Phase I and pharmacologic study of irinotecan in combination with cisplatin for advanced lung cancer

Macroscopic T-type Ca2+ currents, which are often observed in fetal and neonatal cardiac muscle cells, were not found in normal (0 of 17) adult feline ventricular myocytes. However, they were present in most (15 of 21) myocytes isolated from adult feline left ventricles with long-standing pressure-overload-induced hypertrophy. This is the first study to provide evidence in a large mammal, such as the cat, that T-type Ca2+ channels may be reexpressed in adults in association with hypertrophy resulting from slow progressive pressure overload. Importantly, this expression was stable for the duration of the hypertrophy process and was not associated with abrupt pressure overload. T-type Ca2+ currents were separated from L-type Ca2+ currents by exploiting the differences in their voltage dependence of steady-state inactivation. Depolarizations from -80 mV revealed a rapidly activating inward current that peaked in magnitude at -30 mV (-1.8 +/- 0.9 [mean +/- SD] pA/pF) and fully inactivated within 100 milliseconds in 15 of 21 hypertrophied myocytes studied. Further depolarizations activated progressively less T-type Ca2+ current, so that at +10 mV the L-type Ca2+ current predominated. In the hypertrophied myocytes that demonstrated both T-type and L-type Ca2+ currents, two distinct peaks occurred in their current-voltage relations. T-type Ca2+ currents were not evident in any of the 17 normal adult feline left ventricular myocytes studied. The purpose of T-type Ca2+ currents in hypertrophy is unclear. However, their presence may make hypertrophied myocardium more prone to spontaneous action potentials and increase the likelihood for arrhythmias in partially depolarized hypertrophied myocardium.     

Determination of sequence length distribution in SBR by ozonolysis-g.p.c. method

Sequence distribution of styrene-butadiene copolymer (SBR) was investigated by ozonolysis-g.p.c. All the double bonds of butadiene units in SBR were cleaved by ozonolysis in methylene chloride at ?30°C, followed by reduction degradation to alcohol with lithium aluminium hydride. The g.p.c. of the ozonolysis products observed with a u.v.-detector showed the peaks corresponding to styrene sequences and styrene-1,2 sequences. Hot- and cold-emulsion SBR samples contained short sequences consisting of 1 to 4 styrene units and 1,2 styrene units respectively. The average sequence length of cold-emulsion SBR was slightly longer than that of hot-emulsion SBR. A partial block SBR prepared by solution polymerization contained short styrene sequences of 1 to 5 units and long sequences having a broad distribution of $\text{M}{}_{\mathrm{w}}\text{M}{}_{\mathrm{n}}\text{= 1.6}$ with the maximum around 35 units. The styrene sequences containing the 1,2 unit was scarcely observed in this sample.     

Dependence of zero-shear viscosity and steady-state compliance on molecular weight between entanglements for ethylene-cycloolefin copolymers

Dynamic viscoelastic properties of a series of cyclic olefin copolymers have been investigated. The specimens differ in total molecular weight as well as molecular weight between entanglements. The angular frequency (ω) dependence curves of dynamic storage and loss moduli (G′ and G″, respectively) of the specimens have shown that G′ ∝ ω² and G″ ∝ ω in the terminal region, and a plateau region at high ω. On the basis of the experimental results, the dependence of total molecular weight as well as molecular weight between entanglements has been examined for zero-shear viscosity (η₀) and steady-state compliance (J_e). It is shown that for the melts of the copolymers in the entangled regime, M_w being the weight-average molecular weight and M_e the molecular weight between entanglements. The steady-state compliance J_e for the melts scales with M_e and M_w as .     

PMD compensation in optical coherent single carrier transmission using frequency-domain equalisation

The transmission performance of optical single-carrier (SC) transmission using frequency-domain equalisation (FDE) to counter polarisation mode dispersion (PMD) is evaluated. 25 Gbit/s coherent optical SC transmission using FDE (CO-SC-FDE) is demonstrated in the presence of a significant amount of differential group delay (DGD). The results show that CO-SC-FDE compensates for the influence of the 125 ps DGD; the OSNR penalty is 0.81 dB.     

