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The essay will explore new understandings of time in daily life coincident with the onset of urbanization and availability of medical treatment in urban areas in late sixteenth century Japan, focusing on the cities of Ōsaka and Kyoto. The primary source for the essay is a contemporary diary (Tokitsune kyōki) that provides a near-daily record of activity over a period of twenty years. The essay will explore such topics as: reporting of medical symptoms, keeping track of the progress of ailments, the keeping by patients of longer-term records of medicines and their use; times reported for physician – patient interactions, which shed light on activity time in daily life; references to, and speculation on the need to note, time of arrival and departure for trips or attendance at events; and the apparent new rhythms of time consciousness associated with regular medicinal ingestion as part of a long-term health maintenance regimen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we first review current Japanese urban and regional sociological literature on the COVID‐19 pandemic. Some empirical studies of the current conditions, challenges, and difficulties faced by urban communities with the pandemic have loomed large. Although urban governance of infectious disease control has been generally an important research topic in urban studies, there is limited research on this aspect, particularly in Japan. Then, we briefly examine the urban governance of the pandemic in Japan, with a focus on the case of Osaka. Specifically, by analyzing the meeting minutes of Osaka Prefectural Government's countermeasure headquarters, we shed light on what issues were mainly dealt with and what main organizational actors were involved. The results indicate that, in addition to the administrative and political collaboration between central, prefectural, and municipal governments, the involvement of industrial and professional organizations (e.g., medical and economic associations) is particularly salient. This is because the governmental sector in Japan lacks a strong legal framework and a policy implementation capacity for infectious disease control. Consequently, it has requested (through intermediary associations) that residents, businesses, and hospitals cooperate with the government to control the spread of the virus. With regard to the characteristics of the Japanese urban governance of the pandemic, more comparative research between cities and regions in the country and those in other countries will be one of the important issues for future Japanese urban and regional sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: In 2004, the Japanese government halted nationwide mass screening for neuroblastoma in 6-month-old infants as it led to overdiagnosis of localized tumors with favorable prognoses and failed to reduce neuroblastoma-related mortality. However, a new mass screening program for neuroblastoma in 18-month-old infants (18MS) was conducted in the Osaka prefecture. We assessed the efficacy of the 18MS in screening unfavorable cases. Methods: Public health centers in Osaka prefecture, excluding the Osaka city area, provided test kits to the guardians of infants who received a check-up at 18 months of age between 2004 and 2017. For patients whose standardized urinary levels of vanillylmandelic acid or homovanillic acid exceeded the threshold, they were further examined and treated in two specific hospitals Osaka University Hospital and Osaka Women's and Children's Hospital. Screening-positive patients with and without neuroblastoma were retrospectively reviewed. Results: Among 142,423 children screened during the 18MS, 85 tested positive, and 14 were diagnosed with neuroblastoma. Twelve patients were classified as very low risk, while 2 were classified as high risk, based on the International Neuroblastoma Risk Group risk classification. Conclusion: The 18MS did not screen unfavorable cases with neuroblastoma efficiently, although few participants benefited from it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While numerous studies have utilized SET to examine the residents' attitudes towards tourism, relatively scant from the literature is a discussion regarding the influence of emotion generated through SET among residents on their attitudes towards tourism. In addition, past studies mainly explored the social exchange between visitors and locals, while neglecting the social exchange within a local community. The goal of this study is to examine the influence individuals' emotions toward their ethnic counterparts within a community can have on residents' (i.e., members of the dominant ethnic group—Japanese and members of the ethnic minority group—Koreans) attitudes toward ethnic neighborhood tourism within the Korean neighborhood of Ikuno, Osaka, Japan. Ikuno has the highest concentration of Korean residents in Japan, and the town has become a destination of cultural tourism centered on Korean culture. Analysis of 640 completed questionnaires revealed while attitudes of Korean residents, who are more likely to perceive economic benefits from tourism have more favorable attitudes towards tourism, Japanese residents form their particular attitudes towards tourism based on the emotional solidarity they experience with their Korean neighbors. These findings indicate both utility of economic approach of social exchange theory and significant role of emotion in social exchange. