Seeds of 15 diverse rice accessions, representing aus, indica, temperate japonica and tropical japonica subpopulations, were produced under temperate climate conditions in Korea and used for vitamin E analysis and seed storage experiments at 45°C and 10.9% seed moisture content. High γ-tocotrienol was significantly positively correlated with seed longevity. In addition, a high β-tocopherol proportion relative to δ-tocopherol was significantly negatively correlated with seed longevity. Using high-density single-nucleotide polymorphism marker data, DNA haplotype analysis showed clear allelic variations in the region of two S-adenosylmethionine synthetase genes: LOC_Os04g42095 and LOC_Os11g15410, which regulate the conversion of δ-tocopherol into β-tocopherol. Four indica accessions with rare and subpopulation-specific alleles showed a 2.3-fold lower β-/δ-tocopherol ratio compared with accessions from other subpopulations.

We trace Sn nanoparticles (NPs) produced from SnO2 nanotubes (NTs) during lithiation initialized by high energy e-beam irradiation. The growth dynamics of Sn NPs is visualized in liquid electrolytes by graphene liquid cell transmission electron microscopy. The observation reveals that Sn NPs grow on the surface of SnO2 NTs via coalescence and the final shape of agglomerated NPs is governed by surface energy of the Sn NPs and the interfacial energy between Sn NPs and SnO2 NTs. Our result will likely benefit more rational material design of the ideal interface for facile ion insertion.

Vitamin E (tocols) is a key metabolite for efficient scavenging of lipid peroxy radicals that cause membrane breakdown during seed ageing. However, in rice, this hypothesis has been tested for very few lines only and without considering intraspecific variation in genomic structure. Here, we present a correlation study between tocols and seed longevity using a diverse rice panel. Seeds of 20 rice accessions held in the International Rice Genebank at the International Rice Research Institute, representing Aus, Basmati/Sadri, Indica, temperate Japonica and tropical Japonica variety groups, were used for tocols analysis (quantification of α-, β-, γ- and δ-tocopherol/tocotrienol by ultra-performance liquid chromatography) and storage experiments at 45°C and 10.9% seed moisture content. To examine the effects of DNA-haplotype on the phenotype, the 700 K high-density single-nucleotide polymorphism marker dataset was utilized. Both seed longevity (time for viability to fall to 50%; p 50) and tocols content varied across variety groups related to the heterogeneity in the genetic architecture. Among eight types of tocol homologues, α-tocopherol and γ-tocotrienol were significantly correlated with p 50 (negatively and positively, respectively). While temperate Japonica varieties were most abundant in α-tocopherol, Indica varieties recorded 1.3- to 1.7-fold higher γ-tocotrienol than those of other groups. We conclude that the specific ratio of tocol homologues rather than total tocols content plays an important role in the seed longevity mechanism.

A life-threatening cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR)-related injury can cause recurrent arrest after return of circulation. Such injuries are difficult to identify during resuscitation, and their contribution to failed resuscitation can be missed given the limitations of conventional CPR. Extracorporeal cardiopulmonary resuscitation (ECPR), increasingly being considered for selected patients with potentially reversible etiology of arrest, may identify previously occult CPR-related injuries by restoring arterial pressure and flow. Herein, we describe two cases of severe CPR-related injuries contributing to recurrent arrest. Each case had ECPR implemented within 60 minutes of the start of CPR. After the presumed cardiac etiology had been addressed with percutaneous coronary intervention, life-threatening cardiovascular injuries with recurrent arrest were noted, and resuscitative thoracotomy was performed under ECPR. One patient survived to hospital discharge.

ECPR may provide an opportunity to identify and correct severe resuscitation-related injuries causing recurrent arrest. Chest compression depth >6 cm, especially in older women, may contribute to these injuries.

In this paper, we investigate dynamic walking as a convergence to the system's own limit cycles, not to artificially generated trajectories, which is one of the lessons in the concept of passive dynamic walking. For flexible walking, gait transitions can be performed by moving from one limit cycle to another one, and thus, the flexibility depends on the range in which limit cycles exist. To design a bipedal walker based on this approach, we explore period-1 passive limit cycles formed by natural dynamics and analyze them. We use a biped model with knees and point feet to perform numerical simulations by changing the center of mass locations of the legs. As a result, we obtain mass distributions for the maximum flexibility, which can be attained from very limited location sets. We discuss the effect of parameter variations on passive dynamic walking and how to improve robot design by analyzing walking performance. Finally, we present a practical application to a real bipedal walker, designed to exhibit more flexible walking based on this study.

