TREATMENT TECHNOLOGIES AND IN THE LIGHT OF ITS POLLUTION NATURE CONTROL

Abstract This paper discusses an externality-generator called an offender's behavior in employing technologies to treat an externality under standard, tax, and subsidy policies. We analyze his decision making process about production andlor treatment activities of the externahty by measuring his surplus or net benefit from those actwities. In the analysis, we focus on one nature of the externality; whether it continues to exist until its produetion process is fimshed. We will show that not only the offender's decision variables (production, emission and/or treatment) to regulate but also the nature of externalities plays an important role in carrying out the efficient policymaking

Far -Infrared Study of Two-Dimensional Air-Rod Photonic Crystals : Band Gap, Uncoupled Mode and Wavevector Mismatch

Two-dimensional photonic crystals both of square and triangular lattices composed of circular air-rods with the lattice constant of 170 μm were fabricated. The photonic band structures were studied by far-infrared transmission measurements. The clear opaque regions due to the band gap and due to the non coupling between photonic mode and external wave were observed in both lattices. The uncoupled modes can not be excited by an external mode because their wave functions are anti-symmetric under the relevant mirror reflection defined on the lattice. Furthermore, some regions with very low transmittance were found, where exist only a band whose dominant plane-wave component in eigen-function has wavevector not parallel to the propagating direction of the external incident wave. These low transmittance are considered to be caused by wavevector mismatch between photonic modes and external incident waves. The observed spectra are discussed compared with the results of band structure calculated by means of a plane-wave expansion method as well as of the symmetry consideration.Article信州大学理学部紀要 31(2): 89-104(1997)departmental bulletin pape

Real-time human motion analysis and grasping force using the OptiTrack system and Flexi-force sensor

Biologically inspired robotic hands have important applications in industry and biomedical robotics. The grasping capacity of robotic hands is crucial for a robotic system. This paper presents an experimental study on the finger force and movements of a human hand during the grasping operation in real-time. It focuses on two topics; measuring grasping force using Flexi-force sensors and analysing human hand action during grasping operation. The findings show that lifting required higher forces compared with grasp force in the static phase

Contribution of renal angiotensin II type I receptor to gene expressions in hypertension-induced renal injury

Contribution of renal angiotensin II type I receptor to gene expressions in hypertension-induced renal injury. Recent evidence indicates that transforming growth factor-β1 (TGF-β1) plays an important role in renal fibrosis via stimulation of extracellular matrix synthesis. The present study was undertaken to investigate the role of angiotensin II type I receptor (AT1 receptor) in hypertension-induced renal injury. Twenty-two-week-old stroke-prone spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHRSP), which had established hypertension and moderate renal damage, were orally given TCV-116, a selective non-peptide AT1 receptor antagonist (0.1, 1 or 10 mg/kg/day), enalapril (10 mg/kg/day) or vehicle once a day for 10 weeks. At the end point of the treatment, we examined renal function, the gene expressions of TGF-β1 and extracellular matrix components in the interstitium [collagen types I (COI) and III (COIII), fibronectin (FN)] and the basement membrane (COIV and laminin), and renal microscopic morphology in rats aged 32 weeks. In vehicle-treated 32 week-old SHRSP with renal dysfunction and nephrosclerosis, renal mRNA levels for TGF-β1, COI, COIII, FN, COIV were all several-fold higher than in WKY. Thus, renal TGF-β1 gene expression was enhanced in SHRSP, which may contribute to the increased renal expressions of COI, COIII, FN, COIV in SHRSP. Treatment with TCV-116 (0.1 mg/kg/day) in SHRSP, in spite of no reduction of blood pressure, decreased renal mRNA levels for TGF-β1, COI, COIII, FN, COIV, being accompanied by the significant decrease in urinary protein and albumin excretion, blood urea nitrogen and plasma creatinine. Treatment with TCV-116 (10 mg/kg/day) in SHRSP decreased mRNAs for TGF-β1, COI, COIII, FN and COIV to almost the same levels as WKY, being associated with normalization of urinary protein and albumin excretion and the prevention of nephrosclerosis, as judged by microscopic histological observations. On the other hand, the effects of enalapril (10 mg/kg/day) on the above mentioned mRNA levels, renal function and renal morphology were weaker than those of TCV-116 (10 mg/kg/day) and were as much as TCV-116 (1 mg/kg/day). These results suggest that independently of hypotensive action, AT1 receptor antagonist has a potent renal protective effect by inhibiting the gene expression of renal TGF-β1 and extracellular matrix components

