R&D Portfolios and Pharmaceutical Licensing

We examine how R&D portfolios of drug pipelines affect pharmaceutical licensing, controlling firm size, diversity, and competitors in R&D and product markets. The data collected comprises 329 license-outs and 434 license-ins closed by 54 Japanese pharmaceutical companies between 1997 and 2007. We pay special attention to stage-specific licensing by dividing the innovation process into an early stage and a late stage. Estimates from the fixed-effect GMM model reveal that drug pipelines significantly affect stage-specific licensing. Particularly, the state of drug pipelines is leveled off by license-outs at the early stage and license-ins at the late stage. Theoretical implications are also discussed.R&D portfolios, licensing, pharmaceutical industry, drug pipelines

A common subcortical oscillatory network contributes to recovery after spinal cord injury

Recent studies in monkeys showed that when the direct cortico-motoneuronal connection was transected at mid-cervical segments, remaining, indirect cortico-motoneuronal pathways compensated for finger dexterity within one to three months. To elucidate the changes in dynamic properties of neural circuits during the recovery, we investigated the cortico-muscular and inter-muscular couplings of activities throughout the recovery course. Activities of antagonist muscle pairs showed co-activation during the second postoperative week, and oscillated coherently at frequencies of 30-46 Hz (gamma-band) by one month postoperatively. Such gamma-band inter-muscular coherence was not observed preoperatively, but became prominent and distributed widely over proximal and distal muscles with the recovery. Neither the gamma-band cortico-muscular coupling (14-30 Hz) observed before lesion, nor a gamma-band oscillation was observed in bilateral motor cortex after lesion. Thus, we propose that an unknown, subcortical oscillator, independent of cortical oscillation, commonly recruits hand/arm muscles and may underlie functional recovery of dexterous finger movements

Perception analysis of living environment at Taman Melati residential area

Rapid physical development in a residential area will deteriorate living environment of the residents especially if it takes place haphazardly without applying adequate planning guidelines. It will, eventually, exert more pressure on physical infrastructure of the area. As a result, residents of the area will be subjected to dissatisfaction on the present supporting infrastructure as the demand exceeds the supply. Evidently, it may lead to poor living conditions of the area, which ultimately slow the progressiveness of the society to achieve the quality of living standards. This paper investigates residents’ perceptions on present living environmental setting at Taman Melati residential area in Kuala Lumpur. Questionnaire survey was administered to determine the perceptions of the residents on physical environmental parameters such as air, noise, streetlight illuminance, and traffic volume. The level of satisfaction of the residents on the living environment had showed nearly 64% of the respondents expressed “satisfied strongly” or “satisfied”. The level of willingness of the residents to stay further continuously at Taman Melati indicates about 56% of the respondents expressed “strongly willing” or “willing”. It is also seen that the overall satisfaction level of the residents on the living environment was high albeit satisfaction level on individual physical environmental parameters was low

Lightweight High-Speed and High-Force Gripper for Assembly

This paper presents a novel industrial robotic gripper with a high grasping speed (maximum: 1396 mm/s), high tip force (maximum: 80 N) for grasping, large motion range, and lightweight design (0.3 kg). To realize these features, the high-speed section of the quick-return mechanism and load-sensitive continuously variable transmission mechanism are installed in the gripper. The gripper is also equipped with a self-centering function. The high grasping speed and self-centering function improve the cycle time in robotic operations. In addition, the high tip force is advantageous for stably grasping and assembling heavy objects. Moreover, the design of the gripper reduce the gripper's proportion of the manipulator's payload, thus increasing the weight of the object that can be grasped. The gripper performance was validated through kinematic and static analyses as well as experimental evaluations. This paper also presents the analysis of the self-centering function of the developed gripper

Patent and Knowhow Licensing in Japan (Japanese)

Over the past two decades, utilizing markets for technology through licensing and other outsourcing arrangements has emerged as a key to organizing innovative activity. We examine how the rent dissipation effect affects patent and knowhow licensing, controlling organizational capabilities such as firm size, vertical integration, exports, and diversity. A licensor's profit varies and the incentives to license change depending on the rent dissipation effect, which erodes a licensor's profit due to intensifying competition that results from a licensee's entry into the licensor's market. Firms faced with severe competition are marginally exposed to a small rent dissipation effect when licensing their technologies out to rivals, and they can obtain large royalty revenues through such licensing because there are many potential licensees. Using panel data on about ten thousand Japanese firms for the period 1995-2007, we show that the rent dissipation effect facilitates licensing not only between Japanese firms but also between Japanese and foreign firms.

