Comparison of Verbal and Emotional Responses of Elderly People with Mild/Moderate Dementia and Those with Severe Dementia in Responses to Seal Robot, PARO

Introduction: The differences in verbal and emotional responses to a baby seal robot, PARO, of elderly people with dementia residing at an elderly nursing care facility were analyzed. There were two groups of elderly people: one was with mild/moderate dementia (M-group) that consisted with 19 elderly residents in the general ward, and the other was with severe dementia (S-group) that consisted with 11 elderly residents in the dementia ward. Method: Each elderly resident in both groups interacted with either PARO or a control (stuffed lion toy: Lion) brought by a staff at each resident’s private room. Their responses were recorded on video. Behavioral analysis of the initial 6 min of the interaction was conducted using a time sampling method. Results: In both groups, subjects talked more frequently to PARO than to Lion, showed more positive changes in emotional expression with PARO than with Lion, and laughed more frequently with PARO than with Lion. Subjects in M-group even showed more negative emotional expressions with Lion than with PARO. Furthermore, subjects in S-group showed neutral expression more frequently with Lion than with PARO, suggesting more active interaction with PARO. For subjects in M-group, frequencies of touching and stroking, frequencies of talking to staff member, and frequencies of talking initiated by staff member were significantly higher with Lion than with PARO. Conclusion: The elderly people both with mild/moderate dementia and with severe dementia showed greater interest in PARO than in Lion. The results suggest that introducing PARO may increase willingness of the staff members to communicate and work with elderly people with dementia, especially those with mild/moderate dementia who express their demand of communication more than those with severe dementia

Preventive and therapeutic effects of imatinib in Wistar-Kyoto rats with anti-glomerular basement membrane glomerulonephritis

Imatinib is a selective tyrosine kinase inhibitor that can block activity of the platelet-derived growth factor receptor (PDGFR) and that has immunomodulatory effects on various cell types. Here we measured the protective effects of imatinib in Wistar-Kyoto rats with nephrotoxic serum nephritis, a kidney disease model where CD8+ T cells and macrophages play pathogenetic roles. Groups of animals were given imatinib from one day before up to 13 days following induction of nephritis and from day 7 to 20 following disease induction. Compared to control rats, at each time point imatinib treatment caused significantly less proteinuria, lowered serum blood urea nitrogen and creatinine, and decreased the number of glomeruli with necrosis, crescents, and fibrin deposits. Imatinib-treated rats had a significant reduction in glomerular macrophage accumulation and reduced renal cortical PDGFR-β and M-CSF receptor mRNA expression. Using colocalization we found that glomerular macrophages had reduced IL-1β and MCP-1 protein expression. Late imatinib treatment significantly reduced proteinuria, serum blood urea nitrogen, and creatinine, and reversed renal histopathological changes. We show that imatinib has renoprotective and therapeutic properties and provide pre-clinical work that will need to be confirmed in patients with crescentic glomerulonephritis

Six-month low level chlorine dioxide gas inhalation toxicity study with two-week recovery period in rats

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Chlorine dioxide (CD) gas has a potent antimicrobial activity at extremely low concentration and may serve as a new tool for infection control occupationally as well as publicly. However, it remains unknown whether the chronic exposure of CD gas concentration effective against microbes is safe. Therefore, long-term, low concentration CD gas inhalation toxicity was studied in rats as a six-month continuous whole-body exposure followed by a two-week recovery period, so as to prove that the CD gas exposed up to 0.1 ppm (volume ratio) is judged as safe on the basis of a battery of toxicological examinations.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>CD gas at 0.05 ppm or 0.1 ppm for 24 hours/day and 7 days/week was exposed to rats for 6 months under an unrestrained condition with free access to chow and water in a chamber so as to simulate the ordinary lifestyle in human. The control animals were exposed to air only. During the study period, the body weight as well as the food and water consumptions were recorded. After the 6-month exposure and the 2-week recovery period, animals were sacrificed and a battery of toxicological examinations, including biochemistry, hematology, necropsy, organ weights and histopathology, were performed.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Well regulated levels of CD gas were exposed throughout the chamber over the entire study period. No CD gas-related toxicity sign was observed during the whole study period. No significant difference was observed in body weight gain, food and water consumptions, and relative organ weight. In biochemistry and hematology examinations, changes did not appear to be related to CD gas toxicity. In necropsy and histopathology, no CD gas-related toxicity was observed even in expected target respiratory organs.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>CD gas up to 0.1 ppm, exceeding the level effective against microbes, exposed to whole body in rats continuously for six months was not toxic, under a condition simulating the conventional lifestyle in human.</p

