Hedonic Price Function for Residential Area Focusing on the Reasons for Residential Preferences in Japanese Metropolitan Areas

This study aims to offer a new estimate of the hedonic price function of residential areas in Japanese metropolitan areas, focusing on the reasons for residential preferences. More specifically, it introduces two new explanatory variables—‘regional vulnerability’ and ‘accessibility to destination stations’—and determines their usefulness. Based on the evaluation done in this study, the hedonic price function mentioned above showed 60% interpretability (as compared to 52% interpretability by hedonic price function using only conventional explanatory variables.) In addition, the significance level of both the explanatory variables was low, and the land price changed by 9% as the regional vulnerability changed by 1 grade. Furthermore, residents placed great emphasis on both variables. This made it evident that the introduction of the two explanatory variables that reflect the reasons for residential preferences specific to Japanese metropolitan areas was reasonable

Immunohistochemical Expressions of Main PGE2 Biosynthesis-related Enzymes and PGE2 Receptor in Rat Nephrogenesis

Endogenous prostaglandin (PG) E2 plays important roles in renal homeostasis. Immunoexpressions of PGE2 biosynthesis-related enzymes, cyclooxygenase (COX)-2 and microsomal PGE2 synthetase (mPGES)-1 and EP4 (a PGE2 receptor), were investigated in renal development. Kidney tissues were obtained from fetuses on gestation days 18 and 21 and neonates on days 1 to 18. In fetuses and early neonates, the expressions of COX-2, mPGES-1 and EP4 were observed in developing renal tubules, indicating that COX-2 and its product, PGE2, play important roles in blastemal cell-derived renal tubular development via EP4. Cyclin D1 expression was seen in both the nucleus and cytoplasm of the developing tubules. These findings differed from the decreased COX-2 expression and exclusive nuclear expression of cyclin D1 seen in abnormal epithelial regeneration of injured renal tubules in cisplatin-treated rats in our previous articles. Collectively, PGE2, induced by COX-2, regulates renal tubular epithelial formation via EP4

Coevolutionary genetic algorithm for constraint satisfaction with a genetic repair operator for effective schemata formation

We discuss a coevolutionary genetic algorithm for constraint satisfaction. Our basic idea is to explore effective genetic information in the population, i.e., schemata, and to exploit the genetic information in order to guide the population to better solutions. Our coevolutionary genetic algorithm (CGA) consists of two GA populations; the first GA, called “H-GA”, searches for the solutions in a given environment (problem), and the second GA, called “P-GA”, searches for effective genetic information involved in the H-GA, namely, good schemata. Thus, each individual in P-GA consists of alleles in H-GA or “don't care” symbol representing a schema in the H-GA. These GA populations separately evolve in each genetic space at different abstraction levels and affect with each other by two genetic operators: “superposition” and “transcription”. We then applied our CGA to constraint satisfaction problems (CSPs) incorporating a new stochastic “repair” operator for P-GA to raise the consistency of schemata with the (local) constraint conditions in CSPs. We carried out two experiments: First, we examined the performance of CGA on various “general” CSPs that are generated randomly for a wide variety of “density” and “tightness” of constraint conditions in the CSPs that are the basic measures of characterizing CSPs. Next, we examined “structured” CSPs involving latent “cluster” structures among the variables in the CSPs. For these experiments, computer simulations confirmed us the effectiveness of our CGA</p

Relationship of Cell Proliferating Marker Expressions with PGE2 Receptors in Regenerating Rat Renal Tubules after Cisplatin Injection

Cisplatin, an anticancer drug, is well known to have nephrotoxicity as an adverse effect. We investigated the expressions of cell cycle markers and prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) receptors (EP) in the affected renal tubules in rats injected with a single dose (6 mg/kg body weight) of cisplatin. On days 1–3 after dosing, the affected renal epithelial cells were almost desquamated, showing necrosis. On day 5 onwards, the renal tubules were rimmed by flattened or cuboidal epithelial cells with basophilic cytoplasm; BrdU-immunopositive cells began to significantly increase, indicating regeneration. Simultaneously, TUNEL-positive apoptotic cells were also seen. On days 1–5, cyclin D1-immunopositive cells were decreased with an increased expression in p21 mRNA, indicating G1 arrest in the cell cycle. The affected renal epithelial cells began to react to EP4 receptor, but not to EP2 receptor. Some EP4 receptor-reacting epithelial cells gave a positive reaction to BrdU or cyclin D1. Collectively, the affected renal tubules underwent various alterations such as necrosis, apoptosis, regeneration and G1 arrest; the aspects might be influenced by endogenous PGE2 through EP4 receptor

