Interactive multimedia communication systems for next-generationeducation using asymmetrical satellite and terrestrial networks

We propose a new concept of a hierarchical network structure for remote education. This system combines broadband satellite networks and simple terrestrial communication networks effectively to meet the demands of point-to-multipoint communications. Remote education experiments have been conducted using the proposed satellite communication networks. The results of network characteristics and degree of satisfaction are discussed. Acceptable communication quality was achieved ensuring an interactive lecture environment     

Cover Picture: Assembly and Photoinduced Organization of Mono‐ and Oligopeptide Molecules Containing an Azobenzene Moiety (Adv. Funct. Mater. 9/2007)

An illustration of the phototriggered organization and dispersion of tri‐peptide‐substituted azobenzene derivatives, as reported on p. 1507 by Yoko Matsuzawa and co‐workers. The tri‐peptide units form a beta‐sheet structure through hydrogen bonding to assemble a fibrous network system. Cis–trans photoisomerization of the azobenzene moiety leads to a large polarity change of the component molecule to break and re‐form hydrogen bonds between the tri‐peptide units. Assembled systems consisting of an azobenzene moiety as the photofunctional component and valyl units as the network backbone are investigated. The molecular ordering of these assemblies is examined by spectroscopy and theoretical calculations. The number of valyl units greatly influences the molecular order in the organized systems. Only N‐(L ‐valyl‐L ‐valyl‐L ‐valyl)azobenzene‐4‐carboxamide ( 3 ) forms a complete β‐sheet structure in this artificial assembly. Upon photoirradiation, the azobenzene moieties isomerize completely, revealing the reversibility in the structural organization through the flexibility of the β‐sheet network in this system.     

256-QAM (64 Gb/s) Coherent Optical Transmission Over 160 km With an Optical Bandwidth of 5.4 GHz

We report a polarization-multiplexed (Pol-Mux) 4-Gsymbol/s 256 quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) coherent optical transmission over 160 km. A 64-Gb/s data signal was successfully transmitted with an optical bandwidth of 5.4 GHz. We also describe a Pol-Mux, 10-Gsymbol/s, 128- and 64-QAM (140 and 120 Gb/s) transmission over 150 km.      

A 1.3-GHz fifth-generation SPARC64 microprocessor

A fifth-generation SPARC64 processor is fabricated in 130-nm partially depleted silicon-on-insulator CMOS with eight layers of Cu metallization. At V/sub dd/ = 1.2 V and T/sub a/ = 25/spl deg/C, it runs at 1.3 GHz and dissipates 34.7 W. The chip contains 191 M transistors with 19 M logic circuits in an area of 18.14 mm /spl times/ 15.99 mm and is covered with 5858 bumps, of which 269 are for I/O signals. It is mounted in a 1360-pin land-grid-array package. The 16-byte-wide system bus operates with a 260-MHz clock in single-data-rate or double-data-rate modes. This processor implements an error-detection mechanism for execution units and data path logic circuits in addition to on-chip arrays to detect data corruption. Intermittent errors detected in execution units and data paths are recovered via instruction retry. A soft barrier clocking scheme allows amortization of the clock skew and jitter over multiple cycles and helps to achieve high clock frequency. Tunability of the clock timing makes timing closure easier. A relatively small amount of custom circuit design and the use of mostly static circuits contributes to achieve short development time.     

Unique Features of Mobile Commerce

While the market potentials and impacts of web-based e-commerce are still in the ascendant, the advances in wireless technologies and mobile networks have brought about a new business opportunity and research attention, what is termed mobile commerce. Commonly, mobile commerce is considered to be another new application of existing web-based e-commerce onto wireless networks, but as an independent business area, mobile commerce has its own advantages and challenges as opposed to traditional e-commerce applications. This paper focuses on exploring the unique features of mobile commerce as compared with traditional e-commerce. Also, there are still some limitations arisen in m-commerce in contrast to web-based e-commerce. Finally, current state of mobile commerce in Japan is presented in brief, with an introduction of several cases involving mobile commerce applications in today's marketplace.     

A 950-MHz rectifier circuit for sensor network tags with 10-m distance

This paper presents a 950-MHz wireless power transmission system and a high-sensitivity rectifier circuit for ubiquitous sensor network tags. The wireless power transmission offers a battery-life-free sensor tag by recharging the output power of a base station into a secondary battery implemented with the tag. For realizing the system, a high-sensitivity rectifier with dynamic gate-drain biasing has been developed in a 0.3-/spl mu/m CMOS process. The measurement results show that the proposed rectifier can recharge a 1.2-V secondary battery over -14-dBm input RF power at a power conversion efficiency of 1.2%. In the proposed wireless system, this sensitivity corresponds to 10-m distance communication at 4-W output power from a base station.     

Electronically controlled high-speed wavelength-tunable femtosecondsoliton pulse generation using acoustooptic modulator

The compact system of electronically controlled high-speed wavelength-tunable femtosecond (fs) soliton pulse generation is realized for the first time using a passively mode-locked fs fiber laser, a polarization maintaining optical fiber, and an acoustooptic (A-O) modulator. The wavelength of the output pulses can be continuously tuned simply by controlling the input voltage into the A-O modulator. The wavelength of the soliton pulses can be changed at 2.5-μs intervals. Wavelength stabilization, time division wavelength multiplexed soliton pulse generation, and a wavelength scanner have been demonstrated     

Subcellular localization of fructosyl amino acid oxidases in peroxisomes of Aspergillus terreus and Penicillium janthinellum

Fructosyl amino acid oxidase (FAOD) is the enzyme catalyzing the oxidative deglycation of Amadori compounds, such as fructosyl amino acids, yielding the corresponding amino acids, glucosone, and H(2)O(2). In a previous report, we determined the primary structures of cDNAs coding for FAODs from two fungal strains Aspergillus terreus AP1 and Penicillium janthinellum and we found that both fungal FAODs included the putative peroxisome targeting signal 1 (PTS1) at the carboxyl terminal (Yoshida, N. et al., Eur. J. Biochem., 242, 499-505, 1996). In this study, we determined the intracellular localization of FAODs in these two fungi. Subcellular fractionation experiments and immuno-electronmicroscopic observations, together with the previous findings indicated that the FAODs were localized in peroxisomes of A. terreus AP1 and P. janthinellum. These FAODs were also found to belong to a new member of "peroxisomal sarcosine oxidase family protein" in eucaryotic cells.     

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.     

Spectral restoration and energy resolution improvement of electron energy-loss spectra by Pixon reconstruction: II. Application to practical ELNES analysis of low SNR

We applied Pixon deconvolution as introduced in Part I to several practical, examples of low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), electron energy-loss spectra with a goal toward restoring their fine spectral features and/or improving the energy resolution. We demonstrate that by directly fitting the two-dimensional spectral data recorded on the CCD; the method enables us to reveal fine spectral structures. Consequently, Pixon reconstruction extends the ability to probe electronic states in very spatially localized areas, a capability currently unique to our method.