Silage produced in tropical countries is prone to spoilage because of high humidity and temperature. Therefore, determining indigenous bacteria as potential inoculants is important to improve silage quality. This study aimed to determine bacterial community and functional changes associated with ensiling using amplicon metagenomics and to predict potential bacterial additives associated with silage quality in the Malaysian climate. Silages of two forage crops (sweet corn and Napier) were prepared, and their fermentation properties and functional bacterial communities were analysed. After ensiling, both silages were predominated by lactic acid bacteria (LAB), and they exhibited good silage quality with significant increment in lactic acid, reductions in pH and water-soluble carbohydrates, low level of acetic acid and the absence of propionic and butyric acid. LAB consortia consisting of homolactic and heterolactic species were proposed to be the potential bacterial additives for sweet corn and Napier silage fermentation. Tax4fun functional prediction revealed metabolic pathways related to fermentation activities (bacterial division, carbohydrate transport and catabolism, and secondary metabolite production) were enriched in ensiled crops (p < 0.05). These results might suggest active transport and metabolism of plant carbohydrates into a usable form to sustain bacterial reproduction during silage fermentation, yielding metabolic products such as lactic acid. This research has provided a comprehensive understanding of bacterial communities before and after ensiling, which can be useful for desirable silage fermentation in Malaysia.

Pluronic F-68 (PF-68) is a non-ionic surfactant used in plant tissue culture as a growth additive. Despite its usage as a plant growth enhancer, the mechanism underlying the growth-promoting effects of PF-68 remains largely unknown. Hence, this study was undertaken to elucidate the growth-promoting mechanism of PF-68 using recalcitrant MR 219 callus as a model. Supplementation of 0.04% PF-68 (optimum concentration) was shown to enhance callus proliferation. The treated callus recorded enhanced sugar content, protein content, and glutamate synthase activity as exemplified in the comparative proteome analysis, showing protein abundance involved in carbohydrate metabolism (alpha amylase), protein biosynthesis (ribosomal proteins), and nitrogen metabolism (glutamate synthase), which are crucial to plant growth and development. Moreover, an increase in nutrients uptake was also noted with potassium topping the list, suggesting a vital role of K in governing plant growth. In contrast, 0.10% PF-68 (high concentration) induced stress response in the callus, revealing an increment in phenylalanine ammonia lyase activity, malondialdehyde content, and peroxidase activity, which were consistent with high abundance of phenylalanine ammonia lyase, peroxidase, and peroxiredoxin proteins detected and concomitant with a reduced level of esterase activity. The data highlighted that incorporation of PF-68 at optimum concentration improved callus proliferation of recalcitrant MR 219 through enhanced carbohydrate metabolism, nitrogen metabolism, and nutrient uptake. However, growth-promoting effects of PF-68 are concentration dependent.

There are a number of underexplored plant species from the family of Rutaceae despite their economic importance, including Glycosmis perakensis V.Naray. Therefore, the main purpose of this study is to enhance its taxonomic characterization and identification of this plant species by examining the morphology and anatomy of selected parts. The histological procedure for G. perakensis stems and leaves were optimized by increasing the incubation time for the fixation, clearing, and infiltration steps of the standard paraffin embedding method. Different types of stains were also used to identify and differentiate the plant tissues. The anatomy of plant parts such as stem, leaf, and petiole were studied using light microscopy. Pellucid dots and stomata exist on both abaxial and adaxial leaf surfaces. Statistical analysis on stomatal index and stomatal density showed a significant difference between abaxial and adaxial surfaces. Histological analyses showed the presence of sclerenchyma, collenchyma, and parenchyma cells, vascular bundle, prismatic crystals of calcium oxalate, and secretory cavities in the plant leaf and stem transverse sections. This is the first study reporting on the histological morphology of stem, petiole, and leaf of G. perakensis. The findings of this study will be a valuable tool for the identification of this plant.

Analyses of morphological and agronomic traits not only provide important information in the selection of rice varieties for breeding, these data are also important in deciding plant materials for molecular characterization and analysis of phenotypic traits of interest. The aim of the present study was to collect, analyze and compare the agro-morphological data of 6 upland rice and 17 lowland rice varieties (Oryza sativa L.) from the Malaysian rice germplasms grown under the same greenhouse condition. The common factors that contributed to yield per plant in both upland and lowland rice varieties are plant height and percentage of filled grains. Panicle length was positively correlated to grain yield in upland rice varieties while many other agronomic traits could affect the yield per plant in lowland rice varieties such as total number of tillers, total number of panicles per plant, flag leaf width and days-to-flowering. The upland rice varieties have a slightly higher average total grain number per panicle in compensation of a low number of panicles. The compensation in total grain numbers per panicle was not sufficiently significant to affect the total yield per plant most probably due to a low total number of grains per plant. Despite a high 100-grain weight in general, some of these upland rice varieties have more than 50% percentage of unfilled grains. Data on these rice germplasms may offer information on a valuable gene pool which can be utilized in different varietal improvement/development program in future.

Luvunga crassifolia is an underutilized plant in the Citrus family. Other than brief morphological descriptions, there are no published reports on other identification features of this plant. Thus, the current study was aimed to investigate macroscopic and microscopic diagnostic features of L. crassifolia leaves, stems, and petioles. Macroscopic characterization, optimization of histological procedure, and histochemical analyses of differential stains were carried out on the leaves, stems, and petioles of L. crassifolia. The histological method was optimized by modifying the following parameters: number of fixation days, dehydration duration with degraded series of ethanol or butanol, clearing duration, and infiltration duration. After infiltration, embedding and sectioning of the tissues were performed. Histochemical analyses were carried out using differential stains to identify the cellular components in leaf, stem and, petiole tissue sections. This study showed that L. crassifolia leaves are amphistomatic. Pellucid dots were observed on both adaxial and abaxial leaf surfaces. Secretory cavities, xylem, phloem, and pericyclic fibers were found in the cross-sections of leaf, stem, and petiole. Calcium oxalates were present in the leaf and stem sections, while trichomes were detected in stem and petiole sections. The information obtained from this study will be helpful for the identification and future taxonomic-related studies of this plant species.