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The cross sections of the 7Be(n, α)4He reaction for p-wave neutrons were experimentally determined at Ec.m. = 0.20−0.81 MeV close to the Big Bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) energy window for the first time on the basis of the detailed balance principle by measuring the time-reverse reaction. The obtained cross sections are much larger than the cross sections for s-wave neutrons inferred from the recent measurement at the n_TOF facility in CERN, but significantly smaller than the theoretical estimation widely used in the BBN calculations. The present results suggest the 7Be(n, α)4 He reaction rate is not large enough to solve the cosmological lithium problem

The creativity of scientists often manifests as localized hot streaks of significant success. Understanding the underlying mechanisms of these influential phases can enhance the effectiveness of support systems and funding allocation, fostering groundbreaking discoveries worthy of accolades. Historically, analyses have suggested that hot streaks occur randomly over time. However, our research, through meticulous examination, reveals that these phases are not flatly distributed but are more frequent at the early and late stages of scientists' careers. Notably, both early and late hot streaks are marked by dense tie collaborations, with the former typically involving close partnerships with particular authors and the latter being characterized by involvement in large-scale projects compared with single-top or ordinary papers. This pattern indicates that mid-career researchers lack both intimate relations and resources to keep big projects, leading to "mid-career pitfall" of consecutive success. This insight holds profound implications for the development of policies and initiatives aimed at bolstering innovative research and discovery., Competing Interests: Declarations Competing interests The authors declare no competing interests., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Background: Pseudomonas aeruginosa is an important causative agent of bacterial keratitis. This study investigates the antibacterial effect of photodynamic antimicrobial chemotherapy (PACT) with the chlorin derivative TONS504 (TONS504-PACT) and a blue light-emitting diode (LED) on P. aeruginosa in vitro . It also explores the synergistic effects of combining TONS504-PACT with EDTA, and compares the antibacterial effects of TONS504-PACT using blue light with those of previously reported red light., Methods: To evaluate the antibacterial effects of TONS504-PACT using blue light on P. aeruginosa , PACT with TONS504 (0-100 mg/L) was applied using a 405 nm LED at 0-30 J/cm 2 to P. aeruginosa (10 7-8 CFU/mL). The antibacterial effects were assessed by calculating the survival fraction. Subsequently, to compare the effects of TONS504-PACT using blue light with those of using red light, PACT with TONS504 (10 or 100 mg/L) was conducted using a 405 or 660 nm LED at 30 J/cm 2 and evaluated in the same manner. Finally, to investigate the synergistic antibacterial effects of TONS504-PACT with EDTA, PACT with TONS504 (0-100 mg/L) was applied using a 405 nm LED at 5 J/cm 2 , both with and without EDTA (0.015 M), and its antibacterial effects were similarly assessed., Results: TONS504-PACT using blue light decreased the survival of P. aeruginosa , depending on the light intensity. The greatest antibacterial effect was observed at 10 mg/L and 30 J/cm 2 , showing a survival fraction of 3.5 × 10 -5 . TONS504-PACT demonstrated a significantly greater antibacterial effect using blue light than that demonstrated using red light at 10 mg/L, though not at 100 mg/L. The combination of TONS504-PACT using blue light with EDTA significantly enhanced antibacterial effects at all concentrations., Conclusion: These findings confirm the effectiveness of TONS504-PACT using blue light against P. aeruginosa and suggest its potential as a treatment for bacterial keratitis., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest., (©2024 Tottori University Medical Press.)

The analysis of complex behavior in empirical data poses significant challenges in various scientific and engineering disciplines. Dynamic Mode Decomposition (DMD) is a widely used method to reveal the spectral features of nonlinear dynamical systems without prior knowledge. However, because of its infinite dimensions, analyzing the continuous spectrum resulting from chaos and noise is problematic. We propose a clustering-based method to analyze dynamics represented by pseudoeigenfunctions associated with continuous spectra. This paper describes data-driven algorithms for comparing pseudoeigenfunctions using subspaces. We used the recently proposed Residual Dynamic Mode Decomposition (ResDMD) to approximate spectral properties from the data. To validate the effectiveness of our method, we analyzed 1D signal data affected by thermal noise and 2D-time series of coupled chaotic systems exhibiting generalized synchronization. The results reveal dynamic patterns previously obscured by conventional DMD analyses and provide insights into coupled chaos's complexities., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