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For this paper we apply the framework of resilience as an adaptive process to examine alternative practices that assist socially vulnerable populations into the urban fabrik. The recent direction of Osaka’s inner city rental housing market for public assistance recipients is used as case study. We look on systemic aspects such as changing tenant revenues and welfare policies, and analyze the innovative housing reuse practices of local landlords and real estate agents. Our results show that the resilience-producing systemic properties are co-produced by public assitance policies, the particular condition of Osaka’s inner city and individual stakeholders' actions. While these stakeholders have benefited immensely from the housing market’s resilient response, it is structured by uneven dependencies, which ultimately affects the housing opportunities and care services for current and future tenants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research suggests that raccoons (Procyon lotor) can transmit several important pathogens affecting humans, including protozoans. In Japan, the number of wild raccoons has increased since they were first introduced more than 50 years ago. Here, we report the first survey of Cryptosporidium infection using fecal swabs of raccoons captured in Osaka, Japan. Of 116 raccoons examined by PCR targeting of the Cryptosporidium 18S rRNA gene, 7 (6.03%; 2 adults and 5 young animals) were positive, and the isolates were identified as Cryptosporidium skunk genotype (subtype XVIa) and C. parvum based on sequence and phylogenetic analyses. Both species and the genotype are zoonotic; thus, our results suggest that raccoons could transmit Cryptosporidium infections to humans in Japan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This case study wanted to look at how the Assistant Language Teachers (ALTs) in Osaka City called City Native English Teachers (CNETS) perceive the English program that they were hired in, what they think are the difficulties and strengths of the program. The participants of this case study are the CNETs/ALTs working in Osaka, and a survey was done along with interviews for its methodology. Results validated the dilemma of teaching English in Japan such as lack of Communicative Language Teaching activities and more on traditional teacher-centered, grammar-translation method type of teaching. Other aspects such as student personalities, quality of textbooks, kind of teachers (JTE and ALT), access to teaching materials and other issues were tackled as difficulties/weaknesses of the English program in Osaka from the perspectives of the CNETS. Suggestions were also given after the various weaknesses were presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: We aimed to assess recent Latin American medical school graduates' knowledge and attitudes about OSA and examine whether their knowledge and attitudes about OSA differed from practicing physicians. Methods: Recent medical graduates completed the Spanish translation of the OSA Knowledge and Attitudes (OSAKA) questionnaire at the 2013 national primary-care residency-placement meeting in Ecuador. The OSAKA includes 18 knowledge and five attitudinal items about OSA. We compared recent graduates' data with data collected in 2010-2011 from practicing physicians using chi-square tests of associations among categorical variables and analysis of variance of differences in mean knowledge and attitude scores. Unadjusted logistic regression models tested the odds that recent graduates (vs. practicing physicians) answered each item correctly. Results: Of 265 recent graduates, 138 (52.1%) were male, and mean age was 25.9 years. Although mean knowledge was low overall, scores were lower for recent graduates than for the 367 practicing physicians (53.5% vs. 60.4%; p < 0.001). Practicing physicians were significantly more likely to answer specific items correctly with one exception--recent graduates were more likely to know that < 5 apneas-hypopneas/h is normal (OR 1.47, 1. 03-2.07). Physicians in practice attributed greater importance to OSA as clinical disorder and the need for identifying patients with OSA; but recent graduates reported greater confidence in managing patients with OSA and CPAP. Conclusions: OSA-focused educational interventions during medical school should help to improve recent medical graduates' abilities to diagnose and treat OSA. We recommend a greater number of hours of medical students' exposure to sleep education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Present-day stress fields in and around metropolitan Osaka, Japan, have been investigated based on 238 microearthquake focal mechanism solutions from approximately the past 10 years. The successful retrieval of the focal mechanisms in the noisy urban area owed much to