments and semi solid surfaces that is in your body! Quite interesting isn't it? In humans, this bacterium uses a toxic protein to destroy your red blood cells. And plus, Vibrio parahaemolyticus also can multiply rapidly, thanks to its form of reproduction, binary fission. It will reproduce in humans, in water and in other marine organisms such as oyster and humpback whale. 

Well after discovering about Vibrio parahaemolyticus I think I should realized the importance of taking precautions when cooking seafood. This is because this bacteria is becoming a possible illness although that is not lethal to human but it is serious. I just tell you guys more or less about my adopted microbe, Vibrio parahaemolyticus.

We we required to prepare an online scrapbook and also a 3MT slide. The 3MT slide is to present on Week 14. 3MT stands for 3 minutes talk. I am quite nervous about my 3MT, but Alhamdulillah it all went well. Although there are certain infos that I forgot to share during my 3MT I hope what I have delivered during the talk will give benefits to my friends. I just want to share about my adopted microbe to my fellow classmates and also to Dr Wan and Dr Fairol. 

I used cliptomize.com  for my online scrapbook. Cliptomize is an easy tool to do a scrapbook. It was simple but yet very attractive. You can read the book as long as you want. That is why I choose cliptomize. Overall, this assigment, adopted microbe helps me to discover about Vibrio parahaemolyticus. I tried to understand the life of a bacteria and develop love towards this bacteria.

Trip to the Yakult Factory

Assalamualaikum and Hi Dr Wan and Dr Fairol! :)
I'm glad that we have the chance to write reflective journal about our trip to the Yakult factory. As I am very excited to tell you about my trip to the Yakult factory.

The moment when Dr Fairol announced that we are going to have a trip to Yakult factory, my heart leap with joy as I can feel that this trip will benefit so much to me and also I can get new experience visiting a manufacturing factory such as Yakult. After many ups and downs discussing the perfect time for us to visit the Yakult, we all agree to make this trip happen on 16th May 2016. It is Teacher's Day by the way.

Thanks Dr Fairol for being able to come with us :)

On 16th May 2016, we all gathered at Biotech 1 before boarding into the bus. We all have to gather at 8.00 am as the bus will board at 8.30am. By this we can come back before noon. The journey took only 45 minutes. Upon reaching the Yakult factory, I feel very exhilarated as I have never been to a factory before. When we reached the factory, we saw a group of students from Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM) also coming to visit the factory. We reached there at about 9.30am.

Yeay! Naik bas baru! Haha

Once we have enter the building, we were directed into a hall. At there, we were given a talk about this Yakult factory. What I have learned from that talk are;

1. Yakult uses bacteria Lactobacillus casei Shirota strain as proteobacteria (good bacteria) in yakult.
2. The founder of the proteobacteria Lactobacillus is Dr Minoru Shirota.
3. Probiotics is a live, good bacteria consumed in large numbers to improve the balance of good bacteria in our intestines. It also must be scientifically proven beneficial for health.

Free gift

As we are so busy with our modern lifestyle, we forgot to take care of our health. The balance of good and bad bacteria in our intestines are disturbed when we:

• don't have healthy eating habits
• are stressed
• get older
• take medicines (antibiotics)
• have infections / food poisoning

When the balance in our body is disturbed, we are going to suffer from diarrhea, constipation, bloated stomach, skin problems, weak immune system and many more may occur. Thus, in order to keep balance of good bacteria in our intestines we must consume probiotics daily.

 Probiotics are important as it:

• Improve bowel movement (avoid constipation, diarrhea)
• Maintain balance of good and bad bacteria 
• Reduce toxins in our body
• Boost immune system (reduce risk of infection & occurrence of cancer cells)

After listening to the lecture for about half an hour, we started our tour around the factory. We were only allowed to see the machine and processing of yakult through the glass window. 

We were also not allow to take photos or videos of the inside factory. Thus, I cannot show any pictures from inside the factory. But overall, I can see the process of fermenting until the process of packaging of yakult.