The potato cyst nematode Globodera rostochiensis originates from the Andean Mountain region in South America and has unintentionally been introduced to all inhabited continents. Several studies have examined the population genetic structure of this pest in various countries by using microsatellite markers. However, merging microsatellite data produced from different laboratories is challenging and can introduce uncertainty when interpreting the results. To overcome this challenge and to explore invasion routes of this pest, we have genotyped 22 G. rostochiensis populations from all continents. Within populations, the highest genetic diversity was observed in the South American populations, the European populations showed an intermediate level of genetic diversity and the remaining populations were the less diverse. This confirmed pre-existing knowledge such as a first introduction event from South America to Europe, but the less diverse populations could originate either from South America or from Europe. At the continental scale, STRUCTURE genetic clustering output indicated that North America and Asia have experienced at least two introduction events. Comparing different evolutionary scenarios, the Approximate Bayesian Computation analysis showed that Europe served as a secondary distribution centre for the invasion of G. rostochiensis into all other continents (North America, Africa, Asia and Oceania)., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Composite materials are popular because of their high performance capabilities, but new material development is time-consuming. To accelerate this process, researchers studying material informatics, an academic discipline combining computational science and material science, have developed less time-consuming approaches for predicting possible material combinations. However, these processes remain problematic because some materials are not suited for them. The limitations of specific candidates for new composites may cause potential new material pairs to be overlooked. To solve this problem, we developed a new method to predict possible composite material pairs by considering more materials than previous techniques. We predicted possible material pairs by conducting link predictions of material word co-occurrence networks while assuming that co-occurring material word pairs in scientific papers on composites were reported as composite materials. As a result, we succeeded in predicting the co-occurrence of material words with high specificity. Nodes tended to link to many other words, generating new links in the created co-occurrence material word network; notably, the number of material words co-occurring with graphene increased rapidly. This phenomenon confirmed that graphene is an attractive composite component. We expect our method to contribute to the accelerated development of new composite materials., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist., (Copyright: © 2024 Ishii et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

Studies have indicated that higher numbers of nurses regarding staffing ensure patient safety and a better practice environment. Using citation analysis, this study visualizes the landscape of nurse staffing research over the last two decades to show the overall publication trends, major contributors, and main research topics. We extracted bibliometric information from PubMed from January 2000 to September 2022. After clustering the network, we analyzed each cluster's characteristics by keyword. A total of 2167 papers were considered for analysis, and 14 clusters were created. The analysis showed that the number of papers published per year has been increasing. Researchers from the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, and Belgium have led this field. As the main clusters in nurse staffing research during the past two decades, the following five research settings were identified: nurse outcome and patient outcome research in acute care hospitals, nurse staffing mandate evaluation research, nursing home research, and school nurse research. The first three clusters accounted for more than 80% of the total number of published papers, and this ratio has not changed in the past 20 years. To further develop nurse staffing research globally, evidence from other geographic areas, such as African and Asian countries, and from long-term care or community settings is necessary.

Sustainable supply chain networks are critical to the survival of companies in interconnected business ecosystems. Today's rapidly changing market conditions require firms to restructure their network resources flexibly. In this study, we quantitatively investigated how firms' ability to adapt to the turbulent market depends on the stable maintenance and flexible recombination of inter-firm relationships. Using the proposed quantitative index "metabolism," we measured the micro-level dynamics of the supply chain, which represents each firm's average replacement rate of business partners. We applied this index to longitudinal data on the annual transactions of about 10,000 firms from 2007 to 2016 in the Tohoku region, which was affected by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. The distribution of metabolism values differed across regions and industries, indicating differences in the adaptive capacity of the corresponding firms. We also found the typical balance between supply chain flexibility and stability for successful companies that have survived in the market for a long time. In other words, the relationship between metabolism and duration was not linear but U-shaped, indicating an appropriate metabolism value for survival. These findings provide a deeper understanding of supply chain strategies for adapting to regional market dynamics., Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (© 2023 The Author(s).)

