Origin of Critical Behavior in Ethernet Traffic

We perform a simplified Ethernet traffic simulation in order to clarify the physical mechanism of the phase transition behavior which has been experimentally observed in the flow density fluctuation of Internet traffic. In one phase traffics from nodes connected with an Ethernet cable are mixed, and in the other phase, the nodes alternately send bursts of packets. The competition of sending packets among nodes and the binary exponential back-off algorithm are revealed to play important roles in producing $1/f$ fluctuations at the critical point.Comment: 14 pages, 9 figures. To appear physica

The relationship between the Prime Minister and the governing party in Britain and Japan: A comparative analysis of responses to the oil crises 1973-1980.

British and Japanese prime ministers have opposite reputations in policy-making, while sharing similar systemic backgrounds and formal power resources within the executive. Prime-ministers' power in policy-making within the executive was primarily promoted and circumscribed by their relationships with their governing parties and their strategic decisions over appointing ministers. Fourteen case studies on prime ministers' responses to the oil crises in foreign, fiscal and domestic oil policies between 1973 and 1980 found that the Japanese prime ministers exerted more power, while some British prime ministers faced more constraints, than might have been expected. Edward Heath, a British Conservative premier with clear control over the party, exercised power with minimal intervention. Kakuei Tanaka, an LDP premier, exhibited the institutional potential of the Japanese prime minister and the restraints on him, which derived from the existence of autonomous cabinet ministers, enjoying independent support within the party. James Callaghan, a British Labour premier, demonstrated the substantial power resources deployed by the British prime minister and the limits imposed by divisions in the governing party and the cabinet. Masayoshi Ohira, an LDP premier, emphasised ministerial appointment when confronted by hostile groups in the governing party. The main differences of formal power resources of the British and Japanese prime ministers were: the more significant constitutional position of the cabinet in Japan, the superior information network centred on the British prime minister, and the policy unit available to the British prime minister after 1974. Without the support of the governing party it was difficult for the prime ministers even to mobilise their power resources, whereas with its support they did not need to make explicit interventions to achieve their preferred policies. Principal-agent theory and two-level games were relevant for analysing prime-ministerial power in policy-making and party organisation

Heuristic Segmentation of a Nonstationary Time Series

Many phenomena, both natural and human-influenced, give rise to signals whose statistical properties change under time translation, i.e., are nonstationary. For some practical purposes, a nonstationary time series can be seen as a concatenation of stationary segments. Using a segmentation algorithm, it has been reported that for heart beat data and Internet traffic fluctuations--the distribution of durations of these stationary segments decays with a power law tail. A potential technical difficulty that has not been thoroughly investigated is that a nonstationary time series with a (scale-free) power law distribution of stationary segments is harder to segment than other nonstationary time series because of the wider range of possible segment sizes. Here, we investigate the validity of a heuristic segmentation algorithm recently proposed by Bernaola-Galvan et al. by systematically analyzing surrogate time series with different statistical properties. We find that if a given nonstationary time series has stationary periods whose size is distributed as a power law, the algorithm can split the time series into a set of stationary segments with the correct statistical properties. We also find that the estimated power law exponent of the distribution of stationary-segment sizes is affected by (i) the minimum segment size, and (ii) the ratio of the standard deviation of the mean values of the segments, and the standard deviation of the fluctuations within a segment. Furthermore, we determine that the performance of the algorithm is generally not affected by uncorrelated noise spikes or by weak long-range temporal correlations of the fluctuations within segments.Comment: 23 pages, 14 figure

A novel indole compound MA-35 attenuates renal fibrosis by inhibiting both TNF-α and TGF-β1 pathways

Renal fibrosis is closely related to chronic inflammation and is under the control of epigenetic regulations. Because the signaling of transforming growth factor-β1 (TGF-β1) and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) play key roles in progression of renal fibrosis, dual blockade of TGF-β1 and TNF-α is desired as its therapeutic approach. Here we screened small molecules showing anti-TNF-α activity in the compound library of indole derivatives. 11 out of 41 indole derivatives inhibited the TNF-α effect. Among them, Mitochonic Acid 35 (MA-35), 5-(3, 5-dimethoxybenzyloxy)-3-indoleacetic acid, showed the potent effect. The anti-TNF-α activity was mediated by inhibiting IκB kinase phosphorylation, which attenuated the LPS/GaIN-induced hepatic inflammation in the mice. Additionally, MA-35 concurrently showed an anti-TGF-β1 effect by inhibiting Smad3 phosphorylation, resulting in the downregulation of TGF-β1-induced fibrotic gene expression. In unilateral ureter obstructed mouse kidney, which is a renal fibrosis model, MA-35 attenuated renal inflammation and fibrosis with the downregulation of inflammatory cytokines and fibrotic gene expressions. Furthermore, MA-35 inhibited TGF-β1-induced H3K4me1 histone modification of the fibrotic gene promoter, leading to a decrease in the fibrotic gene expression. MA-35 affects multiple signaling pathways involved in the fibrosis and may recover epigenetic modification; therefore, it could possibly be a novel therapeutic drug for fibrosis

Actual therapeutic efficacy of pre-transplant treatment on hepatocellular carcinoma and its impact on survival after salvage living donor liver transplantation.

