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Naoko Okamoto,1 Kaori Umehara,1 Junko Sonoda,1 Mitsuyuki Hotta,2 Hiroki Mizushima,1 Yutaka Takagi,1 Keiko Matsuo,3 Naoko Baba4 1Skin Care Products Research Laboratories, Kao Corporation, Tokyo, 2Biological Science Research Laboratories, Kao Corporation, Tochigi, 3Office of the President, Kao Corporation, Tokyo, 4Department of Dermatology, Kanagawa Children’s Medical Center, Yokohama, Japan Objective: Despite the application of skin care treatments, many infants have skin problems such as dryness and erythema. We proposed a new combination skin care for infants which consisted of a foaming cleanser with lower surfactant activity and moisturizers that contained pseudo-ceramide. Subjects and methods: A total of 50 infants (age: 3–24 months) with insignificant levels of dry skin were enrolled in this usage trial. The parents washed the infants with the test cleanser while bathing and then applied the moisturizer (lotion or cream) containing pseudo-ceramide. Prior to and following the 4-week usage period, visual evaluation of the skin condition was conducted by a dermatologist, in addition to instrumental analysis. Results: Erythema and papule, accompanied by dryness, were commonly observed at week 0. However, by week 4, these symptoms significantly improved; the condition of none of the subjects deteriorated. The number of infants with lower cutaneous barrier function and higher skin pH decreased. The parents of the infants recognized improvements in the skin symptoms and were appreciative of the test materials. Conclusion: The combined usage of the foaming cleanser with lower surfactant activity and a moisturizer containing pseudo-ceramide may be effective in maintaining healthy infant skin and ameliorating the skin symptoms. Keywords: infant, cleanser, lotion, cream, dryness

The Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST) Large Area Telescope (LAT) is a pair-production high-energy (>20 MeV) gamma-ray telescope being built by an international partnership of astrophysicists and particle physicists for a satellite launch in 2006, designed to study a wide variety of high-energy astrophysical phenomena. As part of the development effort, the collaboration has built a balloon flight engineering model (BFEM) for flight on a high-altitude scientific balloon. The BFEM is approximately the size of one of the 16 GLAST-LAT towers and contains all the components of the full instrument: plastic scintillator anticoincidence system (ACD), high-Z foil/Si strip pair-conversion tracker (TKR), CsI hodoscopic calorimeter (CAL), triggering and data acquisition electronics (DAQ), commanding system, power distribution, telemetry, real-time data display, and ground data processing system. The principal goal of the balloon flight was to demonstrate the performance of this instrument configuration under conditions similar to those expected in orbit. Results from a balloon flight from Palestine, TX, on August 4, 2001, show that the BFEM successfully obtained gamma-ray data in this high-background environment. Index Terms--Gamma rays, instrumentation, telescopes.

Objectives: We developed a new telediagnosis system to securely transmit high-quality endoscopic moving images over the Internet in real time. This system would enable collaboration between physicians seeking advice from endoscopists separated by long distances, to facilitate diagnosis.Methods: We adapted a new type of digital video streaming system (DVTS) to our teleendoscopic diagnosis system. To investigate its feasibility, we conducted a two-step experiment. A basic experiment was first conducted to transmit endoscopic video images between hospitals using a plain DVTS. After investigating the practical usability, we incorporated a secure and reliable communication function into the system, by equipping DVTS with "TCP2", a new security technology that establishes secure communication in the transport layer. The second experiment involved international transmission of teleendoscopic image between Hawaii and Japan using the improved system.Results: In both the experiments, no serious transmission delay was observed to disturb physicians' communications and, after subjective evaluation by endoscopists, the diagnostic qualities of the images were found to be adequate. Moreover, the second experiment showed that "TCP2-equipped DVTS" successfully executed high-quality secure image transmission over a long distance network.Conclusions: We conclude that DVTS technology would be promising for teleendoscopic diagnosis. It was also shown that a high quality, secure teleendoscopic diagnosis system can be developed by equipping DVTS with TCP2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background:Tongue squamous cell carcinoma (TSCC) is highly diverse, even in its early stages. This cancer is classified into three subtypes (superficial, exophytic, and endophytic) based on macroscopic appearance. Of these subtypes, the endophytic tumours have the worst prognosis because of their invasiveness and higher frequency of metastasis.Methods:To understand the molecular mechanism underlying the endophytic subtype and to identify biomarkers, we performed a comprehensive gene expression microarray analysis of clinical biopsy samples and also confirmed the clinical relevance of differential gene expression.Results:Expression of the parvin-beta (PARVB) gene and its encoded protein was significantly upregulated in endophytic-type TSCC. PARVB is known to play a critical role in actin reorganization and focal adhesions. Knockdown of PARVB expression in vitro caused apparent decreases in cell migration and wound healing, implying that PARVB has a crucial role in cell motility. Moreover, metastasis-free survival was significantly lower in patients with higher tumour expression of PARVB.Conclusions:These findings suggest that PARVB overexpression is a candidate biomarker for endophytic tumours and metastasis. This protein may be a clinically useful target for adjuvant TSCC therapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]