The Relationship between Teamwork among Teachers and School Organizational Climate: Investigation of the Precondition for Implementing“ a School as a Team”

本研究の目的は，第一に学校組織における教師のチームワークの構成要素を確認し，第二にそれらチームワークの構成要素と学校組織の風土の関連性を検討することである。教師のチームワークについては，特に行動面に焦点をあて，産業領域の知見に基づく尺度を構成した。また学校組織風土として，協働的，同調的，心理的安全性の3 つの側面を測定する尺度を準備した。現職教員を対象に質問紙調査を行い，230 名から回答が得られた。チームワークに関する因子分析により「相互調整」「職務の分析と明確化」「知識と情報の共有」の構成要素が抽出された。そして学校組織風土の関連性を吟味したところ，チームワークの各要素はいずれも「協働的風土」および「心理的安全風土」と正の関連，「同調的風土」とは負の関連を示した。これらの結果から，学校内で協働を志向し，率直で開放的な議論ができる風土の下で，教師のチームワークも発揮されやすいことが示唆された。The purpose of this study is two-fold: (a) identify the components of schoolteachers’ teamwork; and (b) investigate the relationship between components of teachers’ teamwork and school organizational climate. A questionnaire survey for in-service teachers in Japan resulted in 230 responses. Teachers’ teamwork was measured using scales based on previous research in the industrial field. The perceptions of school organizational climate were measured with respect to three aspects using the existing scales: collaboration, conformity, and psychological safety. The results of factor analysis revealed that teachers’ teamwork is composed of three factors ("coordination," "analysis and clarification of task," and "information sharing"). The correlation analyses showed that the scores on each teamwork component positively related to the perception of a collaborationoriented and psychological safety climate and negatively related to the perception of a conformity-oriented climate. On the basis of these findings, the future research directi ons were dis cussed

A Mother’s Sacrifice: The contribution of asymmetric cell division to lifespan regulation in Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

Aging determinants are asymmetrically distributed during cell division in S. cerevisiae, which leads to production of an immaculate, age-free daughter cell. During this process, damaged components are sequestered and retained in the mother cell, while higher functioning organelles and rejuvenating factors are transported to and/or enriched in the bud. Here, we will describe the key quality control mechanisms in budding yeast that contribute to asymmetric cell division of aging determinants, with a specific focus on mitochondria. We find that the actin cytoskeleton, which drives transport of many cellular components in yeast, plays a crucial role in segregating fit from less fit mitochondria between mother and daughter cells. Since actin cables are dynamic structures that undergo retrograde flow, treadmilling from the bud towards the mother cell, they acts as filters to prevent damaged, dysfunctional mitochondria from being inherited by the daughter cell. This asymmetry has a direct impact on regulation of daughter cell fitness. A direct counterpart to mitochondrial motility events is anchorage of the organelle, which occurs in the mother tip, mother cortex, and bud tip in budding yeast. We find that mitochondrial fusion, together with tethering protein, serves to promote anchorage and accumulation of mitochondria at the bud tip. This anchorage must be properly maintained, as ectopic increase in mitochondrial anchorage can disrupt quality control mechanisms aimed at promoting asymmetric cell division

Effects of galactic magnetic field on the UHECR correlation studies with starburst galaxies

We estimate the biases caused by the coherent deflection of cosmic rays due to the Galactic magnetic field (GMF) in maximum-likelihood analysis for searches of ultrahigh-energy cosmic ray (UHECR) sources in the literature. We simulate mock event datasets with a set of assumptions for the starburst galaxy (SBG) source model (arXiv:1801.06160), coherent deflection by a GMF model (arXiv:1204.3662,arXiv:1210.7820), and mixed-mass composition (arXiv:1901.03338); we then conduct a maximum-likelihood analysis without accounting for the GMF in the same manner as previous studies. We find that the anisotropic fraction $f_{\rm ani}$ is estimated systematically lower than the true value. We estimate the true parameters which are compatible with the best-fit parameters reported in (arXiv:1801.06160), and find that except for a narrow region with a large anisotropic fraction and small separation angular scale a wide parameter space is still compatible with the experimental results. We also develop a maximum-likelihood method that takes into account the GMF model and confirm in the MC simulations that we can estimate the true parameters within a 1$\sigma$ contour under the ideal condition that we know the event-by-event mass and the GMF

