Search

Chiral binaphthyldiimine-Ni(II)-catalyzed asymmetric 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition reactions between acyclic carbonyl ylides generated from donor-acceptor oxiranes and aldehydes are reported. Both aromatic and aliphatic aldehydes could be used as dipolarophiles, providing

BACKGROUND Introducing telemedicine in outpatient treatment may improve patient satisfaction and convenience. However, the optimal in-person visit interval for video-based telemedicine in patients with hypertension remains unreported in Japan. OBJECTIVE We determined the optimal in-person visit interval for video-based telemedicine in patients with hypertension. METHODS Design: This was a cluster randomized controlled noninferiority trial. Participants: The target sites were eight clinics in Japan that had a telemedicine system, and the target patients were individuals with essential hypertension. Among patients receiving video-based telemedicine, those who underwent in-person visits at 6-month intervals were included in the intervention group, and those who underwent in-person visits at 3-month intervals were included in the control group. Main Measures: The follow-up period of the participants was 6 months. The primary endpoint of the study was the change in systolic blood pressure, and the secondary endpoints were the rate of treatment continuation after 6 months, patient satisfaction, health economic evaluation, and safety evaluation. RESULTS Overall, 64 patients were enrolled. Their mean age was 54.5 ± 10.3 years, and 39 (60.9%) patients were males. For the primary endpoint, the estimated difference in the change in systolic blood pressure between the two groups was 1.18 (90% confidence interval: −3.68 to 6.04). Notably, the criteria for noninferiority were met. Patient satisfaction was higher in the intervention group than in the control group. Furthermore, the indirect costs indicated that lost productivity was significantly less in the intervention group than in the control group. Moreover, the treatment continuation rate did not differ between the intervention and control groups, and there were no adverse events in either group. CONCLUSIONS Blood pressure control status and safety did not differ between the intervention and control groups. In-person visits at 6-month intervals may cause a societal cost reduction and improve patient satisfaction during video-based telemedicine. CLINICALTRIAL UMIN000040953

Principal investigators (PIs) play a key role in clinical research, and must thus understand the role of clinical research support staff to conduct successful and appropriate clinical research. This study evaluates clinical research capabilities by examining the clinical research knowledge of PIs and clinical research support staff. The participants of this cross-sectional study were academic researchers and clinical research support staff from Japanese universities and research institutions. The participants comprised of 54 respondents, among whom 36 were PIs (physicians) and 18 were clinical research support staff. A self-administered electronic survey was created and evaluated by experts, with 50 knowledge items. Mann-Whitney U tests were used to determine the significance of the differences in knowledge between clinical research support staff and PIs. We compared the correct answer rate of clinical research support staff and PIs for each knowledge category and observed that the clinical research support staff scored significantly higher than the PIs in all aspects of clinical research knowledge sections, including total score. Our findings showed that PIs did not have the same amount of clinical research knowledge as the clinical research support staff. Clinical research knowledge is essential for investigators, especially PIs, to protect patients and promote medical breakthroughs. Thus, more accessible clinical research education and mandatory knowledge testing will allow PIs to lead successful clinical research and further the level of medical research in Japan.

Multi-step phosphorelay (MSP) is a broadly distributed signaling system in organisms. In MSP, histidine kinases (HKs) receive various environmental signals and transmit them by autophosphorylation followed by phosphotransfer to partner histidine-containing phosphotransfer proteins (HPts). Previously, we reported that Per-Arnt-Sim (PAS) domain-containing HK1 (PHK1) and PHK2 of the moss Physcomitrium (Physcomitrella) patens repressed red light-induced protonema branching, a critical step in the moss life cycle. In plants, PHK homolog-encoding genes are conserved only in early-diverging lineages such as bryophytes and lycophytes. PHKs-mediated signaling machineries attract attention especially from an evolutionary viewpoint, but they remain uninvestigated. Here, we studied the P. patens PHKs focusing on their subcellular patterns of localization and interaction with HPts. Yeast two-hybrid analysis, a localization assay with a green fluorescent protein, and a bimolecular fluorescence complementation analysis together showed that PHKs are localized and interact with partner HPts mostly in the nucleus, as unprecedented features for plant HKs. Additionally, red light triggered the interactions between PHKs and HPts in the cytoplasm, and light co-repressed the expression of PHK1 and PHK2 as well as genes encoding their partner HPts. Our results emphasize the uniqueness of PHKs-mediated signaling machineries, and functional implications of this uniqueness are discussed.