the clean seismic data recorded at four borehole observatories deeper than 500 m depth in Osaka prefecture, in which P-wave onset polarity of the microearthquake could be clearly identified. We found many microearthquakes with a pure reverse-faulting mechanism, which is consistent with the faulting style of major active faults within the area (42-km long east-dipping Uemachi and 38-km long east-dipping Ikoma fault zones); however, a considerable number of microearthquakes with strike-slip components were also found to occur. Most of the P-axes are oriented in the ESE–WNW to ENE–WSW directions sub-horizontally, conforming to the general tectonic trend of the area. The analysis of a stress tensor inversion delineated small but noticeable differences in stress regime, on a scale of at least 10 km, where strike-slip faulting prevails throughout the region but the middle and southern sections of the Uemachi fault zone contain some reverse-faulting components. Based on the estimated stress fields, together with assumptions regarding the deep geometry of the Uemachi fault zone, we assessed the reactivation potential of the fault zone through slip-tendency analysis. The results indicate higher potential in the middle and southern sections of the fault zone, which is related to the locally increased reverse component detected there. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cosmopolitanism, and the relation of the city, the state and networks that exceed state borders, has garnered significant recent commentary. This article examines that relation as imagined at a fraught historical moment in a uniquely positioned city. Writing at the height of colonial expansion, Oda Sakunosuke presented Japan's merchant capital Osaka as an off-centre to the imperial capital Tokyo. His 1942 novel Waga machi engages with a notion fundamental to discourses of empire: that of a transcendent unity to which all locales are subordinated. Waga machi dramatizes the powerful allure of this imperial transcendence for its protagonist. At the same time, it imagines an alternative, local cosmopolitanism rooted in Osaka, which it links to the Philippines through images of flow. This article examines the flows that define that local city – flows of water, traffic, language and migrant labour. It argues that attention to the novel's emphatic locality clarifies not only Osaka's significance to the imperial imaginary (and Oda's significance to modern Japanese literature) but also the city's potential to serve as a locus of critique. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: A comparative study on atmospheric polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in particulate matter and the gaseous phase was performed at an urban and a residential site in Osaka, Japan, during 2005–2006. PAH concentrations at the urban site were found to be approximately twice higher than those at the residential site. At both sites, particulate PAH concentrations increased mainly in winter while the trends of temporal change in gaseous PAH concentrations were not clearly observed. The main sources of PAHs were estimated to be local traffic, e.g., diesel engines with catalytic converter. PAH concentrations did not significantly negatively correlate with ozone concentrations and meteorological parameters. Gas–particle partitioning coefficients of representative PAHs with low molecular weight (LMW) significantly negatively correlated with ambient temperature, showing that temporal change in the LMW PAH concentrations in PM could be attributable to the shift of their gas–particle distribution caused by the change in ambient temperature. For the first time, we studied the effect of the formation of atmospherically stable layer following an increase in PAH concentrations in Japan. At the urban site, PAHs showed a significant positive correlation with potential temperature gradients, indicating that temporal variability in PAH concentrations would be dominantly controlled by the formation of atmospherically stable layer in Osaka area. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Determining that the centralized political system is the cause of its persistent economic problems, Japan’s political leaders have been promoting neoliberalism-oriented state decentralization since the early 2000s. Stimulated by this policy, the prefecture of Osaka – the center of Japan’s second economic region – and its neighbors established a federation-type regional government in December 2010. However, some members left this regionalist coalition before its launch, which demonstrates the existance of internal tensions. In this study, the frameworks of Institutional Collective Action and politics of scale are applied to examine the regionalism decision-making process. Our findings suggest: (1) systemic political and economic biases run within the regionalism and (2) the likely urban economic and governance conditions after the devolution would be much more uncertain and messier than the reform advocates suggest they would be. