Power Spectrum Density of long-term MAXI data

Monitor of All-sky X-ray Image (MAXI) on the International Space Station has been observing the X-ray sky since 2009 August 15. It has accumulated the X-ray data for about four years, so far. X-ray objects are usually variable and their variability can be studied by the power spectrum density (PSD) of the X-ray light curves.We applied our method to calculate PSDs of several kinds of objects observed with MAXI. We obtained significant PSDs from 16 Seyfert galaxies.For blackhole binary Cygnus X-1 there was a difference in the shape of PSD between the hard state and the soft state. For high mass X-ray binaries, Cen X-3, SMC X-1, and LMC X-4, there were several peaks in the PSD corresponding to the orbital period and the superorbital period.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, accepted for proceedings of The 12th Asia Pacific Physics Conference of AAPP

Visualization of Documents and Concepts in Neuroinformatics with the 3D-SE Viewer

A new interactive visualization tool is proposed for mining text data from various fields of neuroscience. Applications to several text datasets are presented to demonstrate the capability of the proposed interactive tool to visualize complex relationships between pairs of lexical entities (with some semantic contents) such as terms, keywords, posters, or papers' abstracts. Implemented as a Java applet, this tool is based on the spherical embedding (SE) algorithm, which was designed for the visualization of bipartite graphs. Items such as words and documents are linked on the basis of occurrence relationships, which can be represented in a bipartite graph. These items are visualized by embedding the vertices of the bipartite graph on spheres in a three-dimensional (3-D) space. The main advantage of the proposed visualization tool is that 3-D layouts can convey more information than planar or linear displays of items or graphs. Different kinds of information extracted from texts, such as keywords, indexing terms, or topics are visualized, allowing interactive browsing of various fields of research featured by keywords, topics, or research teams. A typical use of the 3D-SE viewer is quick browsing of topics displayed on a sphere, then selecting one or several item(s) displays links to related terms on another sphere representing, e.g., documents or abstracts, and provides direct online access to the document source in a database, such as the Visiome Platform or the SfN Annual Meeting. Developed as a Java applet, it operates as a tool on top of existing resources

Comparison of Epirubicin-Iodized Oil Suspension and Emulsion for Transcatheter Arterial Chemoembolization in VX2 Tumor

To compare the antitumor efficacy and safety of transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (TACE) by epirubicin suspension (epirubicin suspension: epirubicin-iodized oil mixture without solution) to that by epirubicin emulsion (epirubicin emulsion: epirubicin-iodized oil mixture with solution), the efficacy of treatment by administration of either an epirubicin suspension or emulsion was examined in an animal model. Changes in plasma epirubicin concentration were compared over 24 h immediately after treatment, and enhanced ultrasonographic and histopathological analysis subsequently conducted 7 days after treatment to determine the growth ratio and proportion of viable tumor cells. The growth ratio and proportion of viable tumor cells were found to be significantly lower in the suspension group than in the emulsion group while the plasma epirubicin concentration was found to be significantly higher in the suspension group than in the emulsion group. These results indicate that administration of an epirubicin suspension is a superior form of TACE compared to that of administration of an epirubicin emulsion

Experimental gold nephropathy in guinea pigs: Detection of autoantibodies to renal tubular antigens

Experimental gold nephropathy in guinea pigs: Detection of autoantibodies to renal tubular antigens. Renal tubular dysfunction was induced in Hartley guinea pigs by injection of sodium aurothiomalate (gold) as manifested by excretion of tubular basement membrane (TBM) antigen and renal tubular epithelial (RTE) antigen in urine and tubular proteinuria. Following the tubular dysfunction, autoimmune tubulointerstitial nephritis (TIN) and/or immune complex nephropathy (ICN) developed in a large proportion of animals. TIN was associated with anti-TBM antibodies, and the histological features were characterized by tubular lesions with interstitial mononuclear cell infiltration, destruction of tubules, and interstitial fibrosis. In ICN, the glomerular lesions consisted of partial thickening of capillary walls and mesangial cellularity, and granular immune deposits were seen in the mesangial area and on capillary walls. Furthermore, electron-dense deposits were demonstrated in the mesangial area and in the glomerular basement membrane (GBM) by electron microscopy. Anti-RTE antibodies were detected in the sera and eluates from the kidney of animals with ICN. RTE antigens were also detected in the glomerular deposits by indirect immunofluorescence using anti-guinea pig RTE antibody. These results suggest that TBM and RTE antigens released from renal tubules damaged by a direct toxic action of gold may lead to antibody formation against these antigens and induce TIN and/or ICN