A scientist's choice of research topic affects the impact of their work and future career. While the disparity between nations in scientific information, funding, and facilities has decreased, scientists on the cutting edge of their fields are not evenly distributed across nations. Here, we quantify relative progress in research topics of a nation from the time-series comparison of reference lists from papers, using 71 million published papers from Scopus. We discover a steady leading-following relationship in research topics between Western nations or Asian city-states and others. Furthermore, we find that a nation's share of information-rich scientists in co-authorship networks correlates highly with that nation's progress in research topics. These results indicate that scientists' relationships continue to dominate scientific evolution in the age of open access to information and explain the failure or success of nations' investments in science., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

The potato cyst nematode (PCN) causes extensive crop losses worldwide. Because the hatching of PCN requires host-derived molecules known as hatching factors (HFs), regulating HF production in host plants may help to control this harmful pest. Solanoeclepin A (SEA), isolated from potato, is the most active HF for PCN; however, its biosynthesis is completely unknown. We discovered a HF called solanoeclepin B (SEB) from potato and tomato root exudates and showed that SEB was biosynthesized in the plant and converted to SEA outside the plant by biotic agents. Moreover, we identified five SEB biosynthetic genes encoding three 2-oxoglutarate-dependent dioxygenases and two cytochrome P450 monooxygenases in tomato. Exudates from tomato hairy roots in which each of the genes was disrupted contained no SEB and had low hatch-stimulating activity for PCN. These findings will help to breed crops with a lower risk of PCN infection.

Comprehensive observations of science, technology, and research policy transactions are important for developing an innovation strategy. We propose a new method that combines the academic landscape and matrix analysis to understand the relationships among activities of three aspects of the technological landscape: science, technology, and research policy. First, we divided academic research into 28 knowledge domains by clustering a citation network of scientific papers. Next, we developed a new matrix classifying them into three groups: "mature technology," "intermediate technology," and "emerging technology." The results showed that research domains in "emerging technology" showed a high rate of patent increase, indicating that they were commercializing rapidly. Finally, we identified the group that each country focused on, and this result reflected the countries' research policies. China and Singapore showed high rates, whereas Japan, France, and Germany had low values. This result reflects countries' research policies and implies that specialty research areas differed by country. As above, our research result implies that academia, industry, and government have paid attention to knowledge domains in "emerging technology" and these are important for creating innovation. A supercapacitor, also known as an electric double layer capacitor or ultracapacitor, was selected as an example in our method. This research could help academic researchers, industrial companies, and policymakers in developing innovation strategies., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest., (© 2022 The Authors.)

Identifying promising research as early as possible is vital to determine which research deserves investment. Additionally, developing a technology for automatically predicting future research trends is necessary because of increasing digital publications and research fragmentation. In previous studies, many researchers have performed the prediction of scientific indices using specially designed features for each index. However, this does not capture real research trends. It is necessary to develop a more integrated method to capture actual research trends from various directions. Recent deep learning technology integrates different individual models and makes it easier to construct more general-purpose models. The purpose of this paper is to show the possibility of integrating multiple prediction models for scientific indices by network-based representation learning. This paper will conduct predictive analysis of multiple future scientific impacts by embedding a heterogeneous network and showing that a network embedding method is a promising tool for capturing and expressing scientific trends. Experimental results show that the multiple heterogeneous network embedding improved 1.6 points than a single citation network embedding. Experimental results show better results than baseline for the number of indices, including the author h-index, the journal impact factor (JIF), and the Nature Index after three years from publication. These results suggest that distributed representations of a heterogeneous network for scientific papers are the basis for the automatic prediction of scientific trends., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Nesfatin-1 is an anorectic peptide expressed in both peripheral tissues and brain areas involved in the regulation of feeding, emotion and emesis. The aim of the present study is to characterize the distribution of NUCB2/nesfatin-1 in Suncus murinus and to investigate the actions of nesfatin-1 to affect gastrointestinal contractility, emesis, food and water intake, and locomotor activity. The deduced amino acid sequence of S. murinus nesfatin-1 using in silico cloning showed high homology with humans and rodents. NUCB2 mRNA was detected throughout the entire brain and in the gastrointestinal tract, including the stomach and gut. Western blot analysis and immunohistochemistry confirmed the expression of nesfatin-1 protein in these regions. The NUCB2 mRNA levels in the hypothalamus, hippocampus and brainstem were significantly decreased, whereas that in the striatum were increased after 24 h starvation compared to ad libitum -fed animals ( p < 0.05). In in vitro studies, nesfatin-1 (0.3-1,000 pM) failed to contract or relax the isolated gastric antrum and intestinal segments. In conscious, freely moving animals, intracerebroventricular administration of nesfatin-1 (1-50 pmol) induced emesis ( p < 0.05) and suppressed 6-h cumulative food intake ( p < 0.05), without affecting the latency to feeding. Nesfatin-1 (25 pmol, i.c.v.) decreased 24-h cumulative food and water intake by 28.3 and 35.4%, respectively ( p < 0.01). No significant differences in locomotor activity were observed. In conclusion, NUCB2/nesfatin-1 might be a potent regulator of feeding and emesis in S. murinus . Further studies are required to elucidate the mechanism of actions of this peptide as a mediator linking the brainstem NUCB2/nesfatin-1 to forebrain system., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Lu, Cui, Liu, Jiang, Ngan, Sakata, Takemi, Sakai, Lin, Chan and Rudd.)

