Formation of kink bands by compression of the extrudate of solid linear polyethylene

Extrudates of solid linear polyethylene prepared under proper pressure and temperature conditions have a high c axis orientation along the extrusion direction, with lamellar crystals and amorphous layers stacked alternately along the extrusion direction. Kink bands were formed by compressing the oriented extrudate at room temperature along the extrusion direction. Inspection of the kink bands by wide-angle and small-angle x-ray diffraction and electron microscopy revealed that the fiber axis was rotated from the original axis direction by 70–75° and that the lamellar crystals were inclined to the fiber axis in the kink band by 55–60° and stacked nearly parallel to the kink boundary. The superstructural change during the formation of the kink band could not be interpreted in terms of uniform c axis shear alone. In addition to such a mechanism, it was necessary to take into account intermicrofibril and/or intercrystallite slip.     

127I NQR and 1H NMR studies of 4-aminopyridinium tetraiodoantimonate(III); molecular motion and phase transition

The crystals of 4-NH₂PyHSbI₄ (Py = C₅H₄N) have been investigated by means of ¹²⁷I NQR, ¹H NMR T ₁ and DTA. The crystals can exist in two modifications of β and α(I) at room temperatures. The α(I)-phase is a metastable state which is obtained when the stable β form is heated. The α(I)-phase undergoes a first-order type phase transition of α(I) $\leftrightarrow \alpha $ (II) at 272 K (on heating), while the β-phase is stable down to 77 K. Four and two ¹²⁷I (m = ±1/2 $\leftrightarrow \pm $ 3/2) NQR lines have been found for the β- and α(II)-phases, respectively. One half of them is assignable to the terminal I atom(s) and the other to the bridging I atom(s) in each phase. All the resonance lines of the α(II)-phase underwent a disappearance above ca. 240 K and no resonance line was observed in the α(I)-phase. The second moment M ₂ value of ¹H NMR spectra with 8 G² at 290 K shows that the 4-NH₂PyH^?+? cations reside in the rigid lattice in the β-phase. In contrast, in the α(I)-phase the cation rotates about an axis more symmetric than pseudo threefold axis. The activation energy of 21 kJ mol^???1 was estimated for the reorientational motion in the α(I)-phase from the ¹H NMR T ₁ measurements. The nature of phase transitions in the 4-NH₂PyHSbI₄ is discussed in comparison with that in 4-NH₂PyHSbBr₄.     

Japanese version of voice handicap index for subjective evaluation of voice disorder

Recently, the Voice Handicap Index (VHI), developed in the United States, has been highlighted as a means to assess a patient's perceptions of the severity of his or her voice disorder. The VHI is based on a self-administered questionnaire that quantifies the degree of a patient's disability related to his/her voice disorder. The questionnaire was translated into Japanese and applied to Japanese patients with various kinds of disordered voice or dysphonia. The results were analyzed and the usefulness discussed. In this study, 546 patients (281 males and 265 females) were included. Mean VHI scores were 36.2/120 in males and 44.1/120 in females. In the male patients, VHI scores were the highest among teens. However, VHI scores did not vary with age in the female patients. Patients with vocal fold paralysis, functional dysphonia, psychological dysphonia, and spasmodic dysphonia showed relatively high VHI scores, whereas those with laryngeal granuloma and laryngopharyngeal reflux disease showed low scores. In most diseases, functional and physiological scores were higher than emotional scores. In any treated patients, those with vocal nodule, vocal polyp, polypoid vocal fold, and recurrent laryngeal nerve paralysis, VHI scores decreased after therapeutic intervention. These findings suggest that the Japanese VHI is a useful tool for monitoring a patient's psychological status, choosing appropriate treatment, and assessing the therapeutic outcome.     

Frequent word section extraction in a presentation speech by an effective dynamic programming algorithm

Word frequency in a document has often been utilized in text searching and summarization. Similarly, identifying frequent words or phrases in a speech data set for searching and summarization would also be meaningful. However, obtaining word frequency in a speech data set is difficult, because frequent words are often special terms in the speech and cannot be recognized by a general speech recognizer. This paper proposes another approach that is effective for automatic extraction of such frequent word sections in a speech data set. The proposed method is applicable to any domain of monologue speech, because no language models or specific terms are required in advance. The extracted sections can be regarded as speech labels of some kind or a digest of the speech presentation. The frequent word sections are determined by detecting similar sections, which are sections of audio data that represent the same word or phrase. The similar sections are detected by an efficient algorithm, called Shift Continuous Dynamic Programming (Shift CDP), which realizes fast matching between arbitrary sections in the reference speech pattern and those in the input speech, and enables frame-synchronous extraction of similar sections. In experiments, the algorithm is applied to extract the repeated sections in oral presentation speeches recorded in academic conferences in Japan. The results show that Shift CDP successfully detects similar sections and identifies the frequent word sections in individual presentation speeches, without prior domain knowledge, such as language models and terms.     