Empirical Examination of the Teachers’ Autonomous Learning Attitudes and the School Organizational Climate: Implications for “Lifelong Learning Teachers”

　時代の変化やキャリアステージに応じて求められる資質能力を高めていくために，教師には自律的に学ぶ姿勢が求められている。本研究では，日々の教育実践を省察する多様な観点を考慮して，教師の自律的な学習姿勢の定量的把握を試みるとともに，学校組織風土との関連を実証的に検討した。現職教師への質問紙調査で収集した回答に対し因子分析を行い，教師の自律的な学習姿勢として「同僚の経験の取り入れ」，「児童生徒・保護者の視点の考慮」，「前向きな挑戦姿勢」，「自己省察」の４つの因子を抽出した。これらのうち，「同僚の経験の取り入れ」と「前向きな挑戦姿勢」が，協働的風土と正の関連，同調的風土と負の関連を示した。分析結果に基づき，「学び続ける教師」の実現への示唆を議論した

Discovery of novel enzyme genes involved in the conversion of an arylglycerol-β-aryl ether metabolite and their use in generating a metabolic pathway for lignin valorization

Microbial conversions known as “biological funneling” have attracted attention for their ability to upgrade heterogeneous mixtures of low-molecular-weight aromatic compounds obtained by chemical lignin depolymerization. β-hydroxypropiovanillone (HPV) and its analogs can be obtained by chemoselective catalytic oxidation of lignin using 2,3-dichloro-5,6-dicyano-1,4-benzoquinone/tert-butyl nitrite/O2, followed by cleavage of arylglycerol-β-aryl ether with zinc. Sphingobium sp. strain SYK-6 can degrade HPV generated by the catabolism of arylglycerol-β-aryl ether through 2-pyrone-4,6-dicarboxylate (PDC), a promising platform chemical. Therefore, production of PDC from HPV can be achieved using the HPV catabolic pathway. However, the pathway and genes involved in the catabolism of vanilloyl acetic acid (VAA) generated during HPV catabolism have not been investigated. In the present study, we isolated SLG_24960 (vceA), which encodes an enzyme that converts VAA into a coenzyme A (CoA) derivative of vanillate (vanilloyl-CoA) from SYK-6, by shotgun cloning. The analysis of a vceA mutant indicated that this gene is not required for VAA conversion in vivo, but it encodes a major enzyme catalyzing CoA-dependent VAA conversion in vitro. We also identified SLG_12450 (vceB), whose product can convert vanilloyl-CoA to vanillate. Enzyme genes besides vceA and vceB, which are necessary for the conversions of HPV to VAA and of vanillate to PDC, were introduced and expressed in Pseudomonas putida. The resulting engineered strain completely converted 1 mM HPV into PDC after 24 h. Our results suggest that the enzyme genes that are not required for the catabolic pathway in microorganisms but can be used for the conversion of target substrates are buried in microbial genomes. These genes are, thus, useful for designing metabolic pathways to produce value-added metabolites.PostprintPeer reviewe

Evaluation of internal margins for prostate for step and shoot intensity‐modulated radiation therapy and volumetric modulated arc therapy using different margin formulas

