Applications of Thermoelectric Power Measurement to Deterioration Diagnosis of Nuclear Material and Its Principle

In order to non-destructively evaluate changes in toughness of cast duplex stainless steel, which is frequently used in main coolant pipes of PWR type nuclear power plants, due to thermal aging, we tried to apply thermoelectric power (TEP) measurement. because TEP is sensitive to microstructural material changes, and to clarify the mechanism behind TEP changes due to thermal aging. As a result, TEP of cast duplex stainless steel increased with aging time, and good correlations were found between TEP and toughness. Concerning the mechanism, TEP of high and low Cr content alloys was higher than that of intermediate Cr content alloys. Because high and low Cr areas are created in the ferrite phase due to thermal aging. TEP of the entire material increased. Furthermore, when each Cr fluctuating area acted in parallel, the increase in TEP became larger. According to the Mott-Jones theory, TEP is largely related to the electron density of states at the Fermi level. The electron density of states of Fe–Cr–Ni alloys in the valence band was measured with X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). As a result, there was a high correlation between the TEP calculated from the XPS spectrum and the measured TEP. Therefore, we showed experimentally that the electron density of states changed due to variations in Cr concentration, which also affect TEP.     

High‐luminance 1‐m‐long plasma tubes for wall displays

Abstract— The plasma‐tube array is expected to realize a wall‐sized display. This method will realize an emissive‐type display with a flexible screen shape and an expandable screen size. The shape of the plasma tube was investigated to realize high luminance, high luminance efficacy, and high flexural strength. As the result, a cylindroid tube is proposed to satisfy these demands. An experimental display of 1 m × 128 mm has been developed with these cylindroid tubes and it demonstrated a high luminous efficacy of 3.1 lm/W.     

Multi-objective genetic algorithm for solving N-version program design problem

N-version programming (NVP) is a programming approach for constructing fault tolerant software systems. Generally, an optimization model utilized in NVP selects the optimal set of versions for each module to maximize the system reliability and to constrain the total cost to remain within a given budget. In such a model, while the number of versions included in the obtained solution is generally reduced, the budget restriction may be so rigid that it may fail to find the optimal solution. In order to ameliorate this problem, this paper proposes a novel bi-objective optimization model that maximizes the system reliability and minimizes the system total cost for designing N-version software systems. When solving multi-objective optimization problem, it is crucial to find Pareto solutions. It is, however, not easy to obtain them. In this paper, we propose a novel bi-objective optimization model that obtains many Pareto solutions efficiently.We formulate the optimal design problem of NVP as a bi-objective 0–1 nonlinear integer programming problem. In order to overcome this problem, we propose a Multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA), which is a powerful, though time-consuming, method to solve multi-objective optimization problems. When implementing genetic algorithm (GA), the use of an appropriate genetic representation scheme is one of the most important issues to obtain good performance. We employ random-key representation in our MOGA to find many Pareto solutions spaced as evenly as possible along the Pareto frontier. To pursue improve further performance, we introduce elitism, the Pareto-insertion and the Pareto-deletion operations based on distance between Pareto solutions in the selection process.The proposed MOGA obtains many Pareto solutions along the Pareto frontier evenly. The user of the MOGA can select the best compromise solution among the candidates by controlling the balance between the system reliability and the total cost.     

Sharpness and noise characteristics of a half‐mirror stereoscopic display

Stereoscopic displays are becoming popular in entertainment and industrial applications. We characterize the spatial resolution and noise properties of a stereoscopic display with a half‐mirror and passive polarizing glasses. The upper display images reflected off the mirror have slightly degraded sharpness and reduced high spatial‐frequency noise resulting in modulation transfer functions (MTFs) of 0.59 and 0.50 at the Nyquist frequency with corresponding noise power spectra (NPS) values of 4.79 × 10^?6 and 5.17 × 10^?6 mm² at 10 mm^?1 in the horizontal and vertical directions. These results are compared to the characteristics of the individual displays with MTF values of 0.64 and 0.53 and NPS values of 6.24 × 10^?6 and 5.87 × 10^?6 mm². The polarizing glasses cause minimal reduction in sharpness and high‐frequency noise. The MTFs in the upper images observed with glasses are decreased to 0.54 and 0.47, while the NPS are decreased to 2.86 × 10^?6 and 2.01 × 10^?6 mm². When both displays are turned on and using the mirror and glasses, the observed luminance for each eye is increased from the luminance of the individual displays owing to crosstalk. We find that sharpness and noise are not affected by the interaction between the displays at the particular geometry tested in this study.     

Back‐channel‐etched thin‐film transistor using c‐axis‐aligned crystal In–Ga–Zn oxide

Our crystalline In–Ga–Zn oxide (IGZO) thin film has a c‐axis‐aligned crystal (CAAC) structure and maintains crystallinity even on an amorphous base layer. Although the crystal has c‐axis alignment, its a‐axis and b‐axis have random arrangement; moreover, a clear grain boundary is not observed. We fabricated a back‐channel‐etched thin‐film transistor (TFT) using the CAAC‐IGZO film. Using the CAAC‐IGZO film, more stable TFT characteristics, even with a short channel length, can be obtained, and the instability of the back channel, which is one of the biggest problems of IGZO TFTs, is solved. As a result, we improved the process of manufacturing back‐channel‐etched TFTs.     

