Early caregiving adversity (ECA) is associated with elevated psychological symptomatology. While neurobehavioral ECA research has focused on socioemotional and cognitive development, ECA may also increase risk for “low-level” sensory processing challenges. However, no prior work has compared how diverse ECA exposures differentially relate to sensory processing, or, critically, how this might influence psychological outcomes. We examined sensory processing challenges in 183 8-17-year-old youth with and without histories of institutional (orphanage) or foster caregiving, with a particular focus on sensory over-responsivity (SOR), a pattern of intensified responses to sensory stimuli that may negatively impact mental health. We further tested whether sensory processing challenges are linked to elevated internalizing and externalizing symptoms common in ECA-exposed youth. Relative to nonadopted comparison youth, both groups of ECA-exposed youth had elevated sensory processing challenges, including SOR, and also had heightened internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Additionally, we found significant indirect effects of ECA on internalizing and externalizing symptoms through both general sensory processing challenges and SOR, covarying for age and sex assigned at birth. These findings suggest multiple forms of ECA confer risk for sensory processing challenges that may contribute to mental health outcomes, and motivate continuing examination of these symptoms, with possible long-term implications for screening and treatment following ECA.

Heat shock proteins (HSPs) consist of highly preserved stress proteins that are expressed in response to stress. Two studies were carried out to investigate whether HSP genes in hair follicles from beef calves can be suggested as indicators of heat stress (HS). In study 1, hair follicles were harvested from three male Hanwoo calves (aged 172.2 ± 7.20 days) on six dates over the period of 10 April to 9 August 2017. These days provided varying temperature–humidity indices (THIs). In study 2, 16 Hanwoo male calves (aged 169.6 ± 4.60 days, with a BW of 136.9 ± 6.23 kg) were maintained (4 calves per experiment) in environmentally controlled chambers. A completely randomized design with a 2 × 4 factorial arrangement involving two periods (thermoneutral: TN; HS) and four THI treatment groups (threshold: THI = 68 to 70; mild: THI = 74 to 76; moderate THI = 81 to 83; severe: THI = 88 to 90). The calves in the different group were subjected to ambient temperature (22°C) for 7 days (TN) and subsequently to the temperature and humidity corresponding to the target THI level for 21 days (HS). Every three days (at 1400 h) during both the TN and HS periods, the heart rate (HR) and rectal temperature (RT) of each individual were measured, and hair follicles were subsequently collected from the tails of each individual. In study 1, the high variation (P < 0.0001) in THI indicated that the external environment influenced the HS to different extents. The expression levels of the HSP70 and HSP90 genes at the high-THI level were higher (P = 0.0120, P = 0.0002) than those at the low-THI level. In study 2, no differences in the THI (P = 0.2638), HR (P = 0.2181) or RT (P = 0.3846) were found among the groups during the TN period, whereas differences in these indices (P < 0.0001, P < 0.0001 and P < 0.0001, respectively) were observed during the HS period. The expression levels of the HSP70 (P = 0.0010, moderate; P = 0.0065, severe) and HSP90 (P = 0.0040, severe) genes were increased after rapid exposure to heat-stress conditions (moderate and severe levels). We conclude that HSP gene expression in hair follicles provides precise and accurate data for evaluating HS and can be considered a novel indicator of HS in Hanwoo calves maintained in both external and climatic chambers.

Biomarkers can be powerful tools to guide diagnosis, treatment, and research. However, prudent use of biomarkers requires formal validation efforts. Although the data needed for biomarker validation has traditionally been hard to access, new research initiatives can ease this process.

The FDA's new table of surrogate endpoints used for drug approvals is an important step forward for overseeing the use of biomarkers in clinical trials. Nevertheless, we present several ways in which the table can be improved.

Introduction: Foreign patients often do not receive appropriate treatment in the emergency room as compared to locals. This is due to various causes such as language, insurance, and cultural differences. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether there is a wide range of health inequalities among foreigners who visited the emergency room with injury and to find out what causes it. Methods: We analyzed clinical data from the National Emergency Department Information System(NEDIS) database, which visited the emergency room from January 1, 2013 to December 31, 2015, in all age groups. Foreigners are classified based on the personal information described in the NEDIS. We analyzed the number of injuries, serious cases(death, operation, ICU admission), length of stay in ER, and transfer ratio. Results: A total of 4,464,603 cases of injured patients were included, of whom 67,683 were foreign patients. The incidence rate per 100,000 people per year was 2960.5 from locals and 1659.8 from foreigners. Serious outcomes were higher for foreigners than for locals(31.0% versus 23.2%, p<0.001). There was a further difference in the rural region. Length of stay was longer for foreigners(72 versus 69 minutes, median, p<0.001). The transfer rate was also higher for foreigners(1.9% versus 1.6%, p<0.001). Daegu had the highest ratio of foreigners’ injury compared to locals(ratio=0.998). Jeonnam(0.073) was the highest serious outcome rate in Korea, and Jeonbuk(0.070) was the second. The area with the longest length of stay in the Emergency department was the median 139 minutes for locals and 153 minutes for foreigners in Daegu. The more patients per day, the shorter the time spent in the emergency rooms(Spearman correlation coefficient=-0.388). This phenomenon was more prominent in locals(-0.624 versus -0.175). Multivariable logistic regression was used as a dependent variable for the serious outcomes of foreign patients. The foreign patients(OR=1.413, p<0.001), intention, no insurance, age, sex, urban area, low blood pressure, decreased consciousness, transfer, acuity, and length of stay were statistically significant. Conclusion: This study showed that there is a health inequality for foreigners who came to the emergency room due to injury in Korea. Also, serious outcomes from injury in foreigners have been shown to be related to various causes including factors of the foreigner.