Cadmium (Cd) is a toxic heavy metal that is mainly accumulated through the consumption of foods produced in Cd-contaminated fields. Phytoremediation is one of the most effective methods to reduce the soil Cd concentration. In this study, we bred a new rice line, 'Akita 119', for Cd phytoremediation. 'Akita 119' was obtained by a soft X-ray mutation of 'Cho-ko-koku', a naturally high-Cd-accumulating rice cultivar. The heading date of 'Akita 119' was about 2 weeks later than that of 'Akitakomachi', which is the leading cultivar in Akita Prefecture, Japan. 'Akita 119' has a short culm length and many panicles. The shattering resistance and lodging resistance of 'Akita 119' were improved compared to 'Cho-ko-koku'. The thousand-grain weight of 'Akita 119' was much smaller than that of 'Akitakomachi', and grains of 'Akita 119' could be easily distinguished from general japonica cultivars. When 'Akita 119' was grown in Cd-contaminated fields, the shoot dry weight and Cd concentration were similar to those of 'Cho-ko-koku'. These results demonstrate that 'Akita 119' has improved agronomic characteristics compared to 'Cho-ko-koku' while retaining the ability to extract Cd. Therefore, it should be considered a promising candidate for Cd phytoremediation in paddy fields in northern parts of Japan.

Magnesium (Mg) alloy has been actively investigated as a bioresorbable scaffold (BRS) for use as a next-generation stent because of its appropriate mechanical properties and biocompatibility. However, Mg alloy quickly degrades in the physiological environment. Hydrofluoric acid (HF) treatment and surface coating with biodegradable polymer are approaches for enhancing the corrosion resistance of Mg alloy. However, there are no studies that focus on the corrosion behavior of the Mg alloy stent after balloon catheter expansion, which results in mechanical stress and is required for stent placement. In this study, the corrosion behavior of a Mg alloy stent after expansion by a balloon catheter was investigated. Compared with the bare Mg alloy stent, the HF-treated Mg alloy stent showed excellent corrosion resistance without expansion. However, balloon catheter expansion caused small fragments and cracks to appear on the surface of the HF-treated Mg alloy stent and accelerated its corrosion rate. The HF-treated Mg alloy stent was therefore further coated with poly(d,l-lactic acid) (PDLLA). As a result, the high corrosion resistance of the coated stent was maintained after its expansion along with higher biocompatibility for endothelial cell adhesion than the stent without the polymer coating. The HF-treated and PDLLA-coated platform is expected to be a BRS candidate for clinical applications.

Reduction in crop yield and quality due to global warming is a major concern. In this study, we investigated the effects of high temperature during endosperm development on the level of starch biosynthetic enzymes, including granule-bound starch synthase I (GBSSI), branching enzyme (BE)IIb, and SSI, and structure of starch in the endosperm using japonica rice cultivar, ‘Akitakomachi’. We also performed palatability sensory evaluation of rice grown under different temperatures after cooking. At high ripening temperature, the number of seeds showing opaque regions was significantly increased, and seed weight was significantly decreased. The apparent amylose content and ratio of short to long chains of amylopectin in seeds developed at high temperature was significantly lower and higher, respectively, than that in seeds developed at lower temperature; this was because of low levels of GBSSI and BEIIb, respectively. In general, the amylose content correlates negatively with the stickiness and taste of cooked rice. Rice grains developed at high temperature were less palatable after cooking than those developed under normal conditions, although their amylose content was lower, indicating that the structure of amylopectin has a major impact on the palatability of cooked rice.