Representative velocity scale of Rayleigh-Bénard convection with shear-thinning fluids

Although natural convection is frequently encountered in various chemical processes, Rayleigh number (Ra) cannot be defined fully in shear-thinning fluid systems. In particular, the velocity scale, which is necessary to estimate the effective viscosity of the system, should be discussed carefully. Thus, in this study, the representative velocity scale of Rayleigh-Bénard (RB) convection, which is a typical example of natural convection, with shear-thinning fluids was investigated based on the velocity fields obtained using computational fluid dynamics. Numerical simulations revealed that the critical temperature difference at which RB convection starts to fully develop decreases with an increase in the shear-thinning property. The shear-thinning property also induced subcritical bifurcation. In addition, the velocity scale of convection increases with an increase in the shear-thinning property. Thus, the shear-thinning property is considered to accelerate convection. Compared with several types of velocity scales used by other researchers, significant deviations from the actual scale were observed. Therefore, a new type of velocity scale, including the buoyant to viscous force ratio, arbitrary parameter, and thermal diffusivity, was proposed. The proposed velocity scale allowed an approximate estimation of the actual velocity scale. Although further investigation of the validity is necessary with varying geometries and rheological parameters, this velocity scale will be useful for controlling RB convection with Newtonian/shear-thinning fluids.     

1 Tbit/s (111 Gbit/s/ch X 10 ch) no-guard-interval CO-OFDM transmission over 2100 km DSF

Spectrally efficient (2bit/s/Hz) 1 Tbit/s DWDM transmission of 111 Gbit/s no-guard-interval PDM CO-OFDM signals with 50 GHz spacing over DSF is demonstrated. The record transmission distance of 2100 km was achieved for a 100 Gbit/s-data-rate CO-OFDM system.     

An Optimal Grey PID Control System

The PID control algorithm has been widely applied in many industry control system to solve efficiently the control problems of manufacturing processes. However, PID control algorithm belong to “delay control”, because it functions on basis of the actions occurred in the system. Thus the control accuracy in real-time is limited. In this paper, in order to realize the accurate control in real-time, the grey model based on grey system theory is first proposed to combine with PID control to establish the control system. We define the proposed control system as grey PID control system. Then the cubic spline function is integrated into the grey model. to enhance the control accuracy of system. To further improve the performance, the particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is employed to optimize the parameters of PID algorithm. Finally, we validated the effectiveness of the proposed control system by computer simulation. © 2009 Institute of Electrical Engineers of Japan. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Video Scene Annotation Based on Web Social Activities

This article describes a mechanism to acquire the semantics of video content from the activities of Web communities that use a bulletin-board system and weblog tools to discuss video scenes.     

Functional analyses of neutrophil-like differentiated cell lines under a hyperglycemic condition

Diabetic patients are prone to severe bacterial infections. The functional alterations of neutrophils by hyperglycemia are thought to be partially responsible for such infections. In this study, we investigated the functional changes of neutrophil-like differentiated cell lines (dHL-60, dTHP-1, and dNB-4) by treatment with 5.5 mM, 11 mM, or 35 mM of glucose. In dHL-60 cells, the incubation with high glucose (35 mM) resulted in the enhancement of cell aggregation, the suppression of cellular fragility, the induction of reactive-oxygen species (ROS) production by phorbol myristate acetate (PMA) stimulation, and the impairment of phagocytosis. In dTHP-1 cells, the treatment with higher glucose generated the suppression of cellular fragility and extremely impaired phagocytosis (by 35 mM), and induced ROS production due to PMA stimulation (by 11 mM). Furthermore, the higher glucose exposure to dNB-4 cells enlarged intracellular vacuoles (by 35 mM) and induced ROS production due to PMA stimulation (by 11 mM). Since the ROS generation of those cells was enhanced only after PMA stimulation under the higher glucose conditions, glucose may have a priming effect rather than a triggering effect. These extraordinary sensitivities caused by the higher glucose treatments may reflect the dysfunction or overactivation of neutrophils.     

Quantification of wear,strain and heat energy consumption rates for sliding steel ball against diamond-like carbon coatings

Abstract

In this work, we evaluated the different energy consumption rates associated with the total frictional energy for a ball sliding on a flat surface. The energy generated by the sliding two bodies in contact is dissipated into the materials in various forms. The wear consumption energy for a steel ball against a diamond-like carbon surface was evaluated by the wear coefficient of the wear volume–energy input equation. The strain energy generated in the steel ball as a result of being made to slide under a certain load was calculated using the Hertzian theory. The chemical reaction energy was estimated based on iron oxidation. Finally, the frictional energy dissipated as heat was obtained by subtracting the wear and the strain energies from the total frictional energy.