Semi-insulating undoped GaN films were grown based on controlling the size of the nucleation sites through a special two-step growth method: First, 16 nm LT-GaN was annealed at 950 ° with a ramping time of 4 min, then the GaN was grown at this temperature for 1 min. Second, the growth temperature was increased to 1020° with a ramping time of 2 min and the GaN layer finally grown at 1020 ° for 40 min. The film grown by this sequence exhibited sheet resistance of up to 109 Ω/sq with mirror-like surface morphology. By slow ramping to 950° in the initial phase of growth, smaller grain sizes and higher nuclei densities were formed and the columnar growth mode along the c direction was dominant. The observation of higher resistance in two-step growth is believed due to the increased misorientation of nuclei when the growth proceeds during temperature ramping to 1020°. The fabricated saw filter on semi-insulating GaN exhibited a high velocity of 5342 m/s at center frequencies of 133.57 MHz and an electromechanical coupling coefficient(k2 ) of about 0.763 %, which was enhanced due to the improvement of surface morphology with high sheet resistance by the two- step ramping technique.

Si delta-doping in the GaN layer has been successfully demonstrated by low-pressure metalorganic chemical vapor deposition at a growth temperature of 1040 . Si delta-doping concentration increases and then decreases with an increase in delta-doping time. This indicates that delta-doping concentration is limited by the desorption process owing to much higher thermal decomposition efficiency of silane at high growth temperatures of GaN. In addition, it was observed that the use of a post-purge step in the ammonia ambient reduces Si delta-doping concentration. From capacitance-voltage measurement, a sharp carrier concentration profile with a full-width at half maximum of 4.1 nm has been achieved with a high peak concentration of 9.8 1018 cm−3.

Direct numerical simulations were carried out to investigate the spatial features of large- and very-large-scale motions (LSMs and VLSMs) in a turbulent channel flow ( $\def \xmlpi #1{}\def \mathsfbi #1{\boldsymbol {\mathsf {#1}}}\let \le =\leqslant \let \leq =\leqslant \let \ge =\geqslant \let \geq =\geqslant \def \Pr {\mathit {Pr}}\def \Fr {\mathit {Fr}}\def \Rey {\mathit {Re}}\mathit{Re}_{\tau }=930$ ). A streak detection method based on the streamwise velocity fluctuations was used to individually trace the cores of LSMs and VLSMs. We found that both the LSM and VLSM populations were large. Several of the wall-attached LSMs stretched toward the outer regions of the channel. The VLSMs consisted of inclined outer LSMs and near-wall streaks. The number of outer LSMs increased linearly with the streamwise length of the VLSMs. The temporal features of the low-speed streaks in the outer region revealed that growing and merging events dominated the large-scale (1– $3\delta $ ) structures. The VLSMs $({>}3\delta )$ were primarily created by merging events, and the statistical analysis of these events supported that the merging of large-scale upstream structures contributed to the formation of VLSMs. Because the local convection velocity is proportional to the streamwise velocity fluctuations, the streamwise-aligned structures of the positive- and negative- $u$ patches suggested a primary mechanism underlying the merging events. The alignment of the positive- and negative- $u$ structures may be an essential prerequisite for the formation of VLSMs.

The in vitro corrosion mechanism of the biodegradable cast Mg–10% Ca binary alloy in Hanks' solution was evaluated through transmission electron microscopy observations. The corrosion behavior depends strongly on the microstructural peculiarity of Mg2Ca phase surrounding the island-like primary Mg phase and the fast corrosion induced by the interdiffusion of O and Ca via the Mg2Ca phase of lamellar structure. At the corrosion front, we found that a nanosized crack-like pathway was formed along the interface between the Mg2Ca phase and the primary Mg phase. Through the crack-like pathway, O and Ca are atomically exchanged each other and then the corroded Mg2Ca phase was transformed to Mg oxides. The in vitro corrosion by the exchange of Ca and O at the nanosized pathway led to the rapid bulk corrosion in the Mg–Ca alloys.

Background: Insomnia is a common psychiatric complaint among elderly individuals. This study investigates the prevalence and sociodemographic correlates of insomnia by considering a community sample of elderly individuals in South Korea.

