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In this paper, we describe the optical alignment method for the Prime-focus-Infrared Microlensing Experiment (PRIME) telescope which is a prime-focus near-infrared (NIR) telescope with a wide field of view for the microlensing planet survey toward the Galactic center that is the major task for the PRIME project. There are three steps for the optical alignment: preliminary alignment by a laser tracker, fine alignment by intra- and extra-focal (IFEF) image analysis technique, and complementary and fine alignment by the Hartmann test. We demonstrated that the first two steps work well by the test conducted in the laboratory in Japan. The telescope was installed at the Sutherland Observatory of South African Astronomical Observatory in August, 2022. At the final stage of the installation, we demonstrated that the third method works well and the optical system satisfies the operational requirement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the dynamics of supply chain diversification in a contested East Asia and their implications for India–South Korea cooperation in the post-COVID-19 era. Major powers have sought to restructure supply chain by designing a strategy to reduce their reliance on China-controlled supply chain. The United States–China trade and technological war, Asian regional powers' escalating conflicts with a rising China, and pandemic-induced supply chain disruptions have played key roles in driving the restructuring process. India and South Korea, Asia's two major economies, have also re-evaluated their supply chain strategies. As this paper explains, on the one hand, India has been striving to emerge as a supply chain hub for key industries by ending China's control. On the other hand, South Korea has also been aiming to diversify its supply chain beyond China under the New Southern Policy. Against that backdrop, critical developments concerning supply chain cooperation have occurred between the two countries amid the COVID-19 crisis. The pandemic has not only facilitated the opening of high-level political exchanges on supply chain but also brought tangible outcomes, as Korean companies have become active participants in India's quest to build an India-centric supply chain. I conclude this study by contending that the two countries are "natural partners" in reshaping the supply chain dynamics in East Asia in the post-COVID-19 era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cancer incidence rates are significantly different all over the world. Breast cancer is affected by many factors, the most important being genetics and lifestyle. The aim of this paper is to study the mutation mechanisms of breast cancer for Japanese women by fitting the incidence data of three high-quality population areas in Japan from 1985 to 2010. To achieve this goal, we have set up multi-stage models within the mathematical model of Moolgavkar, Venzon, and Knudson. Such models take both mutation rates and clonal expansion rates as parameters in each compartment into consideration. Based on our simulation outcomes, two to twelve driver mutations are sufficient in the pathway to female breast cancer in Japan. On the other hand, a previous study demonstrated that breast cancer in American women requires two to fourteen gene mutations to get a cancerous cell. Moreover, the 3-stage mathematical model is the optimal model as it fits clinical data very nicely for all affected cases of females in Japan and the US. The genetic instability has a prominent effect on the tumorigenesis of Japanese females caused by the first four driver mutations. The calculated results for Japanese women are compared with previous works for American women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Correlated X-ray scattering (CXS) which was explored to study the conformations of biological macromolecules in solution was studied further in this paper. In our experiment, three kinds of solution sample such as the Peg solution, the linear DNA from salmon sperm and the plasmid DNA were scattered by X-ray Free Electron Laser in Spring8 in Japan. And the X-ray scattering patterns with low rate of signal and noise were obtained. In order to improve the correlated signal, a cluster data filtering method for billions of scattering patterns was put forward. Finally, some of the scattering patterns with high artifacts which were related with potential sources of experimental set-up had been characterized and removed. In addition, different clusters were clarified so as to compute and analyze the angular autocorrelation of different clusters more effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Belle II experiment at SuperKEKB e + / e − collider, Japan, is aiming at exploring flavor physics in high intensity frontier. The target instantaneous luminosity of SuperKEKB is at 8 × 1 0 3 5 s − 1 cm − 2 , which is 40 times higher than that at KEKB. The renovated Belle II detectors around the interaction point are expected to collect 5 0 ab − 1 data within 7 years. This gives high data statistics for precision measurements and probing new physics in rare decay studies. The Belle II experiment has successfully recorded the first collision events at SuperKEKB in April 2018, and is ready for physics data taking. This paper will cover the current status of Belle II and highlight its prospects on flavor physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sanguisorba officinalis Linne ( S. officinalis, Rosaceae) has been used as a medicinal plant for the treatment of burns, hematemesis, melena, intestinal infections, and dermatitis for a long time in China, Korea, and Japan. The therapeutic efficacy of this herb is intimately associated with its anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory, antiviral, antifungal, hemostatic, and