漱石と魯迅の比較研究の試み-『坊つちやん』と『阿Q正伝』の接点を中心に

<p>The estimated global distribution of Zika (red) and dengue (blue) based on current (a, b) and 2050 climate projections (c, d), compared against the current (light grey) and future distribution (dark grey) of all three mosquito vectors <i>Aedes aegypti</i>, <i>Ae</i>. <i>africanus</i> and <i>Ae</i>. <i>albopictus</i> (a-d).</p

Globular cluster population of the HST frontier fields galaxy J07173724+3744224

We present the first measurement of the globular cluster population surrounding the elliptical galaxy J07173724+3744224 (z=0.1546). This galaxy is located in the foreground in the field-of-view of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Frontier Fields observations of galaxy cluster MACS J0717.5+3745 (z=0.5458). Based on deep HST ACS F435W, F606W, and F814W images, we find a total globular cluster population of N_tot = 3441 +/- 1416. Applying the appropriate extinction correction and filter transformation from ACS F814W to the Johnson V-band, we determine that the host galaxy has an absolute magnitude of M_V = -22.2. The specific frequency was found to be S_N = 4.5 +/- 1.8. The radial profile of the globular cluster system was best fit using a powerlaw of the form $\sigma\sim R^{-0.6}$, with the globular cluster population found to be more extended than the halo light of the host galaxy ($\sigma_{halo}\sim R^{-1.7}$). The F435W-F814W colour distribution suggests a bimodal population, with red globular clusters 1-3x more abundant than blue clusters. These results are consistent with the host elliptical galaxy J07173724+3744224 having formed its red metal-rich GCs in situ, with the blue metal-poor globular clusters accreted from low-mass galaxies.Comment: 21 pages, 14 figures, 2 tables, revised following peer-review, accepted for publication in MNRA

Noncommutative QCD corrections to the gluonic decays of heavy quarkonia

We compute the Noncommutative QCD (NCQCD) contributions to the three gluon decay modes of heavy quarkonia. For triplet quarkonia (ortho-quarkonia), the NCQCD correction to the QCD three gluon decay mode, like the standard model contribution, is infrared finite. In the case of singlet quarkonia (para-quarkonia), whose QCD three gluon decay mode has infrared singularities which are removed using one-loop corrections to the two gluon mode, we find that NCQCD contribution is also infrared finite. The calculations are performed in the weak binding limit and do not require the introduction of additional effective couplings.Comment: Version accepted for publicatio

Noncommutative QED and the Lifetimes of Ortho and Para Positronium

We examine the implications of including corrections associated with the noncommutative extension of quantum electrodynamics - NCQED - to the decays of the ortho and para positronium (\Trip and \Sing) ground states. In NCQED, the well known charge conjugation argument restricting \Trip decays to an odd number of photons and \Sing decays to an even number of photons no longer obtains. Instead, the dominant two photon decay mode of \Sing is accompanied by a three photon mode. The dominant three photon decay mode of \Trip receives a NCQED correction, but there is no corresponding two photon decay mode in the weak binding limit. These corrections to the $P_s$ three photon decay mode have a different energy distribution, but their effect is too small to explain any discrepancy between the observed and calculated values of the \Trip lifetime.Comment: Additional reference

Aflatoxins in Corn (2010)

Aflatoxin is a term generally used to refer to a group of extremely toxic chemicals produced by two molds, Aspergillus flavus and A. parasiticus. This publication provides information about aflatoxins in corn

The global distribution of Bacillus anthracis and associated anthrax risk to humans, livestock and wildlife.

