Optical Fiber-Based Sleep Apnea Syndrome Sensor

A noninvasive sleep apnea syndrome (SAS) sensor using optical fibers, the “F-SAS sensor,” has been evaluated in a clinical application ranging in age from 13 to 78 years and with BMIs of 19.2–39.3. The respiratory disturbance index (RDI) from the F-SAS sensor corresponded well with the apnea hypopnea index (AHI) from polysomnography (PSG). Concurrent measurement of the RDI and the AHI had a correlation coefficient of 0.71. This means that the F-SAS is well-suited for preliminary SAS screening. They would also be useful for screening potential SAS sufferers during normal sleep at home. Then, we have succeeded in downsizing F-SAS sensor and have recognized that it is highly correlated with PSG and pulse oximetry. Next, we applied the compact F-SAS sensor to examining SAS diagnosis in a child patient (2–12 years) and report on improved pediatric analysis. The analysis results revealed the correlation value to be R = 0.87 was a significant improvement over the correlation value of R = 0.697 between the AHI obtained by a sleep apnea syndrome examination apparatus (SAS 2100) and RDI obtained by the conventional F-SAS sensor

Left–Right Reversal Recurrently Evolved Regardless of Diaphanous-Related Formin Gene Duplication or Loss in Snails

Bilateria exhibit whole-body handedness in internal structure. This left–right polarity is evolutionarily conserved with virtually no reversed extant lineage, except in molluscan Gastropoda. Phylogenetically independent snail groups contain both clockwise-coiled (dextral) and counterclockwise-coiled (sinistral) taxa that are reversed from each other in bilateral handedness as well as in coiling direction. Within freshwater Hygrophila, Lymnaea with derived dextrality have diaphanous related formin (diaph) gene duplicates, while basal sinistral groups possess one diaph gene. In terrestrial Stylommatophora, dextral Bradybaena also have diaph duplicates. Defective maternal expression of one of those duplicates gives rise to sinistral hatchlings in Lymnaea and handedness-mixed broods in Bradybaena, through polarity change in spiral cleavage of embryos. These findings led to the hypothesis that diaph duplication was crucial for the evolution of dextrality by reversal. The present study discovered that diaph duplication independently occurred four times and its duplicate became lost twice in gastropods. The dextrality of Bradybaena represents the ancestral handedness conserved across gastropods, unlike the derived dextrality of Lymnaea. Sinistral lineages recurrently evolved by reversal regardless of whether diaph had been duplicated. Amongst the seven formin gene subfamilies, diaph has most thoroughly been conserved across eukaryotes of the 14 metazoan phyla and choanoflagellate. Severe embryonic mortalities resulting from insufficient expression of the duplicate in both of Bradybaena and Lymnaea also support that diaph duplicates bare general roles for cytoskeletal dynamics other than controlling spiralian handedness. Our study rules out the possibility that diaph duplication or loss played a primary role for reversal evolution.journal articl

Regulation of the Expression of Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor mRNA with Thyroid Hormone L-3,5,3'-Triiodothyronine in Rat Hepatoma Cells

The expression of epidermal growth factor (EGF) receptor mRNA was examined using thyroid hormone L-3,5,3'-triiodothyronine (T3) by Northern blot analysis in rat hepatoma cells. The expression of full-length, but not truncated receptor mRNA was enhanced and destabilized with T3. These results suggest that T3 induces not only the expression of full-length EGF receptor mRNA but also accelerates their rate of turnover. The 3' terminal region of full-length EGF receptor mRNA may have a role in the destabilization of EGF receptor mRNA by T3, because truncated EGF receptor mRNA lacks only the 3' terminal region of full-length EGF receptor mRNA

X-ray Anomalous Scattering of Diluted Magnetic Oxide Semiconductors: Possible Evidence of Lattice Deformation for High Temperature Ferromagnetism

We have examined whether the Co ions crystallographically substitute on the Ti sites in rutile and anatase Ti_{1-x}$Co$_{x}$O$_{2-delta}$thin films that exhibit room-temperature ferromagnetism. Intensities of the x-ray Bragg reflection from the films were measured around the$K$-absorption-edge of Co. If the Co ions randomly substitute on the Ti sites, the intensity should exhibit an anomaly due to the anomalous dispersion of the atomic scattering factor of Co. However, none of the anatase and rutile samples did exhibit an anomaly, unambiguously showing that the Co ions in Ti$_{1-x}$Co$_{x}$O$_{2-delta}$are not exactly located at the Ti sites of TiO$_2$. The absence of the anomaly is probably caused by a significant deformation of the local structure around Co due to the oxygen vacancy. We have applied the same method to paramagnetic Zn$_{1-x}$Co$_{x}$O thin films and obtained direct evidence that the Co ions are indeed substituted on the Zn sites.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, accepted in PR

Tumorigenesis of Epstein–Barr Virus-Positive Epithelial Cell Lines Derived from Gastric Tissues in the SCID Mouse