Overall, I feel satisfied with this trip. I feel happy because now I know how yakult is made. I love this trip because it is fun and interesting. I'm looking forward for more trip next time. :)

Thanks Dr Fairol, love ya! :)

Topic 10 - ECOLOGY

Assalamualaikum and hi everybody! We meet again for this entry. Today I am going to an entry on topic 10 which is Ecology. 

For this topic, Dr Wan will be taking over the class after not seeing us for a month I guess. I missed Dr Wan so much and it feels so good to have Dr Wan to teach us back even for just this one topic. I love both though, Dr Wan and Dr Fairol, I'm not bias haha. But I just feel happy because I can hear Dr Wan's laugh again in her class. So for this topic Ecology. It is not a new topic for me. I have lerned about this topic before in secondary school and also during my foundation year in UiTM. 

Global ecology

I am quite fond of this topic because I think this is the easiest topic among all. But I noticed some difference when learning Ecology this time as I have to relate to microbial world. As far as I know ecology is the study of interaction between living things, non living things and the environment as a whole. But in this Microbiology course, we have to narrow our subject into microbe's world.

In this topic I learned about interaction between organism. We have two interaction which positive interaction and negative interaction. One new term for is "amensalism/antagonistic". This amensalism interaction is one symbiont will get the negative effect while the other symbiont will get benefit or unaffected. Other interactions I have heard before such as; commensalism, mutualism, predation, competition, parasitism and cooperation. Microbes play an important role in global ecology. For instance;

• Global Geochemical Cycles
• Carbon
• Nitrogen
• Iron,
• Sulfur
• El Niño - what role do microbes play in El Niño?
• Global Warming - The average temperature of the Earth has been steadily increasing over the past one hundred years. What role do microbes play in this global warming trend?
• Gaia - the Earth's biosystem is known to some as Gaia. Because microbes are responsible for most of the cycling of elements, they are the foundation of this system.

By studying Ecology topic, I learned more about our environment and the contribution of microorganism for the sustainable of environment. 

ECOLOGY

An awesome trip to Institut Biosains UPM (IBS) !

Welcome to IBS!

Friday, 25th March 2016.  Dr Wan, Dr Fairol and all of us agreed to saved this date for the trip to Institute of Bioscience Universiti Putra Malaysia which located just inside the UPM. We have to take a bus from faculty to the IBS since it is quite far from our faculty. So we leave the faculty at 3.00pm and arrived 5 minutes later. Sadly, neither Dr Wan or Dr Fairol can accompany us to the IBS. So Dr Amalia which the Group 1 lecturer come with us to the IBS.  

I am so excited for this trip because this is my first time visiting the IBS. Before this I have no chance to visit IBS. So thanks to Dr Wan and Dr Fairol for this beautiful opportunity to finally let me visit IBS. 

So here are some information on the background of IBS;

The Institute of Bioscience (IBS), Universiti Putra Malaysia was established on 1st of August 1996 and was the first research institute founded in UPM. IBS was established to boost Research and Development (R&D) and postgraduate training in various fields of biological sciences. The emphasis on research was given to strengthen the scientific and technological capabilities of the country as well as to develop relevant human capital to support the Industrial and Agricultural Master Plan. Since its inception, IBS’ areas of research have grown and it is gradually developing into a leading research centre in UPM. 
 
Institute of Bioscience is recognized as a Higher Institution Centre of Excellence (HICoE). It was announced by YAB Dato' Sri Mohd. Najib Tun Haji Abdul Razak, Malaysia Prime Minister during the launching of the National Professors Association (NPA) and the Higher Education Centre of Excellence (HICoE) on 1st April 2010 at Putrajaya International Convention Center (PICC).  