BACKGROUND: The exact efficacy of pre-liver transplant (LT) therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and the impact on survival after LT remain controversial in regard to salvage LT. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Of 79 patients transplanted in Nagasaki University Hospital between August 1997 and December 2007, 29 patients (36.7%) were indicated for HCC based on the Milan criteria using computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging. Pre-LT therapy other than liver resection had been performed in 18 cases (62.1%) for 24 lesions. Treated lesions were analyzed histologically using thin slices of the whole explanted liver. RESULTS: Pre-LT therapy included transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) for 10 lesions, percutaneous ethanol injection (PEI) + TACE for 1 lesion, PEI in 6 lesions and ablation therapy in 7 lesions. Under preoperative imaging study, 19 lesions (79.1%) were "thought-to-be" necrotic by pre-LT therapy. However, histologically, viable HCCs were still observed in 9 lesions (9/19 47%). A median interval between the first pre-therapy and LT was 22 months, while last pre-LT therapy and LT was 11 months. No sarcomatous HCC or forced portal venous tumor thrombus was found in all cases with residual lesions. One peritoneal recurrence has occurred after LT, in whom PEI and RFA had been performed before LDLT. The disease free survival after LDLT was comparable to that of cases without pre-LT therapy. CONCLUSION: Half of the preoperatively "thought-to-be" necrotic lesions still contained viable HCC cells after the pre-LT treatment. Overall, the history of pre-LT therapy does not preclude or interfere with subsequent LT, although percutaneous treatment may spread disseminated tumor cell growth under immunosuppression

Is The Japanese Prime Minister Too Weakor Too Strong? : An Institutional Analysis

The Japanese political system has conventionally been perceived as a parliamentary system, which indicates that executive power depends on the national assembly. Such a parliamentary system could with coherent governing parties show decisive power in the policy-making processes. After the political reforms were implemented in 1994, some prime ministers did indeed show such decisive power in Japan, and presently the prime minister enjoys almost a free hand. At present the problem of Japanese politics arguably lies on an excessively powerful prime minister. Having said that, prime ministers in Japan had changed almost every year between 2006 and 2012; this office had symbolised the instability of the Japanese political system. The mystery of the Japanese political system merely deepens, when these observations are considered. This paper explores the question as to why such an extreme alternation of prime-ministerial power occurs in Japanese politics. By so doing this paper depicts the nature of the political system in Japan

The relationship between the Prime Minister and the governing party in Britain and Japan : a comparative analysis of responses to the oil crisis, 1973-1980

EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

The Centralised Core Executive vs Policy Communities : Challenges and Problems of the Blair Government's Approach

英国の伝統的国家構造の基本は議会主権であり、その主権を担う議会の信任する政府が政策運営を主導するものと理解されてきた。なかでも、首相や内閣、大臣には多くの関心が寄せられ、官僚制を含め、いずれのアクターが政策を主導しているのかが、ときにはゼロ・サム的関係を前提に、議論されてきた。他方、英国では特に1970年代半ば以降、このような静的な政策決定メカニズムの理解には疑問も投げかけられるようになった。政策コミュニティー論あるいは政策ネットワーク論として知られる一連の研究の登場である。政策は実際にはマクロの政策決定メカニズムによってではなく、政策領域や争点ごとに多様なアクターの相互関係のなかで決せられているのではないか、というのがその主張であった。しかし、政策コミュニティーあるいは政策ネットワークを強調する議論は、理論的にも現実政治的にも、政府全体の統合や調整への問いを惹起する。理論的には、執政府中枢（core executive）という概念が形成され、こうした研究課題への取り組みが本格化してきた。執政府中枢という概念を提示した研究者のひとりが政策ネットワーク論に取り組んできたロッド・ローズであったことは偶然ではない。さらに現実政治では、断片化した政府を問題と捉え、これを強力に統合しようとしたのがブレア労働党政権であった。ブレア政権は、首相府、内閣府、財務省を司令塔とし、他の省庁をある種の執行機関と位置づけ、執政府中枢による介入とコントロールを強化した。だが、それは重大な弊害を伴う改革でもあった