Micro MUMPS: An interactive database language for micro-computers

A simple interactive language named Micro MUMPS has been implemented on a microcomputer system. Its powerful facilities for data base manipulation and character handling make programming easy for end users who are unfamiliar with computers. Micro MUMPS is a practical subset of the language MUMPS which has been implemented on many minicomputers, and it also has some additional capabilities indispensable to micro-computer applications. A modified prefix B-tree is used in Micro MUMPS database and its organization can be changed according to the requirements of space and time efficiency. The design criteria of Micro MUMPS and micro-computer based implementation techniques are discussed in this paper.     

A High-Performance Cycloconverter-Fed Synchronous Machine Drive System

A high-performance variable-speed drive system using a cycloconverter-fed synchronous machine is described. The principle of the drive control is based on the field-oriented control method. For operating the synchronous machine drive system with high dynamic performance and excellent static characteristics over a wide range from zero to top speed, accurate field orientation and high response current control are particularly important problems to be solved. New methods of solving these problems are presented. This systems was manufactured for a 2500-kW reversible rolling mill drive system, using a six-pulse three- phase cycloconverter and an ordinary rotating field type synchronous machine without any special requirements. The expected performance was successfully obtained.     

Doppler effect in flexible and expandable light waveguide and development of new fiber-optic vibration/acoustic sensor

New principle and a geometrical arrangement of an optical fiber for a vibration/acoustic measurement are proposed in the present paper. The sensor is based on a new finding that a frequency of light wave transmitted through a bent optical fiber is shifted by vibration at the bent region. The phenomenon can be explained as Doppler's effect in flexible and expandable light waveguide. Several configurations of the sensor have been designed, and very high sensitivity is achieved in the extremely wide frequency range. Principle, sensor configuration and theoretical sensitivity, measurement system, and some experimental consideration are described in the present paper. The sensor sensitivity was examined experimentally in the low and middle frequency range, and the detectability was confirmed experimentally in the frequency range of acoustic emission signals.     

Phased array of AlGaAs multistripe index-guided lasers

The fabrication and characteristics of a novel index-guided phase-locked array are described. A single-lobe far-field pattern was obtained up to the CW output of 100 mW in the 3-element diode laser.     

Temperature dependence of impact fracture energies of short glass fiber–epoxy and unsaturated polyester composites

The temperature dependence of the impact fracture energies of composites reinforced with random-planar orientation of short fibers was studied theoretically and experimentally. The theoretical values of the impact fracture energy of these composites is described by the sum of the fracture energy of the matrix and the fibers and the energy necessary to pull out the fibers on the crack surface, taking into consideration the temperature dependence of the critical fiber length and the breaking probability of fibers. The impact fracture energies were studied experimentally for epoxy and unsaturated polyester resins reinforced with random-planar orientation of short glass fibers. The theoretical values of the impact fracture energy were in good agreement with the experimental values. It was found that in any composite, the impact fracture energy of the fibers in a composite mainly contributes to the impact fracture energy of the composite at room temperature. At higher temperatures, fiber pull-out energy is more significant.     

Effects of sex steroids on secretory granule formation in gonadotropes of castrated male rats with respect to granin expression

Pituitary gonadotropes show sex-related differences in their ultrastructure. Typical gonadotropes of male rats exhibit both large granules, which contain chromogranin A (CgA), and small granules, which contain secretogranin II (SgII). In contrast, typical female rat gonadotropes show only a very few large granules among the numerous small granules. To clarify the nature of the biogenesis of these secretory granules and the effects of sex steroids, the ultrastructural and immunocytochemical changes in gonadotropes were examined in castrated male rats supplied with a testosterone or estradiol implant. In castrated rats, pituitary expression and plasma levels of LH increased drastically, but the pituitary content of CgA decreased. The majority of gonadotropes then showed features of "castration cells" containing many small secretory granules. A testosterone implant to castrated rats remarkably suppressed the expression and circulating levels of LH and increased the CgA content in the pituitary to near-normal levels. In this situation, immunocytochemical studies demonstrated that gonadotropes again exhibited large and small secretory granules with the respective localization of CgA and SgII. On the contrary, in castrated rats supplied with an estradiol implant, the expression and content of CgA in the pituitary were remarkably suppressed, and large secretory granules disappeared from gonadotropes. These results suggest that the expression of CgA in gonadotropes is regulated differently by male and female sex steroids. These different effects of androgen and estrogen on the expression level of CgA are closely associated with the sex-related differences in the ultrastructure of secretory granules within gonadotropes.     

Assessment of the offshore wind resource in Japan with the ASCAT microwave scatterometer

We analysed wind speed and direction off the coast of Japan using data from the satellite-borne Advanced Scatterometer (ASCAT) and the Weather Research and Forecasting model (WRF), validated these data using in situ wind measurements from 20 buoys, and evaluated the effect of the long time intervals from ASCAT observations on wind resource assessment. More than 25 km from the coast, and at heights of 10 m, the ASCAT wind speed has negative biases of up to 3.4% and root mean square errors of up to 18.5%; its wind direction has 11° to 27° of mean absolute error compared to buoy measurements at a height of 10 m. These accuracies are better than either the expected accuracies reported in the technical manual or those simulated with WRF with its spatial resolution of 10 km. We also evaluated long-term average ASCAT wind speeds in comparison to 4- and 5-year averages of in situ buoy wind speeds measured at three buoys, with resulting differences of –0.3%, –6.3%, and – 1.6%. Furthermore, wind roses show that appearance frequencies of the ASCAT wind direction for the long term are in a good agreement with those of the measurements at the three buoys. Our results show that the ASCAT-derived wind speed and direction are appropriate more than 25 km from the coast, and that the long time interval between ASCAT observations has an insignificant effect on wind resource assessment, if at least 4 or 5 years of averaged ASCAT data are used.     

Renal cell carcinoma sharply captured by imaging technology at an early stage in a hemodialysis patient: Usefulness of noninvasive monochrome superb microvascular imaging

It has been drawing much attention that type 2 diabetes mellitus is closely associated with increased incidence of numerous cancers and their poor prognosis. Consequently, malignancy has been recently recognized as one of diabetic complications in addition to various conventional complications. Furthermore, it is well known that the prevalence of renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is drastically increased in hemodialysis (HD) patients. Therefore, screening of RCCs in HD patients is a very important and urgent issue as there are no highly sensitive tumor markers for RCCs. Monochrome superb microvascular imaging (mSMI) is a relatively new Doppler ultrasound technique and is useful especially when evaluating very slow blood flow state, because this allows for imaging microvessels with low velocity in the absence of a contrast agent. Thus, mSMI might be also useful when contrast enhancement is not obvious on CT and/or contrast-enhanced ultrasonography using perflubutane or contrast agents are contraindicated. Moreover, it has been reported that mSMI could effectively detect vascularity of renal malignant tumor than benign renal mass in nondialysis patients. We propose that mSMI of ultrasonography could become one of the very useful methods for detecting RCCs at an early stage with high sensitivity in HD patients.     

High‐resolution OLED display with remarkably low power consumption using blue/yellow tandem structure and RGBY subpixels

A top‐emission organic light‐emitting diode (OLED) with a microcavity structure combined with a blue/yellow tandem structure was developed. A high‐resolution active‐matrix OLED display with the world's lowest level of power consumption using the tandem OLED with red, green, blue, and yellow subpixels was fabricated.