Midterm surgical results of total cavopulmonary connection: clinical advantages of the extracardiac conduit method

AbstractObjectiveWe evaluated the midterm surgical outcomes of intra-atrial lateral tunnel and extracardiac conduit total cavopulmonary connection to clarify the clinical superiority.MethodsPatients (n = 167) underwent total cavopulmonary connection (88 with lateral tunnel and 79 with extracardiac conduit) from November 1991 to March 1999. Survival, incidence of reoperation and late complications, exercise tolerance, hemodynamic variables, and plasma concentration of natriuretic peptide type A were compared. In the lateral tunnel group, time-related change in lateral tunnel size was investigated for its relationship to postoperative arrhythmias.ResultsThe 8-year survival was 93.2% in the lateral tunnel group and 94.9% in the extracardiac conduit group. Seven reoperations were performed in the lateral tunnel group but none in the extracardiac conduit group. Supraventricular arrhythmias developed in 14 patients (15.9%) in the lateral tunnel group and in 4 patients (5.1%) in the extracardiac conduit group (P = .003). Freedom from cardiac-related events was 72.5% in the lateral tunnel group and 89.8% in the extracardiac conduit group at 8 years (P = .0098). Hemodynamic variables and exercise tolerance were similar in both groups but plasma natriuretic peptide type A concentration, a parameter of atrial wall tension, was higher in the lateral tunnel group. In the lateral tunnel group, intra-atrial tunnel size increased by 19.4% during the 44.2-month interval and the percent increase in tunnel size was an independent predictor of supraventricular arrhythmias.ConclusionsThe midterm survival, hemodynamic variables, and exercise tolerance were similar and satisfactory in both lateral tunnel and extracardiac conduit groups; however, the incidence of cardiac-related events was significantly less frequent in the extracardiac conduit group. In the lateral tunnel group, careful observation is required to monitor the relationship of the dilating tendency of the intra-atrial tunnel and the development of late complications

Noninvasive monitoring of deterioration in skeletal muscle function with forearm cast immobilization and the prevention of deterioration

BACKGROUND: In this research inactivity was simulated by immobilizing the forearm region in a plaster cast. Changes in skeletal muscle oxidative function were measured using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), and the preventative effect of the training protocol on deterioration of skeletal muscle and the clinical utility of NIRS were examined. METHODS: Fourteen healthy adult men underwent immobilization of the forearm of the non-dominant arm by plaster cast for 21 days. Eight healthy adult subjects were designated as the immobilization group (IMM) and six were designated as the immobilization + training group (IMM+TRN). Grip strength, forearm circumference and dynamic handgrip exercise endurance were measured before and after the 21-day immobilization period. Using NIRS, changes in oxidative function of skeletal muscles were also evaluated. Muscle oxygen consumption recovery was recorded after the completion of 60 seconds of 40% maximum voluntary contraction (MVC) dynamic handgrip exercise 1 repetition per 4 seconds and the recovery time constant (TcVO(2)mus) was calculated. RESULTS: TcVO(2)mus for the IMM was 59.7 ± 5.5 seconds (average ± standard error) before immobilization and lengthened significantly to 70.4 ± 5.4 seconds after immobilization (p < 0.05). For the IMM+TRN, TcVO(2)mus was 78.3 ± 6.2 seconds before immobilization and training and shortened significantly to 63.1 ± 5.6 seconds after immobilization and training (p < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The training program used in this experiment was effective in preventing declines in muscle oxidative function and endurance due to immobilization. The experimental results suggest that non-invasive monitoring of skeletal muscle function by NIRS would be possible in a clinical setting