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Sarcopenia is a complication of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) that negatively affects physical activity and quality of life. However, the underlying mechanism by which COPD affects skeletal muscles remains to be elucidated. Therefore, we investigated the association between oxidative stress and structural alterations in muscles in elastase-induced emphysema mouse models.Twelve-week-old male C57BL/6J mice were treated with either intratracheal porcine pancreatic elastase (PPE) dissolved in saline, or saline alone. The mice were euthanized 12 weeks after treatment, and the lungs and limb muscles were used for protein analysis of oxidative stress, p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (p38 MAPK) signaling pathway and muscle atrophy signaling pathway related with oxidative stress. Furthermore, C57BL/6J mice treated with PPE or saline were analyzed for the effects of oral administration of astaxanthin or p38 inhibitor.The weight of the soleus muscle, proportion of type I muscle fibers, and cross-sectional areas of muscle fibers in the PPE group were lower than those in the control group. Oxidative stress marker levels in the PPE group were elevated in skeletal muscles. The p38 MAPK signaling pathway was activated in the soleus muscles, leading to the activation of the ubiquitin-proteasome system and autophagy. Astaxanthin and p38 inhibitors attenuated alterations in muscle structure through the deactivation of the p38 MAPK signaling pathway.This study provides first evidence in COPD mouse model that oxidative stress trigger a series of muscle structural changes. Our findings suggest a novel target for sarcopenia in COPD.

High strength nanocrystalline and amorphous Ni-14---24 at. % W alloys with their tensile strengths of about 3 GPa have been prepared by electrodeposition. Nano-microscale Ni---W alloy mould inserts, consisting of line and space structures with the line-widths of 700 and 300 nm and the height of 200 nm, were fabricated. High compression stress moulding of some metal plates of pure-Al, SUS-316L stainless steel and Zr69Cu16Ni5Al10 bulk metallic glass with the Ni---W alloy inserts was carried out at room temperature. In the case of the pure-Al under moulding stress of about 350 MPa, full moulding was achieved with the depths of about 200 nm approximately equal to the height of the inserts. Repeat moulding of 200 cycles did not cause any noticeable change or degradation of the Ni---W alloy inserts. In the case of the SUS-316L stainless steel under the moulding stress of about 1 GPa, however, the nano-microscale moulding was not achieved. This may be due to the high strain hardening ability of the SUS-316L stainless steel during plastic deformation. In the case of the Zr69Cu16Ni5Al10 bulk metallic glass with a high yielding stress of about 1.5 GPa and no strain hardening ability, full moulding was almost achieved successfully under the high moulding stress of about 2 GPa.

In this paper, an ICP coupled with a three dimensional quadrupole mass spectrometer (ICP-3DQMS) was evaluated for lead isotopic measurements. The 3DQMS is a type of an ion trap mass spectrometer. These days, ICP coupled with a quadrupole mass spectrometer (ICP-QMS) is widely used for its advantages of high sensitivities and capability of isotopic measurements. However, the obtained precision (％RSD) of the isotopic measurements is limited to about 0.3％, because several isotopes are detected sequentially. On the other hand, because 3DQMS can trap several isotopes simultaneously, a precision of less than 0.1％ (ca. 0.08％) could be achieved for 207 Pb/ 206 Pb and 208 Pb/ 206 Pb in this study. One drawback of 3DQMS is that there is a limitation on the number of total ions, that can be trapped. It was found that the value of [trapping time (ms)×concentration (ng/ml)] influences the accuracy and precision of isotopic measurements.

High-speed diffusion spectroscopic imaging based on an echo-planar technique is presented. A pair of diffusion gradients is applied prior to a rapidly oscillating magnetic field gradient which encodes both chemical shift and spatial information. By applying this technique to a phantom consisting of acetone and water, a diffusion spectroscopic image is obtained in about 15 min, about 64 times faster than the time required in the conventional method. The measured diffusion coefficients show good agreement with previously reported values. This kind of diffusion spectroscopic imaging is expected to provide a way to observe more specific metabolism.

Ejected electron spectra from the double‐excited helium‐like and beryllium‐like ions produced by the double electron capture collisions of bare or helium‐like ions with targets have been measured by using zero‐degree Auger electron spectroscopy with a high energy resolution. Singlet and triplet states of doubly excited configurations were made by the double electron capture processes, selectively.

In an inspection method which generates a static magnetic field, a gradient magnetic field and a radio frequency magnetic field, detects nuclear magnetic resonance signals from an inspection object, computes and processes the nuclear magnetic resonance signals so detected and outputs the result of computation processing, a gradient magnetic field for generating signal attenuation by diffusion and an oscillating gradient magnetic field for generating chemical shift information and spatial information of the materials contained in the inspection object are applied, separation and acquisition of spatial information of each material contained in the inspection object are simultaneously conducted, and a measurement time is shortened.