Detecting possible pairs of materials for composites using a material word co-occurrence network.

Composite materials are popular because of their high performance capabilities, but new material development is time-consuming. To accelerate this process, researchers studying material informatics, an academic discipline combining computational science and material science, have developed less time-consuming approaches for predicting possible material combinations. However, these processes remain problematic because some materials are not suited for them. The limitations of specific candidates for new composites may cause potential new material pairs to be overlooked. To solve this problem, we developed a new method to predict possible composite material pairs by considering more materials than previous techniques. We predicted possible material pairs by conducting link predictions of material word co-occurrence networks while assuming that co-occurring material word pairs in scientific papers on composites were reported as composite materials. As a result, we succeeded in predicting the co-occurrence of material words with high specificity. Nodes tended to link to many other words, generating new links in the created co-occurrence material word network; notably, the number of material words co-occurring with graphene increased rapidly. This phenomenon confirmed that graphene is an attractive composite component. We expect our method to contribute to the accelerated development of new composite materials.

Recovery process of vertical perception and activities of daily living in stroke patients: A retrospective cohort study.

INTRODUCTION: Clarifications regarding the recovery process of the subjective postural vertical (SPV) and activities of daily living in stroke patients are required to help clinicians determine treatment plans. Therefore, we aimed to investigate the characteristics of the longitudinal recovery process of SPV and activities of daily living after stroke. METHODS: Overall, 109 patients with stroke were enrolled. Clinical assessments included the SPV and total functional independence measure (FIM), initially and after 1 month. The mean and standard deviation of SPV indicated the directional and variability errors, respectively. Participants were categorized as follows: nondeviation group comprised directional and variability errors within the standard values, deviation of variability errors group comprised directional errors within the standard value and variability errors greater than the standard value, and deviation of both directional and variability errors group comprised directional and variability errors greater than the standard values. In addition, a two-way analysis of variance was performed for initial pre- and post-SPV, and pre- and posttotal FIM scores (p < .05). RESULTS: The deviation of variability errors group, and deviation of both directional and variability errors group, had larger SPV variability errors than did the nondeviation group. Furthermore, the deviation of variability errors group showed a significant improvement in variability errors after 1 month. There was a correlation between the initial SPV with eyes opened variability error and total FIM after 1 month in Pusher patients with unilateral spatial neglect in the deviation of both directional and variability errors group. CONCLUSIONS: SPV with eyes opened variability errors and initial FIM score may influence the independence of activities of daily living after 1 month in the recovery of patients with stroke with Pusher and unilateral spatial neglect.

Obtaining interactions among science, technology, and research policy for developing an innovation strategy: A case study of supercapacitors.

Comprehensive observations of science, technology, and research policy transactions are important for developing an innovation strategy. We propose a new method that combines the academic landscape and matrix analysis to understand the relationships among activities of three aspects of the technological landscape: science, technology, and research policy. First, we divided academic research into 28 knowledge domains by clustering a citation network of scientific papers. Next, we developed a new matrix classifying them into three groups: "mature technology," "intermediate technology," and "emerging technology." The results showed that research domains in "emerging technology" showed a high rate of patent increase, indicating that they were commercializing rapidly. Finally, we identified the group that each country focused on, and this result reflected the countries' research policies. China and Singapore showed high rates, whereas Japan, France, and Germany had low values. This result reflects countries' research policies and implies that specialty research areas differed by country. As above, our research result implies that academia, industry, and government have paid attention to knowledge domains in "emerging technology" and these are important for creating innovation. A supercapacitor, also known as an electric double layer capacitor or ultracapacitor, was selected as an example in our method. This research could help academic researchers, industrial companies, and policymakers in developing innovation strategies.

Induction of DNA methylation by artificial piRNA production in male germ cells.

Global DNA demethylation and subsequent de novo DNA methylation take place in mammalian male embryonic germ cells [1-3]. P-element-induced wimpy testis (PIWI)-interacting RNAs (piRNAs), which are germline-specific small RNAs, have been postulated to be critically important for de novo DNA methylation of retrotransposon genes, and many proteins, including PIWI family proteins, play pivotal roles in this process [4-6]. In the embryonic mouse testis, two mouse PIWI proteins, mouse PIWI-like (MILI) and mouse PIWI2 (MIWI2), are involved in the biogenesis of piRNAs through the so-called ping-pong amplification cycle [7-10], and long single-stranded RNAs transcribed from the gene regions of piRNA clusters have been proposed to be the initial material [11-16]. However, it remains unclear whether transcription from the piRNA clusters is required for the biogenesis of piRNAs. To answer this question, we developed a novel artificial piRNA production system by simple expression of sense and antisense EGFP mRNAs in embryonic male germ cells in the piRNA biogenesis phase. EGFP expression was silenced by piRNA-dependent DNA methylation, indicating that concomitant expression of sense and antisense RNA transcripts is necessary and sufficient for piRNA production and subsequent piRNA-dependent gene silencing. In addition, we demonstrated that this artificial piRNA induction paradigm could be applied to an endogenous gene essential for spermatogenesis, DNMT3L [3, 17, 18]. This study not only provides novel insights into the molecular mechanisms of piRNA production, but also presents an innovative strategy for inducing epigenetic modification in germ cells.

Early identification of cognitive impairment and dementia: Results from four years of the community consultation center.