On 9 February, 1995, the Senate, supported the idea of establishing Universiti Pertanian Malaysia Research Institute with the aim that it will organise research and development programmes in line with the corporate plan of Universiti Pertanian Malaysia. The proposed Institute was conceived as a central research centre in UPM for researchers from various faculties and centres to conduct strategic and multidisciplinary research in a conducive and world class research environment.

The proposal on the establishment of the Institute was presented to the Universiti Pertanian Malaysia Board of Directors on 1 April, 1995 which agreed in principle to the proposal and requested a detailed proposal paper. The name Universiti Pertanian Malaysia Research Institute was revised and the new name, Institute of Bioscience (IBS), was accepted by the Senate. In its 120 th Meeting on 9 September, 1995, the Board of Directors agreed to the formation of the Institute.

The Committee on Education Planning under the Ministry of Education Malaysia in its 131 st Meeting held on 27 April, 1996, approved the proposal for the establishment of Institute of Bioscience, UPM.

Following that, the then Vice Chancellor of Universiti Pertanian Malaysia, Y. Bhg. Prof. Tan Sri Dr. Syed Jalaluddin Syed Salim announced the establishment of the Institute of Bioscience and appointed the Director and Deputy Director to head and develop the Institute. Prof. Dr. Abdul Rani Bahaman had been appointed as the first Director of IBS and Prof. Dr. Ho Yin Wan as the Deputy Director.

Over the past 17 years, the Institute of Bioscience has rearranged and developed the existing units into 5 laboratories to ensure the smoothness and effectiveness of administration as well as resource and facilities management. Each laboratory has 2 main functions, i.e. doing researches and provides the Service and Facility Unit. These 5 laboratories are:

• Laboratory of Natural Products
• Laboratory of Vaccines and Immunotherapeutics
• Laboratory of Molecular Biomedicine
• Laboratory of Biotechnology Marine
• Laboratory of Cancer Research UPM-MAKNA

Each research project is headed by Associate Researcher invited as integrated Institute researchers and are assisted by Science Officers, Research Officer, Laboratory Assistants and other supporting staffs. Research programs conducted at the Institute of Bioscience are potentially competitive to generate knowledge in biology science by focusing on integrated and multidiscipline research involving the faculties in UPM.

Human resource development in IBS continued to expand in line with the development of its infrastructure and facilities to accommodate the needs of its staff when conducting research. Presently, IBS has 119 permanent and contract staff consisting of 50 Officers from the Professional and Management Group and 69 supporting staff under its administration.

As a result of its goal to become a Centre for Excellence in Research and Development and Innovation, IBS has produced 81 graduates with a Master of Science or a Doctor of Philosophy. The institute is proud to produce quality graduates, some of whom are now serving in renowned research institutions both locally and abroad.

My first impression when I entered IBS was I am so impressed with the big building of IBS. I guess there must be vast technologies and researching have been done in the IBS. 

Upon reaching the IBS building, we enter the building and directed into a space of laboratories. Through the way inside IBS, we can see a lot of microscope on our right and left side. I am so excited to see Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). They were so big and complex. The price is also too expensive.  

We were divided into 2 groups. My groups we ordered to sit first and listened to an explanation on how to prepare a sample to be observed under TEM or SEM. TEM is used to analyse internal structures while SEM is used to analyse surface structure.  From the explanation written on the board;

I simplify what is written on the board;

 This is such a good opportunity for to see TEM and SEM at a closer look.
We were brought to several rooms inside the IBS buildings to see different room carried out different activities. There is one room called " ULTRAMICROTOME". This room basically a place where the cut sample using diamond knife or glass knife before observing them under TEM or SEM.

Ultramicrotome room

Diamond knife

I am impressed by the diamond knife because it is just a small tool to cut microbes, but it actually powerful enough to cut small microbes.

After a walking around the IBS for a few times, our trip ends two hour after that. I am satisfied with this trip and I hope I can come to Institut Biosains UPM once again. I would love to explore more on this massive building. And I also can't wait to work here. I hope I would have the opportunity to do so. Thus, we end our trip with a big smile on our face :)