Planar n-SI-n heterostructure athermal InP (110) optical modulator.

We report an athermal InP (110) optical modulator with a simple planar n-SI-n heterostructure. A symmetrical push-pull operation provides a high-extinction ratio of >25 dB over the entire C-band and zero-chirp modulation. A Mach-Zehnder optical modulator (MZM) exhibits a 3 dB-EO bandwidth of 30 GHz and 40-Gb/s NRZ high-speed modulation with wavelength and temperature insensitive operation. We also successfully demonstrate an MZM integrated twin-IQ modulator that exhibits 56-Gb/s × 2 athermal QPSK modulation at constant drive and bias voltages.

[A case of pulmonary dirofilariasis diagnosed by biopsy, immunological tests and the clinical course without operation].

A 52-year-old woman who was a pet trimmer by occupation and had four cats, presented with cold-like symptoms. Her chest radiograph and CT scan on admission showed a tumor about 4cm in size with spicula and ground-glass opacity in the right middle lobe. We performed fiberoptic bronchoscopy and CT-guided percutaneous needle lung biopsy on the suspicion of lung cancer, but the tissue consisted largely of granulation tissue with eosinophilic infiltration and no findings of malignancy. The cold-like symptoms subsided and C-reactive protein became within the normal range. Because of the histological findings, her occupation and her pets, we suspected pulmonary dirofilariasis. We asked the National Institute for Infectious Diseases for specific IgG antibody assays to various parasite antigens, which showed positive finding for pulmonary dirofilariasis. We therefore diagnosed pulmonary dirofilariasis and did not perform an operation.

Bowel welding technique in dogs and cats using a diode laser: an experimental study.

A laser bowel welding technique for dogs and cats was developed. The bowel was pinched using a special clamp having an opening on the body developed for this experiment (LW clamp). Using the 2 different types of contact probe (blunt tip: Laser Bipolar Dissector (LBD); sharp tip: Super Scalpel Dissector (SSD)), the laser passed through the hole in the LW clamp to cut the bowels, while at the same time, sealing the cut portion. The results obtained in this study showed that the optimum laser output using LBD was 6-10 W in dog and cat ileum, and 8-10 W in dog and cat colon. Optimum laser output using SSD was 6-8 W in dog ileum, 8-10 W in dog colon, 10 W in cat ileum and 6-8 W in cat colon. No marked differences were observed between ileum and colon when using either LBD or SSD. At the same power, burst pressure tended to be slightly higher with LBD than with SSD, although there were not significant differences between them. Histologically, complete sealing of the welded site was seen. Welding and cutting of bowel in dogs and cats was thus confirmed to be possible using the LW clamp in combination with LBD or SSD probes under a diode laser output of approximately 8 W for 50-80 s (400-640 J/cm). Thus, we can expect that this method is applicable to clinical veterinary medicine.

The discovery of dinotefuran: a novel neonicotinoid.

Dinotefuran (MTI-446: (RS)-1-methyl-2-nitro-3-(tetrahydro-3-furylmethyl)guanidine) is a new neonicotinoid commercialized by Mitsui Chemicals. Research led to this novel neonicotinoid by the removal of the chloropyridine or chlorothiazole ring that had been considered as indispensable for neonicotinoides. The research advanced as follows; (1) selection of acetylcholine for the lead compound, (2) recognition of the insecticidal advantages of 3-methoxypropyl compounds, (3) synthesis of (+/-)-tetrahydro-3-furylmethyl compounds by cyclization of the 3-methoxypropyl moiety. It resulted in dinotefuran which has a (+/-)-tetrahydro-3-furylmethyl moiety instead of a halogenated aromatic heterocyclic ring, and belongs to the third-generation neonicotinoids (sub-class: furanicotinyl compounds).

Recent progress in soliton transmission technology.

Recent progress on time-division multiplexed (TDM) and wavelength-division multiplexed (WDM) soliton transmission is described, in which dispersion management plays an important role in increasing the power margin and the dispersion tolerance. The characteristics of the dispersion-managed soliton are compared with those of return to zero and nonreturn to zero pulses. With a small dispersion swing, the system can still be described as an average soliton using the nonlinear Schrodinger equation, while with a large dispersion swing, the solitonlike steady-state pulse becomes a chirped Gaussian pulse, in which the governing equation is closer to a linear Schrodinger equation with a parabolic potential well. We describe an in-line modulation scheme for up to 80 Gbit/s per channel and its two channel WDM transmission over 10 000 km. Finally, we describe 640 Gbit/s (40 Gbit/sx16 channels) WDM soliton transmission over 1000 km with a dispersion-managed single-mode fiber. (c) 2000 American Institute of Physics.