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The levels of polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxin and dibenzofuran (PCDD/PCDFs), and dioxin-like polychlorinated biphenyls (DL-PCBs) were determined in sediment samples from Can Gio, South Vietnam, and Osaka, Japan. Can Gio is known for the defoliation of its mangrove forests by aerial spraying with Agent Orange during the Vietnam War, whereas Osaka is renowned for a PCDD/PCDF pollution accident at a municipal solid-waste incinerator. For comparison, we also analyzed PCDD/PCDFs and DL-PCBs in sediment samples from Hue and Hanoi, Vietnam. The toxic equivalent quantity (TEQ) values in Can Gio were as high as those in Hue, Hanoi, and suburban areas of Osaka, but much lower than those in urban areas of Osaka. The proportion of the World Health Organization (WHO)-TEQ value contributed by 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD) in Can Gio was approximately 30%, higher than the values in the other sample areas. These data suggest that residual sedimentary TCDD that originated from aerial spraying of Agent Orange occur in only low concentrations in Can Gio. The main contributors to WHO-TEQ values in Can Gio are natural sources, as in Hue. In contrast, commercial PCBs are the dominant contributors to WHO-TEQ values in Hanoi. In Osaka, agrochemicals used in rice cultivation, the incineration of solid waste, and commercial PCBs equally contributed to WHO-TEQ values at suburban locations. The dumping of incinerator-related materials and/or the inadequate management of commercial PCBs have resulted in significantly elevated WHO-TEQ values of 240–370ngkg–1 dw at urban locations in Osaka. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• Feedback effects in the urban building energy and climate system were quantified. • Fed-back gains in cooling energy demand reaching 10% were estimated in Osaka. • The proposed urban meteorological model WRF-CM-BEM can reproduce the above effect. • The model estimated fed-back impacts on air temperature of 10 to 20%. The interaction between urban air temperature (T) and building cooling energy demand (E) generates a well-known positive feedback (PFB), which is mediated by sensible anthropogenic heat (Q fs) and named Q fs -T-E PFB in this study. This PFB could induce self-reinforced warming in urban areas, but its effects have not been completely quantified. Hence, this study aimed to clarify these effects by targeting Osaka, a Japanese major city. Focusing on the from-weekends-to-weekdays increase in urban energy consumption including E increase as an observable trigger of the PFB, its induced T rise due to growth in Q fs was estimated with the fed-back additional E gain on weekdays based on observed ground-level T and district-wise electric power consumption during summer. The result indicated that the weekdays–weekends contrast in energy consumption over Osaka could induce the Q fs -T-E PFB effects, which resulted in fed-back E gain reaching 10% on weekdays. Such observational PFB impact on E was found to be roughly reproducible by the proposed urban meteorological model, named WRF-CM-BEM. Thus, the validated model was applied to the quantification of the climatological PFB impact on T based on feedback gain (g A) which means a percentage of T variation caused by the PFB. An attempt was made to quantify g A through the two-cases simulations of the weekdays-run and holidays-run for the months of August in 10 years, focusing again on the weekdays–weekends contrast in urban energy consumption. The simulations provided estimates on g A , whose daytime averages reached nearly 10% in the downtown commercial areas and 20% in the leeward-located residential areas, suggesting the influence of sea breeze heat advection of downtown Q fs. Such estimated impacts on T were roughly in the same order of magnitude compared to those in a few earlier studies that were not based on observational validations and seemed to be non-negligible, considering the feedback impacts on global surface warming estimated with g A of approximately 50% by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ground penetrating radar (GPR) and high-resolution shallow reflection seismic surveying were carried out to investigate the subsurface geology in and around the Uemachi Fault zone in the Yamato River area, Osaka, Japan. Shallow drilling in the area showed a major displacement event during the middle Pleistocene. The main Uemachi Fault plane could be clearly imaged on the seismic section, except for the most shallow 200 m. Several shallow normal fault planes with less displacement could be detected on both sides of the fault plane. GPR profiles confirmed the presence of several shallow normal faults within the area near the fault zone. These shallow faults could be followed in all of the GPR profiles crossing the fault zone. The integration of seismic section, GPR profiles and drilling data led to a conceptual model that explains the evolution of the Uemachi Fault system. The proposed model suggests the occurrence of several cycles of small vertical displacement along the deep part of the fault plane caused by the regional east–west compressional stress. The ductile nature of the shallow sedimentary cover and the absence of confining pressure in the shallow part allow for a