Is oral food challenge useful to avoid complete elimination in Japanese patients diagnosed with or suspected of having IgE-dependent hen's egg allergy? A systematic review

Background: IgE-mediated egg allergy is a common food allergy worldwide. Patients with egg allergy are known to easily achieve tolerance compared to other allergens such as nuts. Oral food challenge (OFC) is often performed on patients diagnosed with or suspected of having IgE-mediated food allergy, but whether hen's egg OFC is useful in IgE-dependent egg allergy patients to avoid complete elimination remains unknown. Methods: We identified articles in which OFCs were performed in Japanese patients diagnosed with or suspected of having IgE-mediated egg allergy. We evaluated whether the OFCs were useful to avoid the complete elimination of eggs by assessing the following: (1) the number of patients who could avoid complete elimination; (2) the number of patients who experienced serious adverse events (SAEs); or (3) adverse events (AEs); (4) improvement in quality of life (QOL); and (5) immunological changes. Results: Fifty-nine articles were selected in the study; all the references were case series or case studies in which OFC was compared to pre-challenge conditions. The overall negative ratio against egg OFC was 62.7%, but an additional 71.9% of OFC-positive patients could take eggs when expanded to partial elimination. Of the 4182 cases, 1146 showed AEs in the OFC, and two cases reached an SAE. Two reports showed an improvement in QOL and immunological changes, although the evidence was weak. Conclusions: OFCs against eggs may be useful to avoid complete elimination, but medical professionals should proceed with the test safely and carefully

Walking and Sports Participation and Mortality From Coronary Heart Disease and Stroke

ObjectivesWe aimed to examine the impact of exercise on mortality from cardiovascular disease (CVD) in Asian populations.BackgroundFew data have been available in Asian countries, where job-related physical activity is higher than that in Western countries.MethodsBetween 1988 and 1990, 31,023 men and 42,242 women in Japan, ages 40 to 79 years with no history of stroke, coronary heart disease (CHD), or cancer, completed a self-administered questionnaire. Systematic mortality surveillance was performed through 1999, and 1,946 cardiovascular deaths were identified. We chose the second lowest categories of walking and sports participation as the reference to reduce a potential effect of ill health.ResultsMen and women who reported having physical activity in the highest category (i.e., walking ≥1 h/day or doing sports ≥5 h/week) had a 20% to 60% lower age-adjusted risk of mortality from CVD, compared with those in the second lowest physical activity category (i.e., walking 0.5 h/day, or sports participation for 1 to 2 h/week). Adjustment for known risk factors, exclusion of individuals who died within two years of baseline inquiry, or gender-specific analysis did not substantially alter these associations. The multivariate-adjusted hazard ratios (95% confidence interval) for the highest versus the second lowest categories of walking or sports participation were 0.71 (0.54 to 0.94) and 0.80 (0.48 to 1.31), respectively, for ischemic stroke (IS); 0.84 (0.64 to 1.09) and 0.51 (0.32 to 0.82), respectively, for CHD; and 0.84 (0.75 to 0.95) and 0.73 (0.60 to 0.90), respectively, for CVD.ConclusionsPhysical activity through walking and sports participation might reduce the risk of mortality from IS and CHD

Scanning Differential-Phase-Contrast Hard X-Ray Microscopy with Wedge Absorber Detector