We present recent observation results of Sgr A* at millimeter obtained with VLBI arrays in Korea and Japan.

7 mm monitoring of Sgr A* is part of our AGN large project. The results at 7 epochs during 2013-2014, including high resolution maps, flux density and two-dimensional size measurements are presented. The source shows no significant variation in flux and structure related to the G2 encounter in 2014. According to recent MHD simulations by kawashima et al., flux and magnetic field energy can be expected to increase several years after the encounter; We will keep our monitoring in order to test this prediction.

Astrometric observations of Sgr A* were performed in 2015 at 7 and 3.5 millimeter simultaneously. Source-frequency phase referencing was applied and a combined ”core-shift” of Sgr A* and a nearby calibrator was measured. Future observations and analysis are necessary to determine the core-shift in each source.

Experimental data are presented showing maximum carbon C6+ ion energies obtained from nm-scaled targets in the relativistic transparent regime for laser intensities between 9 × 1019 and 2 × 1021 W/cm2. When combined with two-dimensional particle-in-cell simulations, these results show a steep linear scaling for carbon ions with the normalized laser amplitude a0 ($a_0 \propto \sqrt ( I)$). The results are in good agreement with a semi-analytic model that allows one to calculate the optimum thickness and the maximum ion energies as functions of a0 and the laser pulse duration τλ for ion acceleration in the relativistic-induced transparency regime. Following our results, ion energies exceeding 100 MeV/amu may be accessible with currently available laser systems.

A trend toward greater body size in dizygotic (DZ) than in monozygotic (MZ) twins has been suggested by some but not all studies, and this difference may also vary by age. We analyzed zygosity differences in mean values and variances of height and body mass index (BMI) among male and female twins from infancy to old age. Data were derived from an international database of 54 twin cohorts participating in the COllaborative project of Development of Anthropometrical measures in Twins (CODATwins), and included 842,951 height and BMI measurements from twins aged 1 to 102 years. The results showed that DZ twins were consistently taller than MZ twins, with differences of up to 2.0 cm in childhood and adolescence and up to 0.9 cm in adulthood. Similarly, a greater mean BMI of up to 0.3 kg/m2 in childhood and adolescence and up to 0.2 kg/m2 in adulthood was observed in DZ twins, although the pattern was less consistent. DZ twins presented up to 1.7% greater height and 1.9% greater BMI than MZ twins; these percentage differences were largest in middle and late childhood and decreased with age in both sexes. The variance of height was similar in MZ and DZ twins at most ages. In contrast, the variance of BMI was significantly higher in DZ than in MZ twins, particularly in childhood. In conclusion, DZ twins were generally taller and had greater BMI than MZ twins, but the differences decreased with age in both sexes.

For the success of PAL-XFEL, two critical systems, namely a low emittance injector and a variable gap out-vacuum undulator, are under development. In order to realize the target emittance of the PAL-XFEL injector we carried out an optimization study of various parameters, such as the laser beam transverse profile, the laser pulse length, the laser phase, and the gun energy. The transverse emittance measured at the Injector Test Facility (ITF) is ${\it\varepsilon}_{x}=0.48\pm 0.01~\text{mm}~\text{mrad}$. An undulator prototype based on the EU-XFEL design and modified for PAL-XFEL was built and tested. A local-$K$ pole tuning procedure was developed and tested. A significant reduction (90%) of the local-$K$ fluctuation was observed. The requirement of undulator field reproducibility better than $2\times 10^{-4}$ and the undulator gap setting accuracy below $1~{\rm\mu}\text{m}$ were achieved for the prototype. The optical phase jitter after the pole height tuning at the tuning gap was calculated to be $2.6^{\circ }$ rms, which satisfies the requirement of $5.0^{\circ }$.

Recently, small-sized compact electric vehicles have been in demand for short-distance travel in urban areas, although battery charging in electric vehicles present in the market is still problematic. Borrowing from the concept of a mobile inverted pendulum system, in this paper, a two-wheel robotic vehicle system is implemented and controlled as the future personal transportation device called the TransBOT. The TransBOT has two driving modes: a regular vehicle mode, where stable contact on the ground is maintained by two wheels and two casters, and the balancing mode, which maintains the stable posture with two wheels on the ground. The two-wheel balancing mechanism can be used as a transportation vehicle in narrow and busy urban areas. Gain scheduling control methods based on linear controllers are used for different drivers. In addition, desired balancing angles are specified for the different sizes of drivers in order to have a stable balancing control performance. These desired balancing angle values have been found by empirical studies. Experimental studies with drivers of different weights, as well as indoor and outdoor driving tasks, were conducted to ensure the feasibility of TransBOT.

This study compared the molecular characteristics of vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium (VREF) isolates recovered from 20 non-tertiary-care hospitals (36 isolates) and three tertiary-care hospitals (26 isolates) in diverse geographical areas of Korea from October 2010 to April 2011. All isolates carried the vanA gene only, but 42% and 73% of non-tertiary and tertiary-care isolates expressed the VanB phenotype (teicoplanin minimum inhibitory concentration ⩽16 μg/ml). All isolates harboured insertion sequences, IS1542 and IS1216V, within Tn1546. The isolates from tertiary-care hospitals tended to have reduced Tn1546 lengths by deletion of sequences adjacent to IS elements. Multilocus sequence typing revealed eight sequence types within clonal complex 17 (CC17), but DNA fingerprinting by rep-PCR did not show clonal relatedness between the intra- and inter-hospital isolates. These results suggest that vanA, which has prevailed in tertiary-care hospitals of Korea since the 1990s, had been transferred horizontally to non-tertiary-care hospitals while the genetic rearrangement driven by evolutionary adaptation to adverse environments may have occurred in tertiary-care hospitals.