considerable amount of plastic bending before failing in the shallow sedimentary layers. This bending generates stretching force within the shallow sedimentary cover, which in time, along with gravitational force, gives rise to the formation of the swarm of normal faults within the shallow layers near the fault zone. Some of the detected faults extend to a depth of less than 3 m below the ground surface, suggesting that the last tectonic activity along the fault plane may have occurred recently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A ground penetrating radar (GPR) survey was conducted across the well-known Uemachi fault system in order to investigate the shallow geological structures in the vicinity of the fault zone. Field acquisition parameters were selected after collecting several test profiles to find out the most adequate gain, time range and wave frequency. Twelve GPR profiles and six wide-angle refraction reflection (WARR) profiles were acquired in the area. Basic processing was applied to the data in order to reduce artifacts and noise in the original data. The interpreted GPR profiles clearly show the location and the geometry of a subsurface fault scarp that has a visible expression at the surface as well as several subsurface fault strands. The subsurface faults and fractures mainly trend in the north–south direction, parallel to the strike of Uemachi fault plane. Most of these fault strands extend for long distance so that they could be easily traced from one profile to the next. The field survey shows that deformational structures are reasonably concentrated near the Uemachi fault zone. The intensity of fault strands increases with increasing depth and towards the south at the study site. The hazardous zone around the fault can be easily avoided in future building and development as the planes of weakness are concentrated near the fault plane and completely disappear at distances less than 100 m away from the fault plane. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

A 3.5-km-long shallow seismic reflection profile was acquired along Yodo riverbank across the active Uemachi fault, Osaka City, Japan. The study aimed to explore the subsurface geological structures in and around the Uemachi active fault system and to assess the feasibility of using reflection seismology to investigate subsurface structure in urban areas where large amount of cultural noise is expected to interfere with the seismic signal. Field recording parameters were adapted to the accessibility limitation and safety precautions in the study area.The quality of collected data was marginal and the signal to noise (S/N) ratio was considerably low. The data processing involved intensive frequency–wave number (f–k) filtering and summing adjacent common midpoints (CMPs) before stack as well as weighted stacking. The f–k filtering removed most of the ground roll and guided waves while summation of adjacent common midpoints increased the fold and enhanced the apparent signal to noise ratio of the final section. Trace weighting before stack was remarkably effective in increasing the identity and continuity of reflections. The visual and statistical comparison between weighted stack and the basic stack proved that weighted stacking produces significantly more coherent section.The interpretation of the final seismic section and the correlation with the borehole data in the vicinity confirmed the location of the Uemachi fault plane. The fault is shown in the seismic section as a reverse fault that dips to the east with an angle of about 75°. The seismic line also revealed the possibility of the presence of other two shallow faults on the hanging wall of the Uemachi fault. The two faults are dipping to the same dip direction of Uemachi fault with slightly larger dip angle. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In Japan, research on urban residential differentiation has been carried out since the 1970s. Most of this research has focused on large cities using social area analysis and factorial ecology. The poor availability of small area statistics hindered research on urban residential differentiation until the end of the 1960s. Therefore, previous studies that focused on the modern cities in Japan used region-specific materials. For example, Ueno (1981) who studied in Tokyo in the 1920s used the census data calculated by the Tokyo City Office and Mizuuchi (1982) who studied in Osaka from the 1860s to the 1930s used various statistics created by the prefectural police and so on. For this reason, it is difficult to explore the inter-city comparison on the residential differentiation during the period of modernization in Japan. This study assesses the possibility of utilizing telephone directories as a data source to determine differences in geographical residence on the basis of occupation and visualize the distribution of white-collar workers' residences in the mid-1930s in three Japanese cities: Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto. Although the regional situation on the penetration of telephones needs to be considered, the inter-city comparison becomes possible since the telephone directories