Siti Aisyah Samudin is currently a Senior Lecturer at the Syariah and Law Department, Academy of Islamic Studies, University of Malaya, Malaysia. She graduated with a Diploma in Syariah and Islamic Jurisprudence with honors class one from the International Islamic University College of Selangor in 2011. In 2015, she was awarded a Bachelor Degree in Syariah and Law with honors class one from the Academy of Islamic Studies, University of Malaya. She completed her doctoral studies in 2019 at the same university in which she specialized in Islamic tort and Islamic criminal justice. Her areas of expertise and research interests are Islamic criminal law, negligence, tort and consumerism. Her current research is on the need for an approach of harmonisation between diyya and existing compensation method including Malaysian law and insurance, to provide comprehensive protection to victims of road accidents. She is currently active in research and writing articles, especially on compensation for road traffic accident victims in Malaysia, the role of Insurance and Takaful as well as the potential of diyat in the area of damages. She was the recipients for Gold Medal Poster Exhibition Research University Malaya 2019. She is currently supervising 1 masters students and upcoming 5 PhD students. Outside the University, she is an exco member of al-Mukhlisin Foundation (an NGO).

Hi, I am an Associate Professor at the Department of Science and Technology Studies (STS), Faculty of Science, Universiti Malaya (UM), and the Founding Director of the Universiti Malaya Sustainable Development Centre (UMSDC) since 2022. I began my academic career at UM after completing my PhD in Science and Technology Policy at SPRU, University of Sussex, in 2009. My educational background includes a BSc in Ecology from the Insitute Biological Sciences, Universiti Malaya and an MSc in Environmental Management and Policy from the International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics (IIIEE), Lund University, Sweden. My research primarily explores the intersection of science, technology, and innovation (STI) with environmental sustainability, particularly within the context of sustainable development and the challenges faced by late-industrializing countries. Over the years, I have expanded my interdisciplinary approach to contribute to Sustainability Science, engaging in areas such as sustainability transitions, education for sustainable development, participatory watershed management, place-based citizen science, and social innovation. I am actively involved in teaching and supervising undergraduate and postgraduate students, integrating environmental sciences with STI policy, management, and governance. My commitment to campus sustainability dates back to my student years and continues today. From 2009 to 2013, I served as Deputy Coordinator and later Principal Coordinator of UM’s ecocampus initiative. In 2014, I became the founding Director of UMCARES, the university’s Sustainability and Community Centre at the time (now rebranded as UM's Community Engagement), and played a key role in shaping the UM Campus Sustainability Living Lab Programme during my tenure.  Within the civil society, space I was the founding principal coordinator of UM’s Water Warriors, one of the university’s pioneering greening movements and Living Lab, focusing on participatory watershed conservation. Today, I continue to contribute as an academic volunteer, working alongside dedicated colleagues and students across generations to promote environmental stewardship, within the UM campus and beyond. Additionally, I serve as an advisor to Inspirasi Kawa, a community-based environmental organization in Kuala Selangor, and Sekitar Kita, a university-based social enterprise. I am also a research associate with the social enterprise Urban Biodiversity Initiative (UBI) Beyond Malaysia, I represent UM in regional and international sustainability networks, including the ASEAN University Network on Ecological Education and Culture (AUN-EEC) and the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) Malaysia Chapter. Previously, I was a networking fellow under the Universities and Research Council Network on Innovation for Inclusive Development in Southeast Asia (UNIID-SEA) and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) Asia Core Programme on Asian-Oriented Integrated Watershed Management. For more details, please visit my my full UMEXPERT profile. 

Dr. Mohamad NorTaufiq Nor Hashim is a scholar specializing primarily in Malay etymology, with further expertise in Malay language and culture, and the history of the Malay language. He obtained his PhD in Malay Linguistics from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) in 2022, after completing a Master of Arts in 2018 and a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in 2017, also in Malay Linguistics at USM. His research explores the intersections of etymology, language, culture, and history, and he has published academic works in these areas. Together with lecturers from Universiti Tenaga Nasional (UNITEN), he co-developed Easy Malay, an interactive smart application designed to support Chinese learners in acquiring Malay vocabulary more effectively. His international academic experience includes serving as a Lecturer at Xi’an International Studies University (2020–2025), Yunnan University (2021–2023), and Tianjin Foreign Studies University (2019–2020), as well as a Visiting Lecturer at Yunnan Uniasia International Education Center (2023). Beyond academia, he also worked as Public Relations (PR) at the Malaysia Chamber of Commerce (MAYCHAM) Xi’an, China (2024–2025), where he contributed to strengthening bilateral and academic collaborations between Malaysia and China.