The community consultation center was established as the core facility for a project entitled "Community Support Network for Citizens with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and Dementia." This study reports on our center's activity and user outcomes. Users consulted with medical staff regarding their memory problems and were self-screened using a touch-panel computer assisted screening tool (TPST). Dementia was suspected when the TPST score was 12 points or below, and the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) was conducted by our onsite clinical psychologists, which served as the gold standard. All reports were provided to user's primary care physicians, or a nearby medical institute if users did not have a primary care physician. Patient outcomes were obtained from participating medical institutes. Informed consent was obtained for all users. In the four-year period, 2802 users visited the center. Of them, 1565 registered (men/women=519/1046; mean age, 74 years). Of 1354 people who used TPST, 622 (45.9%) scored 12 points or below. 409 confirmed diagnoses from the medical institutes revealed MCI in 11.2%, Alzheimer's disease in 37.1%, and vascular dementia in 8.0%. Among the 207 users who had no primary care physicians at consultation, 43 (20.8%) were diagnosed with MCI or dementia. Approximately half of the users who took the TPST were suspected of dementia following interview by a clinical psychologist. Both MCI and dementia were confirmed by the medical institutes in 59.6% of users. We conclude that our consultation center plays a pivotal role in early diagnosis of MCI and dementia.

Roles of consultation organizations in the early detection of dementia: from the practices of the Community Consultation Center for Citizens with Mild Cognitive Impairment and Dementia, Nippon Medical School.

BACKGROUND: As society ages, early detection of dementia is becoming increasingly important. Many hospitals have opened memory-loss clinics, and various new approaches for early examination and appropriate diagnosis are being tried. However, these memory-loss clinics are ultimately part of the hospital establishment, implying that, in addition to the burdens of time and effort to undergo examinations and consultations, patients might have a certain psychological resistance. With a grant from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, the Institute of Development and Aging Science at Nippon Medical School has opened a center called the Community Consultation Center for Citizens with Mild Cognitive Impairment and Dementia, which is a dementia-related center outside the regular hospital. This center has been developing a system that makes consultations easier. We performed a retrospective follow-up study that aimed to determine how much this approach contributes to the early detection of dementia compared with outpatient visits to university hospitals. METHODS: Persons who were found to have organic brain syndrome (defined as organic diseases related to dementia, including mild cognitive impairment) after visiting the Consultation Center during the survey period were referred to as the Consultation Center group, and persons who were found to have organic brain syndrome after an initial visit to the Department of Neurology at Nippon Medical School Musashi Kosugi Hospital were referred to as the Hospital group. We compared the groups in terms of sex, age, Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) score, and subclassification by means of the t-test and χ(2) test. RESULTS: Both the mean MMSE score (p<0.001) and percentage of subjects with an MMSE score of 24 points of higher (p=0.007) were significantly higher in the Consultation Center group than in the Hospital group. CONCLUSIONS: Consultations can be made more casually at the Consultation Center than at hospitals. Our results suggest that more casual consultations contribute to the early detection of dementia.

Effect of plaunotol in combination with clarithromycin or amoxicillin on Helicobacter pylori in vitro and in vivo.

Plaunotol, a cytoprotective anti-ulcer agent, has antibacterial activity against Helicobacter pylori. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of plaunotol when combined with clarithromycin or amoxicillin against H. pylori. When combined with clarithromycin, plaunotol showed synergic activity against 11 of 14 strains, and additive activity against the other three strains, by chequerboard titration. When combined with amoxicillin, plaunotol showed additive activity against 10 of 14 strains. No antagonistic effects were seen against any of the strains tested. The interactions between plaunotol and either clarithromycin or amoxicillin were determined by time-kill assay against the Sydney Strain (strain SS1) of H. pylori. The combination of plaunotol with clarithromycin showed synergic activity and with amoxicillin showed additive activity. In a C57BL/6 mouse gastritis model infected with H. pylori SS1, the plaunotol-clarithromycin and plaunotol-amoxicillin combinations both exhibited synergic effects, which allowed the effective dose of clarithromycin to be reduced when co-administered with plaunotol. These results suggest that plaunotol may have a useful role in combination with anti-H. pylori drugs in the treatment of H. pylori-associated diseases.

[Rapid bactericidal activities of carbapenems against Pseudomonas aeruginosa in simulating human plasma concentrations].

The rapid bactericidal activities of panipenem (PAPM), imipenem (IPM), and meropenem (MEPM) against Pseudomonas aeruginosa were investigated by using in vitro pharmacodynamic model simulating the human plasma concentrations after intravenous drip infusion at 500 mg for 0.5 hours. Against P. aeruginosa PAO1, PAPM and IPM showed rapider reduction in viable cell counts than MEPM at 0.5 hours after exposure. All drugs showed more than 3 log10 reduction in viable cell counts at 2 hours after exposure and bacterial regrowth was not observed throughout 6 hours. The initial bactericidal activities of the drugs against 4 clinical isolates within 1 hour after exposure were also investigated by the same method. Against P. aeruginosa strain 12,475, the 3 drugs showed similar initial bactericidal activity but PAPM and IPM showed stronger initial bactericidal activity than MEPM against the other strains as did against P. aeruginosa PAO1. The morphological change of a strain 12,489, for which the initial bactericidal activities were different largely, after 0.5 hours exposure to simulated drug-concentrations was investigated by scanning electron microscope. PAPM and IPM induced morphological changes in most of the cells and cell lysis and bulge formation. On the other hand, MEPM induced changes of the surface structure of cells and slightly elongated cells, but not cell lysis.