Gap between self-evaluation and actual hand hygiene compliance among health-care workers

Hand hygiene (HH) compliance among health-care workers has not satisfactorily improved despite multiple educative approaches. Between October 2019 and February 2020, we performed a self-evaluation test and a direct observation for the compliance of the 5 Moments for Hand Hygiene program advocated by the World Health Organization at two Japanese hospitals. Average percentages of self-evaluated HH compliance were as follows: (i) 76.9% for “Before touching a patient,” (ii) 85.8% for “Before clean/aseptic procedures,” (iii) 95.9% for “After body fluid exposure/risk,” (iv) 84.0% for “After touching a patient,” and (v) 69.2% for “After touching patient surroundings.” On the other hand, actual HH compliance was 11.7% for “Before touching a patient” and 18.0% for “After touching a patient or patient surroundings.” The present study demonstrated a big gap between self-evaluation and actual HH compliance among nurses working at hospitals, indicating the need of further providing the education in infection prevention

Photochemical Characterization of a New Heliorhodopsin from the Gram-Negative Eubacterium Bellilinea caldifistulae (BcHeR) and Comparison with Heliorhodopsin-48C12

Many microorganisms express rhodopsins, pigmented membrane proteins capable of absorbing sunlight and harnessing that energy for important biological functions such as ATP synthesis and phototaxis. Microbial rhodopsins that have been discovered to date are categorized as type-1 rhodopsins. Interestingly, researchers have very recently unveiled a new microbial rhodopsin family named the heliorhodopsins, which are phylogenetically distant from type-1 rhodopsins. Among them, only heliorhodopsin-48C12 (HeR-48C12) from a Gram-positive eubacterium has been photochemically characterized [Pushkarev, A., et al. (2018) Nature 558, 595-599]. In this study, we photochemically characterize a purple-colored heliorhodopsin from Gram-negative eubacterium Bellilinea caldifistulae (BcHeR) as a second example and identify which properties are or are not conserved between BcHeR and HeR-48C12. A series of photochemical measurements revealed several conserved properties between them, including a visible absorption spectrum with a maximum at around 550 nm, the lack of ion-transport activity, and the existence of a second-order O-like intermediate during the photocycle that may activate an unidentified biological function. In contrast, as a property that is not conserved, although HeR-48C12 shows the light adaptation state of retinal, BcHeR showed the same retinal configuration under both dark- and light-adapted conditions. These comparisons of photochemical properties between BcHeR and HeR-48C12 are an important first step toward understanding the nature and functional role of heliorhodopsins

Hepatic encephalopathy due to extrahepatic portosystemic shunt

Clinicians should recognize extrahepatic portosystemic shunt as a cause of refractory or intermittent hepatic encephalopathy. Treatment strategies should be individualized according to patients' anatomic and hemodynamic status

Prevalence of Viral Frequency-Dependent Infection in Coastal Marine Prokaryotes Revealed Using Monthly Time Series Virome Analysis

海洋微生物も”密”ならウイルスに感染する --頻度依存的なウイルス感染を大阪湾で実証--. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2023-02-24.Viruses infecting marine prokaryotes have a large impact on the diversity and dynamics of their hosts. Model systems suggest that viral infection is frequency dependent and constrained by the virus-host encounter rate. However, it is unclear whether frequency-dependent infection is pervasive among the abundant prokaryotic populations with different temporal dynamics. To address this question, we performed a comparison of prokaryotic and viral communities using 16S rRNA amplicon and virome sequencing based on samples collected monthly for 2 years at a Japanese coastal site, Osaka Bay. Concurrent seasonal shifts observed in prokaryotic and viral community dynamics indicated that the abundance of viruses correlated with that of their predicted host phyla (or classes). Cooccurrence network analysis between abundant prokaryotes and viruses revealed 6, 423 cooccurring pairs, suggesting a tight coupling of host and viral abundances and their “one-to-many” correspondence. Although stable dominant species, such as SAR11, showed few cooccurring viruses, a fast succession of their viruses suggests that viruses infecting these populations changed continuously. Our results suggest that frequency-dependent viral infection prevails in coastal marine prokaryotes regardless of host taxa and temporal dynamics