Improving distances to nearby bright stars: Combining astrometric data from Hipparcos, Nano-JASMINE and Gaia

Starting in 2013, Gaia will deliver highly accurate astrometric data, which eventually will supersede most other stellar catalogues in accuracy and completeness. It is, however, lim- ited to observations from magnitude 6 to 20 and will therefore not include the brightest stars. Nano-JASMINE, an ultrasmall Japanese astrometry satellite, will observe these bright stars, but with much lower accuracy. Hence, the Hipparcos catalogue from 1997 will likely remain the main source of accurate distances to bright nearby stars. We are investigating how this might be improved by optimally combining data from all three missions in a joint astrometric solu- tion. This would take advantage of the unique features of each mission: the historic bright-star measurements of Hipparcos, the updated bright-star observations of Nano-JASMINE, and the very accurate reference frame of Gaia. The long temporal baseline between the missions pro- vides additional benefits for the determination of proper motions and binary detection, which indirectly improve the parallax determination further. We present a quantitative analysis of the expected gains based on simulated data for all three missions.Comment: Final draft for the proceedings of the IAU Symposium 289: Advancing the physics of cosmic distances, held in Beijing, China, August 2012, eds. Richard de Grijs and Giuseppe Bono, Cambridge Univ. Pres

ARTIFICIAL BORING ON THE INCISOR ROOT AT THE LATE JOHMON PERIOD

A single hole penetrating tangentially through the middle of the dental root was found in a right central incisor of the mandible. The tooth was excavated from the bottom layer of the late Johmon and early Yayoi periods under the shell mound of Mitani ruin, Tokushima city. The hole is roundly polished to make a cone-like shape on both the mesial and distal sides without crack. There is neither pathological injury nor trace of living response on microscopy and X-ray test. It is strongly suggested that the hole was simply made on the tooth after extraction from the human mandible

Analysis of Human Hand Impedance Properties Depending on Driving Conditions

This paper examines the influence of driving conditions on human hand impedance properties by using an originally developed driving simulator. A set of driving tests combining driving speed and the existence of a road centerline was carried out with five subjects. The results statistically demonstrate that humans steer a vehicle with increasing hand stiffness by activating arm muscles, i.e., under some tension, on the straight load especially at a lower speed with a centerline. In addition, it was confirmed that there was a clear correlation between steering behaviors and human hand stiffness according to the driving conditions. Human impedance measurement in driving would be useful to ascertain not only steering behaviors but also driver's physical and mental conditions for driving conditions, which may be required to develop an intelligent driving support system

Combining and comparing astrometric data from different epochs: A case study with Hipparcos and Nano-JASMINE

The Hipparcos mission (1989-1993) resulted in the first space-based stellar catalogue including measurements of positions, parallaxes and annual proper motions accurate to about one milli-arcsecond. More space astrometry missions will follow in the near future. The ultra-small Japanese mission Nano-JASMINE (launch in late 2013) will determine positions and annual proper motions with some milli-arcsecond accuracy. In mid 2013 the next-generation ESA mission Gaia will deliver some tens of micro-arcsecond accurate astrometric parameters. Until the final Gaia catalogue is published in early 2020 the best way of improving proper motion values is the combination of positions from different missions separated by long time intervals. Rather than comparing positions from separately reduced catalogues, we propose an optimal method to combine the information from the different data sets by making a joint astrometric solution. This allows to obtain good results even when each data set alone is insufficient for an accurate reduction. We demonstrate our method by combining Hipparcos and simulated Nano-JASMINE data in a joint solution. We show a significant improvement over the conventional catalogue combination.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, 1 table; proceedings of ADASS XXI (Paris, 2011), ASP Conference Serie

Coronavirus Spike Protein Inhibits Host Cell Translation by Interaction with eIF3f

In response to viral infection, the expression of numerous host genes, including predominantly a number of proinflammatory cytokines and chemokines, is usually up-regulated at both transcriptional and translational levels. It was noted that in cells infected with coronavirus, transcription and translation of some of these genes were differentially induced. Drastic induction of their expression at the transcriptional level was observed in cells infected with coronavirus. However, induction of the same genes at the translational level was usually found to be minimal to moderate. To investigate the underlying mechanisms, yeast two-hybrid screen was carried out using SARS-CoV proteins as baits, revealing that a subunit of the eukaryotic initiation factor 3 (eIF3), eIF3f, may interact with the N-terminal region of the SARS-CoV spike (S) protein. This interaction was subsequently confirmed by co-immunoprecipitation and immunofluorescent staining. Meanwhile, parallel experiments confirmed that eIF3f could also interact with the S protein of another coronavirus, the avian coronavirus infectious bronchitis virus (IBV). These interactions led to the inhibition of translation of a reporter gene in both in vitro expression system and intact cells. Interestingly, IBV-infected cells stably expressing a Flag-tagged eIF3f showed much higher translation of IL-6 and IL-8, suggesting that the interaction between coronavirus S protein and eIF3f plays a functional role in controlling the expression of host genes, especially genes that are induced during coronavirus infection cycles. This study reveals a novel mechanism exploited by coronavirus to regulate viral pathogenesis

