Gas Sensing Properties of Rutile-tio2 (100) Films Prepared by Pulsed Laser Deposition

Gas sensing property of TiO2 thin films have been demonstrated in rutile-TiO2 (100) films grown on the a-Al2O3 (0001)substrates by Pulsed Laser Deposition (PLD). High quality rutile-TiO2 (100) films were successfully grown on a-Al2O3(0001) with the substrate temperature at 500oC under 15 mTorr of O2 gas pressure. The thickness and crystallinity ofTiO2 films were evaluated by Rutherford backscattering spectrometry combined with channeling (RBS/C) and X-raydiffraction using q-2q scans. To evaluate CO2 gas sensing property of TiO2 films, the dependence of the changing ofelectrical resistivity on the temperature was measured. It's found that high crystallinity rutile-TiO2 (100) films on the a-Al2O3 (0001) substrate kept at 100oC exhibits good gas sensing property for CO2 gas

Criterion and Construct Validity of the CogState Schizophrenia Battery in Japanese Patients with Schizophrenia

BACKGROUND: The CogState Schizophrenia Battery (CSB), a computerized cognitive battery, covers all the same cognitive domains as the Measurement and Treatment Research to Improve Cognition in Schizophrenia (MATRICS) Consensus Cognitive Battery but is briefer to conduct. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the criterion and construct validity of the Japanese language version of the CSB (CSB-J) in Japanese patients with schizophrenia. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Forty Japanese patients with schizophrenia and 40 Japanese healthy controls with matching age, gender, and premorbid intelligence quotient were enrolled. The CSB-J and the Brief Assessment of Cognition in Schizophrenia, Japanese-language version (BACS-J) were performed once. The structure of the CSB-J was also evaluated by a factor analysis. Similar to the BACS-J, the CSB-J was sensitive to cognitive impairment in Japanese patients with schizophrenia. Furthermore, there was a significant positive correlation between the CSB-J composite score and the BACS-J composite score. A factor analysis showed a three-factor model consisting of memory, speed, and social cognition factors. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: This study suggests that the CSB-J is a useful and rapid automatically administered computerized battery for assessing broad cognitive domains in Japanese patients with schizophrenia

Self‐Emergent Protocells Generated in an Aqueous Solution with Binary Macromolecules through Liquid‐Liquid Phase Separation

生体内の高分子混雑に着目した新規の細胞モデルの創成に成功. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2020-12-16.Recently, liquid–liquid phase separation (LLPS) has attracted considerable attention among researchers in the life sciences as a plausible mechanism for the generation of microstructures inside cells. LLPS occurs through multiple nonspecific interactions and does not always require a lock‐and‐key interaction with a binary macromolecular solution. The remarkable features of LLPS include the non‐uniform localization and concentration of solutes, resulting in the ability to isolate certain chemical systems and thereby parallelize multiple chemical reactions within the limited space of a living cell. We report that, by using the macromolecules, poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) and dextran, that exhibit LLPS in an aqueous solution, cell‐sized liposomes are spontaneously formed therein in the presence of phospholipids. In this system, LLPS is generated through the depletion effect of macromolecules. The results showed that cell‐like microdroplets entrapping DNA wrapped by a phospholipid layer emerge in a self‐organized manner

Reversible Morphological Control of Tubulin-Encapsulating Giant Liposomes by Hydrostatic Pressure

Liposomes encapsulating cytoskeletons have drawn much recent attention to develop an artificial cell-like chemical-machinery; however, as far as we know, there has been no report showing isothermally reversible morphological changes of liposomes containing cytoskeletons because the sets of various regulatory factors, that is, their interacting proteins, are required to control the state of every reaction system of cytoskeletons. Here we focused on hydrostatic pressure to control the polymerization state of microtubules (MTs) within cell-sized giant liposomes (diameters ∼10 μm). MT is the cytoskeleton formed by the polymerization of tubulin, and cytoskeletal systems consisting of MTs are very dynamic and play many important roles in living cells, such as the morphogenesis of nerve cells and formation of the spindle apparatus during mitosis. Using real-time imaging with a high-pressure microscope, we examined the effects of hydrostatic pressure on the morphology of tubulin-encapsulating giant liposomes. At ambient pressure (0.1 MPa), many liposomes formed protrusions due to tubulin polymerization within them. When high pressure (60 MPa) was applied, the protrusions shrank within several tens of seconds. This process was repeatedly inducible (around three times), and after the pressure was released, the protrusions regenerated within several minutes. These deformation rates of the liposomes are close to the velocities of migrating or shape-changing living cells rather than the shortening and elongation rates of the single MTs, which have been previously measured. These results demonstrate that the elongation and shortening of protrusions of giant liposomes is repeatedly controllable by regulating the polymerization state of MTs within them by applying and releasing hydrostatic pressure