anticancer activities. Its root contains triterpenoid saponins (zigyuglycoside I: CHO and ziyuglycoside II: CHO8) and tannins (sanguiin H-6: CHO). It has been recently revealed that these active constituents of S. officinalis possess antiwrinkle properties without cytotoxicity. They also have anticancer effects by inducing apoptosis and cell cycle arrest. Moreover, they can inhibit proliferative tumorigenesis. The underlying mechanism involved in the pharmacological actions of these active constituents is mainly related to p38 MAPK signaling. Although various studies have reported its therapeutic activities and major chemical components, review articles that extensively organize various properties of S. officinalis and its major constituents are still scarce. Taken together, the objective of this paper is to provide overall pharmacological and phytochemical profiles of S. officinalis and its constituents (including ziyuglycoside I, ziyuglycoside II, and sanguiin H-6), and their potential roles in clinical applications for the treatment of inflammatory diseases, bleeding disorders, and cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), Japanese-Chinese medicine, and Korean Sasang constitutional medicine have common origins. However, the constitutional medicines of China, Japan, and Korea differ because of the influence of geographical culture, social environment, national practices, and other factors. This paper aimed to compare the constitutional medicines of China, Japan, and Korea in terms of theoretical origin, constitutional classification, constitution and pathogenesis, clinical applications and basic studies that were conducted. The constitutional theories of the three countries are all derived from the Canon of Internal Medicine or Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Diseases of Ancient China. However, the three countries have different constitutional classifications and criteria. Medical sciences in the three countries focus on the clinical applications of constitutional theory. They all agree that different pathogenic laws that guide the treatment of diseases govern different constitutions; thus, patients with different constitutions are treated differently. The three countries also differ in terms of drug formulations and medication. Japanese medicine is prescribed only based on constitution. Korean medicine is based on treatment, in which drugs cannot be mixed. TCM synthesize the treatment model of constitution differentiation, disease differentiation and syndrome differentiation with the treatment thought of treating disease according to three categories of etiologic factors, which reflect the constitution as the characteristic of individual precision treatment. In conclusion, constitutional medicines of China, Japan, and Korea have the same theoretical origin, but differ in constitutional classification, clinical application of constitutional theory on the treatment of diseases, drug formulations and medication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the author aims to examine the differences in perception concerning the anxiety toward the risk among three countries — Japan, the United States of America and China. The anxiety, in this case, is triggered by uncertainty. This paper also intends to clarify the effect of information to improve people's risk management targeted on the respondents of the Chinese population focusing on earthquake disasters. The social survey using questionnaire has been carried out in order to obtain the needed quantitative data for my research project. It is interesting to conclude that both respondents in China and in the United States tend to accept the impact of uncertainty better. They have shown somewhat lower level of anxiety toward nineteen items of the risks as compared with that of the Japanese respondents. The significant effects on information designed as a part of the risk management action plan as well as the living sufficiency safeguard are clearly observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose interactive and visual discovery method of hidden factors for accidents or incidents. Accidents or incidents tend to occur because of very small differences from an ideal situation. From the above viewpoint, we introduce scenario violation model and regard scenario violation as a gap from the proper scenario. Previously, we proposed abduction-based scenario violation determination strategy, but in this paper, we adopt the Kamishibai-KeyGraph to analyze multiple patterns at the same time. Then, we show a gap discovery procedure by using the Kamishibai-KeyGraph. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we developed a technique for analyzing individual PM2.5 particles using micro-PIXE. PM2.5, a designation for extremely small particulate matter (PM) in the air, has recently become the center of attention because high levels of PM2.5 were recorded in parts of western Japan, especially Fukuoka Prefecture, in January 2013. For a better understanding of their formation mechanism, analysis of individual particles is indispensable. We collected PM2.5 on a thick Prolene foil using a multi-nozzle cascade impactor at Fukuoka Women's University, Fukuoka, Japan. Its elemental analysis was carried out using a micro-PIXE system at Tohoku University. Although elemental concentration ratios of scanned areas were similar, those of individual particles were quite different from each other. Elemental concentration ratios for individual particles were categorized into five groups, indicating that the PM2.5 particles came from at least five different sources. Although elemental concentrations obtained by averaging over single particles formed in different processes will lose detailed