In a dissipative quantum system, we report the dynamic mode decomposition (DMD) analysis of damped oscillation signals. We used a reflection-type pump-probe method to observe time-domain signals, including the coupled modes of long-lived longitudinal optical phonons and quickly damped plasmons (LOPC) at various pump powers. The Fourier transformed spectra of the observed damped oscillation signals show broad and asymmetric modes, making it difficult to evaluate their frequencies and damping rates. We then used DMD to analyze the damped oscillation signals by precisely determining their frequencies and damping rates. We successfully identified the LOPC modes. The obtained frequencies and damping rates were shown to depend on the pump power, which implies photoexcited carrier density. We compared the pump-power dependence of the frequencies and damping rates of the LOPC modes with the carrier density dependence of the complex eigen-energies of the coupled modes by using the non-Hermitian phenomenological effective Hamiltonian. Good agreement was obtained between the observed and calculated dependences, demonstrating that DMD is an effective alternative to Fourier analysis which often fails to estimate effective damping rates., (© 2021. The Author(s).)

Occurrence of pale potato cyst nematode, Globodera pallida (Stone) Behrens, was first recorded in Japan in 2015. Among several control measures, cultivation of resistant potato ( Solanum tuberosum L.) varieties is the most effective in cost and environmental impact. As no G. pallida -resistant varieties have yet been developed in Japan, great emphasis is being placed on screening of germplasm possessing the resistance and development of the resistant varieties. In this study, we first improved previously reported DNA markers linked to the G. pallida resistance loci ( GpaIV s adg and Gpa5 ) and then used these to screen more than 1,000 germplasms to select several candidate germplasms with resistance. We performed inoculation testing on the selected candidates and identified several resistant germplasms to the Japanese G. pallida population. Furthermore, we developed a simultaneous detection method combining three DNA markers linked to G. pallida and Globodera rostochiensis (Wollenweber) Behrens resistance loci. We validated the ability of C237-I marker to select resistant allele of GpaIV s adg and predict the presence of resistance in a Japanese breeding population. Resistant germplasms identified in this study could potentially be used to develop G. pallida -resistant varieties. The marker evaluation methods developed in this study will contribute to the efficient development of resistant varieties., (Copyright © 2021 by JAPANESE SOCIETY OF BREEDING.)

In this paper, we propose a finger-jointing model to describe the possible ultrastructures of cellulose microfibrils based on new observations obtained through heating of 2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidine-1-oxyl (TEMPO) oxidized cellulose nanofibrils (CNFs) in saturated water vapor. We heated the micrometers-long TEMPO-CNFs in saturated water vapor (≥ 120 °C, ≥ 0.2 MPa) and observed a surprising fact that the long TEMPO-CNFs unzipped into short (100 s of nanometers long) fibers. We characterized the heated TEMPO-CNFs using X-ray diffraction (XRD) and observed the XRD patterns were in consistent with Iβ. We observed also jointed ultrastructures on the heated TEMPO-CNFs via high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HR-TEM). Thus we concluded that cellulose microfibrils are not seamlessly long structures, but serial jointed structures of shorter blocks. Polysaccharide chains of the short blocks organized in Iβ. The jointed region can be either Iα or amorphous, depending on positions and distances among the chains jointed in proximity. Under heating, Iα was not converted into Iβ but was simply destroyed. The jointed structure implies a "working and resting rhythm" in the biosynthesis of cellulose.