Yamato-791093, a metal-sulfide-enriched H-group chondritic meteorite transitional to primitive IIE irons with silicate inclusions

The Y-791093 meteorite consists of volumetrically equal amounts of metal-sulfide-rich and chondritic portions. The chondritic portion is texturally and mineralogically similar to H6 chondrites. The metal-sulfide-rich portion consists mainly of kamacite and troilite; chondritic fragments, including silicate grains and chondrules, are common. The entire assemblage of the metal-sulfide-rich portion is texturally similar to the primitive IIE irons with chondritic inclusions such as Netschaevo and Techado, but richer in sulfide component. The chondritic, sulfide, and metallic components were analysed by INAA, and compared with average compositions of H chondrites and Netschaevo. The chondritic portion has the same composition as that of average H chondrite. The abundances of siderophile and chalcophile elements in the metal-sulfide-rich portion estimated from the compositions of metallic and sulfide components are similar to those of average H chondrite and Netschaevo, except for higher chalcophiles and a lower Ir content than average H chondrite. The metal-sulfide-rich portion of Y-791093 crystallized from Fe-Ni-S melt produced by shock melting of H chondrites, and Y-791093 was formed by mixing of the Fe-Ni-S melt with H6 chondritic material, near the surface of an H-group chondrite parent body. We conclude that Y-791093 is a transitional member between H chondrites and primitive IIE irons with silicate inclusions

Identification of amino acid residues of mammalian mitochondrial phosphate carrier important for its functional expression in yeast cells, as achieved by PCR-mediated random mutation and gap-repair cloning

The mitochondrial phosphate carrier (PiC) of mammals, but not the yeast one, is synthesized with a presequence. The deletion of this presequence of the mammalian PiC was reported to facilitate the import of the carrier into yeast mitochondria, but the question as to whether or not mammalian PiC could be functionally expressed in yeast mitochondria was not addressed. In the present study, we first examined whether the defective growth on a glycerol plate of yeast cells lacking the yeast PiC gene could be reversed by the introduction of expression vectors of rat PiCs. The introduction of expression vectors encoding full-length rat PiC (rPiC) or rPiC lacking the presequence (ΔNrPiC) was ineffective in restoring growth on the glycerol plates. When we examined the expression levels of individual rPiCs in yeast mitochondria, ΔNrPiC was expressed at a level similar to that of yeast PiC, but that of rPiC was very low. These results indicated that ΔNrPiC expressed in yeast mitochondria is inert. Next, we sought to isolate “revertants” viable on the glycerol plate by expressing randomly mutated ΔNrPiC, and obtained two clones. These clones carried either of two mutations, F267S or F282S; and these mutations restored the transport function of ΔNrPiC in yeast mitochondria. These two Phe residues were conserved in human carrier (hPiC), and the transport function of ΔNhPiC expressed in yeast mitochondria was also markedly improved by their substitutions. Thus, substitution of F267S or F282S was concluded to be important for functional expression of mammalian PiCs in yeast mitochondria

High-pressure synthesis of superconducting Nb{1-x}B2 (x = 0-0.48) with the maximum Tc = 9.2 K

Superconductivity with Tc above 9 K was found in metal-deficient NbB2 prepared under 5 GPa, while no clear superconductivity was observed down to 3 K in stoichiometric NbB2. The superconductivity was observed above x = 0.04 in Nb1-xB2. and the lattice parameters also changed abruptly at x = 0.04. As x increased, the transition temperature Tc slightly rose and fell with the maximum value of 9.2 K at x = 0.24 for the samples sintered at 5 GPa and 1200 C. The Tc-value changed in the range from 7 K to 9 K, depending on the sintering pressure. A series of Ta1-xB2 (0 =< x =< 0.24) was also synthesized under high pressure to examine a special effect of high-pressure synthesis.Comment: 24 pages including 2 tables and 7 figures, accepted for publication in Physica