A new and simple idea for scanning differential-phase-contrast (S-DPC) hard X-ray microscopy has been proposed. It only uses a wedge absorber coupled with two intensity detectors, and is much more sensitive to sample structures than absorption contrast. It can also extract pure quantitative one-dimensional phase gradient given by a sample without an effect of sample absorption. The S-DPC microscope has been constructed at BL24XU of SPring-8, and its feasibility has been successfully demonstrated at the photon energy of 10 keV by clearly visualizing structures of samples. Further, the experimental phase gradient profile agrees well with simulation. By integrating the resultant phase gradient, the corresponding phase shift distribution could be also imaged. There are two main types in X-ray microscopes, one is an imaging type and the other is a scanning type. 1) The former provides direct magnification and shorter exposure time, while the latter provides digitally stored images with minimal radiation exposure to samples. 1) Recently, phasecontrast X-ray microscopy has rapidly grown in the hard Xray region since the advent of the 3 rd generation synchrotron radiation facilities. It is based on the fact that phase-shift cross section is almost a thousand times larger than absorption one for light elements as expected from a comparison between real and imaginary parts of the refractive index. 2,3) In the imaging type, the phase-contrast microscopy has been demonstrated by the Zernike's method 6) Further, we have recently demonstrated the novel imaging phase-contrast microscopy using a micro-interferometer consisting of a twin zone plate. 7) On the other hand, in the scanning type, the phase-contrast microscopy has been demonstrated by the configured 8) or segmented 9) detectors, the CCD-camera image-detections, 10-12) the diffracting aperture based method 13) and the dark-field imaging. 14,15) The former two require the highly sophisticated X-ray detector of electronic devises. The CCD-camera imagedetection must take diffraction images of a microbeam for all pixels, thus need a huge memory and the stored dataset must be processed later with an appropriate numerical calculation for image reconstruction. The diffracting aperture based method and the dark-field imaging are simple methods to realize the scanning phase-contrast microscopy, but phase information was not evaluated quantitatively. Here, we propose a new idea for S-DPC hard X-ray microscopy. It is a very simple way to purely extract quantitative one-dimensional phase gradient given by a sample to be imaged removing an effect of sample absorption by only adding a wedge absorber coupled with two intensity detectors into the normal scheme of the scanning microscopy. In this paper, the concept of the S-DPC hard X-ray microscopy is described and the feasibility test is presented. The principle of the S-DPC microscopy is illustrated i

Prognostic Significance of C-reactive Protein-to-prealbumin Ratio in Patients with Esophageal Cancer

Background: The prognostic value of combination of C-reactive protein and prealbumin (CRP/PAlb) in esophageal cancer remains unclear. Methods: We enrolled 167 esophageal cancer patients who underwent curative esophagectomy. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to determine the prognostic significance of various markers, including CRP-to-albumin (CRP/Alb) ratio, modified Glasgow prognostic score, neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR), and prognostic nutritional index. Results: Receiver operating characteristic analysis revealed the optimal cut-off value of each inflammatory factor, and CRP/PAlb ratio had the greatest discriminative power in predicting recurrence-free survival (RFS) among the examined measures (AUC 0.668). The 5-year overall survival and RFS rates were significantly lower in patients with high CRP/PAlb ratio than in those with low CRP/PAlb ratio (P < 0.001, P = 0.001, respectively). In the univariate analysis, RFS was significantly worse in patients with low BMI, T2 or deeper tumor invasion, positive lymph node metastasis, positive venous invasion, high CRP/PAlb ratio, high CRP/Alb ratio, high NLR, and high LMR. Multivariate analysis revealed that CRP/PAlb, but not CRP/Alb, was an independent prognostic factor along with lymph node metastasis. Conclusion: CRP/PAlb ratio was useful for predicting the prognosis of esophageal cancer patients

Clinical characteristics and risk factors for septic shock in patients receiving emergency drainage for acute pyelonephritis with upper urinary tract calculi

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Acute pyelonephritis (APN) is a common complication of ureteral obstruction caused by urolithiasis, and it can be lethal if it progresses to septic shock. We investigated the clinical characteristics of patients undergoing emergency drainage and assessed risk factors for septic shock.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A retrospective study was performed of 98 patients (101 events) requiring emergency drainage at our urology department for obstructive APN associated with upper urinary tract calculi from January 2003 to January 2011. Clinical characteristics were summarized, and risk factors for septic shock were assessed by logistic regression analysis.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Objective evidence of sepsis was found in 64 (63.4%) events, and 21 events (20.8%) were categorized as septic shock. Ninety-six patients recovered, but 2 patients died of septic shock. Multivariate analysis revealed that age and the presence of paralysis were independent risk factors for septic shock.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>APN associated with upper urinary tract calculi is a severe disease that should be treated with caution, particularly when risk factors are present.</p