The development of the Japanese version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory and the examination of the factor structure

This article presents an evaluation of the factor structures of the Japanese version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). The MBI is a widely used psychometric instrument for measuring 'burnout' developed by Maslach and her co-workers. The MBI consists of four subscales: Emotional Exhaustion, Personal Accomplishment, Depersonalization, and Involvement. The MBI was translated into Japanese along with a back-translation and was administered to a sample of 267 nurses. Various psychometric analyses showed that the Japanese version of the MBI has high reliability for the 22 items scored for the frequency dimension. The factor analysis using principal factoring with an oblique rotation resulted in three factor structures that had different implications from the MBI: Emotional Exhaustion/Depersonalization, Personal Accomplishment, and Physical Exhaustion. The correlationship between the MBI and the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ), measures of depression, showed that burnout was a unique phenomenon.     

Effect of the drop impact on BGA/CSP package reliability

In this study, ball grid arrays (BGAs) and chip size packages (CSPs) were evaluated with respect to their solder joint reliabilities under drop impacts. The correlation between solder joint stresses and motherboard strains was confirmed by numerical analysis, and the motherboard strains caused by the drop impacts were measured to evaluate the BGA/CSP reliability. The authors found that the stress at a solder joint differs depending on the package structure, even if the motherboard strain is the same, and that underfilling eases the motherboard strain and disperses the stress concentrated on a solder joint.     

Submillimeter wave esr and far infrared spectroscopy measurements of CuGeO3

Submillimeter wave ESR and far infrared transmission measurements of first inorganic spin-Peierls system CuGeO₃ have been performed using the single crystals. Our new results are discussed in connection with the magnetic properties of the spin-Peierls systems and the recent neutron measurements of CuGeO₃.     

Kerr effect in an optical passive ring-resonator gyro

The Kerr effect in an optical passive ring-resonator gyro (OPRG) is analyzed considering the optical source coherence. This effect causes the drift to be much greater than the theoretical limit of rotation sensing given by the detector shot noise for an OPRG with high sensitivity. The drift depends not only on the fluctuation of the power splitting ratio between two counter-propagating beams in the resonator, but also on the frequency modulation indices used to set the operating point. Square-wave intensity modulation of the incident beam is also discussed as a way to eliminate the drift. It is found that the ratio of the signal-beam round-trip time in the resonator to the modulation period must be an integer to optimize the drift elimination. From the practical viewpoint, the requirement for the modulation parameters is analyzed numerically.     

Antimicrobial synergism of partially-denatured lysozyme with glycine: effect of sucrose and sodium chloride

Previously we reported that heat-treatment of lysozyme at 80°C for 20 min in pH 6.0 (HL80/6) greatly promoted its antimicrobial action to Gram-negative bacteria without detrimental effects on its inherent action to Gram-positive ones. In this study the effects of sucrose and NaCl on the promoted antimicrobial activity of HL80/6 and synergy with glycine were investigated. This potent antimicrobial lysozyme (HL80/6) retained 54% of the native enzymatic activity. The enhanced bactericidal action of HL80/6 against Escherichia coli K12 was gradually decreased with increasing sucrose and NaCl concentration in the medium, where complete suppression was observed at 2% sucrose and 0.1% NaCl. On the other hand, 1% NaCl concentration was required to suppress the antimicrobial activity against Staphylococcus aureus of either native lysozyme (NLz) or HL80/6, while sucrose up to 8% had no detectable inhibitory effect on this strain. However, similar doses of sucrose or NaCl had no effect on the enzymatic activity of both NLz and HL80/6, indicating that the antimicrobial action of HL80/6 is independent of its muramidase activity. HL80/6 lysozyme, but not NLz, exhibited good synergy with glycine against Gram-negative bacteria even in the presence of the inhibitory doses of sucrose or NaCl, suggesting a possible application in food industry as a food preservative. Thus, the results introduce an interesting finding that partial denaturation of lysozyme can induce its antimicrobial specificity to include the food-borne Gram-negative pathogens and heralded fascinating opportunities for application of HL80/6 with glycine in formulated food systems.     

Addition of glucagon to lipid-free total parenteral nutrition reduces production of prostaglandin E2 by stimulated splenic macrophages

Sepsis is a major complication of total parenteral nutrition (TPN). Impaired immunity has been suggested as being responsible for TPN-related sepsis, but it is unknown how the immune system is affected by TPN. We recently found that administration of lipid-free TPN resulted in an increase in prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) release by stimulated splenic macrophages. This observation suggested that TPN may impair immunity through the prominent immunosuppressive effects of PGE2. In the present study, we tested the hypothesis that addition of glucagon to TPN solution may protect against the immunosuppressive effect of TPN by modifying PGE2 secretion. Adult, male Sprague-Dawley rats (n = 18) underwent jugular vein cannulation: group 1 (n = 7) received intravenous saline and chow ad libitum; group 2 (n = 6) received TPN (80 mL/24 h); and group 3 (n = 5) received TPN (80 mL/24 h) plus glucagon (100 micrograms/24 h). After 10 days, spleens were removed and splenic macrophages were isolated and cultured for 24 h in plain M199 medium (nonstimulated) or in medium containing Escherichia coli lipopolysaccharide (5 micrograms/mL) (stimulated). PGE2 release was determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. There were no differences in PGE2 release between the groups of nonstimulated cells, but when stimulated with lipopolysaccharide, the macrophages from the TPN rats (group 2) released more PGE2 (81.68 +/- 25.99 ng/2.5 x 10(6) cells) than the control group (16.04 +/- 3.26 ng/2.5 x 10(6) cells). The release of PGE2 was normalized in the TPN animals treated with glucagon (15.71 +/- 3.33 ng/2.5 x 10(6) cells). This difference was significant, with p < .05 by Tukey's test after analysis of variance.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)