[Purpose] This feasibility study evaluated the intra-fractional prostate motion using an ultrasound image-guided system during step and shoot intensity-modulated radiation therapy (SS-IMRT) and volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT). Moreover, the internal margins (IMs) using different margin formulas were calculated. [Methods] Fourteen consecutive patients with prostate cancer who underwent SS-IMRT (n = 5) or VMAT (n = 9) between March 2019 and April 2020 were considered. The intra-fractional prostate motion was observed in the superior–inferior (SI), anterior–posterior (AP), and left–right (LR) directions. The displacement of the prostate was defined as the displacement from the initial position at the scanning start time, which was evaluated using the mean ± standard deviation (SD). IMs were calculated using the van Herk and restricted maximum likelihood (REML) formulas for SS-IMRT and VMAT. [Results] For SS-IMRT, the maximum displacements of the prostate motion were 0.17 ± 0.18, 0.56 ± 0.86, and 0.18 ± 0.59 mm in the SI, AP, and LR directions, respectively. For VMAT, the maximum displacements of the prostate motion were 0.19 ± 0.64, 0.22 ± 0.35, and 0.14 ± 0.37 mm in the SI, AP, and LR directions, respectively. The IMs obtained for SS-IMRT and VMAT were within 2.3 mm and 1.2 mm using the van Herk formula and within 1.2 mm and 0.8 mm using the REML formula. [Conclusions] This feasibility study confirmed that intra-fractional prostate motion was observed with SS-IMRT and VMAT using different margin formulas. The IMs should be determined according to each irradiation technique using the REML margin

Involvement of activated transcriptional process in efficient gene transfection using unmodified and mannose-modified bubble lipoplexes with ultrasound exposure.

Recently, our group developed ultrasound (US)-responsive and mannose-modified gene carriers (Man-PEG(2000) bubble lipoplexes), and successfully obtained a high level of gene expression in mannose receptor-expressing cells following gene transfection using Man-PEG(2000) bubble lipoplexes and US exposure. We also reported that large amounts of plasmid DNA (pDNA) were transferred into the cytoplasm of the targeted cells in the gene transfection using this method. In the present study, we investigated the involvement of transcriptional processes on enhanced gene expression obtained by unmodified and Man-PEG(2000) bubble lipoplexes with US exposure. The transcriptional process related to activator protein-1 (AP-1) and nuclear factor-κB (NFκB) was activated by US exposure, and was founded to be involved in enhanced gene expression obtained by gene transfection using unmodified and Man-PEG(2000) bubble lipoplexes with US exposure. On the other hand, activation of AP-1 and NFκB pathways followed by US exposure was hardly involved in the inflammatory responses in the gene transfection using this method. These findings suggest that activation of AP-1 and NFκB followed by US exposure is involved in the enhanced gene expression using unmodified and Man-PEG(2000) bubble lipoplexes with US exposure, and the selection of pDNAs activated by US exposure is important in this gene transfection method

Numerical study of air-entraining and submerged vortices in a pump sump

Numerical detection of harmful vortices in pump sumps, such as an air-entraining vortex (AEV) and a submerged vortex (SMV), is crucially important to develop the drain pump machinery. We performed numerical simulations of the benchmark experiments of the pump sump conducted by Matsui et al. (2006 and 2016) using the OpenFOAM and compared the simulation results with the experimental data considering the effects of turbulence model, grid density and detection method of the vortices. We studied the threshold of the gas-liquid volume fraction of the VOF method and the second invariant of velocity gradient tensor to identify AEV and SMV. The methods proposed in the present paper were found to be very effective for the detection of the vortices, and the simulation results by RANS with the SST k-omega model successfully reproduced the experimental data. LES with the Smagorinsky model, however, was sensitive to the grid system and difficult to reproduce the experimental data even for the finest grid system having 3.7 million cells in the present study

Characterization of Fluorescent Proteins for Three- and Four-Color Live-Cell Imaging in S. cerevisiae

Saccharomyces cerevisiae are widely used for imaging fluorescently tagged protein fusions. Fluorescent proteins can easily be inserted into yeast genes at their chromosomal locus, by homologous recombination, for expression of tagged proteins at endogenous levels. This is especially useful for incorporation of multiple fluorescent protein fusions into a single strain, which can be challenging in organisms where genetic manipulation is more complex. However, the availability of optimal fluorescent protein combinations for 3-color imaging is limited. Here, we have characterized a combination of fluorescent proteins, mTFP1/mCitrine/mCherry for multicolor live cell imaging in S. cerevisiae. This combination can be used with conventional blue dyes, such as DAPI, for potential four-color live cell imaging