Coupons of stainless steel, Inconel, beryllium, copper and aluminium bronze were exposed to tritium in hydrogen gas mixtures over a wide range of parameters: temperature up to 770
K, pressure from 1
...×
10
−4
MPa to 0.05
MPa, tritium concentration from 1
at.% to 98
at.%. The tritium concentration on the surface and distribution through the metals were measured using radiography, radioluminography, β-ray induced X-ray spectroscopy and acid etching methods. The effect of metal processing, such as forging, polishing and heat treatment on the tritium distribution was studied along with parameters relating to the exposure of the metal to tritium.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
Tritium amount retained in surface layers and release behavior from surface layers were examined using SS316L samples exposed to plasmas in the Large Helical Device and a commercial Cu–Be alloy ...plate. BIXS analyses and observation by SEM indicate that carbon and titanium deposited on the plasma-facing surface of the SS316L samples. Larger amount of tritium was trapped in the plasma-facing surface in comparison with the polished surface. Higher enrichment of tritium in surface layers was similarly found in the polished surface of both samples. The amount of surface tritium in both samples was almost same, while the bulk concentration of tritium in Cu–Be was much lower than that in SS316L. Tritium release from the SS316L and Cu–Be samples into water was examined by immersion experiments. Tritium elution was observed for both samples, but changes in the residual tritium amount in surface layers were different from each other.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
North Pacific minke whale (
Balaenoptera acutorostrata
) boing calls are commonly detected in Hawaiian waters. When producing boing vocalizations, minke whales seem to be in one of two calling ...behavioral states. Most often minke whales produce boings with inter-call intervals of several minutes, but sometimes minke whales call rapidly with inter-call intervals of less than a minute. Since minke whales are difficult to detect visually, cue-rate-based density estimation using passive acoustic monitoring has been proposed. However, the variables that influence cue rate or calling rate are poorly understood in most whales, including minke whales. We collected passive acoustic recordings from 47 bottom-mounted hydrophones at the Pacific Missile Range Facility’s instrumented range off the coast of Kauaʻi, Hawaiʻi to test the hypothesis that minke whales call more rapidly when closer in proximity to other calling conspecifics. A total of 599 days of data were recorded between August 2012 and July 2017 and were automatically post-processed to detect, classify, and localize calls. Localized calls were grouped into tracks and manually validated, resulting in 509 individual tracks composed of 36,033 calls within a 16 x 39 km focal study area. Tracked minke whales exhibited a strong bimodal call rate with means of one call every 6.85 min (
σ
= 2.54 min) and 0.63 min (
σ
= 0.36 min). We ran hidden Markov models to quantify the relationship between call rate and the distance to the nearest calling conspecific. Overall, the probability of the higher call rate occurring increased as the distance to the nearest conspecific decreased, and the probability of the lower call rate occurring increased as the distance to the nearest conspecific increased. We also examined individual track data and found that minke whales may also exhibit other responses (i.e. increased speed, changes in heading, and cessation of calling) when calling conspecifics are nearby. These findings provide new information about minke whale calling behavior in what is likely a breeding area.
Abstract Background Mizoribine (MZR) has been developed as an immunosuppressive agent in Japan, but it shows less potent immunosuppressive effects at doses up to 3 mg/kg/d. In this study, we ...investigated whether high-dose MZR (6 mg/kg/d) was effective for ABO-incompatible (ABO-i) living donor kidney transplantation (LKT) using treatment with anti-CD25 and anti-CD20 monoclonal antibodies without splenectomy. Methods Since 2007, we encountered 24 cases of ABO-i LKT using anti-CD20 and anti-CD25 monoclonal antibody without splenectomy. The pretransplant immunosuppressive regimen consisted of two doses of anti-CD20 antibody, mycophenolate mofetil (MMF), prednisolone, a calcineurin inhibitor (cyclosporine 7 mg/kg or tacrolimus 0.2 mg/kg and two doses of anti-CD25 antibody. Antibody removal by plasmapheresis was performed before LKT up to several times according to the antibody titer. The posttransplant regimen consisted of high-dose mizoribine (6 mg/kg/d) instead of MMF (MZR group, n = 12). Results The 1-year graft survival rates for the MZR and MMF groups were both 100%. The rejection rate in the MZR group (eight %) was not significantly higher than that in the MMF group (seventeen %) Serum creatinine level was not significantly different between the two groups. In the MZR group 6 (50%) patients developed CMV antigenemia-positivity versus 11 (92%) in the MMF group ( P < .05). The number of patients who developed CMV disease was 0 in the MZR group and 1 (8%) in the MMF group. The number of patients treated with ganciclovir was 0% and 8%, respectively (not significant). Conclusions We obtain good clinical results with high-dose MZR in ABO-i LKT using anti-CD20 and anti-CD25 antibody treatment without splenectomy.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
Minke whales (Balaenoptera acutorostrata) were acoustically detected and localized via their boing calls using 766 h of recorded data from 24 hydrophones at the U.S. Navy's Pacific Missile Range ...Facility located off Kauai, Hawaii. Data were collected before, during, and after naval undersea warfare training events, which occurred in February over three consecutive years (2011-2013). Data collection in the during periods were further categorized as phase A and phase B with the latter being the only period with naval surface ship activities (e.g., frigate and destroyer maneuvers including the use of mid-frequency active sonar). Minimum minke whale densities were estimated for all data periods based upon the numbers of whales acoustically localized within the 3780 km(2) study area. The 2011 minimum densities in the study area were: 3.64 whales confidence interval (CI) 3.31-4.01 before the training activity, 2.81 whales (CI 2.31-3.42) for phase A, 0.69 whales (CI 0.27-1.8) for phase B and 4.44 whales (CI 4.04-4.88) after. The minimum densities for the phase B periods were highly statistically significantly lower (p < 0.001) from all other periods within each year, suggesting a clear response to the phase B training. The phase A period results were mixed when compared to other non-training periods.
