Siti Nazrah Zailani

Recovery of synthetic dye from simulated wastewater using emulsion liquid membrane process containing tri-dodecyl amine as a mobile carrier.

The extraction of Red 3BS reactive dye from aqueous solution was studied using emulsion liquid membrane (ELM). ELM is one of the processes that have very high potential in treating industrial wastewater consisting of dyes. In this research, Red 3BS reactive dye was extracted from simulated wastewater using tridodecylamine (TDA) as the carrier agent, salicyclic acid (SA) to protonate TDA, sodium chloride as the stripping agent, kerosene as the diluent and SPAN 80 as emulsifier. Experimental parameters investigated were salicyclic acid concentration, extraction time, SPAN 80 concentration, sodium chloride concentration, TDA concentration, agitation speed, homogenizer speed, emulsifying time and treat ratio. The results show almost 100% of Red 3BS was removed and stripped in the receiving phase at the optimum condition in this ELM system. High voltage coalesce was applied to break the emulsion hence, enables recovery of Red 3BS in the receiving phase.

Extraction of Rhodamine 6G Dye from Liquid Waste Solution: Study on Emulsion Liquid Membrane Stability Performance and Recovery

Effluent from industry using coloring material is hazardous to the environment because it is toxic in nature. Thus, it is important to treat the effluent to preserve the environment. In this research, extraction of Rhodamine 6G (R6G) from liquid wastewater using emulsion liquid membrane (ELM) process was studied. ELM formulation consists of kerosene as diluent, bis (2-ethylhexyl) phosphate (D2EHPA) as carrier, sulphuric acid (H2SO4) as internal phase, and SPAN 80 as surfactant. Several parameters had been examined to determine the stability of ELM and the recovery of R6G basic dyes from liquid waste solutions. The results show that the most stable emulsion was obtained with formulation consists of 0.1 M D2EHPA, 1.0 M of H2SO4 by using 12000 rpm homogenizer speed at 5 minutes emulsifying time. Furthermore, the result of recovery R6G in ELM process shows that the optimum condition of 50 ppm concentration of dye extraction were 5 minutes extraction time with the concentration of Span 80 at 3% w/v, agitation speed at 150 rpm, and the condition of 1:3 treat ratio. At this condition, the percentage of extraction and recovery were 100% and 84% respectively. Hence, the conclusion that ELM is a very promising technique for separating R6G from liquid wastewater.

Reading behaviors of students in Kolej Datin Seri Endon (KDSE)

Purpose – This is an exploratory study of reading behaviors and interest among students residing in a female residential college of Kolej Datin Seri Endon (KDSE), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) and the use of reading stations (RS) placed at strategic locations throughout the main campus. The UTMs Vice Chancellor project of developing various RS was to promote a reading culture in UTM. Currently there are 48 RS in the main campus of Skudai and ten more in UTM International campus. Most of the books were donated by UTM staff and students themselves.Design/methodology/approach – Using simple random sampling, 187 students were selected from a population of 1,300 female students. The survey instrument was designed in the form of structured questionnaire comprising a series of close‐ended and open‐ended questions design. A team of researcher investigated and evaluated at least 15 Reading Stations through out the campus.Findings – The findings highlighted some factors related to reading habits and interest...

Reduction of soil acidity for agriculture activities in Malaysian ultisols by rhodopseudomonas palustris

The potential of the phototrophic bacterium, Rhodopseudomonas palustris (R. palustris), to reduce the acidic soil pH of Malaysian Ultisols (Bungor Series) was investigated. The R. palustris was first adsorbed onto the dried pineapple leaves (DPL) before being applied. The most suitable broth condition for the bacterium that could be adsorbed onto the DPL was identified. Different conditions and amounts of R. palustris adsorbed onto the DPL % (w/w) were tested in soils where the soil pH was monitored. It was found that the maximum cell adsorption onto the DPL was obtained using an initial cell concentration of 1.5 x 107 colony-forming units (CFU) mL-1, at pH 8.0 with the ionic strength of 5 mmolL-1 ammonium nitrate (NaNO3). The R. palustris was adsorbed onto the DPL surface area of 64.33 A. The acidic soil was treated with R. palustris adsorbed onto the DPL by direct application. The calcium carbonate (CaCO3) was introduced as a benchmark to reduce the soil acidity. The results showed that, with the application of R. palustris adsorbed on 5.0 % (w/w) of DPL, the soil pH was improved from 4.9 to more than 6.0 after 12 d of application. This improved soil pH will make the soil more applicable for agricultural activity.

Assessment of compost stability using single and mixed culture in a static semi-closed fed-batch reactor

Different microbial inoculums are expected to affect the degradation and stability of different compost materials. The results tend to vary more significantly in an open system due to the varied ambient conditions (temperature, moisture and air-borne microbial). To minimise such variation and avoid low reproducibility of the data, the present work was performed in a static semi-closed fed-batch reactor (SSCFBR) for better control of the composting process. The thermophilic Bacillus coagulans (BC) and the commercial effective microorganisms (EM) were used as the microbial inoculum (MI) in the SSCFBR. Distilled water was used in place of the MI for the control experiments. The mixture of chicken dung (CD), wooden husk (WH), and rice husk (RH) were used as the compost materials. The MI was inoculated into the compost bed in the SSCFBR (15 L working volume) at the same initial optical density (OD) of 0.8 and the initial volume of 800 mL with a forced aeration of 0.4 L/min. The parameters for the assessment of compost stability included the temperature, moisture content, oxygen uptake rate (OUR) and carbon dioxide emission rate (CER). BC showed comparable or better results to that achieved by the commercial EM. The temperature profile for both composts showed similar patterns where the highest peak of temperature was recorded within 1 d of composting (slightly higher for BC, 55 ± 0.8 °C and 47 ± 0.8 °C for EM). Such thermophilic temperature profile has not been observed in the control. The initial moisture content was set similar for all composts (44.5 ± 0.7 %). The moisture content declined slightly different for both MI compost (to 39.0 ± 0.6 % for BC and 36.6 ± 1.2 % for EM). Both composts showed very similar trend in the OUR. A higher evolution rate of carbon dioxide (CO2) was observed for the compost with BC for the first three days (0.06 ± 0.014 g/mol) as compared to that by EM (0.02 ± 0.007 g/mol). On the 4th d of composting, the production of CO2 in EM compost showed a near constant value (0.008 ± 0.002 g/mol) but the BC compost showed the rate of 0.06 ± 0.01 g/mol the 5th d and declined to 0.02 ± 0.004 g/mol on the 7th d. For both composting cases, the highest rate of CO2 was observed at the highest peak of temperature. The SSCFBR has been designed and could be used to facilitate the assessment of compost stability in a closed system with improved reproducibility of the data for composting.