Monoclonal anti-erythrocyte autoantibodies derived from NZB mice cause autoimmune hemolytic anemia by two distinct pathogenic mechanisms

In vivo pathological manifestations of eight monoclonal anti-mouse red blood cell (MRBC) autoantibodies obtained from unmanipulated NZB mice were determined in BALB/c mice. Three (two IgG1 and one IgG2a) of four IgG monoclonal antibodies (mAb) and two of four IgM mAb were able to induce anemia following their i.p. injection. All five pathogenic anti-MRBC mAbs reacted only with MRBC, whereas non-pathogenic anti-MRBC mAbs showed binding to different species of RBC. Competition studies suggested the presence of at least two distinct epitopes recognized by our pathogenic anti-MRBC mAb. Histological examinations revealed that anemia resulted from either marked sequestration of agglutinated MRBC in spleens and livers or erythrophagocytosis, most remarkably by Kupffer cells in livers. This difference was correlated with the ability of each mAb to mediate Fc receptor-dependent phagocytosis by macrophages. The absence of complement-mediated hemolysis in vitro and the development of anemia in C5-deficient or C3-depleted mice indicated a minor role, if any, for complement-mediated lysis in the anemia induced by our anti-MRBC mAb. Our results suggest that (i) at least two different pathogenic epitopes are implicated in autoimmune hemolytic anemia; and (ii) sequestration of agglutinated MRBC in spleens and livers and Fc receptor-dependent phagocytosis, but not complement-mediated hemolysis, are the major mechanisms for the development of autoimmune hemolytic anemi

Microscopic photometry and its parameterization for objective evaluation of aesthetics of woven fabrics

One of the most important end-use performance parameters for fabrics and other textile products are the fabric hands and fabric aesthetics. Our previous research attempted to elucidate the factors that affect the fabric aesthetics using factor analysis and identified two principal factors tentatively labelled as 'lustre and depth sensation' and 'surface roughness sensation'. The focus of the second step in the study of fabric aesthetics is on the investigation of the objective trends in the performance evaluation of textiles. In this study, we developed our own experimental equipment based on microscopic goniophotometric principles and its parameterization method. Subsequently, we attempted to define an index based on the distribution of the reflection intensity of woven fabrics and its characterization in order to evaluate the principal factors governing fabric aesthetics. On the basis of the results, we infer that microscopic goniophotometry and its parameterization is a more viable approach than conventional macroscopic goniophotometry for the quantitative evaluation of the principal factors governing fabric aesthetics.ArticleTEXTILE RESEARCH JOURNAL. 82(19):1982-1995 (2012)journal articl

Density matrix renormalization group approach to a two-dimensional bosonic model

Density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) is applied to a (1+1)-dimensional $\lambda\phi^4$ model to study spontaneous breakdown of discrete $Z_2$ symmetry numerically. We obtain the critical coupling $(\lambda/\mu^2)_{\rm c}=59.89\pm 0.01$ and the critical exponent $\beta=0.1264\pm 0.0073$, which are consistent with the Monte Carlo and the exact results, respectively. The results are based on extrapolation to the continuum limit with lattice sizes $L=250,500$, and 1000. We show that the lattice size L=500 is sufficiently close to the the limit $L\to\infty$ \cite{Sugihara:2004qr}.Comment: 3 pages, 2 figures, parallel talk given at LATTICE 2004, Fermilab, June 21-26, 200

Selective pathogenicity of murine rheumatoid factors of the cryoprecipitable IgG3 subclass

To analyze the involvement of rheumatoid factors (RF) in the generation of cryoglobulins and the development of related tissue injuries, we have established a panel of anti-IgG2a RF mAbs derived from MRL/MpJ-lpr/lpr (MRL-lpr), C3H/HeJ-lpr/lpr, and 129/Sv mice. After injection of hybridoma cells to normal mice, all four IgG3 RF mAbs induced cryoglobullnemia, and various degrees of glomerulonephritis and skin leukocytoclastic vasculitis. In contrast, none of the RF mAbs of the other isotypes generated cryoglobulins or tissue lesions. Since the same observation was obtained with another panel of five clonally related anti-IgG2a RF mAbs of MRL-lpr origin with almost Identical heavy and light chain variable (V) regions but five different Isotypes, it seems unlikely that the absence of pathogenicity of non-IgG3 RF mAbs was due to differences in fine specificity or V framework regions. In addition, the analysis of serum RF In MRL-lpr mice has demonstrated that a majority of 4 month old MRL-lpr mice produced substantial amounts of IgG3 RF with cryoglobulin activity. Because the cryoglobulin activity is associated with the murine IgG3 heavy chain constant region, RF of this subclass may play a significant role in the development of autoimmune-related tissue injuries, especially In MRL-lpr mic