Current Situation on research core of Integrated Field Control

Food production systems have been studied in order to improve production capacity and quality in individual bio-production fields, and these advances have contributed to establishing a sufficient food supply to meet the needs of the increasing world population since the industrial revolution. However, it has also been clarified in the last two decades that agricultural activity has also contributed to increases in environmental loading such as global warming gas increase, stream and subterranean water pollution, soil degradation, etc. The development of environmentally friendly bio-production systems that integrate high production efficiency with the ecosystems, including human society, is expected to be of great interest. To facilitate the development of environmentally friendly bio-production systems that consider the ecosystem, the new Field Science Center was established in 2003 through the merger and reorganization of two former educational and research facilities for field science : the University Farm, and the Education and Research Center of Marine Bio-resources. The new center has three educational and research stations : the Field Control Station (Sendai), the Terrestrial Field Station (Naruko), and the Marine Field Station (Onagawa). It also has five following research cores : the Forest-Andisols Research Core, the Ruminant Production Research Core, the Rice Production Research Core, the Marine Bio-production Research Core, and the Integrated Field Control Research Core. The Integrated Field Control Core was formed to promote an environmentally, friendly, high quality and high yielding bio- production and to hasten the integrated field science in terrestrial-marine ecosystems

Hatching controlled by the circatidal clock, and the role of the medulla terminalis in the optic peduncle of the eyestalk, in an estuarine crab Sesarma haematocheir

Embryos attached to the female crab Sesarma haematocheir hatch synchronously within 1 h. Hatching is also synchronized near the time of the expected nocturnal high tide. These events are governed by a single circatidal clock (or pacemaker) in the female crab. The present study examined the role of the optic peduncle of the eyestalk on hatching and hatching synchrony. Surgery was performed either from the tip of the eyestalk [to remove the region of the optic peduncle from the compound eye–retina complex to the medulla interna (MI)] or from a small triangle 'window' opened on the eyestalk exoskeleton [to create lesions on the medulla terminalis (MT) of the optic peduncle]. Neither hatching nor hatching synchrony was affected by removal of the region of the optic peduncle from the compound eye–retina complex to the MI: the circatidal rhythm also remained. Removal of the MI probably caused damage to the sinus gland and the bundle of axons running from the sinus gland to the X organ. Nevertheless, maintenance of highly synchronized hatching indicates that the X organ–sinus gland system is not related to hatching. Hatching and hatching synchrony were not affected by dorsal-half cuts of the MT: the timing of hatching was not affected either. By contrast, transverse and ventral-half cuts of the MT caused severe damage to most females; hatching of many females was suppressed, while hatching of some females was either periodic, at intervals of approximately 24 h, or arrhythmic for a few days. The bundle of neuronal axons is tangled in the MT, and the axons inducing hatching pass through the ventral half of the MT. Complete incision of these axon bundles may have suppressed hatching. Incomplete incision of the axon bundle or partial damage to the neurons may have caused periodic or arrhythmic patterns of hatching. There are two possible roles for MT in hatching. One possibility is that neurons in the MT only induce hatching under the control of the circatidal pacemaker located in a site somewhere other than the optic peduncle. Another possibility is that the circatidal pacemaker is actually present in the MT. The second possibility seems more plausible. Each embryo has a special 48–49.5 h developmental program for hatching. This program could be initiated by the circatidal pacemaker in the female, and hatching synchrony may also be enhanced by the same pacemaker

Der fragmentarische und geflickte Körper: Die Vorstellung des Körpers in der Zwischenkriegszeit in Deutschland - The Fragmentary and Repaired Body: The Representation of Body in the Interwar Period in Germany

The purpose of this study is to examine the image of the human body in artwork after the First World War portraying the theme of Disabled Veterans. Particularly, I will focus on the relation between the fragmentary body and the object of the body: torso, doll and automaton. I would like to examine the change in the boundary of the body and how the artist views this change in relation to the fragmented body. 要旨 本研究の目的は、第一次世界大戦後のドイツの芸術に見られる傷痍軍人をテーマとした作品の身体イメージについて検討することである。特に断片化した彼らの身体が、トルソ、人形、自動人形という身体のオブジェと関連付けられて描かれていることに注目し、身体の断片化に伴う身体の境界の変化を、当時の芸術家たちがどのように捉えていたのかを検討したい

Individual and environment-related acoustic-phonetic strategies for communicating in adverse conditions

In many situations it is necessary to produce speech in ‘adverse conditions’: that is, conditions that make speech communication difficult. Research has demonstrated that speaker strategies, as described by a range of acoustic-phonetic measures, can vary both at the individual level and according to the environment, and are argued to facilitate communication. There has been debate as to the environmental specificity of these adaptations, and their effectiveness in overcoming communication difficulty. Furthermore, the manner and extent to which adaptation strategies differ between individuals is not yet well understood. This thesis presents three studies that explore the acoustic-phonetic adaptations of speakers in noisy and degraded communication conditions and their relationship with intelligibility. Study 1 investigated the effects of temporally fluctuating maskers on global acoustic-phonetic measures associated with speech in noise (Lombard speech). The results replicated findings of increased power in the modulation spectrum in Lombard speech, but showed little evidence of adaptation to masker fluctuations via the temporal envelope. Study 2 collected a larger corpus of semi-spontaneous communicative speech in noise and other degradations perturbing specific acoustic dimensions. Speakers showed different adaptations across the environments that were likely suited to overcome noise (steady and temporally fluctuating), restricted spectral and pitch information by a noise-excited vocoder, and a sensorineural hearing loss simulation. Analyses of inter-speaker variation in both studies 1 and 2 showed behaviour was highly variable and some strategy combinations were identified. Study 3 investigated the intelligibility of strategies ‘tailored’ to specific environments and the relationship between intelligibility and speaker acoustics, finding a benefit of tailored speech adaptations and discussing the potential roles of speaker flexibility, adaptation level, and intrinsic intelligibility. The overall results are discussed in relation to models of communication in adverse conditions and a model accounting for individual variability in these conditions is proposed