Significance of elevated urinary N-acetyl-beta-D-glucosaminidase activity in chronic cadmium poisoning

N-Acetyl-beta-D-glucosaminidase (NAG) activity and beta 2-microglobulin (beta 2-m) concentration were measured in the urine of inhabitants of a cadmium-polluted area (Cd), including patients with, or suspected, "itai-itai" disease and control subjects. Urinary NAG activity increased with increasing beta 2-m concentration up to about 100 U/g creatinine; above this value the NAG activity did not increase with increasing beta 2-m concentration. Urinary NAG activity thus represents another useful indicator of renal tubular damage caused by Cd poisoning since the mechanisms for the excretion of NAG and beta 2-m into urine are thought to be different.     

Fracture Toughness Analysis of Advanced Ceramic Composite for Hip Prosthesis

The fracture behavior of a zirconia-toughened alumina-matrix composite (added with small amounts of mixed oxides) for ceramic hip joint prostheses has been evaluated with emphasis placed on the effect of environmental surface degradation in moist environment. Accelerated aging tests were performed up to 300 h in an autoclave operating at 121°C (under 0.1 MPa pressure) in vapor environment, which represents a quite severe environmental testing condition. Besides conventional fracture mechanics characterizations, including different types of fracture toughness test, microscopic insight into the effect of environmental surface degradation on toughness could be obtained according to Raman and fluorescence microprobe spectroscopy. The main outcomes of this study were as follows: (i) after 10-h autoclaving (according to ISO standard recommendation) no significant change of monoclinic volume fraction and fracture toughness could be detected; (ii) after very long exposure time (300 h) the monoclinic phase content increased and the surface fracture toughness decreased by approximately 30%, although it was still above the toughness level of pure alumina; and (iii) the bulk toughness was unaffected by autoclave exposure, independent of exposure time elongation.     

Microstructure and material properties of an Al–Cu alloy provided by the Ohno continuous casting technique

The specific objective in this work is an exploration of the material properties produced by a recently developed continuous casting technique. The study focuses on an Al–Cu alloy provided by the Ohno continuous casting process. The experimental approaches give rise to unusual microstructural characteristic in the cast samples, namely a fine lamellar eutectic structure with unidirectional growth along its axial direction together with a regularly oriented lattice structure. Such microstructural characteristics significantly increase the tensile and fatigue properties.     

Recent Chemical Approaches for Site-Specific Conjugation of Native Antibodies: Technologies toward Next-Generation Antibody–Drug Conjugates

Antibody–drug conjugates (ADCs), which consist of three components, antibody, linker, and payload, can function as “magic bullets”. These conjugates offer the ability to target drug delivery to specific cells, based on cell-specific recognition and the binding of an antigen by a monoclonal antibody (mAb). In particular, by delivering a cytotoxic payload to cancer cells, ADCs are expected to provide a breakthrough in oncology treatments by providing a way to increase efficacy and decrease toxicity, in comparison with traditional chemotherapeutic treatments. The development of ADC therapeutics has dramatically progressed in the past decade and two ADCs have been approved and used as anticancer drugs in the clinic. However, several critical issues regarding the performance of ADCs are still being discussed and investigated. Indeed, in the past few years, several groups have reported that, changing the number and position of the drug payloads in the ADCs, affects the pharmacokinetics, drug release rates, and biological activity. The use of conventional heterogeneous conjugation methods for ADC preparation results in the drug/antibody ratio and connecting position of the payload having stochastic distributions. Therefore, it is important to investigate how these potential problems can be circumvented through site-specific conjugation. Herein, various site-specific chemical conjugation strategies with native mAbs that are currently used for the production of ADCs, including residue-selective labeling for generating ADCs, disulfide rebridging, and affinity-peptide-mediated site-specific chemical conjugation technologies, are reviewed and described.     

New Members of the Pb-based 1222 Superconductor Containing Phosphorus: (Pb0.75P0.25)Sr2(Ln1.9?x Ce x Sr0.1)Cu2O z (Ln=Sm and Gd)

We previously reported on the synthesis of new Pb-based 1222 superconductor containing phosphorus in the (Pb_0.75P_0.25)Sr₂(Eu_1.9−x Ce _x Sr_0.1)Cu₂O _z system. Recently, we have discovered new members of the Pb-based 1222 superconductor containing phosphorus in the (Pb_0.75P_0.25)Sr₂(Ln_1.9−x Ce _x Sr_0.1)Cu₂O _z (Ln=Sm and Gd) systems. In each system, it is found that the samples of almost the single 1222 phase can be obtained for a wide composition area of 0.3≤x≤1.0. After annealing under 143 atm O₂ atmosphere at 400 °C, each sample of Ln=Sm and Gd with x=0.3 is found to show an onset of resistivity-drop at about 28 K and at about 24 K, respectively. Moreover, each samples of Ln=Sm and Gd is found to show an onset of diamagnetic signal at about 25 K and about 22 K, respectively. From these facts, these samples of Ln=Sm and Gd are found to be new members of the Pb-based 1222 superconductor containing phosphorus.     

Interfacial energy gradient at a front of an electrochemical wave appearing in CuSn-alloy oscillatory electrodeposition

In the present work, we show that a large interfacial energy gradient is produced at a front of an electrochemical wave appearing in CuSn-alloy oscillatory electrodeposition from an aqueous solution by observing the directional lateral motion of an oil droplet put on an electrode surface. During the oscillation, the surface composition of the electrodeposit changed periodically between Cu-rich and Sn-rich alloys. The transition from the Cu-rich phase to the Sn-rich phase, or vice versa, initiated at a region of the electrode and propagated to the entire surface as an electrochemical wave. Contact angle measurements of the droplet revealed that the electrochemical interfacial energy varies largely between during Cu-rich and Sn-rich alloy electrodeposition. Repetitive approaches of the electrochemical wave front to the droplet drives the directional movement of the droplet, indicating the lateral imbalance of the interfacial energy (i.e., the interfacial tension) at the front is so large that the force produced by the imbalance can transport macroscopic objects such as an oil droplet.     

Analysis of raw materials, intermediates and subsidiary colours in Food Yellow No. 5 (Sunset Yellow FCF) by LC/MS

Raw materials, intermediates and subsidiary colours in Food Yellow No. 5 (Sunset Yellow FCF) were determined using liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) with electrospray ionization. A gradient consisting of acetonitrile and 0.04% aqueous ammonium carbonate solution was used for the HPL C mobile phase. Quasi-molecular ions of impurities were used as monitor ions. It was necessary to use fragment ions of the sodium salts of 6-hydroxy-5-phenylazo-2-naphthalenesulphonic acid (SS-AN) and 4-(2- hydroxy-1- naphthylazo) benzenesulphonic acid (2N-SA) as monitor ions because the compounds are not resolved by chromatography and have the same molecular weight. Fifteen samples of commercial Sunset Yellow FCF were examined. The results obtained by UV-Vis spectroscopy were in good agreement with the results of LC/MS analyses. The detection limits of the impurities in Sunset Yellow FCF ranged from 0.01 to 0.1%.