Despite the intensive study of the viral spread of fake news in political echo chambers (ECs) on social networking services (SNSs), little is known regarding the underlying structure of the daily information spread in these ECs. Moreover, the effect of SNSs on opinion polarisation is still unclear in terms of pluralistic information access or selective exposure to opinions in an SNS. In this study, we confirmed the steady, highly independent nature of left- and right-leaning ECs, both of which are composed of approximately 250,000 users, from a year-long reply/retweet network of 42 million Japanese Twitter users. We found that both communities have similarly efficient information spreading networks with densely connected and core-periphery structures. Core nodes resonate in the early stages of information cascades, and unilaterally transmit information to peripheral nodes. Each EC has resonant core users who amplify and steadily spread information to a quarter of a million users. In addition, we confirmed the existence of extremely aggressive users of ECs who co-reply/retweet each other. The connection between these users and top influencers suggests that the extreme opinions of the former group affect the entire community through the top influencers.

Highly dispersed graphene nanosheets (GNS) are directly integrated into polyurethane sponge for the very first time. Individual GNS with an average thickness of 5 nm were uniformly encapsulated in polyurethane sponge (PUF). Highly durable, flexible, hydrophilic GNS/PUF demonstrated excellent organic dye absorption properties. For a detailed study, we selected typical water-soluble organic dyes such as methylene blue (MB), ethidium bromide (EtBr), eosin Y (EY). The adsorption behavior follows the Langmuir isotherm model indicating strong monolayer chemisorption. Adsorption capacity (μmol/g) of GNS while using in GNS/PUF is 586.8 (MB), 843.1 (EtBr), and 813.3 (EY). Thermodynamic study on the adsorption with three organic dyes using GNS/PUF revealed that the process was spontaneous and exothermic in nature. Additionally, the rate of adsorption is higher and follow the pseudo-second-order kinetic model. The detailed pH-dependent study showed that cationic dyes' adsorption increases with an increase in pH, and anionic dyes follow the opposite trend. The overall results show that the new adsorbent has highly suitable for practical application., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have influenced the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

A novel deodorizer that is capable of selectively eliminating the odorous chemicals, such as ammonia, trimethylamine, hydrogen sulfide and methyl mercaptan, is described. The deodorizer is a nanostructured aerogel by nature, consisting of 2,2-6,6-tetramethylpiperidine-1-oxyl (TEMPO) oxidized cellulose nanofibrils (CNF), transition metal divalent cations (M 2+ ), and multi-walled carbon nanotubes (CNT) as the constitutive elements. CNF are firstly mixed with M 2+ (M 2+ , in this paper, typifies Ni 2+ , Co 2+ and Cu 2+ ) to form CNF-M 2+ complexes, monodispersed CNT is then mixed to prepare CNT/CNF-M 2+ waterborne slurries; CNT/CNF-M 2+ hybridized aerogels are finally obtained via freezing-drying of the CNT/CNF-M 2+ waterborne slurries. The CNT/CNF-M 2+ aerogels are a foam-like structure consisting of CNF and CNT as backbones and M 2+ as linkers. The aerogels show higher capabilities (in comparison with activated carbon) for selectively adsorbing ammonia, trimethylamine, hydrogen sulfide and methyl mercaptan. Computing simulations suggest a theoretical conclusion that the odorous chemicals are absorbed in a preferring manner of bimolecular absorptions via the M 2+ moieties. The CNT/CNF-M 2+ hybridized aerogels are lightweight, eco-friendly, and easy to produce in industrial scales. Our new finding, as is described in this paper, demonstrates potential applications of the TEMPO-oxidized CNF to the field of deodorizations., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Delayed recognition in which innovative discoveries are re-evaluated after a long period has significant implications for scientific progress. The quantitative method to detect delayed recognition is described as the pair of Sleeping Beauty (SB) and its Prince (PR), where SB refers to citation bursts and its PR triggers SB's awakeness calculated based on their citation history. This research provides the methods to extract valid and large SB-PR pairs from a comprehensive Scopus dataset and analyses how PR discovers SB. We prove that the proposed method can extract long-sleep and large-scale SB and its PR best covers the previous multi-disciplinary pairs, which enables to observe delayed recognition. Besides, we show that the high-impact SB-PR pairs extracted by the proposed method are more likely to be located in the same field. This indicates that a hidden SB that your research can awaken may exist closer than you think. On the other hand, although SB-PR pairs are fat-tailed in Beauty Coefficient and more likely to integrate separate fields compared to ordinary citations, it is not possible to predict which citation leads to awake SB using the rarity of citation. There is no easy way to limit the areas where SB-PR pairs occur or detect it early, suggesting that researchers and administrators need to focus on a variety of areas. This research provides comprehensive knowledge about the development of scientific findings that will be evaluated over time., Competing Interests: Competing interestsThe authors declare that they have no competing interests., (© The Author(s) 2021.)