Two-component systems (TCSs) are signal transduction mechanisms for responding to various environmental stimuli. In angiosperms, TCSs involved in phytohormone signaling have been intensively studied, whereas there are only a few reports on TCSs in basal land plants. The moss Physcomitrella patens possesses several histidine kinases (HKs) that are lacking in seed plant genomes. Here, we studied two of these unique HKs, PAS-histidine kinase 1 (PHK1) and its paralog PHK2, both of which have PAS (Per-Arnt-Sim) domains, which are known to show versatile functions such as sensing light or molecular oxygen. We found homologs of PHK1 and PHK2 only in early diverged clades such as bryophytes and lycophytes, but not in seed plants. The PAS sequences of PHK1 and PHK2 are more similar to a subset of bacterial PAS sequences than to any angiosperm PAS sequences. Gene disruption lines that lack either PHK1 or PHK2 or both formed gametophores earlier than the wild-type, and consistently, more caulonema side branches were induced in response to light in the disruption lines. Therefore, PHK1 and PHK2 delay the timing of gametophore development, probably by suppressing light-induced caulonema branching. This study provides new insights into the evolution of TCSs in plants.

We systematically investigate stress–strain behavior of ferrite and bainite with nano-sized vanadium carbides in low carbon steels; the ferrite samples were obtained through austenite/ferrite transformation accompanied with interphase precipitation and the bainite samples were via austenite/bainite transformation with subsequent aging. The stress–strain curves of both samples share several common features, i.e. high yield stress, relatively low work hardening and sufficient tensile elongation. Strengthening contributions from solute atoms, grain boundaries, dislocations and precipitates are calculated based on the structural parameters, and the calculation result is compared with the experimentally-obtained yield stress. The contributions from solute atoms and grain boundaries are simply additive, whereas those from dislocations and precipitates should be treated by taking the square root of the sum of the squares of two values. Nano-sized carbides may act as sites for dislocation multiplication in the early stage of deformation, while they may enhance dislocation annihilation in the later stage of deformation. Such enhanced dynamic recovery might be the reason for a relatively large elongation in both ferrite and bainite samples.

This paper describes the construction of a body cooling system to avoid heatstroke for survivors of cervical spinal cord injury. For accomplishment of this purpose, we chose the neck as a cooling point of the body, and we constructed a prototype neck cooling head with a refrigerated circulator. The neck cooling head was made by thin heat-welding thermoplastic films with high thermal conductivity. To test our proposed system, we conducted experiments on two unimpaired participants in a room which simulated a hot summer day (33 [°C], relative humidity 40%). Reduction of sweating were observed, and the average skin temperatures and the core temperature of the head with cooling increased more slowly than those without cooling. The estimated cooling power of the proposed system was about 10 [W] with 50 [W] total power consumption of the cooling head.

Methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) fluxes were measured from paddy–upland rotation (three years for soybean and three years for rice) with different soil fertility due to preceding compost application for four years (i.e., 3 kg FW m−2 year−1 of immature or mature compost application plots and a control plot without compost). Net greenhouse gas (GHG) balance was evaluated by integrating CH4 and N2O emissions and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions calculated from a decline in soil carbon storage. N2O emissions from the soybean upland tended to be higher in the immature compost plot. CH4 emissions from the rice paddy increased every year and tended to be higher in the mature compost plot. Fifty-two to 68% of the increased soil carbon by preceding compost application was estimated to be lost during soybean cultivation. The major component of net GHG emission was CO2 (82–94%) and CH4 (72–84%) during the soybean and rice cultivations, respectively. Net GHG emissions during the soybean and rice cultivations were comparable. Consequently, the effects of compost application on the net GHG balance from the paddy–upland rotation should be carefully evaluated with regards to both advantages (initial input to the soil) and disadvantages (following increases in GHG).

Electroactive polymer (EAP) actuators were developed using composite nanofiber electrode films fabricated with multi-walled carbon nanotubes and poly vinylidene fluoride-co-hexafluoropropylene (PVDF-HFP). Aligned nanofiber electrode films were fabricated by the electrospinning method. We evaluated the characteristics of the nanofiber electrode films, fabricating conditions of the EAP actuators and property of the EAP actuators. It was confirmed that the alignment of nanofibers fabricated by electrospinning methods was anisotropic in the electrical conductivity and tensile strength. The nanofiber electrode film had 100 times the surface area of the cast electrode film. The capacitance and displacement of the nanofiber electrode actuator were larger than that of the cast electrode actuator. It is suggested that increasing the specific surface area enlarges the capacitance and displacement of the actuator.

