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The willingness to purchase a house is closely related to previous experiences with housing market changes. This paper establishes the variable effects of willingness to purchase a house based on experience to analyze how experience with the Lost Decade (1991 to 2001) in Japan has influenced its housing market. This study finds that when the regional house-price levels are less deviated from those of Tokyo, willingness to purchase a house is relatively higher, which inhibits the growth of rent prices. Grouping data into urban and non-urban areas shows that the negative impact of willingness to purchase a house is higher in non-urban areas. This indicates an urban-rural gap in the country and house prices in the urban areas can self-adjust so that willingness to purchase a house does not reflect significantly on the rental market. Experience with the cumulative house prices of each prefecture from 1985 to 2015 relative to the Tokyo standard is calculated for deviation to determine whether the cumulative experience of longterm past losses could be used to analyze divergence in the regional housing markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the time-series behaviour of house prices for the four Asian markets, namely, Hong Kong, Singapore, Tokyo and Taipei, by using structural time-series methodology. The paper assumes two types of trend models to characterise and compare the long-run movement of house prices. It also examines the cyclical pattern hidden in the series. The long-run trend rate in these markets ranged between approximately 1.6 and 3.2 per cent per annum. Hong Kong, Singapore and Taipei have relatively higher figures, which could be expected in light of the rapidly growing economies. Surprisingly, their cyclical patterns were fairly similar, although causes of the cycles differed. The markets were found to have stochastic cycles of around one year, two to four years and seven to ten years, which were consistent with previous findings on real business cycles commonly observed internationally in other macroeconomic time series. However, the found stochastic nature suggests all these markets are not in a steady state and is still changing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reports on the isolation of 8-hydroxyglycitein and 6-hydroxydaidzein from soybean miso by researchers from Japan. Use of mass spectrometry on the elucidation of their chemical structures; Demonstration on the DPPH-radical scavenging activity by the isolated compounds; Significance of isolating antioxidants from soybean miso.

Reverse genetics is a powerful tool to study single-stranded RNA viruses. Despite tremendous efforts having been made to improve the methodology for constructing flavivirus cDNAs, the cause of toxicity of flavivirus cDNAs in bacteria remains unknown. Here we performed mutational analysis studies to identify Escherichia coli promoter (ECP) sequences within nucleotides (nt) 1 to 3000 of the dengue virus type 2 (DENV2) and Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) genomes. Eight and four active ECPs were demonstrated within nt 1 to 3000 of the DENV2 and JEV genomes, respectively, using fusion constructs containing DENV2 or JEV segments and empty vector reporter gene Renilla luciferase. Full-length DENV2 and JEV cDNAs were obtained by inserting mutations reducing their ECP activity in bacteria without altering amino acid sequences. A severe cytopathic effect occurred when BHK21 cells were transfected with in vitro-transcribed RNAs from either a DENV2 cDNA clone with multiple silent mutations within the prM-E-NS1 region of dengue genome or a JEV cDNA clone with an A-to-C mutation at nt 90 of the JEV genome. The virions derived from the DENV2 or JEV cDNA clone exhibited infectivities similar to those of their parental viruses in C6/36 and BHK21 cells. A cis-acting element essential for virus replication was revealed by introducing silent mutations into the central portion (nt 160 to 243) of the core gene of DENV2 infectious cDNA or a subgenomic DENV2 replicon clone. This novel strategy of constructing DENV2 and JEV infectious clones could be applied to other flaviviruses or pathogenic RNA viruses to facilitate research in virology, viral pathogenesis, and vaccine development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]