Cyst nematodes ( Globodera spp. and Heterodera spp.) are highly evolved sedentary endoparasites that are considered as harmful pests worldwide. The hatching of the dormant eggs of cyst nematodes occurs in response to hatching factors (HFs), which are compounds that are secreted from the roots of host plants. Solanoeclepin A (SEA), a triterpene compound, has been isolated as HF for potato cyst nematode (PCN) eggs, whereas other compounds, such as steroidal glycoalkaloids (SGAs), are also known to show weak hatching stimulation (HS) activity. However, the structures of both compounds are different and the HF-mediated hatching mechanism is still largely unknown. In the present study, we observed specific hatching of PCN eggs stimulated by the hairy root culture media of potato and tomato, revealing the biosynthesis and secretion of HFs. SGAs, such as α-solanine, α-chaconine, and α-tomatine, showed significant HS activity, despite being remarkably less activities than that of SEA. Then, we evaluated the contribution of SGAs on the HS activities of the hairy root culture media. The estimated SGAs content in the hairy root culture media were low and nonconcordant with the HS activity of those, suggesting that the HS activity of SGAs did not contribute much. The analysis of structure-activity relationship revealed that the structural requirements of the HS activity of SGAs are dependent on the sugar moieties attached at the C3-hydoroxyl group and the alkaloid property of their aglycones. The stereochemistry in the EF rings of their aglycone also affected the strength of the HS activity., (© 2020 Japanese Society for Plant Biotechnology.)

High-performance/low-cost platinum (Pt)-based electrocatalysts have been established by top-coating both sides of a titanium plate with Pt nanoparticles. The average diameter of the Pt nanoparticles used in this study is approximately 100 nm. Three types of Pt top-coated Pt/Ti electrocatalysts, each having different top-coated Pt layer thicknesses, are prepared. Type I is a monolayered Pt top-coated type, in which the thickness of the top-coated Pt layer is approximately 100 nm; Type II is a few-layered type with a top-coated Pt layer thickness of approximately 200 nm, and Type III is a multilayered type with a top-coated Pt layer thickness of approximately 750 nm. The mass loading of Pt is 0.0215 mg cm -2 for Type I, 0.043 mg cm -2 for Type II, and 0.161 mg cm -2 for Type III. The electrocatalytic activities of each type of Pt/Ti electrocatalyst are evaluated through the electrolysis of acidic water and tap water. Type I gives the highest electrocatalytic efficiencies, which are comparable or even better than the electrocatalytic efficiencies of the state-of-the-art commercially available Pt/C electrode and other metal-/carbon-based HER catalysts. For example, in the case of the electrolysis of acidic water at an overpotential of 0.15 V, Type I shows a Tafel slope of 29 mV dec -1 and a current density of 27.5 mA cm -2 . Even in the case of the electrolysis of tap water, Type I gives an HER Faradaic efficiency of 92%. A model of water (H 2 O), hydronium ions (H 3 O + ), and hydroxyl ions (OH - ) properly adsorbing on the Pt (111) facet is proposed to explain the electrocatalytic mechanism. New insights into the distinguishing properties of the resultant electrolyzed hydrogen water (EHW), namely, the healthy beneficial effects of EHW, are also described, and a new concept of storing and carrying reductive hydrogen (H*) by free Pt nanoparticles is proposed.

