Calcium-dependent fast depolarizing afterpotentials in vasopressin neurons in the rat supraoptic nucleus

Oxytocin (OT) and vasopressin (VP) synthesizing magnocellular cells (MNCs) in the supraoptic nucleus (SON) display distinct firing patterns during the physiological demands for these hormones. Depolarizing afterpotentials (DAPs) in these neurons are involved in controlling phasic bursting in VP neurons. Our whole cell recordings demonstrated a Cs+-resistant fast DAP (fDAP; decay tau = ∼200 ms), which has not been previously reported, in addition to the well-known Cs+-sensitive slower DAP (sDAP; decay tau = ∼2 s). Immunoidentification of recorded neurons revealed that all VP neurons, but only 20% of OT neurons, expressed the fDAP. The activation of the fDAP required influx of Ca2+ through voltage-gated Ca2+ channels as it was strongly suppressed in Ca2+-free extracellular solution or by bath application of Cd2+. Additionally, the current underlying the fDAP (IfDAP) is a Ca2+-activated current rather than a Ca2+ current per se as it was abolished by strongly buffering intracellular Ca2+ with BAPTA. The I-V relationship of the I fDAP was linear at potentials less than -60 mV but showed pronounced outward rectification near -50 mV. IfDAP is sensitive to changes in extracellular Na+ and K+ but not Cl-. A blocker of Ca2+-activated nonselective cation (CAN) currents, flufenamic acid, blocked the fDAP, suggesting the involvement of a CAN current in the generation of fDAP in VP neurons. We speculate that the two DAPs have different roles in generating after burst discharges and could play important roles in determining the distinct firing properties of VP neurons in the SON neurons. Copyright © 2007 The American Physiological Society

Firm-Level Labor Demand for and Macroeconomic Increases in Non-Regular Workers in Japan

This work has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 645763.The purpose of this study is to account for the increase in non-regular workers, namely, part-time and dispatched workers, in the Japanese economy from the early 2000s. Our contribution is that we use a firm-level panel dataset extracted from an administrative survey and distinguish between the short-run and long-run determinants of non-regular labor demand. Using the estimated parameters of the labor demand function, we decompose the rate of increase in the macroeconomic non-regular worker ratio into determinant factor contributions. Our major results can be summarized as follows. First, the firm-level determinants of the demand for part-time and dispatched workers significantly differ. Second, our results suggest that the non-regular job creation stimulated by the increased female labor supply plays an essential role relative to direct demand-side factors. Third, the microeconomic demand conditions for non-regular labor are widely dispersed among firms. Neither the demand factors examined in this study nor industrial differences can explain this heterogeneity

Satisfiability Algorithm for Syntactic Read-kk-times Branching Programs

The satisfiability of a given branching program is to determine whether there exists a consistent path from the root to 1-sink. In a syntactic read-k-times branching program, each variable appears at most k times in any path from the root to a sink. We provide a satisfiability algorithm for syntactic read-k-times branching programs with n variables and m edges that runs in time Oleft(poly(n, m^{k^2})cdot 2^{(1-mu(k))n}right), where mu(k) = frac{1}{4^{k+1}}. Our algorithm is based on the decomposition technique shown by Borodin, Razborov and Smolensky [Computational Complexity, 1993]

High-threshold, Kv3-like potassium currents in magnocellular neurosecretory neurons and their role in spike repolarization

We identified Kv3-like high-threshold K+ currents in hypothalamic supraoptic neurons using whole cell recordings in hypothalamic slices and in acutely dissociated neurons. Tetraethylammonium (TEA)-sensitive currents (TEA) evoked from -50 I/V were characterized by a large component that inactivated in 10-30 ms, and a smaller, persistent component that inactivated in 1-2 s. UV relations in dissociated neurons revealed TEA-subtracted currents with a slope and voltage dependency consistent with the presence of Kv3-like channels. In slices, tests with 0.01-0.7 mM TEA produced an IC50 of 200-300 nM for both fast and persistent currents. The fast transient current was similar to currents associated with the expression of Kv3.4 subunits, given that it was sensitive to BDS-I (100 nM). The persistent TEA-sensitive current appeared similar to those attributed to Kv3.1/3.2 subunits. Although qualitatively similar, oxytocin (OT) and vasopressin (VP) neurons in slices differed in the stronger presence of persistent current in VP neurons. In both cell types, the IC50 for TEA-induced spike broadening was similar to that observed for current suppression in voltage clamp. However, TEA had a greater effect on the spike width of VP neurons than of OT neurons. Immunochemical studies revealed a stronger expression of the Kv3.1b α-subunit in VP neurons, which may be related to the greater importance of this current type in VP spike repolarization. Because OT and VP neurons are not considered fast firing, but do exhibit frequency- and calcium-dependent spike broadening, Kv3-like currents may be important for maintaining spike width and calcium influx within acceptable limits during repetitive firing. Copyright © 2004 The American Physiological Society