Psychological Stress Exacerbates Inflammation of the Ileum via the Corticotropin-Releasing Hormone-Mast Cell Axis in a Mouse Model of Eosinophilic Enteritis

The effects of psychological stress on eosinophilic gastrointestinal disorders have not been elucidated. This study investigated the effects of psychological stress in a mouse model of eosinophilic enteritis (EoN). BALB/c mice were treated with ovalbumin (OVA) to create an EoN model and subjected to either water avoidance stress (WAS) or sham stress (SS). Microscopic inflammation, eosinophil and mast cell counts, mRNA expression, and protein levels of type 2 helper T cell (Th2) cytokines in the ileum were compared between groups. We evaluated ex vivo intestinal permeability using an Ussing chamber. A corticotropin-releasing hormone type 1 receptor (CRH-R1) antagonist was administered before WAS, and its effects were analyzed. WAS significantly increased diarrhea occurrence and, eosinophil and mast cell counts, and decreased the villus/crypt ratio compared to those in the SS group. The mRNA expression of CRH, interleukin IL-4, IL-5, IL-13, eotaxin-1, and mast cell tryptase β2 significantly increased, and the protein levels of IL-5, IL-13, and OVA-specific immunoglobulin E (IgE) also significantly increased in the WAS group. Moreover, WAS significantly increased the intestinal permeability. The CRH-R1 antagonist significantly inhibited all changes induced by WAS. Psychological stress exacerbated ileal inflammation via the CRH-mast cell axis in an EoN mouse model.     

栏栅式山溪取水工程取水特性的试验研究

通过水工模型试验,对栏栅式山溪取水工程的取水特性进行了研究,探讨了在有足够大的集水廊道的前提下,该取水工程的潜在取水能力。结果表明,在影响栏栅取水量的诸因素中,栅条长度、栅隙和栏栅的设置角度对取水量的影响程度不同;其取水量主要由栏栅的设置角度决定,而栅条长度和栅隙对取水量的影响程度较小;栏栅的设置角度小于50°时,栏栅有较大的引水比,栏栅的设置角度大于50°后,栏栅的引水比大幅度下降。     

Uterine Deletion of Bmal1 Impairs Placental Vascularization and Induces Intrauterine Fetal Death in Mice

Recently, it was demonstrated that the expression of BMAL1 was decreased in the endometrium of women suffering from recurrent spontaneous abortion. To investigate the pathological roles of uterine clock genes during pregnancy, we produced conditional deletion of uterine Bmal1 (cKO) mice and found that cKO mice could receive embryo implantation but not sustain pregnancy. Gene ontology analysis of microarray suggested that uterine NK (uNK) cell function was suppressed in cKO mice. Histological examination revealed the poor formation of maternal vascular spaces in the placenta. In contrast to WT mice, uNK cells in the spongiotrophoblast layer, where maternal uNK cells are directly in contact with fetal trophoblast, hardly expressed an immunosuppressive NK marker, CD161, in cKO mice. By progesterone supplementation, pregnancy could be sustained until the end of pregnancy in some cKO mice. Although this treatment did not improve the structural abnormalities of the placenta, it recruited CD161-positive NK cells into the spongiotrophoblast layer in cKO mice. These findings indicate that the uterine clock system may be critical for pregnancy maintenance after embryo implantation.     

A Low-Loss Built-In Current Sensor

This paper presents a novel built-in current sensor that uses two additional power supply voltages besides the system power supply voltage, and that is constructed by using a current mirror circuit to pick up an abnormal IDDQ. It is activated only by an abnormal quiescent power supply current and minimizes the voltage drop at the terminal of the circuit under test. Simulation results showed that it could detect 16-A IDDQ against 0.03-V voltage drop at 3.3-V VDD and that it reduced performance degradation in the circuit under test. It is therefore suitable for testing low-voltage integrated circuits. Moreover, we verified the behavior of the sensor circuit implemented on the board by using discrete devices. Experimental results showed that the real circuit of the sensor functioned properly.     

Determination of γ-glutamyl-valyl-glycine in raw scallop and processed scallop products using high pressure liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry

The determination of the kokumi peptide, γ-glutamyl-valyl-glycine (γ-Glu-Val-Gly) in raw scallop and processed scallop products was carried out using high pressure liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry (LC/MS/MS). The detection of γ-Glu-Val-Gly was achieved using a multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) method. The optimised condition enabled the precise determination of γ-Glu-Val-Gly. Raw scallop contained 0.08 μg/g γ-Glu-Val-Gly, and the γ-Glu-Val-Gly levels in processed scallop products, such as dried-scallop and scallop extract, were measured to be 0.64 and 0.77 μg/g, respectively. This is the first report to confirm the existence of γ-Glu-Val-Gly in foodstuff.