Bacillus anthracis is a spore-forming, Gram-positive bacterium responsible for anthrax, an acute infection that most significantly affects grazing livestock and wild ungulates, but also poses a threat to human health. The geographic extent of B. anthracis is poorly understood, despite multi-decade research on anthrax epizootic and epidemic dynamics; many countries have limited or inadequate surveillance systems, even within known endemic regions. Here, we compile a global occurrence dataset of human, livestock and wildlife anthrax outbreaks. With these records, we use boosted regression trees to produce a map of the global distribution of B. anthracis as a proxy for anthrax risk. We estimate that 1.83 billion people (95% credible interval (CI): 0.59-4.16 billion) live within regions of anthrax risk, but most of that population faces little occupational exposure. More informatively, a global total of 63.8 million poor livestock keepers (95% CI: 17.5-168.6 million) and 1.1 billion livestock (95% CI: 0.4-2.3 billion) live within vulnerable regions. Human and livestock vulnerability are both concentrated in rural rainfed systems throughout arid and temperate land across Eurasia, Africa and North America. We conclude by mapping where anthrax risk could disrupt sensitive conservation efforts for wild ungulates that coincide with anthrax-prone landscapes

The Odor Specificities of a Subset of Olfactory Receptor Neurons Are Governed by Acj6, a POU-Domain Transcription Factor

AbstractLittle is known about how the odor specificities of olfactory neurons are generated, a process essential to olfactory coding. We have found that neuronal identity relies on the abnormal chemosensory jump 6 (acj6) gene, originally identified by a defect in olfactory behavior. Physiological analysis of individual olfactory neurons shows that in acj6 mutants, a subset of neurons acquires a different odorant response profile. Certain other neurons do not respond to any tested odors in acj6. Molecular analysis of acj6 shows that it encodes a POU-domain transcription factor expressed in olfactory neurons. Our data suggest that the odor response spectrum of an olfactory neuron, and perhaps the choice of receptor genes, is determined through a process requiring the action of Acj6

Effects of arterial cannulation stress on regional cerebral blood flow in major depressive disorder

Individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD) display abnormal neurophysiological responses to psychological stress but little is known about their neurophysiological responses to physiological stressors. Using [15O-H2O] positron emission tomography we assessed whether the regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) response to arterial cannulation differed between patients with MDD and healthy controls (HCs). Fifty-one MDD patients and 62 HCs were scanned following arterial cannulation and 15 MDD patients and 17 HCs were scanned without arterial cannulation. A region-of-interest analysis showed that a significantly increased rCBF of the anterior cingulate cortex and right amygdala was associated with arterial cannulation in MDD. A whole brain analysis showed increased rCBF of the right post-central gyrus, left temporopolar cortex, and right amygdala during arterial cannulation in MDD patients. The rCBF in the right amygdala was significantly correlated with depression severity. Conceivably, the limbic response to invasive physical stress is greater in MDD subjects than in HCs

RegAnalyst: a web interface for the analysis of regulatory motifs, networks and pathways

RegAnalyst is a user-friendly web interface that integrates MoPP (Motif Prediction Program), MyPatternFinder (pattern detection tool) and MycoRegDB (mycobacterial promoter and regulatory elements database). Since motif discovery is a challenging task, numerous tools have been developed over the past few years. Strikingly, the existing programs were not successful in detecting the known consensus in all mycobacterial (epitomizing degenerate) datasets even in the absence of noise and their performance was further reduced in the presence of noise. Consequently, MoPP, a de novo and greedy (for degeneracy) ‘inexact’ word-based tool that is tailored to enumerate significantly conserved degenerate oligonucleotide motifs was developed. Benchmarking on datasets from MycoRegDB and SCPD (http://rulai.cshl.edu/SCPD/) indicate that MoPP (i) consistently outperforms other motif discovery tools on highly degenerate as well as less degenerate datasets and (ii) successfully detects completely degenerate motifs (with no two instances of a pattern being exactly the same) even in the presence of noise. We have also developed another accessory program, MyPatternFinder, that scans a given sequence or genome to find exact or approximate matches to a query motif of any length identified by MoPP or any other user-defined motif. RegAnalyst will be a valuable tool for in silico analysis of regulatory networks and can be accessed at http://www.nii.ac.in/~deepak/RegAnalyst