Development of an osteoblast-based 3D continuous-perfusion microfluidic system for drug screening

In this work, we demonstrated that biological cells could be cultured in a continuous-perfusion glass microchip system for drug screening. We used mouse Col1a1GFP MC-3T3 E1 osteoblastic cells, which have a marker gene system expressing green fluorescent protein (GFP) under the control of osteoblast-specific promoters. With our microchip-based cell culture system, we realized automated long-term monitoring of cells and sampling of the culture supernatant system for osteoblast differentiation assay using a small number of cells. The system successfully monitored cells for 10 days. Under the 3D microchannel condition, shear stress (0.07 dyne/cm² at a flow rate of 0.2 μL/min) was applied to the cells and it enhanced the GFP expression and differentiation of the osteoblasts. Analysis of alkaline phosphatase (ALP), which is an enzyme marker of osteoblasts, supported the results of GFP expression. In the case of differentiation medium containing bone morphogenetic protein 2, we found that ALP activity in the culture supernatant was enhanced 10 times in the microchannel compared with the static condition in 48-well dishes. A combined system of a microchip and a cell-based sensor might allow us to monitor osteogenic differentiation easily, precisely, and noninvasively. Our system can be applied in high-throughput drug screening assay for discovering osteogenic compounds.     

Three new sulfur-containing alkaloids, polycarpaurines A, B, and C, from an Indonesian ascidian Polycarpa aurata

Three new sulfur-containing alkaloids, polycarpaurines A (1), B (2), and C (3) were isolated from the tropical ascidian Polycarpa aurata collected in Indonesia, together with six known compounds (4-9). The structures of new compounds were assigned on the basis of their spectral data. Compounds 1, 3, 4, and 8 inhibited colony formation of Chinese hamster V79 cells with EC₅₀ values of 6.8, 8.6, 3.8, and 10 μM, respectively. Compounds 2 and 7 showed modest activity against V79 cells (EC₅₀>10 μM).     

Omaezallene from Red Alga Laurencia sp.: Structure Elucidation,Total Synthesis,and Antifouling Activity

Natural antifouling products have been the subject of considerable attention. We screened marine algae for antifouling activity and discovered omaezallenes, the new bromoallene‐containing natural products isolated from the red alga Laurencia sp. Described is the isolation, structure elucidation, and total syntheses of omaezallenes. The relative and absolute configurations of natural omaezallenes were unambiguously established through total synthesis. The antifouling activities and ecotoxicity of omaezallenes were also evaluated.     

Preparation of oriented β‐form poly(L‐lactic acid) by solid‐state extrusion

Melt‐crystallized, low molecular weight poly(L ‐lactic acid) (PLLA) consisting of α crystals was uniaxially drawn by solid‐state extrusion at an extrusion temperature (T_ext) of 130–170 °C. A series of extrusion‐drawn samples were prepared at an optimum T_ext value of 170 °C, slightly below the melting temperature (T_m) of α crystals (～180 °C). The drawn products were characterized by deformation flow profiles, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) melting thermograms, wide‐angle X‐ray scattering (WAXD), and small‐angle X‐ray scattering as a function of the extrusion draw ratio (EDR). The deformation mode in the solid‐state extrusion of semicrystalline PLLA was more variable and complex than that in the extensional deformation expected in tensile drawing, which generally gave a mixture of α and β crystals. The deformation profile was extensional at a low EDR and transformed to a parabolic shear pattern at a higher EDR. At a given EDR, the central portion of an extrudate showed extensional deformation and the shear component became progressively more significant, moving from the center to the surface region. The WAXD intensities of the (0010)_α and (003)_β reflections on the meridian as well as the DSC melting thermograms showed that the crystal transformation from the initial α form to the oriented β form proceeded rapidly with increasing EDR at an EDR greater than 4. Furthermore, WAXD showed that the crystal transformation proceeded slightly more rapidly at the sheath region than at the core region. This fact, combined with the deformation profiles (shear at the sheath and extensional at the core), indicated that the crystal transformation was promoted by shear deformation under a high pressure rather than by extensional deformation. Thus, a highly oriented rod consisting of only β crystals was obtained by solid‐state extrusion of melt‐crystallized, low molecular weight PLLA slightly below T_m. The structure and properties of the α‐ and β‐form crystals were also studied. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 40: 95–104, 2002