Education for Multicultural Society in the Global Age - Promoting Active Communication with Different Communities in Japan-

This study bases on the idea that promoting　active communication and mutual understanding with different communities should meet the aims of education preparing the young people for multicultural society in the global age. In this paper, an experimental lesson for students at the University of Fukui implemented in the spring term of 2006 will be described. In the lesson Japanese students were encouraged to communicate with overseas students. Some key findings from the questionnaires distributed to explore issues and effectiveness of the lesson indicate that there is a lack of understanding of different communities and preparing the young people to live in multicultural society is one of the significant issues for countries like Japan where consisted of mono-cultural society for a long time

Small mitochondrial ARF (smARF) is located in both the nucleus and cytoplasm, induces cell death, and activates p53 in mouse fibroblasts

AbstractThe ARF transcript produces two proteins, the full-length ARF, p19ARF, and a short mitochondrial version, smARF. To explore the functional difference between the two, we generated GFP-fused expression vectors for each protein and introduced them into NIH3T3 murine fibroblasts, which sustains a global deletion in the INK4a locus but contains a functional p53 gene. GFP-p19ARF was located within the nucleolus as previously reported, whereas GFP-smARF was detected mainly in the nucleoplasm. GFP-smARF induced cell death although to a slightly lesser extent than p19ARF. GFP-smARF stabilized p53 thereby inducing expression of the target genes, MDM2 and p21. We suggest that smARF has functions other than mitochondria-mediated autophagy, and induces p53 expression and cell death via a novel mechanism

Enhanced anti-HIV-1 activity of CC-chemokine LD78β, a non-allelic variant of MIP-1α/LD78α

AbstractWe compared the anti-HIV-1 activity of CC-chemokine LD78β with that of MIP-1α, another CC-chemokine which shows 94% sequence homology with LD78β. Despite its close similarity to MIP-1α, the anti-HIV-1 activity of LD78β appeared to be nearly 10 times higher than that of MIP-1α. Mutagenesis of MIP-1α showed that the N-terminal additional tetrapeptide, which was present in LD78β and absent in MIP-1α, is responsible for enhanced anti-HIV-1 activity. The N-terminal structure-function relationship of LD78β described here will be of value in understanding the chemokine-receptor interactions and designing anti-HIV-1 compounds based on LD78β

Distribution of Lenticular Astigmatism in a Pre-Cataract Surgery Population

Recently custom ablation of LASIK (laserin situ keratomileusis) has rapidly evolved. It could achieve supervision temporarily, but we suspect that the vision could deteriorate due to against-the rule astigmatism decades after the operation. To clarify this concern, we evaluated distribution of the total and corneal astigmatism of 101 eyes of 65 pre-cataract surgery patients (meanage:73 years). Then we calculated the lenticular astigrlatism by vector analysis. The mean amounts of total and corneal astigmatism were 1.22±1.50D and 0.97±0.84D each. The percentages of no astigmatism: oblique: with-the-rule: against-the-rule were 32: 4: 15: 50 and 7: 28: 26: 40, respectively. The mean amount of lenticular astigrlatism measured by vector analysis was 1.6± 1.4D. The percentage of no astigmatism: oblique: with-the-rule: against-the-rule was 2: 0: 39: 59. This biased distribution of astigmatism might have contributed to the biased distribution (no and against-the-rule) of total astigmatism. These data indicate that in a pre-cataract surgery population against-the-rule astigmatism is predominant in both corneal and lenticular astigmatism. We suspect that custom correction of adolescent eyes, in which with-the-rule astigmatism is predominant, might elicit more against-the-rule astigmatism when they reach pre-cataract surgery age population, leading to a decline in quality of vision

The Hydrogen Burning Turn-off of RS Ophiuchi 2006

We report a coordinated multi-band photometry of the RS Oph 2006 outburst and highlight the emission line free y-band photometry that shows a mid-plateau phase at y ~ 10.2 mag from day 40 to day 75 after the discovery followed by a sharp drop of the final decline. Such mid-plateau phases are observed in other two recurrent novae, U Sco and CI Aql, and are interpreted as a bright disk irradiated by the white dwarf. We have calculated theoretical light curves based on the optically thick wind theory and have reproduced the observed light curves including the mid-plateau phase and the final sharp decline. This final decline is identified with the end of steady hydrogen shell-burning, which turned out the day ~80. This turnoff date is consistent with the end of a supersoft X-ray phase observed with Swift. Our model suggests a white dwarf mass of 1.35 \pm 0.01 M_\sun, which indicates that RS Oph is a progenitor of Type Ia supernovae. We strongly recommend the y-filter observation of novae to detect both the presence of a disk and the hydrogen burning turn-off.Comment: to appear in ApJL, 4 pages including 4 figure

Selective activation of STAT5 unveils its role in stem cell self-renewal in normal and leukemic hematopoiesis

Although the concept of a leukemic stem cell system has recently been well accepted, its nature and the underlying molecular mechanisms remain obscure. Constitutive activation of signal transducers and activators of transcription 3 (STAT3) and STAT5 is frequently detected in various hematopoietic tumors. To evaluate their role in normal and leukemic stem cells, we took advantage of constitutively active STAT mutants to activate STAT signaling selectively in hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). Activation of STAT5 in CD34–c-Kit+Sca-1+ lineage marker– (CD34–KSL) HSCs led to a drastic expansion of multipotential progenitors and promoted HSC self-renewal ex vivo. In sharp contrast, STAT3 was demonstrated to be dispensable for the HSC maintenance in vivo, and its activation facilitated lineage commitment of HSCs in vitro. In a mouse model of myeloproliferative disease (MPD), sustained STAT5 activation in CD34–KSL HSCs but not in CD34+KSL multipotential progenitors induced fatal MPD, indicating that the capacity of STAT5 to promote self-renewal of hematopoietic stem cells is crucial to MPD development. Our findings collectively establish a specific role for STAT5 in self-renewal of normal as well as leukemic stem cells