in which the occupation of telephone subscribers was recorded was made available nationwide in the pre-war period. Since the white-collar workers during that period relatively belonged to the high class, many of them were considered subscribing to telephones. In addition, white-collar workers changed the previous urban structure that consisted of merchants and craftsmen into a modern one. Therefore, white-collar workers are a suitable subject for analyzing the telephone directory and the residential differentiation in the mid-1930s. According to the Burgess' concentric zone model, in the early twentieth century, the white-collar workers lived in the suburbs. It is also possible that their residences had spread the sectorial pattern along transportation routes considering Hoyt's sector model. Ueno (1981) says that in 1920, the residential districts in Tokyo comprised of civil servants and professional workers spread to the western region in a sectorial pattern. In Osaka, which is the second largest city in Japan, white-collar workers lived in the suburbs and also the center (Mizuuchi, 1982). In this study, we examine the distribution of residences among white-collar workers in the mid-1930s based on the results of the previous studies and population statistics related to white-collar workers in 1925 and 1965. The telephone directories used in this study are "Syokugyou-betsu Denwa Meibo Dai 25 Han (Classified Telephone Directory of 25th Edition in Tokyo)" as of 1935, "Osaka-shi Oyobi Kinko Denwa Bango-bo (Telephone Directory of Osaka City and Suburbs)" as of 1937 and "Kyoto-shi Denwa Bango-bo (Telephone Directory of Kyoto City)" as of 1937. Figure 1 shows the distribution of telephone subscribers among company employees and executives in Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto. In Tokyo, there were not many white-collar workers in the old city center who had their origin from the townsmen's residences in the Edo period. Many of the white-collar workers lived in the western sector of the suburbs. Their residences spread not only in the specific sector of the suburbs but also in the old city center in Osaka and Kyoto. The distribution of the white-collar workers generally corresponded to the distribution of the salaried workers based on the 1925 Population Census by municipalities in the three cities. However, there was some difference in Tokyo since the salaried workers' residences also spread in the city center. It is assumed that the suburbanization of the white-collar workers had proceeded in the decade. The Second World War had two significant impacts on the white-collar workers in the major Japanese cities. First, although there was no severe damage only in Kyoto by the air raid, many of them lost their residences due to the fire and evacuation. Second, the decrease in young population by the conscription affected the whole Japanese society without any distinction between urban or rural areas. Regarding the distribution of the white-collar workers in 1965, there were no significant impacts of WWII. From the mid-1930s through 1965, the suburbanization of the white-collar workers in the three cities progressed further. The whitecollar workers living in the city center gradually decreased in Osaka and Kyoto. In fact, the war damage did not affect the urban structure on the residential differentiation, but it changed the urban landscape completely. The white-collar workers registered in these directories were either "Kaisya-jyuyaku Oyobi Kaisya-in (company employees and executives)", "Ginko-jyuyaku Oyobi Ginko-in (bank employees and executives)", or "Kanri (clerical workers)". The data for analysis in the three cities were collected from the address information of only company employees and executives provided in the telephone directories. Moreover, being a company employee or executive was regarded as a typical occupation of white-collar workers. The spatial units chochos (small areas) in Tokyo and Osaka were considered. Since the address information in the center of Kyoto was insufficient, the units in only Kyoto were taken as census tracts. The number of telephone subscribers per 100 households in the 1935 Population Census was calculated by summing up the records of the subscribers on the basis of their spatial units. Table 1 shows the number of telephone subscribers among company employees and executives in the mid-1930s and the number of households in 1935 in Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto. Since the distribution of white-collar workers' residences in the mid-1930s Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto appears to be consistent with that in 1925 and 1965, the telephone directory seems to be an effective source of information on office workers in small areas. In the future, we aim to analyze residences of all white-collar workers (e.g., clerical workers, professionals) using telephone directories. We have assumed that the distribution of white-collar workers' residences in the 1930s (based on the telephone directories) was the first phase in the long-term transition of white-collar workers from 1925 to 1965 in Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto. The