Atypical Presenting Symptoms of Acute Onset Systemic Lupus Erythematosus with Enteritis and Cystitis

Lupus enteritis and lupus cystitis are relatively rare manifestations of systemic lupus erythematosus. Some patients develop severe complications such as bowel perforation, infarction, obstruction, or irreversible bladder dysfunction. Early diagnosis is critical for management of lupus enteritis and cystitis. We report a 48-year-old Japanese man who presented with initial manifestations of abdominal pain, severe diarrhea, and bloody feces. The diagnosis was delayed due to atypical initial symptoms, resulting in clinical worsening. Physicians should be aware of typical computed tomography findings of lupus enteritis and lupus cystitis

音楽媒体との接触に関する社会心理学的研究(Ⅱ)：音楽嗜好におよぼす独自性欲求の影響

Moroi & Itagaki (2013) examined long tail distribution model for consumer behavior proposed by Anderson(2006). The present study explored the relationships among music tastes and need for uniqueness (Snyder & Fromkin, 1977) in female undergraduates. The Purchase Experiences of Recent Japanese Popular Songs Scale developed by authors and Need for Uniqueness Scale (Miyashita, 1991) were administered to female undergraduates(N=311). Results of Spearman’s rank correlation analyses indicated that need for uniqueness facilitated downloading music files which were not popular. The effects of similarity motive(Byrne, 1971) were discussed.論

〔報文〕非加熱および加熱調理時における高オレイン酸含有ひまわり油の感覚評価

　　Previous research has shown that high oleic sunflower oil (HOSO) that comes from sunflower seeds has high oxidative stability when heated. An article on the sensory characteristics of foods fried in HOSO suggested that they have a light, mild oil flavor. However, the sensory characteristics of HOSO used in foods that have not been fried have not been examined. We therefore investigated the sensory characteristics of HOSO when used in French dressing, mayonnaise, stir-fried foods, and deep-fried foods. For the testing, we used high oleic sunflower oil (89% oleic acid) and rapeseed oil from canola seeds for comparison. The results were as follows. French dressing and mayonnaise were not very greasy, each had a weak aftertaste, and sour and salty flavors were strong. Stir-fried eggplants were evaluated to have a mild oil odor and a light flavor. Stir-fried carrots were highly palatable. Deep-fried foods were highly evaluated as palatable, with a mild oil odor, weak aftertaste, mild greasiness, and a light flavor

Enpp1 is an anti-aging factor that regulates Klotho under phosphate overload conditions

Control of phosphate metabolism is crucial to regulate aging in mammals. Klotho is a well-known anti-aging factor that regulates phosphate metabolism: mice mutant or deficient in Klotho exhibit phenotypes resembling human aging. Here we show that ectonucleotide pyrophosphatase/phosphodiesterase 1 (Enpp1) is required for Klotho expression under phosphate overload conditions. Loss-of-function Enpp1 ttw/ttw mice under phosphate overload conditions exhibited phenotypes resembling human aging and Klotho mutants, such as short life span, arteriosclerosis and osteoporosis, with elevated serum 1,25(OH)2D3 levels. Enpp1ttw/ttw mice also exhibited significantly reduced renal Klotho expression under phosphate overload conditions, and aging phenotypes in these mice were rescued by Klotho overexpression, a low vitamin D diet or vitamin D receptor knockout. These findings indicate that Enpp1 plays a crucial role in regulating aging via Klotho expression under phosphate overload conditions

栽培方法，抽出条件の異なる緑茶抽出液によるin vitroでのビフィズス菌の増殖への影響

In this study green tea leaves harvested in Kyoto（June 2014）and grown with or without shading were extracted with boiled or 80℃ water, examining for their effects in vitro on the growth of Bifidobacterium bifidum. In addition, catechins and other components included in each sample were assayed by the HPLC method. The results demonstrated that all of the extracts increased the growth of the strain. Compared with water（control）, the growth-promoting effects on the strain were 517 times higher than those with the boiled-water extract from the leaves grown without shading, 322 times than those with the boiled-water extract from the leaves grown with shading, and 308 times than those with the 80℃ extract from the leaves grown with shading. The total amount of catechins in the extracts was 343.29 mg/100 ml, 240.57 mg/100 ml, and 128.87 mg/100 ml, respectively. Thus, the green tea extracts used in this experiment may have promoted an increase in strain growth in vitro, but the degree of the effects was not necessarily proportional to catechin content.研究ノー

Results of the search for inspiraling compact star binaries from TAMA300's observation in 2000-2004

We analyze the data of TAMA300 detector to search for gravitational waves from inspiraling compact star binaries with masses of the component stars in the range 1-3Msolar. In this analysis, 2705 hours of data, taken during the years 2000-2004, are used for the event search. We combine the results of different observation runs, and obtained a single upper limit on the rate of the coalescence of compact binaries in our Galaxy of 20 per year at a 90% confidence level. In this upper limit, the effect of various systematic errors such like the uncertainty of the background estimation and the calibration of the detector's sensitivity are included.Comment: 8 pages, 4 Postscript figures, uses revtex4.sty The author list was correcte

Observation results by the TAMA300 detector on gravitational wave bursts from stellar-core collapses

