Night-Time Color Imaging with High Resolution from a 35 kg Microsatellite

Canon Electronics Inc. developed its third microsatellite to demonstrate optical systems and in-house developed components in orbit. The 35 kg microsatellite CE-SAT-IIB can capture night-time color images of moon lit earth surface as well as city lights with a newly-designed camera using an ultra-high sensitivity image sensor developed by Canon. CE-SAT-IIB was launched in October 2020 as a payload on the Rocket LabsElectron15and has been performing experiments to validate optical systems and the bus using in-house components. CE-SAT-IIB has three types of cameras. The first camera is a 20 cm Cassegrain telescope with the ultra-high sensitivity detector previously described. Exposure is controllable through shutter speed, CMOS gain, and ND filters. The sensitivity is equivalent to approximately 4 million in ISO by maximizing the gain and detaching all the ND filters. Focus can be adjusted via a stepper motor on the detector, and observable area is approximately 3.5 km x 2.3 km on the ground with theoretical ground sampling distance (GSD) 5m from a 500 km orbit. The second camera is 8.7 cm Cassegrain telescope with a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS)detector using24.2 MP CMOS sensor. Exposure is controllable through shutter speed and ISO, and focus can be adjusted by controlling the temperature of the telescope. The Effective focal length of this camera is809 mm, which enables to capture ground images of approximately 5.6 km x 3.7kmwith theoretical GSD2.3m. The third camera is also a COTS compact digital camera. Exposure is controllable through shutter speed, ISO, and F-number. In addition, adjustable focal length provides wide range of images from approximately 215 km x 145 km to 645 km x 435km in ground distance. The bus of CE-SAT-IIB mainly consists of in-house components such as sun aspect sensors, a geomagnetic aspect sensor, an inertial reference unit, a star tracker, magnetorquers, and reaction wheels to shorten the delivery time and guarantee quality for mass-manufacturing. All of these components have worked as designed in orbit, and the satellite has achieved 3-axis attitude control such as ground tracking, and inertial pointing. Canon Electronics has demonstrated three sizes of Cassegrain telescopes and validated two size of bus systems by CE-SAT-I and CE-SAT-IIB. We are going to start providing high quality telescopes, detectors, bus systems, components, and integrated satellite systemin a short delivery time

Effectiveness of Cross‐Linked Gelatin Glue in Canine Lung Surgery Models.

Background. Air leakage is a common postoperative complication in pulmonary surgery, and surgical sealants have been developed to prevent or reduce the incidence of air leaks. In this study, we evaluated the efficacy of cross-linked gelatin glue (gelatin plus glutaraldehyde) in canine lung surgery models. Methods. Pulmonary fistulas and injuries were created in dogs and sealed with gelatin glue, fibrin glue, or fibrin glue with a polyglycolic acid (PGA) sheet. Seal-breaking pressures were measured in the fistula model, and pleural adhesions were assessed 28 days postoperatively in the lung injury model. Results. The seal-breaking pressures for canine cadaver and living lung surgeries (; the maximum pressures were 80 and 40 cm H₂O) were respectively: gelatin glue, 77 ± 6 and 32.3 ± 8.9cm H₂O; fibrin glue using spray, 39.2 ± 9.3 and 32 ± 6cm H₂O; fibrin glue using the rub-and-soak method, 35 ± 13.4 and 40 ± 0 cm H₂O; and fibrin glue with a PGA sheet, 55.5 ± 18.2 and 39 ± 2cm H₂O. In the lung injury model, there were no chest wall adhesions in the gelatin and fibrin glue alone groups, while strong adhesions were observed when treated with fibrin glue with a PGA sheet. Conclusions. Gelatin glue's sealing effect was superior to that of fibrin glue while preventing postoperative pleural adhesions. These findings suggest that gelatin glue may be effective as a surgical sealant or anti-adhesion materialin lung surgery

The Japanese space gravitational wave antenna; DECIGO

DECi-hertz Interferometer Gravitational wave Observatory (DECIGO) is the future Japanese space gravitational wave antenna. DECIGO is expected to open a new window of observation for gravitational wave astronomy especially between 0.1 Hz and 10 Hz, revealing various mysteries of the universe such as dark energy, formation mechanism of supermassive black holes, and inflation of the universe. The pre-conceptual design of DECIGO consists of three drag-free spacecraft, whose relative displacements are measured by a differential Fabry– Perot Michelson interferometer. We plan to launch two missions, DECIGO pathfinder and pre- DECIGO first and finally DECIGO in 2024

DECIGO pathfinder

DECIGO pathfinder (DPF) is a milestone satellite mission for DECIGO (DECi-hertz Interferometer Gravitational wave Observatory) which is a future space gravitational wave antenna. DECIGO is expected to provide us fruitful insights into the universe, in particular about dark energy, a formation mechanism of supermassive black holes, and the inflation of the universe. Since DECIGO will be an extremely large mission which will formed by three drag-free spacecraft with 1000m separation, it is significant to gain the technical feasibility of DECIGO before its planned launch in 2024. Thus, we are planning to launch two milestone missions: DPF and pre-DECIGO. The conceptual design and current status of the first milestone mission, DPF, are reviewed in this article