southwestern suburb of Tokyo, where many of the white-collar workers lived in 1965, began transforming into residential areas for white-collar workers since the mid-1930s. This was due to an increase in the supply of residential properties after the Great Kanto earthquake in 1923. On the other hand, the pressure of suburbanization was weaker in Osaka and Kyoto; hence, in 1937, the spatial distribution of white-collar workers in these cities had a less pronounced sectoral pattern than the distribution in Tokyo. However, between 1937 and 1965, the residential pattern of the whitecollar workers in Osaka and Kyoto began changing into a sectoral structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper sheds light on the residences of white-collar workers in Tokyo and Osaka, Japan in the modernizing period using historical statistical data and telephone directories from a historical geographic information system (GIS) analysis. We examined the differences between the distribution of white-collar workers and the progress of suburbanization by comparing the respective unemployment censuses and telephone directories of Tokyo and Osaka. The analysis shows that in 1925, there was a tendency for many white-collar workers to live in certain city sectors, as well as in the city center. However, this trend had changed by the mid-1930s, when data show that private-sector white-collar workers tended to live more in areas with a relatively low population density. Compared to Osaka, Tokyo was relatively suburbanized with white-collar workers in private companies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On June 18, 2018, an MJMA6.1 inland crustal earthquake occurred on the northeast edge of the Osaka basin, Japan. This event impacted the region by the maximum PGA larger than 0.9 g, and it was followed by a series of weaker aftershocks. The earthquakes were located near the Arima-Takatsuki Tectonic Line (ENE–WSW dextral strike-slip faults) and the Uemachi fault system (N–S reverse faults), hence the seismotectonic interpretations we assumed to be rather complex. Here we propose a seismotectonic model of this sequence based on seismological data and stress field considerations. In particular, we infer to a centroid moment tensor for the mainshock using Bayesian full-waveform inversion from strong motion records. The solution of Mw5.6 involved a significant CLVD component, which we interpreted as being due to rupture process on a complex fault geometry. Decomposition of the non-DC moment tensor into major and minor pure-shear moment tensors suggests a combination of strike-slip and reverse faulting mechanisms. We also analyzed the 108 strongest aftershocks with MJMA between 2.0 and 4.1 using records from broadband and short-period stations. Aftershocks' moment tensors inverted from P-wave amplitudes exhibit mainly strike-slip and reverse faulting mechanisms, having significant spatial variations. The local stress field inverted from these mechanisms had a dominant maximum (compressional) principal stress σ1 in ESE–WNW direction, while σ2 ≅ σ3. Both ENE–WSW dextral strike-slip and N–S reverse faults can be active in such stress field as observed in the mainshock (without any need for stress spatial inhomogeneity). To conclude, the activated strike-slip fault is parallel to the Arima-Takatsuki Tectonic Line. The activated N–S reverse fault is dipping to east by 50° similarly as the Uemachi fault system. Joint shear movements on both of these faults contributed significantly to the total seismic moment of the mainshock. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pachytraga Paquier, 1900, the stratigraphically oldest genus of caprinine caprinid rudist, was previously known from only two chronospecies from a single lineage, that is the Hauterivian P. tubiconcha Astre, 1961 and the early Aptian P. paradoxa (Pictet and Campiche, 1869). Here, a new species, Pachytraga? tanakahitoshii, is erected on the basis of isolated left valves recovered from the Osaka and Sanchu areas, south-west Japan. This species has a moderate shell size (antero-posterior commissural diameter c. 30 mm), and its left valve is characterized by at least one possibly autapomorphic character (narrow anterior myophore, inclined inwards), as well as a mosaic of primitive (single longitudinal carina developed on the anterior side) and derived (simple marginal canals in the antero-dorsal valve margin) characters of Mediterranean and Middle East Tethyan Pachytraga. The Japanese Pachytraga? represents the first probable record of this genus outside the Mediterranean/Middle Eastern Tethyan province, and its early Barremian age partly fills the 'gap' in its previously known stratigraphical record, although the evolutionary relationship of the Japanese form with Mediterranean and Middle East Tethyan Pachytraga remains unsolved. However, the discovery of early Barremian Pachytraga? in Japan indicates that the evolutionary history of the genus is more complex than previously thought and should thus be discussed in a broader palaeogeographical context that must now include the Pacific. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]