We present data-analysis schemes and results of observations with the TAMA300 gravitational-wave detector, targeting burst signals from stellar-core collapse events. In analyses for burst gravitational waves, the detection and fake-reduction schemes are different from well-investigated ones for a chirp-wave analysis, because precise waveform templates are not available. We used an excess-power filter for the extraction of gravitational-wave candidates, and developed two methods for the reduction of fake events caused by non-stationary noises of the detector. These analysis schemes were applied to real data from the TAMA300 interferometric gravitational wave detector. As a result, fake events were reduced by a factor of about 1000 in the best cases. The resultant event candidates were interpreted from an astronomical viewpoint. We set an upper limit of 2.2x10^3 events/sec on the burst gravitational-wave event rate in our Galaxy with a confidence level of 90%. This work sets a milestone and prospects on the search for burst gravitational waves, by establishing an analysis scheme for the observation data from an interferometric gravitational wave detector

The whole blood transcriptional regulation landscape in 465 COVID-19 infected samples from Japan COVID-19 Task Force

「コロナ制圧タスクフォース」COVID-19患者由来の血液細胞における遺伝子発現の網羅的解析 --重症度に応じた遺伝子発現の変化には、ヒトゲノム配列の個人差が影響する--. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2022-08-23.Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a recently-emerged infectious disease that has caused millions of deaths, where comprehensive understanding of disease mechanisms is still unestablished. In particular, studies of gene expression dynamics and regulation landscape in COVID-19 infected individuals are limited. Here, we report on a thorough analysis of whole blood RNA-seq data from 465 genotyped samples from the Japan COVID-19 Task Force, including 359 severe and 106 non-severe COVID-19 cases. We discover 1169 putative causal expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) including 34 possible colocalizations with biobank fine-mapping results of hematopoietic traits in a Japanese population, 1549 putative causal splice QTLs (sQTLs; e.g. two independent sQTLs at TOR1AIP1), as well as biologically interpretable trans-eQTL examples (e.g., REST and STING1), all fine-mapped at single variant resolution. We perform differential gene expression analysis to elucidate 198 genes with increased expression in severe COVID-19 cases and enriched for innate immune-related functions. Finally, we evaluate the limited but non-zero effect of COVID-19 phenotype on eQTL discovery, and highlight the presence of COVID-19 severity-interaction eQTLs (ieQTLs; e.g., CLEC4C and MYBL2). Our study provides a comprehensive catalog of whole blood regulatory variants in Japanese, as well as a reference for transcriptional landscapes in response to COVID-19 infection

DOCK2 is involved in the host genetics and biology of severe COVID-19

「コロナ制圧タスクフォース」COVID-19疾患感受性遺伝子DOCK2の重症化機序を解明 --アジア最大のバイオレポジトリーでCOVID-19の治療標的を発見--. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2022-08-10.Identifying the host genetic factors underlying severe COVID-19 is an emerging challenge. Here we conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) involving 2, 393 cases of COVID-19 in a cohort of Japanese individuals collected during the initial waves of the pandemic, with 3, 289 unaffected controls. We identified a variant on chromosome 5 at 5q35 (rs60200309-A), close to the dedicator of cytokinesis 2 gene (DOCK2), which was associated with severe COVID-19 in patients less than 65 years of age. This risk allele was prevalent in East Asian individuals but rare in Europeans, highlighting the value of genome-wide association studies in non-European populations. RNA-sequencing analysis of 473 bulk peripheral blood samples identified decreased expression of DOCK2 associated with the risk allele in these younger patients. DOCK2 expression was suppressed in patients with severe cases of COVID-19. Single-cell RNA-sequencing analysis (n = 61 individuals) identified cell-type-specific downregulation of DOCK2 and a COVID-19-specific decreasing effect of the risk allele on DOCK2 expression in non-classical monocytes. Immunohistochemistry of lung specimens from patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia showed suppressed DOCK2 expression. Moreover, inhibition of DOCK2 function with CPYPP increased the severity of pneumonia in a Syrian hamster model of SARS-CoV-2 infection, characterized by weight loss, lung oedema, enhanced viral loads, impaired macrophage recruitment and dysregulated type I interferon responses. We conclude that DOCK2 has an important role in the host immune response to SARS-CoV-2 infection and the development of severe COVID-19, and could be further explored as a potential biomarker and/or therapeutic target

Water purification using porous ceramics prepared by recycling volcanic ash and waste glass

Abstract Water purification was examined using porous ceramics prepared by sintering a powder mixture of volcanic ash, waste glass and a small amount of wood charcoal. The porous ceramics had cross-linked 3D-channels of which the diameter ranged from several nm to several μm. Three kilograms of porous ceramics placed in 90 L of circulating artificial seawater, in which several tropical fishes were actually living under aeration, caused a decrease in COD from 23.8 to 13.1 mg L−1 in a week. The number of coliform bacteria was almost constant in a range of 52–65 mL−1 despite that a lot of excrements were discharged frequently. The number of the coliform bacteria in the seawater examined “without the tropical fishes” decreased from 900 to 1 mL−1 in 2 weeks, and COD decreased from 37.9 to 7.9 mg L−1. It proved that several aerobic bacteria proliferating in the macropores inside the porous ceramics could effectively decompose several organic materials. Graphical abstrac