Ionotropic Glutamate Receptor AMPA 1 Is Associated with Ovulation Rate

Ionotropic glutamate receptors mediate most excitatory neurotransmission in the central nervous system by opening ion channels upon the binding of glutamate. Despite the essential roles of glutamate in the control of reproduction and anterior pituitary hormone secretion, there is a limited understanding of how glutamate receptors control ovulation. Here we reveal the function of the ionotropic glutamate receptor AMPA-1 (GRIA1) in ovulation. Based on a genome-wide association study in Bos taurus, we found that ovulation rate is influenced by a variation in the N-terminal leucine/isoleucine/valine-binding protein (LIVBP) domain of GRIA1, in which serine is replaced by asparagine. GRIA1Asn has a weaker affinity to glutamate than GRIA1Ser, both in Xenopus oocytes and in the membrane fraction of bovine brain. This single amino acid substitution leads to the decreased release of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) in immortalized hypothalamic GT1-7 cells. Cows with GRIA1Asn have a slower luteinizing hormone (LH) surge than cows with GRIA1Ser. In addition, cows with GRIA1Asn possess fewer immature ovarian follicles before superovulation and have a lower response to hormone treatment than cows with GRIA1Ser. Our work identified that GRIA1 is a critical mediator of ovulation and that GRIA1 might be a useful target for reproductive therapy

The status of DECIGO

DECIGO (DECi-hertz Interferometer Gravitational wave Observatory) is the planned Japanese space gravitational wave antenna, aiming to detect gravitational waves from astrophysically and cosmologically significant sources mainly between 0.1 Hz and 10 Hz and thus to open a new window for gravitational wave astronomy and for the universe. DECIGO will consists of three drag-free spacecraft arranged in an equilateral triangle with 1000 km arm lengths whose relative displacements are measured by a differential Fabry-Perot interferometer, and four units of triangular Fabry-Perot interferometers are arranged on heliocentric orbit around the sun. DECIGO is vary ambitious mission, we plan to launch DECIGO in era of 2030s after precursor satellite mission, B-DECIGO. B-DECIGO is essentially smaller version of DECIGO: B-DECIGO consists of three spacecraft arranged in an triangle with 100 km arm lengths orbiting 2000 km above the surface of the earth. It is hoped that the launch date will be late 2020s for the present

The whole blood transcriptional regulation landscape in 465 COVID-19 infected samples from Japan COVID-19 Task Force

「コロナ制圧タスクフォース」COVID-19患者由来の血液細胞における遺伝子発現の網羅的解析 --重症度に応じた遺伝子発現の変化には、ヒトゲノム配列の個人差が影響する--. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2022-08-23.Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a recently-emerged infectious disease that has caused millions of deaths, where comprehensive understanding of disease mechanisms is still unestablished. In particular, studies of gene expression dynamics and regulation landscape in COVID-19 infected individuals are limited. Here, we report on a thorough analysis of whole blood RNA-seq data from 465 genotyped samples from the Japan COVID-19 Task Force, including 359 severe and 106 non-severe COVID-19 cases. We discover 1169 putative causal expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) including 34 possible colocalizations with biobank fine-mapping results of hematopoietic traits in a Japanese population, 1549 putative causal splice QTLs (sQTLs; e.g. two independent sQTLs at TOR1AIP1), as well as biologically interpretable trans-eQTL examples (e.g., REST and STING1), all fine-mapped at single variant resolution. We perform differential gene expression analysis to elucidate 198 genes with increased expression in severe COVID-19 cases and enriched for innate immune-related functions. Finally, we evaluate the limited but non-zero effect of COVID-19 phenotype on eQTL discovery, and highlight the presence of COVID-19 severity-interaction eQTLs (ieQTLs; e.g., CLEC4C and MYBL2). Our study provides a comprehensive catalog of whole blood regulatory variants in Japanese, as well as a reference for transcriptional landscapes in response to COVID-19 infection

DOCK2 is involved in the host genetics and biology of severe COVID-19

「コロナ制圧タスクフォース」COVID-19疾患感受性遺伝子DOCK2の重症化機序を解明 --アジア最大のバイオレポジトリーでCOVID-19の治療標的を発見--. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2022-08-10.Identifying the host genetic factors underlying severe COVID-19 is an emerging challenge. Here we conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) involving 2, 393 cases of COVID-19 in a cohort of Japanese individuals collected during the initial waves of the pandemic, with 3, 289 unaffected controls. We identified a variant on chromosome 5 at 5q35 (rs60200309-A), close to the dedicator of cytokinesis 2 gene (DOCK2), which was associated with severe COVID-19 in patients less than 65 years of age. This risk allele was prevalent in East Asian individuals but rare in Europeans, highlighting the value of genome-wide association studies in non-European populations. RNA-sequencing analysis of 473 bulk peripheral blood samples identified decreased expression of DOCK2 associated with the risk allele in these younger patients. DOCK2 expression was suppressed in patients with severe cases of COVID-19. Single-cell RNA-sequencing analysis (n = 61 individuals) identified cell-type-specific downregulation of DOCK2 and a COVID-19-specific decreasing effect of the risk allele on DOCK2 expression in non-classical monocytes. Immunohistochemistry of lung specimens from patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia showed suppressed DOCK2 expression. Moreover, inhibition of DOCK2 function with CPYPP increased the severity of pneumonia in a Syrian hamster model of SARS-CoV-2 infection, characterized by weight loss, lung oedema, enhanced viral loads, impaired macrophage recruitment and dysregulated type I interferon responses. We conclude that DOCK2 has an important role in the host immune response to SARS-CoV-2 infection and the development of severe COVID-19, and could be further explored as a potential biomarker and/or therapeutic target