AbstractTo study the tumorigenesis of Epstein–Barr virus (EBV)-positive epithelial cell lines GT38 and GT39 derived from human gastric tissues, we inoculated these cells under the skin of severe combined immunodeficient (SCID) mice. The development of tumors was observed in each of the mice about 2 months after the inoculation. The tumors were diagnosed with undifferentiated carcinoma by hematoxylin/eosin staining. EBV-encoded small RNA1 was detected in the paraffin-embedded tumor sections. The tumor cells had human chromosome. The circular, but not linear, EBV DNA was detected in the tumors. The molecular sizes of EBV DNA termini were the same as that of the inoculated GT38 or GT39 cells. The expressions of EBV nuclear antigen 2 and latent membrane protein 1 reduced in the tumors. Transcripts of BamHI C and W promoters in latency III were detected in the tumors and the cultured cells in vitro. The tumor cells were passaged from one SCID mouse to other SCID mice and to cultures in vitro. This is the first evidence that the EBV-positive epithelial cell lines produced tumors in the SCID mouse

Nucleotide sequence of the genes, encoding the pentaheme cytochrome (dmsC) and the transmembrane protein (dmsB) involved in dimethyl sulfoxide respiration from Rhodobacter sphaeroides f. sp. denitrificans

AbstractThe nucleotide sequence of the genes encoding a pentaheme cytochrome (dmsC) and a transmembrane protein (dmsB) were determined upstream of the dmsA gene encoding dimethyl sulfoxide reductase from Rhodobacter sphaeroides f. sp. denitrificans. dmsC and dmsB encode proteins of 404 and 226 amino acid residues, which show 40% and 26% identity to the pentaheme cytochrome TorC and the transmembrane protein TorD, respectively, of the trimethylamine N-oxide reduction system in Escherichia coli

Fabrication of large preforms for low-loss single-mode optical fibers by a hybridized process

Α hybridized fabrication process for single-mode optical fibers has been studied. The process consists of direct overcladding a VAD derived core rod with a porous body made from commercial silica powder by means of the cold isostatic pressing technique. By using a mixture of main silica powder with an average particle diameter of 10 µm and 1 w t% of fine silica powder with an average particle diameter of 0.04 µm and a core rod having a core/cladding diameter ratio of 1/2.4 as starting materials, large preforms for 300 km fibers were fabricated, which were drawn into fibers with attenuation losses of 0.350 dB/km at 1.31 µm and 0.232 dB/km at 1.55 µm. In the process, a special rubber mold with a structure in which both ends of the core rod are pressed by hydrostatic pressure makes the fabrication of large hybridized soot preforms possible, plastic deformation of the porous body during degreasing being remarkably reduced by using a suitable content of glycerol

Finding cell-specific expression patterns in the early Ciona embryo with single-cell RNA-seq

Single-cell RNA-seq has been established as a reliable and accessible technique enabling new types of analyses, such as identifying cell types and studying spatial and temporal gene expression variation and change at single-cell resolution. Recently, single-cell RNA-seq has been applied to developing embryos, which offers great potential for finding and characterising genes controlling the course of development along with their expression patterns. In this study, we applied single-cell RNA-seq to the 16-cell stage of the Ciona embryo, a marine chordate and performed a computational search for cell-specific gene expression patterns. We recovered many known expression patterns from our single-cell RNA-seq data and despite extensive previous screens, we succeeded in finding new cell-specific patterns, which we validated by in situ and single-cell qPCR

Clustering Malicious DNS Queries for Blacklist-Based Detection

Some of the most serious threats to network security involve malware. One common way to detect malware-infected machines in a network is by monitoring communications based on blacklists. However, such detection is problematic because (1) no blacklist is completely reliable, and (2) blacklists do not provide the sufficient evidence to allow administrators to determine the validity and accuracy of the detection results. In this paper, we propose a malicious DNS query clustering approach for blacklist-based detection. Unlike conventional classification, our cause-based classification can efficiently analyze malware communications, allowing infected machines in the network to be addressed swiftly

Charge disproportionation in the spin-liquid candidate κ − (ET)2Cu2(CN)3 at 6 K revealed by 63Cu NQR measurements

The spin-liquid candidate κ−(ET)2Cu2(CN)3 [ET: bis(ethylenedithio)tetrathiafulvalene] does not exhibit magnetic ordering down to a very low temperature, but shows a mysterious anomaly at 6 K. The origin of the so-called 6-K anomaly is still under debate. We carried out nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) measurements on the copper sites of the insulating layers, which are sensitive to the charge dynamics unlike conventional spin-1/2 nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). The main finding of this Rapid Communication is that the observation of a sharp peak behavior in the nuclear spin-lattice relaxation rate T−11 of 63Cu NQR at 6 K while T−11 of both 13C and 1H NMR show no clear anomaly. This behavior can be understood as a second-order phase transition related to charge disproportionation in the ET layers