information, we were able to derive comprehensive elemental compositions of individual PM2.5 particles using our novel technique. The individual particle analysis technique for PM2.5 will provide important information to identify pollution sources and particle formation mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper applies Bayesian estimation to an open-economy Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) model of Japan, to assess the effects of expanding government debt on interest rates, real exchange rate dynamics, and real sector performance. We find that the emergence of even a small risk premium on government debt will trigger considerable instability in the real and nominal variables. We show that a switch to an exchange-rate rule for monetary policy would considerably moderate the instability induced by a rising risk premium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper applies Bayesian estimation to an open-economy Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) model of Japan, to assess the effects of expanding government debt on interest rates, real exchange rate dynamics, and real sector performance. We find that the emergence of even a small risk premium on government debt will trigger considerable instability in the real and nominal variables. We show that a switch to an exchange-rate rule for monetary policy would considerably moderate the instability induced by a rising risk premium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LCGT is the large scale cryogenic gravitational wave telescope project in Japan in order to firstly detect gravitational waves. After the detection, the detector will be served as an astronomical tool to observe the Universe in collaborative observation with Advanced LIGO, GEO HF, Advanced Virgo and AIGO detectors. LCGT will contribute both the enterprise of detecting the gravitational wave events and the worldwide network for gravitational wave astronomy. This paper summarizes the status of LCGT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyzing the logical structure of a sentence is important for understanding natural language. In this paper, we present a task of Recognition of Requisite Part and Effectuation Part in Law Sentences, or RRE task for short, which is studied in research on Legal Engineering. The goal of this task is to recognize the structure of a law sentence. We investigate the RRE task regarding both the linguistic features and problem modeling aspects. We also propose solutions and present experimental results in a Japanese legal text domain. We got 88.58% with a supervised learning model and 88.84% with a semi-supervised learning model in the Fβ=1 score on the Japanese National Pension Law corpus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The elementary photo-strangeness production process has been intensively studied based on the high-quality data of the charged kaon channel, γ + p → K+ + Λ(Σ0). However, there had been no reliable data for the neutral kaon channel γ + n → K0 + Λ(Σ0) and the theoretical investigations suffer seriously from the lack of the data. In order to have reliable data for the neutral kaon photo-production data, substantial effort has been made to measure the γ + n → K0 + Λ process in the π+π- decay channel, using a liquid deuterium target and a tagged photon beam (Eγ = 0.8-1.1 GeV) in the threshold region at the Laboratory of Nuclear Science (LNS), Tohoku University. We have taken exploratory data quite successfully with the use of Neutral Kaon Spectrometer (NKS) at LNS-Tohoku in 2003 and 2004. The data is compared to theoretical models and it indicates a hint that the K0 differential cross section has a backward peak in the energy region. The second generation of the experiment, NKS2, is designed to extend the NKS experiment by considerably upgrading the original neutral kaon spectrometer, fully replacing the spectrometer magnet, tracking detectors and all the trigger counters. The new spectrometer NKS2 has significantly larger acceptance for neutral kaons compared with NKS, particularly covering forward angles and much better invariant mass resolution. The estimated acceptance of NKS2 is three (ten) times larger for $K_S^0 (\Lambda)$ than that of NKS. The spectrometer is newly constructed and installed at the Laboratory of Nuclear Science, Tohoku University in 2005. The deuterium target data was taken with tagged photon beam in 2006-2007. We will report recent results of NKS2 in this paper. Additionally, a status of the upgrade project that gives us larger acceptance and capability of K0 + Λ coincidence measurement will be presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The causes of risks are hard to identify if events occur temporarily and disappear before the occurrence of their observable effects. In the face of this hurdle, transient causal events of significant effects are desired to be explained, for the safety of human life. In this paper, Kamishibai KeyGraph, a variation of KeyGraph developed to deal with sequential data, is presented as a tool to explain the causality involving transient causes. This method is applied here for two data sets: (1) newspaper text on social events, and (2) data on earthquakes in Japan. The performance of this method is hard to evaluate quantitatively due to the nature of transient events, so we partially evaluate the qualitative scenarios interpreted subjectively from the visualized maps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies of hadrons composed of charm quarks attend a growing attention in recent years due to both, experimental accessibility and theoretical motivation. In this paper we review selected results on charm hadron studies carried out with the Belle detector at the electron positron collider KEKB in