CONSTRUCTION PLACEMENT, HARDENED PROPERTIES AND DURABILITY OF SHOTCRETE WITH HIGHLY FUNCTIONAL FLY ASH

Shikoku Electric Power Co., Inc. has developed the technology to manufacture a brand name “Finash” about 12 years ago, by sorting and classifying coal ash generated in coal fired power plants. “Finash” is highly functional fly ash (HFA) is produced by removing irregular coarse particles. It is important for the production of HFA to minimize the variation in quality of coal ash with sophisticated classification technique and extracting good-quality spherical fine particles. The specific surface of HFA is more than 5000 cm2/g. It is now widely utilized as concrete admixture for general civil engineering structures and buildings in Japan. When highly functional fly ash (HFA) is used as shotcrete admixture to substitute for fine aggregate of 100kg/m3, the shotcrete has the advantages of decreasing the amount of dust and rebound during spraying operation, improving the hardened properties and durability of concrete, etc. Therefore, it has been applied in many tunnels by NATM. In order to verify the high performance of shotcrete with HFA, firstly it was carried out the spray tests at the model tunnel using the shotcrete with HFA having the specific surface of 5530cm2/g compared with normal shotcrete without fly ash and shotcrete with the lower fly ash (class 4th-FA) having the specific surface of 1770cm2/g. Secondly it was carried out the spray tests at an actual road tunnel using the shotcrete with HFA having the specific surface of 5450cm2/g compared with normal shotcrete without fly ash and shotcrete with the conventional dust reducing agent of 0.1% mass of the cement. This paper discusses about the various characteristics such as construction placement (dust concentration and rebound rate), hardened properties and durability (compressive strength, accelerating neutralization depth and dry shrinkage) on theses several sorts of shotcrete

A novel nonsense mutation in a Japanese family with ataxia with oculomotor apraxia type 2 (AOA2)

We report a 67-year-old Japanese woman with ataxia with oculomotor apraxia type 2 (AOA2). She was born to consanguineous parents and showed a teenage onset, a slowly progressive cerebellar ataxia and sensory-motor neuropathy and an elevated level of serum alpha-fetoprotein (AFP). All of these clinical features were consistent with typical AOA2. She lacked oculomotor apraxia, as frequently observed in previously reported AOA2 patients. She was homozygous for a novel nonsense mutation, Glu385Ter (E385X), in the senataxin gene (SETX). To our knowledge, this is the fifth Japanese family with genetically confirmed AOA2. The mutations in SETX in Japanese AOA2 families are heterogeneous, except for M274I, which has been found in two unrelated families. More extensive screening by serum AFP followed by molecular genetic analysis of SETX in patients with Friedreich's ataxia-like phenotype may show that AOA2 is more common in Japan than previously thought. Journal of Human Genetics (2009) 54, 746-748; doi: 10.1038/jhg.2009.104; published online 6 November 2009ArticleJOURNAL OF HUMAN GENETICS. 54(12):746-748 (2009)journal articl

Influence of QED Corrections on the Orientation of Chiral Symmetry Breaking in the NJL model

We study QED corrections to chiral symmetry breaking in the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio (NJL) model with two flavors of quarks. In this model, the isospin symmetry is broken by the differences between the current quark masses and the electromagnetic charges of the up and down quarks. To leading order in the 1/N expansion, we calculate the effective potential of the model with one-loop QED corrections at finite temperature. Evaluating the effective potential, we study the influence of the isospin symmetry breaking on the orientation of chiral symmetry breaking. The current quark mass plays an essential role in maintaining the orientation of the chiral symmetry breaking. If the average of the up and down quark masses is small enough, we find a phase in which the pion field has non-vanishing expectation value and dynamical CP violation takes place.Comment: 22 pages, 13 figures; added discussion about pion mass differenc

Interplay between spin polarization and color superconductivity in high density quark matter

Here, it is suggested that a four-point interaction of the tensor type may lead to spin polarization in quark matter at high density. It is found that the two-flavor superconducting phase and the spin polarized phase correspond to distinct local minima of a certain generalized thermodynamical potential. It follows that the transition from one to the other phase occurs passing through true minima with both a spin polarization and a color superconducting gap. It is shown that the quark spin polarized phase is realized at rather high density, while the two-flavor color superconducting phase is realized at a lower density region.Comment: 21 pages, 3 figure

Temperature Dependence of \eta and \eta^{\prime} Masses

We investigate the temperature dependence of \eta and \eta^{\prime} masses due to scatterings from thermal pions in a heat bath using the non-linear sigma model. We show that mass shifts of \eta and \eta^{\prime} and the shift in the mixing angle are negligible.Comment: Latex, 11 pages, 2 eps figures include

The axial anomaly in QCD at finite temperature

We study flavor mixing and the axial anomaly in QCD at zero and finite temperature. Using the instanton liquid model, we show that the strength of the anomaly is essentially unchanged near the critical temperature for chiral symmetry restoration. We demonstrate that nevertheless, chiral symmetry restoration has important consequences for the eta and eta prime. In particular, the strange and non-strange components of the eta unmix near T_c. The anomaly does not affect the strange eta, so we expect a light purely strange pseudoscalar meson near the phase transition.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figure

Characterization of follistatin-related gene as a negative regulatory factor for activin family members during mouse heart development

Follistatin-related gene (FLRG) encodes a secretory glycoprotein that has characteristic cysteine-rich follistatin domains. FLRG protein binds to and neutralizes several transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) superfamily members, including myostatin (MSTN), which is a potent negative regulator of skeletal muscle mass. We have previously reported that FLRG was abundantly expressed in fetal and adult mouse heart. In this study, we analyzed the expression of FLRG mRNA during mouse heart development. FLRG mRNA was continuously expressed in the embryonic heart, whereas it was very low in skeletal muscles. By contrast, MSTN mRNA was highly expressed in embryonic skeletal muscles, whereas the expression of MSTN mRNA was rather low in the heart. In situ hybridization and immunohistochemical analysis revealed that FLRG expressed in smooth muscle of the aorta and pulmonary artery, valve leaflets of mitral and tricuspid valves, and cardiac muscles in the ventricle of mouse embryonic heart. However, MSTN was expressed in very limited areas, such as valve leaflets of pulmonary and aortic valves, the top of the ventricular and atrial septa. Interestingly, the expression of MSTN was complementary to that of FLRG, especially in the valvular apparatus. Biochemical analyses with surface plasmon resonance biosensor and reporter assays demonstrated that FLRG hardly dissociates from MSTN and activin once it bound to them, and efficiently inhibits these activities. Our results suggest that FLRG could function as a negative regulator of activin family members including MSTN during heart development