Fiber morphology of 3 species of bamboo namely Bambusa vulgaris, Gigantochloa levis, and Gigantochloa scortechinii at age of 1, 3, and 5 years, was evaluated. It shows that different species of bamboo have different properties in terms of their fiber morphology that consist of fiber length, fiber diameter, and lumen diameter. Fiber diameter, fiber length, and cell wall thickness increased with the increasing of the bamboo age but the lumen diameter decreased when the bamboo gets older. G. levis at age 1 to 3 and G. scortechinii at age 1 have high potential to be the raw materials for the pulp and paper industry.

One way to minimize emissions of greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change is to reduce the use of wood as the main material for pulp and paper production. Therefore, non-woody plants such as bamboo can be alternatives as raw materials for pulp and paper. This study aims to determine the effect of the different bamboo species and age on the bamboo pulping yield and bamboo mechanical paper properties. Bambusa vulgaris, Gigantochloa levis, and Gigantochloa scortechinii bamboo species or locally known as Aur, Beting, and Semantan bamboo at the age of 1, 3, and 5-year old, were pulped using Soda-Anthraquinone (AQ) pulping. No beating process was conducted to all the papermaking processes to evaluate the basic mechanical properties of the bamboo paper. Pulping yield ranged from 35.7 to 51.7% at different bamboo species and age, with the pulping conditions at 20% of NaOH, 170ºC pulping temperature, 90 min time to reach pulping temperature and 90 min time at pulping temperature, 1:6 of bamboo to liquor ratio and 0.1% of AQ based on bamboo oven-dried weight. The paper was made according to TAPPI Standard T205 sp- 95. The paper mechanical properties for burst index, tear index, tensile index, and folding endurance ranged from 1.32 to 2.36 kPa.m2/g, 7.48 to 14.9 Nm2/g, 16.02 to 29.68 Nm/g, and 2 to 28 double folds, respectively, at different bamboo species and age. It was found that Beting bamboo has the potential to be a viable raw material for pulp and paper products as it shows the highest mechanical properties compared to Aur and Semantan.

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This paper presents a study on the development of a lower limb exoskeleton suit (exo-suit) for post-stroke patients. The exo-suit is designed and developed for restoration of post-stroke patients' gait motion (ability to use their lower limb joints) and analysis on ergonomics and statics are also considered. The mechanical structure of the exo-suit is proposed according to the anatomy of Asian people with an average mass of eighty kilograms in order that it is fitted perfectly. The conceptual design is established and selected by a dedicated design matrix and compared using the matrix evaluation process, and then Computer-Aided Design (CAD) software CATIA is used to create the 3D model. The design has undergone an evaluation of static structural and ergonomic analysis via CATIA and ANSYS Finite Element Analysis (FEA) software. Two materials are used in the static structural analysis, one is aluminium alloy, the other is steel material. The result of equivalent stress for both materials is within the allowable range of 29.511MPa to 1168.4 MPa. For RULA (Rapid Upper Limb Assessment) Analysis, the results showed that all three postures (static, intermittent, and repeated) yield acceptable final score which is 1 for intermittent and 2 for static and repeated postures.