The colour and the sweetness of honey are the main characteristics refers by consumers when buying honey for their consumption. Consumers always believe that the darker the colour and the sweeter the taste, the better the quality of honey. This study aims to investigate the correlation of colour lightness and the sweetness of stingless bee honey with its mineral contents. Honey samples were collected from seven beehives around Terengganu, Malaysia. All samples have different colours and tastes. The colour of honey was measured based on CIELAB colour system using a reflectance spectrometry and the sweetness of honey is measured using a refractometer. ICP-OES is used to analyze mineral elements present in the honey samples. We found that the lighter the colour of honey, the less sweet it is (r= -0.77). The results obtained also shows that the lighter the colour of honey, the higher the amount of potassium (r= -0.94) and phosphorus (r= -0.94) in honey. Meanwhile, the sweeter the honey, the higher the amount of potassium (r= 0.87), sodium (r= 0.85) and phosphorus (r= 0.82). Our findings prove that the colour and sweetness of honey can only be used to estimate the certain nutritive value of honey. Even though these findings still cannot fully uncover the myth of honey; consumers still can depend on these characteristics to choose the best honey for their own consumption.

Cocos Nucifera Linn. Var. MATAG is a Dwarf coconut variety that had high demand in Malaysia but low supply. Vegetative propagation of high-yielding MATAG coconut by using in vitro cloning must be considered in contributing to increase coconut productivity. Thus, attempts were made to develop a protocol that would enhance callogenesis as a first preliminary step towards a protocol for mass propagation of C. nucifera L. var. MATAG. The anther isolated from immature inflorescence was used as explants and cultured on modified Eeuwens Y3 media in different concentrations of 2,4-dicholorophenoxy acetic acid (2,4-D) and activated charcoal. The highest callus induction percentage (31.25 ± 12.18) was observed in 20 mg/L 2,4-D. However, 2,4-D at any level tested were not statistically significant. Callus induction media supplemented with 0.5 mg/L activated charcoal gave the highest callusing percentage (25.89 ± 13.59 %) indicating a positive effect of activated charcoal on callusing even though the result obtained not significant compared to control (15.95 ± 6.76 %). But, activated charcoal supplemented in media produced a significant effect compared to control in reducing the percentage of browning. In conclusion, media supplemented with activated charcoal produced a higher rate on callus induction and preventing tissue browning in explant. Besides that, the anther and ovule explant may serve as an efficient explant to study the callus induction of C. nucifera L. var. MATAG and as a basis to screen the potential useful plant growth regulators for somatic embryogenesis.

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Heavy metals have become one of the environmental pollutants in water. To overcome this problem, the phytoremediation process was used as the method to cleanse polluted media. The objectives of the study are to determine the heavy metal accumulation by water spinach (Ipomea aquatica) in different types of heavy metal and to determine the level of heavy metal reduction in contaminated water. Ipomea aquatica was placed in containers that had solutions of different heavy metal concentrations. The selected heavy metals are cadmium (Cd), zinc (Zn), and copper (Cu), with a concentration of 5 ppm, 10 ppm, and 15 ppm, respectively. This study lasted about 20 days. Every four days, plant and water samples are collected. The plant samples were dried, digested, and analyzed by using ICP-OES. The two-way ANOVA statistical test was used to measure the differences in the amounts of the heavy metals accumulated in the plant and water. The accumulation of elements in plants shows a gradual increase in the uptake of cadmium, Cu, and Zn. Ipomea aquatica is suitable to take up cadmium, where the highest level of cadmium found was 13.99 mg/kg. On day 8, the level of heavy metals in the water gradually decreases for Cu and Zn. The presence of heavy metals in the water had decreased by 82.20 % on the last day of treatment. Ipomea aquatica accumulated more heavy metals while the number of heavy metals in the water decreased over a period of days. For all heavy metal types, significant differences in heavy metal concentration were obtained at p<0.05, showing that Ipomea aquatica can be used in the phytoremediation approach to remove heavy metals from wastewater.

Hevea brasiliensis is exploited for its latex production, and it is the only viable source of natural rubber worldwide. The demand for natural rubber remains high due its high-quality properties, which synthetic rubber cannot compete with. In this paper, we present transcriptomic data and analysis of three H. brasiliensis clones using tissue from latex and bark tissues collected from 10-year-old plant. The combined, assembled transcripts were mapped onto an H. brasiliensis draft genome. Gene ontology analysis showed that the most abundant transcripts related to molecular functions, followed by biological processes and cellular components. Simple sequence repeats (SSR) and single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) were also identified, and these can be useful for selection of parental and new clones in a breeding program. Data generated by RNA sequencing were deposited in the NCBI public repository under accession number PRJNA629890.