Methods: A face-to-face household survey was conducted in five regions of South Korea from June 2008 to August 2008. Among a total of 3,074 individuals aged 65 years and over, 2,002 participants were interviewed. The presence of insomnia was defined as having at least one of four sleep complaints that included difficulty in initiating sleep (DIS), difficulty in maintaining sleep (DMS), early morning awakening (EMA), and non-restorative sleep (NRS) more than three times per week in the last month. The Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS) Questionnaire, a short form of the Geriatric Depression scale (GDS), and a medical review of systems were implemented.

Results: Insomnia was found in 29.2% of the participants. DIS, DMS, EMA, and NRS accounted for 19.4%, 21.7%, 19.6%, and 8.0% of the participants respectively. Insomnia accompanied by daytime consequences accounted for 17.1% of the participants. The participants who were females, had no education, lived alone, showed symptoms of RLS or depression, and had a lifetime history of physical illness were significantly more likely to report insomnia. The prevalence of DIS, DMS, EMA, or insomnia increased slightly with age, whereas that of NRS decreased slightly. The lifetime history of head trauma, hyperlipidemia, heart disease, anemia, or depression was significantly related to insomnia.

Conclusion: Sleep problems are common among elderly individuals and are closely related to their lifetime history of physical illness.

The liquid phase plasma reduction method has been applied to prepare silver nanoparticles from a solution of silver nitrate (AgNO3) using a bipolar pulsed electrical discharge system. The excited states of atomic silver, hydrogen and oxygen as well as the molecular bands of hydroxyl radicals were detected in the emission spectra. As the discharge duration increased up to 10 min, silver particle peaks produced by surface plasmon absorption were observed around 430 nm. Both the particle size and the particle numbers were observed to increase with the length of the plasma treatment time and with the initial AgNO3 concentration. Spherical nanoparticles of about 5–20 nm in size were obtained with the discharging time of 5 min, whereas aggregates of nanoparticles of about 10–50 nm in size were mainly produced with the discharging time of 20 min. The cationic surfactant of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) added with the CTAB/AgNO3 molar ratio of 30% was shown to inhibit nanoparticle aggregation.

We previously demonstrated that the chronic consumption of a high-fat diet (HFD) promotes lung and liver metastases of 4T1 mammary carcinoma cells in obesity-resistant BALB/c mice. To examine early transcriptional responses to tumour progression in the liver and lungs of HFD-fed mice, 4-week-old female BALB/c mice were divided into four groups: sham-injected, control diet (CD)-fed; sham-injected, HFD-fed (SH); 4T1 cell-injected, CD-fed (TC); 4T1 cell-injected, HFD-fed (TH). Following 16 weeks of either a CD or HFD, 4T1 cells were injected into the mammary fat pads of mice in the TC and TH groups and all mice were continuously fed identical diets. At 14 d post-injection, RNA was isolated from hepatic and pulmonary tissues for microarray analysis of mRNA expression. Functional annotation and core network analyses were conducted for the TH/SH Unique gene set. Inflammation in hepatic tissues and cell mitosis in pulmonary tissues were the most significant biological functions in the TH/SH Unique gene set. The biological core networks of the hepatic TH/SH Unique gene set were characterised as those genes involved in the activation of acute inflammatory responses (Orm1, Lbp, Hp and Cfb), disordered lipid metabolism and deregulated cell cycle progression. Networks of the pulmonary Unique gene set displayed the deregulation of cell cycle progression (Cdc20, Cdk1 and Bub1b). These HFD-influenced alterations may have led to favourable conditions for the formation of both pro-inflammatory and pro-mitotic microenvironments in the target organs that promote immune cell infiltration and differentiation, as well as the infiltration and proliferation of metastatic tumour cells.

The effect of wet chemical treatment on the magnetic tunneling junction (MTJ) was examined. The tunneling magneto-resistance (TMR) increased and the resistance of anti-parallel state and parallel state decreased when a wet cleaning treatment was carried out after a reactive ion etching process. Furthermore, the exfoliation between the capping layer and Inter layer Dielectric (ILD) was prevented. Presumably, these were due to the elimination of the damaged layer and the residues. This investigation showed that the wet treatment after the MTJ patterning using RIE process could improve the MTJ properties without degradation of Hc, such as TMR and R low .