For research domains such as life sciences, which pursue fundamental scientific understanding and applications intended for immediate use, academic entrepreneurship has played a pivotal role in commercialization. This paper presents an evaluation method of researchers related to user-inspired fundamental research, using global databases of startup finances and academic research papers of "startup readiness." Case studies of startups related to biopharmaceutical research topics suggest that the biopharmaceutical field has rich opportunities stemming from scientific research, commercialization, and entrepreneurship. This evaluation method sorts specific industry segments by which financing activities are active, and by which related growing research topics attract increased academic attention. We constructed networks of author citation and co-authorship from paper citation networks related to research topics in industry segments in the biopharmaceutical domain. Results obtained across all research topics we surveyed demonstrated that authors in the top 10% of degree centrality ranking in both networks are far more likely to be startup participants than other authors. Our computational approach might provide convenient, dynamic, global, and real-time understanding of the "startup readiness" of researchers working with research topics for which academic attention is emerging in actively financed biopharmaceutical fields., (© 2020 The Author(s).)

Conventionally, the importance of nodes in a network has been debated from the viewpoint of the amount of information received by the nodes and its neighbors. While node evaluation based on the adjacency relationship mainly uses local proximity information, the community structure that characterizes the network has hardly been considered. In this study, we propose a new node index that contributes to the understanding of the inter-community structure of a network by combining the measures of link distribution and community relevance. The visualization of node rankings and rank correlations with respect to the attack tolerance of networks demonstrated that the proposed index shows the highest performance in comparison with five previously proposed indexes, suggesting a new way to detect latent mediators in heterogeneous networks.

Measurements of relaxation processes are essential in many fields, including nonlinear optics. Relaxation processes provide many insights into atomic/molecular structures and the kinetics and mechanisms of chemical reactions. For the analysis of these processes, the extraction of modes that are specific to the phenomenon of interest (normal modes) is unavoidable. In this study we propose a framework to systematically extract normal modes from the viewpoint of model selection with Bayesian inference. Our approach consists of a well-known method called sparsity-promoting dynamic mode decomposition, which decomposes a mixture of damped oscillations, and the Bayesian model selection framework. We numerically verify the performance of our proposed method by using coherent phonon signals of a bismuth polycrystal and virtual data as typical examples of relaxation processes. Our method succeeds in extracting the normal modes even from experimental data with strong backgrounds. Moreover, the selected set of modes is robust to observation noise, and our method can estimate the level of observation noise. From these observations, our method is applicable to normal mode analysis, especially for data with strong backgrounds., (© 2020 The Author(s). Published by National Institute for Materials Science in partnership with Taylor & Francis Group.)

Gastric contractions show two specific patterns in many species, migrating motor contractions (MMC) and postprandial contractions (PPCs), that occur in the fasted and fed states, respectively. In this study, we examined the role of somatostatin (SST) in gastric motility both in vivo and in vitro using the Asian house shrew (Suncus murinus). We performed in vivo recordings of gastric motility and in vitro organ bath experiments using S. murinus, which was recently established as a small laboratory animal for use in tests of gastrointestinal motility. SST (1.65 µg kg -1  min -1 ) was intravenously administered during phase II of MMC and PPCs. Next, the effect of SST on motilin-induced gastric contractions at phase I of MMC was measured. Cyclosomatostatin (CSST), an SST receptor antagonist, was administered at the peak of phase III of MMC. In addition, the effect of SST (10 -11 -10 -9  M) on motilin-induced gastric contractions was evaluated using an organ bath experiment in vitro. In conscious, free-moving S. murinus, the administration of SST decreased the occurrence of the spontaneous phase II of MMC and PPCs. Pretreatment with SST and octreotide suppressed the induction of motilin-induced gastric contractions both in vivo and in vitro. Administration of CSST before the peak of spontaneous phase III contractions had no effect on gastric contractions. Endogenous SST is not involved in the regulation of gastric MMC and PPCs, but exogenous SST suppresses spontaneous gastric contractions. Thus, SST would be good for treating abnormal gastrointestinal motility disorders.

