Three-Dimensional “Honeycomb” Culture System that Helps to Maintain the Contractile Phenotype of Vascular Smooth Muscle Cells

Vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) in the normal aorta are described as having a contractile phenotype because they can contract and do not proliferate. VSMCs in pathological conditions such as atherosclerosis and restenosis can proliferate and migrate, but lose their ability to contract, which is referred to as a synthetic phenotype. VSMCs show plasticity by changing their phenotype according to the surrounding environment. When VSMCs are cultured on a plastic plate, which is a normal two-dimensional culture system, they display the synthetic phenotype because they proliferate and migrate without contraction. Recently, we successfully cultured VSMCs that display features similar to the contractile phenotype, using type I collagen three-dimensional matrices, “honeycombs,” in the presence of abundant fetal bovine serum albumin. VSMCs cultured in honeycombs stop proliferating and can contract. The honeycomb culture system can maintain VSMCs in the contractile phenotype for a long period of time. In this chapter, we show the method of this new culture system and the characteristics of VSMCs in honeycombs. It is expected that the use of this culture system will generate new information on the characteristics of VSMCs

Topological Properties and Functionalities in Oxide Thin Films and Interfaces

As symbolized by the Nobel Prize in Physics 2016, "topology" has been recognized as an essential standpoint to understand and control the physics of condensed matter. This concept may be spreading even into application areas such as novel electronics. In this trend, there has been reported a number of study for the oxide films and heterostructures with topologically non-trivial electronic or magnetic states. In this review, we overview the trends of new topological properties and functionalities in oxide materials with sorting out a number of examples. The technological advances in oxide film growth achieved over the last few decades are now opening the door for harnessing novel topological properties.Comment: 15 pages, 7 figure

The Ejecta Distributions of the Heavy Elements in the Cygnus Loop

We analyzed the metal distribution of the Cygnus Loop using 14 and 7 pointings observation data obtained by the \textit{Suzaku} and the \textit{XMM-Newton} observatories. The spectral analysis shows that all the spectra are well fitted by the two-$kT_e$ non-equilibrium ionization plasma model as shown by the earlier observations. From the best-fit parameters of the high-$kT_e$ component, we calculated the emission measures about various elements and showed the metal distribution of the ejecta component. We found that the distributions of Si and Fe are centered at the southwest of the geometric center toward the blow-out region. From the best-fit parameters, we also estimated the progenitor mass of the Cygnus Loop from our field of view and the metal rich region with a radius of 25 arcmin from the metal center. The result from the metal circle is similar to that from our entire FOV, which suggests the mixing of the metal. From the results, we estimated the mass of the progenitor star at 12-15\MO.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures, PASJ, Vol.61, No.

Creating Working Value Evaluation Model WVEM

The authors create a Working Value Evaluation Model WVEM for labor valuation by using statistical science that allows manufacturers to visualize the performance of labor. We verify the effectiveness of this model at auto manufactures and others