In this paper, we propose a method for matching, combinations extraction and configuration of mesh models for assembly and geometric modeling. Given two mesh models, a graph is first generated for each model. This graph, called a “feature-graph”, represents abstract geometry information and connections of segments (local regions) for the model. Next, a set of pairs of segments which can be matched are extracted by performing sequential matching tests on the graphs. Finally, using the resulting pairs, the configuration between the models is determined by phased registrations keeping previous contact condition. An example of application to assembly modeling is included.

In this paper, the effects of collision velocity and collision angle on bullet deformation were discussed and performance of protection board made of PC (polycarbonate) plate was estimated. After gun firing experiments, the shape of the bullet and PC were measured using three dimensional measurement machine and deformed the bullet and PC plate shapes were reconstructed by using 3D-CAD as digital data. Furthermore, crash simulation of the bullets were performed by FEM analysis code “LS-DYNA”, and the results of simulation and measurement were discussed.

A 64-year-old man took levofloxacin 100 mg three times a day from the day before trans-rectal prostate needle biopsy. He suddenly fell into septic shock about 12 hours after the biopsy. We performed polymyxin B-immobilized fiber-direct hemoperfusion treatment at our intensive care unit. The circle dynamics was stable after five days of observation, and he was discharged seven days after the event. Levofloxacin-resistant Escherichia coli (E. coli) was detected by blood and urine culture.

The efficacy of transcranial electrostimulation for sleep-wake and behavior disorders in elderly patients with dementia was tested in a double-blind study. The subjects were 27 inpatients with multi-infarct dementia (12 males and 15 females, aged 58-86). They were randomly divided into two groups: active treatment (n = 14) and placebo treatment (n = 13). For electrostimulation, a device (HESS-100) was used which delivered repetitive rectangular electric pulses of 6-8 V at increasing frequencies from 6 to 80 Hz, each pulse lasting 0.2 ms and with a root mean square value of 256-530 microA. Electrostimulation was performed for 20 minutes from 10:00 h every morning. The active or placebo treatment was performed for 2 weeks in each group. The electrostimulation was significantly effective in behavior disorders such as wandering or nocturnal delirium, and decreased motivation during the daytime. It was also effective in improving night sleep. Electroencephalograms confirmed increased vigilance levels in the daytime both during and after the treatment.

Component waves of EEGs led from the F3-A1, C3-A1, O1-A1, and O2-A2 scalp regions of 24 multi-infarct dementia seniles (MID) patients (ages 58 to 85 years, average 73.3 years) and eight to 19 normal, healthy, adult (NA) subjects were obtained by autoregressive component analysis. Some differences in the component waves were demonstrated between the two groups of subjects. (1) The characteristics of the EEG component waves, including the natural, damping, and resonance frequencies, their power, regularity, etc. were determined, and compared between MID patients and NA subjects. (2) No significant difference was found between male and female patients in the occurrence rate of 11 types of component waves. (3) On the average, the alpha wave frequency was lower in MID patients. (4). Slow alpha waves (7.5 to 9.4 Hz) of MID patients were superior to those of NA subjects, whereas typical alpha waves (9.5 to 11.4 Hz) were inferior to those of NA subjects. (5) The power of alpha waves in the F3-A1 and C3-A1 regions of MID patients was superior to that of NA subjects, whereas the result was reversed in the O1-A1 and O2-A2 regions. However, there was less regularity of alpha waves in all regions among MID patients. (6) The theta wave frequency in all regions was higher in MID patients than in NA subjects. (7) Both the power and regularity of theta waves of MID patients were superior to those of NA subjects in all regions. (8) The average number of delta waves that appeared in the O1-A1 and O2-A2 regions was larger in MID patients than in NA subjects. EEG were led from the F3-A1, C3-A1, O1-A1, and O2-A2 scalp regions of multi-infarct dementia seniles (MID) patients, who had sleep disorders, such as reversed day-time sleep patterns or irregular sleep-wake patterns, frequently accompanied by behavior disorders, such as wandering, violent behavior, and/or delirium. Examination by the method of EEG pattern discrimination revealed some differences in EEG component waves in comparison with normal, healthy, adult (NA) subjects.