Development of an Operating Robot System for Die and Mold Polishing

This paper proposes an operating robot system that assists polishing tasks in die and mold manufacturing. The proposed system consists of an industrial robot and a joystick. Theoperator manipulates the joystick and remotely moves a tool attached at the hand of the robot. A three-DOF motor-driven joystick was developed, and a force-reflecting bilateralcontroller was constructed in order to realize interactive manual operation. In addition to manual operation, the system can control the contact force of the tool automatically by the force feedback. The operator can use two control modes according to the task. The combination of the manual control and the automatic control enables effective and flexible polishing tasks of objects having complex shape. The developed system was applied to simple polishing tasks. Experimental results show that the tool can be manipulated remotely as if we were handling it directly. Moreover, the results suggest that the system increases the efficiency of polishing tasks remarkably

Performance of new Kuraray wavelength-shifting fibers with short decay time

We measure the decay time and the attenuation length of newly developed wavelength-shifting fibers, YS series from Kuraray, which have fast response. Using a 405 nm laser, the decay times of the YS-2, 4, and 6 are measured to be $3.70 \pm 0.04$ ns, $2.06 \pm 0.03$ ns, and $1.50 \pm 0.02$ ns, respectively. The decay time of Y-11 is measured to be $7.16 \pm 0.09$ ns using the same system. All fibers are found to have similar attenuation lengths of more than 4 meters. When combined with the plastic scintillators EJ-200 and EJ-204, the YS series have better time resolution than Y-11, with light yields of 60-100% of Y-11.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figure

Possible Charge-Exchange X-Ray Emission in the Cygnus Loop Detected with Suzaku

X-ray spectroscopic measurements of the Cygnus Loop supernova remnant indicate that metal abundances throughout most of the remnant's rim are depleted to about 0.2 times the solar value. However, recent X-ray studies have revealed in some narrow regions along the outermost rim anomalously "enhanced" abundances (up to about 1 solar). The reason for these anomalous abundances is not understood. Here, we examine X-ray spectra in annular sectors covering nearly the entire rim of the Cygnus Loop using Suzaku (21 pointings) and XMM-Newton (1 pointing). We find that spectra in the "enhanced" abundance regions commonly show a strong emission feature at about 0.7 keV. This feature is likely a complex of He-like O K(gamma + delta + epsilon), although other possibilities cannot be fully excluded. The intensity of this emission relative to He-like O Kalpha appears to be too high to be explained as thermal emission. This fact, as well as the spatial concentration of the anomalous abundances in the outermost rim, leads us to propose an origin from charge-exchange processes between neutrals and H-like O. We show that the presence of charge-exchange emission could lead to the inference of apparently "enhanced" metal abundances using pure thermal emission models. Accounting for charge-exchange emission, the actual abundances could be uniformly low throughout the rim. The overall abundance depletion remains an open question.Comment: Published in Ap

リテール決済改革の世界的な潮流について ―リアルタイム送金とモバイル・ペイメントを中心に―

There is a clear trend towards Real-time Retail Payment Systems on a global basis. Retail payment systems were left behind the surge of technological innovation and remained inbackward systems. To get out of this situation, several countries try to build new retail payment systems, i. e. Real-time Retail Payment Systems (RT-RPS). Most of these RT-RPSs have common characteristics: near-real-time payment, 24/7/365 operation and mobile payment function.These reforms have its roots in U.K. which introduced“Faster Payments”as RT-RPS and “Paym”as mobile payment service. This trend has spread to Singapore and Australia. Then at last, U.S. and euro area has started the similar project for sophisticated retail payment system, which means that making RT-PRS is becoming a global trend. Japanese banking society should take appropriate action to keep up with this global trend

単一ユーロ決済圏(SEPA)の形成に関する一考察

The Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) is an area in which consumers, companies and other economic actors will be able to make and receive payments in euro, whether within or between national boundaries, under the same basic conditions, rights and obligations,regardless of their location. The SEPA aims to foster European integration via a competitive and innovative retail payments market in the euro area.The SEPA is a grand project involving 31 countries. It should also be mentioned that the SEPA will have an impact not only on banking industry but also on corporates, public administrations, merchants and consumers. The SEPA is made of three components, namely,SEPA Credit Transfer (SCT), SEPA Direct Debit (SDD), and SEPA Card Framework. The main actors in the SEPA project are European Commission, Eurosystem, and European Payments Council (EPC). The target date of the SEPA is the end of 2010.This paper investigates the recent situation of these three components of the SEPA. The payment infrastructures\u27 reaction to the SEPA is also discussed. The infrastructures, which are fragmented at European level, should have to be capable of handling the critical mass of euro payments in the SEPA format. In addition, the remaining issues for implementation and migration towards the SEPA are discussed

ペイメント・チェーンにおける銀行の役割について-e-invoicingを中心に-

Banks have played an important role as a payment network between corporates.That is to say,banks have carried on payments through the inter-bank network,which is the last part of business process. Recently,"e-invoicing"has been a particular focus of attention,especially in EU. E-invoicing is defined as the sending of invoices by electronic means,instead of exchanging paper invoices.E-invoicing has several great advantages, including cost savings for both the sender and receiver,and shortening the invoice-to-pay cycle time.The European Union has been a strong advocate of e-invoicing. Large companies has already introduced e-invoicing. There are several service models of e-invoicing, including 2 corner, 3 corner and 4 corner models. The penetration rate of e-invoicing so far is below 10% of all invoices in the EU,but it is growing fast at around 40% per annum. Several large banks already offer or plan to offer e-invoicing services to corporates as a Single Bank Model. However,the Single Bank Model has limitations as for the reachability of customers. The Euro Banking Association (EBA)is planning to establish a pan-European e-invoicing network and offer e-invoicing service using the inter-bank network. This initiative draws attention as an effort to expand banking business to upper stream of the supply chain. This paper studies the current status of e-invoicing in Europe, several business models of e-invicing and EBA e-invoicing initiatives. These studies are followed by the discussion on business rationale for banks to engage in e-invoicing. Some implications for Japanese market are also discussed

Adaptive Threonine Increase in Transmembrane Regions of Mitochondrial Proteins in Higher Primates

BACKGROUND: The mitochondrial (mt) gene tree of placental mammals reveals a very strong acceleration of the amino acid (AA) replacement rate and a change in AA compositional bias in the lineage leading to the higher primates (simians), in contrast to the nuclear gene tree. Whether this acceleration and compositional bias were caused by adaptive evolution at the AA level or directional mutation pressure at the DNA level has been vigorously debated. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Our phylogenetic analysis indicates that the rate acceleration in the simian lineage is accompanied by a marked increase in threonine (Thr) residues in the transmembrane helix regions of mt DNA-encoded proteins. This Thr increase involved the replacement of hydrophobic AAs in the membrane interior. Even after accounting for lack of independence due to phylogeny, a regression analysis reveals a statistical significant positive correlation between Thr composition and longevity in primates. CONCLUSION/SIGNIFICANCE: Because crucial roles of Thr and Ser in membrane proteins have been proposed to be the formation of hydrogen bonds enhancing helix-helix interactions, the Thr increase detected in the higher primates might be adaptive by serving to reinforce stability of mt proteins in the inner membrane. The correlation between Thr composition in the membrane interior and the longevity of animals is striking, especially because some mt functions are thought to be involved in aging