The intestinal epithelial monolayer forms a mucosal barrier between the gut microbes and the host tissue. The mucosal barrier is composed of mucins and antimicrobial peptides and proteins (AMPs). Several animal studies have reported that Paneth cells, which occupy the base of intestinal crypts, play an important role in the intestinal innate immunity by producing AMPs, such as lysozyme, Reg3 lectins, α-defensins, and group IIA secretory phospholipase A2 (GIIA sPLA2). The house musk shrew (Suncus murinus) has only a few intestinal commensal bacteria and is reported to lack Paneth cells in the intestine. Although the expression of lysozyme was reported in the suncus intestine, the expression of other AMPs has not yet been reported. Therefore, the current study was focused on GIIA sPLA2 expression in Suncus murinus. GIIA sPLA2 mRNA was found to be most abundant in the spleen and also highly expressed in the intestine. Cells expressing GIIA sPLA2 mRNA were distributed not only in the crypt, but also in the villi. In addition, intragastric injection of lipopolysaccharide increased GIIA sPLA2 expression in the small intestine of suncus. These results suggest that suncus may host unique AMP-secreting cells in the intestine., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

In the present study, TONS504 (C 51 H 58 N 8 O 5 I 2 ; molecular weight, 1,116.9), a novel cationic hydrophilic photosensitizer, was synthesized from protoporphyrin IX dimethyl ester through a five-step process according to a patented method for use in photodynamic therapy (PDT). The subcellular localization of TONS504 and the cytotoxic effects of TONS504-mediated PDT in the mouse mammary tumor EMT6 cell line were investigated. TONS504 was localized primarily in the lysosomes and partially in the mitochondria. The cytotoxic effects of TONS504-mediated PDT in the mouse mammary tumor EMT6 cell line were investigated using a WST8 assay and an Oxidative Stress kit. The cell viability values following treatment with 10 µg/ml TONS504 at light energies of 0, 1, 5 and 10 J/cm 2 were 92.5, 101.8, 27.7 and 1.8%, respectively. The percentages of reactive oxygen species (ROS)(+) cells following the same treatment were 8.6, 8.5, 29.2 and 70.1%, respectively, whereas the percentages of apoptotic cells were 7.1, 5.6, 24.8 and 48.7%, respectively. The percentages of ROS(+) and apoptotic cells in the group subjected to TONS504-mediated PDT increased in a manner dependent on the TONS504 concentration and light energy. Further studies are required to evaluate the in vivo pharmacokinetics, tissue distribution and photodynamic effects of TONS504.

Ghrelin is a unique fatty acid-modified peptide hormone produced in the stomach and has important roles in energy homeostasis and gastrointestinal motility. However, the medium-chain fatty acid source for ghrelin acyl-modification is not known. We found that a fat-free diet and the removal of intestinal microbiota did not decrease acyl-ghrelin production in the stomach or plasma acyl-ghrelin levels in mice. RT-PCR analysis showed that genes involving fatty acid synthesis, metabolism, and transport were expressed in pancreas-derived ghrelinoma (PG-1) cells. Treatment with an irreversible inhibitor of carnitine palmitoyltransferase-1 (CPT-1) strongly decreased acylated ghrelin levels but did not affect ghrelin or ghrelin o-acyl transferase (GOAT) mRNA levels in PG-1 cells. Our results suggest that the medium-chain fatty acid used for the acyl-modification of ghrelin is produced in ghrelin-producing cells themselves by β-oxidation of long-chain fatty acids provided from the circulation.

Several network features and information retrieval methods have been proposed to elucidate the structure of citation networks and to detect important nodes. However, it is difficult to retrieve information related to trends in an academic field and to detect cutting-edge areas from the citation network. In this paper, we propose a novel framework that detects the trend as the growth direction of a citation network using network representation learning(NRL). We presume that the linear growth of citation network in latent space obtained by NRL is the result of the iterative edge additional process of a citation network. On APS datasets and papers of some domains of the Web of Science, we confirm the existence of trends by observing that an academic field grows in a specific direction linearly in latent space. Next, we calculate each node's degree of trend-following as an indicator called the intrinsic publication year (IPY). As a result, there is a correlation between the indicator and the number of future citations. Furthermore, a word frequently used in the abstracts of cutting-edge papers (high-IPY paper) is likely to be used often in future publications. These results confirm the validity of the detected trend for predicting citation network growth., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.