Japan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes a method for separating online handwritten patterns into Japanese text, figures and mathematical formulas. Today, Tablet PCs and electronic whiteboards provide much larger writing area for pen interfaces unlike PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants), through which users can easily input text, write mathematical formulas and draw figures on the screen. The fact that these objects can be written by a single pen (marker) without switching the device, mode, software or whatever else, and without any writing restrictions such as grids or boxes is one of the most important benefits of the pen interfaces. However, the task of segmenting these objects is challenging. To address this issue, we have applied a probabilistic model employing stroke features, stroke crossings and stroke densities. Further, we partially apply the approach of segmentation by recognition. Although the current recognizer for formulas is not a true recognizer, we have achieved about 81% correct segmentation for all the strokes when applied to our newly prepared database of mixed patterns. This method has been compared with a neural-network. The results show that our method is generally better but less effective in distinguishing figures from other components. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose a Kansei retrieval method based on the design pattern of traditional Japanese crafting object to provide a user with the desired presentation space in digital traditional Japanese crafting system. The visual quantitative feature values are extracted by using Visual Pattern Image Coding (VPIC). These values include the total number, the frequency, the dispersion rate and the deviation rate for different edges. The quantitative feature values for traditional Japanese crafting objects are registered in the multimedia database and the relation between Kansei words and the visual feature of traditional Japanese crafting objects are analyzed by using the questionnaire. Then, the visual features are compared with the quantitative feature values. Through the above process, we can find the relation between the design pattern components and edge types using VPIC. By finding this relation, the Kansei retrieval method can be realized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The following paper presents the results obtained during the analyses of the street structure of Tokyo, focusing on six districts: Shinjuku, Shibuya, Ikebukuro, Ueno, Nakano and Aoto. The length-area relation in the chosen zones shows the presence of the analogue of a fractal dimension. The fractal dimension appears in these high-density street zones branching within a limited territory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lean manufacturing, pioneered by Toyota, has been credited with the most significant improvements in production efficiency and product quality since the transformation from craft manufacturing to mass production in the early 20th century. It represents a comprehensive philosophy for structuring, operation, control, and management of production systems that is believed to have wide applicability. This paper outlines major lean manufacturing principles and discusses their potential for application in the mining industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In January 1999, the authors published a quantitative prediction that the Nikkei index should recover from its 14-year low in January 1999 and reach ≈20 500 a year later. The purpose of the present paper is to evaluate the performance of this specific prediction as well as the underlying model: the forecast, performed at a time when the Nikkei was at its lowest (as we can now judge in hindsight), has correctly captured the change of trend as well as the quantitative evolution of the Nikkei index since its inception. As the change of trend from sluggish to recovery was estimated quite unlikely by many observers at that time, a Bayesian analysis shows that a skeptical (resp. neutral) Bayesian sees prior belief in our model amplified into a posterior belief 19 times larger (resp. reach the 95% level). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information about several papers presented at the Seventh International Symposium on Bio-Proton induced X-Ray Emission (PIXE), held from October 30 to November 4, 2011, at the Katahira Sakura Hall and the Center Hall, Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan, is presented. Topics discussed include nuclear microprobe analysis, ion beam microscopy and synchrotron radiation X-ray fluorescence (SR-XRF). It featured Tilo Reinert, Chris Ryan and Primoz Pelicon.

T2K is the first of a new generation of long baseline neutrino oscillation experiments that will measure neutrino oscillations parameters. The experiment uses the J-PARC accelerator complex on the east cost of Japan to sent a neutrino beam to the Kamioka mine, located 295 km to the west. It consists of a dedicated beam-line, a near detector complex to characterize the beam and the well-known Super-Kamiokande detector to measure the oscillation signal. This paper describes the experimental setup, the results of the first measurement campaign as well as giving an outlook on the future potential of the experiment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information about several papers presented at the Seventh International Symposium on Bio-Particle induced X-Ray Emission (PIXE), held from October 30 to November 4, 2011, at the Katahira Sakura Hall and the Center Hall, Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan, is presented. Topics discussed include the fundaments of PIXE, techniques of PIXE analysis and experimental developments. It featured 122 participants from 17 countries.