A Novel Photonic Material for Designing Arbitrarily Shaped Waveguides in Two Dimensions

We investigate numerically optical properties of novel two-dimensional photonic materials where parallel dielectric rods are randomly placed with the restriction that the distance between rods is larger than a certain value. A large complete photonic gap (PG) is found when rods have sufficient density and dielectric contrast. Our result shows that neither long-range nor short-range order is an essential prerequisite to the formation of PGs. A universal principle is proposed for designing arbitrarily shaped waveguides, where waveguides are fenced with side walls of periodic rods and surrounded by the novel photonic materials. We observe highly efficient transmission of light for various waveguides. Due to structural uniformity, the novel photonic materials are best suited for filling up the outer region of waveguides of arbitrary shape and dimension comparable with the wavelength.Comment: 4 figure

Optimal Monetary Policy in an Estimated Local Currency Pricing Model

We analyze fluctuations in inflation and the nominal exchange rate under optimal monetary policy with local currency pricing by developing two-country DSGE local currency pricing and producer currency pricing models. We estimate our models using Bayesian techniques with Japanese and US data, and calculate impulse response functions. Our estimation results show that local currency pricing is strongly supported against producer currency pricing. From the estimated parameters, we show that completely stabilizing consumer price index inflation is optimal from the viewpoint of minimizing welfare costs and that completely stabilizing consumer price index inflation is consistent with completely stabilizing the nominal exchange rate.local currency pricing, optimal monetary policy, CPI inflation, fixed exchange rate, Bayesian estimation

Development of Tumor-Specific Caffeine-Potentiated Chemotherapy Using Span 80 Nano-Vesicles DDS

Osteosarcoma cases with metastasis have poor prognosis in general. Recently, caffeinepotentiated chemotherapy, which is chemotherapy with caffeine dosage against malignancies, has manifested potently high efficacy as well as diverse effects. Recently, we demonstrated that nonionic vesicles prepared from Span 80 have promising physicochemical properties, which let them an attractive option besides the common liposomes. Here, we manifested the tumor-specific caffeine-potentiated chemotherapy against osteosarcoma in murine model employing a novel drug delivery system (DDS) with Span 80 nano-vesicles. C3H/HeJ mice underwent transplantation of LM8 osteosarcoma cell line and then were doped with therapeutic agents. Caffeine was employed as an enhancer in addition to ifosfamide (IFO) as the antitumor agent. in vitro, the united administration of IV + CV revealed significant induction of tumor apoptosis in the early phase. In vivo study manifested that IV + CV-administration markedly decreased the tumor volume as well as the viable tumor area than in the other groups. No marked organ damage was observed in the IV or IV + CV groups as well as fertility injury and/or malformations in their progeny. This novel DDS might have the importance for clinical application in primary tumors as well as the metastatic osteosarcoma

Fatigue Limit Reliability Analysis for Notched Material with Some Kinds of Dense Inhomogeneities Using Fracture Mechanics

This study proposes a quantitative method for predicting fatigue limit reliability of a notched metal containing inhomogeneities. Since the fatigue fracture origin of the notched metal cannot be determined in advance because of stress nonuniformity, randomly distributed particles, and scatter of a matrix, it is difficult to predict the fatigue limit. The present method utilizes a stress-strength model incorporating the “statistical hardness characteristics of a matrix under small indentation loads” and the “statistical hardness characteristics required for non-propagation of fatigue cracks from microstructural defects”. The notch root is subdivided into small elements to eliminate the stress nonuniformity. The fatigue limit reliability is predicted by unifying the survival rates of the elements obtained by the stress-strength model according to the weakest link model. The method is applied to notched specimens of aluminum cast alloy JIS AC4B-T6 containing eutectic Si, Fe compounds and porosity. The fatigue strength reliability at 107 cycles, which corresponds to the fatigue limit reliability, is predicted. The fatigue limits of notch root radius ρ = 2, 1, 0.3, and 0.1 mm are obtained by rotating-bending fatigue tests. It is shown that the fatigue limits predicted by the present method are in good agreement with the experimental ones