SHIFT OF AXIAL POSITION FOR ROTATION AT THE INTERVERTEBRAL JOINT IN DOGS

To elucidate whether the position of axis for rotation at the intervertebral joint is related with the spinal curvature, the authors investigated the spinal columns of beagles. The spinal column of beagle was composed of 7 cervical, 13 thoracic, 7 lumbar, 3 sacral, and 19 coccygeal vertebrae. It was observed that the position of axis for rotation at the intervertebral joint was shifted on the superior and inferior views of the 2nd thoracic vertebra and was next shifted on the superior and inferior views of the 10th thoracic vertebra. It was suggested that in the case of beagle and Wistar rat with 13 thoracic vertebrae, the upper shift of axial position for rotation at the intervertebral joint occurred on the superior and inferior views of the 2nd thoracic vertebra and the lower shift of axial position for rotation at the intervertebral joint occurred on the superior and inferior views of the 10th thoracic vertebra

Physiological Activities of Perilla Frutescens Var. Frutescens Leaf Extracts and Storage Stability in Kneaded Noodles

Perilla (Perilla frutescens var. frutescens) leaves were fractionated based on their chemical properties, and the physiological activities of the fractions were evaluated. The acidic fraction had high radical scavenging ability, whereas the superoxide dismutase-like activities of all fractions were low. A positive correlation was observed between scavenging activity and polyphenol content. The inhibitory effects of the extracts on a-amylase and on a-glucosidase activities were low, indicating a weak suppressive effect of the leaf extracts on diabetes. The acidic and phenolic fractions suppressed pancreatic lipase activity and accelerated lipid hydrolysis in adipocytes differentiated from 3T3-L1 cells. Flour noodles kneaded with leaf powder were prepared, and storage stability was examined. The functional compounds in the leaves were heat-sensitive in the flour noodles. We fractionated perilla leaves to isolate and identify valuable components to provide functionality to processed food and determined that some conditions, such as storage temperature, must be considered to effectively use the compounds

Vitamin D receptor initiation codon polymorphism influences genetic susceptibility to type 1 diabetes mellitus in the Japanese population

BACKGROUND: Vitamin D has been shown to exert manifold immunomodulatory effects. Type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) is regarded to be immune-mediated and vitamin D prevents the development of diabetes in the NOD mouse. We studied the association between T1DM and the initiation codon polymorphism in exon 2 of the vitamin D receptor gene in a Japanese population. We also investigated associations between the vitamin D receptor polymorphism and GAD65-antibody (Ab) positivity. We carried out polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis in 110 Japanese T1DM patients and 250 control subjects. GAD65 antibodies were assessed in 78 patients with T1DM. RESULTS: We found a significantly higher prevalence of the F allele / the FF genotype in the patients compared to the controls (P = 0.0069 and P = 0.014, respectively). Genotype and allele frequencies differed significantly between GAD65-Ab-positive patients and controls (P = 0.017 and P = 0.012, respectively), but neither between GAD65-Ab-negative patients and controls (P = 0.68 and P = 0.66, respectively) nor between GAD65-Ab-positive and -negative patients (P = 0.19 and P = 0.16, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that the vitamin D receptor initiation codon polymorphism influences genetic susceptibility to T1DM among the Japanese. This polymorphism is also associated with GAD65-Ab-positive T1DM, although the absence of a significant difference between GAD65-Ab-negative patients and controls might be simply due to the small sample size of patients tested for GAD65 antibodies

Changes in Drug Utilization After Publication of Clinical Trials and Drug-Related Scandals in Japan: An Interrupted Time Series Analysis, 2005–2017

Background: Breaches of ethics undermine the practice of medicine. In Japan, two major scandals involving clinical research and drug marketing occurred after the publication of clinical trials. To study the effects of those scandals, we evaluated changes in the use of first-generation angiotensin II receptor blockers (ARBs) after publication of relevant clinical trials and also after the subsequent scandals. Methods: We conducted a quasi-experimental design of an interrupted time series analysis (ITSA) on nationwide monthly drug-market data covering 12 years (2005 to 2017) in Japan. The main outcome was the use of first-generation ARBs (valsartan, candesartan, and losartan). The two exposures were the publication of ARB-related clinical-trial results (October 2006) and subsequent ARB-related scandals involving research and marketing (February 2013). A generalized estimating equation model was fitted for ITSA with a log link, Poisson distribution, robust variance estimators, and seasonality adjustment. Results: The publication of clinical trials was associated with 12% increase in the use of first-generation ARBs in Japan, and the subsequent ARB-related scandals was associated with 19% decrease. The decrease in the use of first-generation ARBs after the scandals was greater than the increase in their use after the publication of clinical-trial results. The net effect of the two exposures was a 9% decrease in the use of first-generation ARBs. Conclusions: The scandals were associated with decrease in the use of first-generation ARBs, and that decrease was greater than the increase associated with the publication of “successful” clinical trials, making the net effect not zero but negative