Improved Exact Algorithms for Mildly Sparse Instances of Max SAT

We present improved exponential time exact algorithms for Max SAT. Our algorithms run in time of the form O(2^{(1-mu(c))n}) for instances with n variables and m=cn clauses. In this setting, there are three incomparable currently best algorithms: a deterministic exponential space algorithm with mu(c)=1/O(c * log(c)) due to Dantsin and Wolpert [SAT 2006], a randomized polynomial space algorithm with mu(c)=1/O(c * log^3(c)) and a deterministic polynomial space algorithm with mu(c)=1/O(c^2 * log^2(c)) due to Sakai, Seto and Tamaki [Theory Comput. Syst., 2015]. Our first result is a deterministic polynomial space algorithm with mu(c)=1/O(c * log(c)) that achieves the previous best time complexity without exponential space or randomization. Furthermore, this algorithm can handle instances with exponentially large weights and hard constraints. The previous algorithms and our deterministic polynomial space algorithm run super-polynomially faster than 2^n only if m=O(n^2). Our second results are deterministic exponential space algorithms for Max SAT with mu(c)=1/O((c * log(c))^{2/3}) and for Max 3-SAT with mu(c)=1/O(c^{1/2}) that run super-polynomially faster than 2^n when m=o(n^{5/2}/log^{5/2}(n)) and m=o(n^3/log^2(n)) respectively

Bounded Depth Circuits with Weighted Symmetric Gates: Satisfiability, Lower Bounds and Compression

A Boolean function f:{0,1}^n -> {0,1} is weighted symmetric if there exist a function g: Z -> {0,1} and integers w_0, w_1, ..., w_n such that f(x_1, ...,x_n) = g(w_0+sum_{i=1}^n w_i x_i) holds. In this paper, we present algorithms for the circuit satisfiability problem of bounded depth circuits with AND, OR, NOT gates and a limited number of weighted symmetric gates. Our algorithms run in time super-polynomially faster than 2^n even when the number of gates is super-polynomial and the maximum weight of symmetric gates is nearly exponential. With an additional trick, we give an algorithm for the maximum satisfiability problem that runs in time poly(n^t)*2^{n-n^{1/O(t)}} for instances with n variables, O(n^t) clauses and arbitrary weights. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first moderately exponential time algorithm even for Max 2SAT instances with arbitrary weights. Through the analysis of our algorithms, we obtain average-case lower bounds and compression algorithms for such circuits and worst-case lower bounds for majority votes of such circuits, where all the lower bounds are against the generalized Andreev function. Our average-case lower bounds might be of independent interest in the sense that previous ones for similar circuits with arbitrary symmetric gates rely on communication complexity lower bounds while ours are based on the restriction method

Japan’s New Minority: Persons with Hattatsu Shogai (Developmental Disability).

This dissertation looks at the process by which a new category of disability, “hattatsu shōgai”, came to be defined in Japan. Hattatsu shōgai, literally translated as developmental disability, is considered to be a congenital disability caused by a functional disorder of the brain and includes learning disability, ADHD and autism spectrum disorder. The term gained a foothold in Japan over the past 10 years amidst the country’s economic and social stagnation, and the emergence of a group of young children with the diagnosis has caused much controversy and public debate over the meaning of the disability label and minority status. Based on an ethnographic study of several fields including schools, non-profit advocacy organizations and treatment programs, as well as interviews with parents, medical professionals, psychologists, disability rights activists and others involved with the community, this work is an attempt to take a close look at the local context by which the knowledge and practices concerning hattatsu shōgai has come to be shaped.PhDAnthropologyUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/108969/1/teruyama_1.pd

Host-directed therapy for bacterial infections -Modulation of the phagolysosome pathway-

Bacterial infections still impose a significant burden on humanity, even though antimicrobial agents have long since been developed. In addition to individual severe infections, the f fatality rate of sepsis remains high, and the threat of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria grows with time, putting us at inferiority. Although tremendous resources have been devoted to the development of antimicrobial agents, we have yet to recover from the lost ground we have been driven into. Looking back at the evolution of treatment for cancer, which, like infectious diseases, has the similarity that host immunity eliminates the lesion, the development of drugs to eliminate the tumor itself has shifted from a single-minded focus on drug development to the establishment of a treatment strategy in which the de-suppression of host immunity is another pillar of treatment. In infectious diseases, on the other hand, the development of therapies that strengthen and support the immune system has only just begun. Among innate immunity, the first line of defense that bacteria encounter after invading the host, the molecular mechanisms of the phagolysosome pathway, which begins with phagocytosis to fusion with lysosome, have been elucidated in detail. Bacteria have a large number of strategies to escape and survive the pathway. Although the full picture is still unfathomable, the molecular mechanisms have been elucidated for some of them, providing sufficient clues for intervention. In this article, we review the host defense mechanisms and bacterial evasion mechanisms and discuss the possibility of host-directed therapy for bacterial infection by intervening in the phagolysosome pathway

Sink Location Problems in Dynamic Flow Grid Networks

A dynamic flow network consists of a directed graph, where nodes called sources represent locations of evacuees, and nodes called sinks represent locations of evacuation facilities. Each source and each sink are given supply representing the number of evacuees and demand representing the maximum number of acceptable evacuees, respectively. Each edge is given capacity and transit time. Here, the capacity of an edge bounds the rate at which evacuees can enter the edge per unit time, and the transit time represents the time which evacuees take to travel across the edge. The evacuation completion time is the minimum time at which each evacuees can arrive at one of the evacuation facilities. Given a dynamic flow network without sinks, once sinks are located on some nodes or edges, the evacuation completion time for this sink location is determined. We then consider the problem of locating sinks to minimize the evacuation completion time, called the sink location problem. The problems have been given polynomial-time algorithms only for limited networks such as paths, cycles, and trees, but no polynomial-time algorithms are known for more complex network classes. In this paper, we prove that the 1-sink location problem can be solved in polynomial-time when an input network is a grid with uniform edge capacity and transit time.Comment: 16 pages, 6 figures, full version of a paper accepted at COCOON 202