Peroxisome proliferator activator-receptor (PPAR)-gamma is a ligand-activated transcriptional factor belonging to a steroid receptor superfamily. PPAR-gamma plays a role in both adipocyte ...differentiation and carcinogenesis. Up-date, PPAR-gamma is expressed in various cancer tissues, and PPAR-gamma ligand induces growth arrest of these cancer cells. In this study, we examined the expression of PPAR-gamma in human urological cancer (including renal cell carcinoma, bladder tumor, prostate cancer and testicular cancer) by RT-PCR and immunohistochemistry, and we also examined the effect of PPAR-gamma ligand in these cells by MTT assay, flow cytometry and hoechest staining. PPAR-gamma expression was significantly more extensive and intense in malignant tissues than in normal tissues. PPAR-gamma ligand induced the reduction of malignant cell viability through early apoptosis. These results demonstrated that generated PPAR-gamma in urological cancer cells may play an important role in carcinogensis and become a new target therapy in the treatment of urological cancer.
Several type 316L stainless steel specimens of 6mm thickness were charged with tritium at 473K at Joint European Torus (JET) using five sets of conditions. Isothermal tritium release rates were ...investigated at Hydrogen Isotope Research Centre (HRC) over extended periods of time at 473, 573, or 673K constant temperature. The HTO/HT ratio of the liberated tritium was generally high, but decreased with decreasing release temperature. Nearly complete release of tritium required additional prolonged heating at 1073K. Chemical etching and beta-ray-induced X-ray spectrometry measurements carried out at HRC provided complementary information on the tritium distribution in surface and bulk of thermally treated specimens. Whereas the thickness of the material and initial distribution of tritium in its bulk were found to play an important role for expedient thermal decontamination, the influence of the type of purge gas was only minor. Experimental evidence for tritium grain boundary diffusion is provided. Implications of the results for waste conditioning are discussed.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
Absorption and desorption isotherms of protium and deuterium were measured for Pd-based alloys as Pd
(1−
x)
AE
x
, where AE
=
Co, Ni, Cu, Rh, Ag, Pt and Au. It was observed that the heat of hydride ...formation decreased with increasing AE content for Co, Ni, Cu, Rh, Pt and Au, although the extent of the increase differed from each other. According to Lässer, on the other hand, alloying of Ag caused to increase the heat of hydride formation. These features were analyzed from electronic structures of the alloys inspected by use of DV-Xα package, where the inspections were carried out for small clusters as Pd
(14−
y)
AE
y
. The DV-Xα calculations showed that the energy of the highest occupied molecular orbital of the clusters change almost linearly with their composition, suggesting that the Fermi energy of respective alloys changes in the similar manner. By assuming the Fermi energy of Pd
(1−
x)
AE
x
to be arithmetic means of the Fermi energies of pure Pd and AE, a linear relation was found between the observed enthalpy change of hydride formation and the assumed Fermi energy.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK
Stainless steel exposed to gaseous tritium characteristically shows a firmly trapped fraction of tritium in the surface layer, which is not fully removable by water at ambient temperature. Prolonged ...thermal treatment of tritium-loaded specimens at <443 K causes substantial depletion of the bulk but almost no depletion of the surface layer. For complete removal of hydrogen isotopes from the bulk and the surface, temperatures exceeding 573 K are necessary. Upon chemical etching virtually all tritium trapped in the surface layer appears in the etching solution as tritiated water. Following removal of the layer by chemical etching, the tritium-rich layer reappears after months of aging at ambient temperature with nearly the original tritium activity. Comparison of chronic tritium release rates into liquid water before and after etching reveals that the surface layer only marginally influences the rate. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy provides evidence that during prolonged aging the surface layer continues to grow while at the same time trapping a fraction of bulk tritium released at ambient temperature. Experimental results suggest different mechanisms of hydrogen uptake and release by the bulk and surface layers. Inference of tritium activity in the bulk of aged or heat-exposed stainless steel material from surface activity measurements may depart significantly from reality.
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BFBNIB, GIS, IJS, KISLJ, NUK, PNG, UL, UM, UPUK
