Incidence of side effects of topical atropine sulfate and cyclopentolate hydrochloride for cycloplegia in Japanese children: a multicenter study.

Purpose: To investigate the incidence rate and side effects of topical atropine sulfate and cyclopentolate hydrochloride for cycloplegia in children aged 15 years or under.

Methods: This prospective study had been conducted at 9 institutions between April 1, 2016 and March 31, 2017 in patients 15 years old or younger who received either atropine or cyclopentolate for refraction assessment. The investigation included patient's age, symptoms, and whether patients with side effects had any systemic diseases.

Synthetically useful variants of industrial lipases from Burkholderia cepacia and Pseudomonas fluorescens.

Industrial enzymes lipase PS (LPS) and lipase AK (LAK), which originate from Burkholderia cepacia and Pseudomonas fluorescens, respectively, are synthetically useful biocatalysts. To strengthen their catalytic performances, we introduced two mutations into hot spots of the active sites (residues 287 and 290). The LPS_L287F/I290A double mutant showed high catalytic activity and enantioselectivity for poor substrates for which the wild-type enzyme showed very low activity.

[Surveillance report of drug-resistant bacteria from 2007 to 2012 in Saga Prefecture, Japan (the second report)].

Drug-resistant bacteria are a problematic issue in Japan. Surveillance of drug-resistant bacteria is important because the frequency of isolation and kinds of such bacteria vary between hospitals and local areas. This study summarizes the results of detection of drug-resistant bacteria in Saga Prefecture from July 2007 to June 2012.

[Viewing 3D stereoscopic images in children and adults with and without strabismus: multicenter study in Japan].

Purpose: To investigate the ability of patients with strabismus and/or amblyopia to see 3D images.

Methods: A questionnaire survey conducted for children aged 6 to 19 years and adults aged 20 to 39 years on their experience of viewing 3D images (movies, motion attractions, television, games), asking whether they could see stereoscopically, with or without adverse effects. A retrospective investigation of ophthalmological examinations was followed.

Shift of temporal responsivity curve of pattern reversal visually evoked potentials to lower frequencies in patients after recovery from optic neuritis.

Purpose: To investigate the responsivity of the visual system to pattern reversal stimuli of different reversal rates in optic neuritis patients after a full recovery of visual acuity.

Methods: Thirty eyes with optic neuritis and 30 eyes of age-matched normal controls were studied. Steady-state pattern reversal visually evoked potentials (P-VEPs) were recorded using reversal rates of 2, 10, 20 and 30 Hz.

Abnormalities of visual-evoked potentials and pupillary light reflexes in a family with autosomal dominant occult macular dystrophy.

Occult macular dystrophy (OMD) is an unusual inherited or sporadic macular dystrophy characterized by an essentially normal appearing ocular fundus and normal ocular circulation determined by fluorescein angiography but with a progressive decrease of visual acuity. We present a family with OMD who have a delay in the implicit times of both the visual-evoked potentials and the pupillary light reflexes. Because these delays are usually indicative of optic nerve disorders, deciding on a diagnosis between OMD and optic nerve disorder should be done carefully.

[Three cases of abducens nerve palsy accompanied by Horner syndrome].

Purpose: To report three cases of nasopharyngeal carcinoma, exhibiting abducens nerve palsy and Horner syndrome during the medical treatment of the tumor, whose invasive cavernous sinus lesions could be detected.

Subjects: The patients were two men and one woman who were referred to our department with complaints of diplopia during the clinical course of nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

Results: Right abducens nerve palsy, Horner syndrome, and impairment of the 1st division of the trigeminal nerve were recognized in all patients.

Host-symbiont relationships in hydrothermal vent gastropods of the genus Alviniconcha from the Southwest Pacific.

Hydrothermal vent gastropods of the genus Alviniconcha are unique among metazoans in their ability to derive their nutrition from chemoautotrophic gamma- and epsilon-proteobacterial endosymbionts. Although host-symbiont relationships in Alviniconcha gastropods from the Central Indian Ridge in the Indian Ocean and the Mariana Trough in the Western Pacific have been studied extensively, host-symbiont relationships in Alviniconcha gastropods from the Southwest Pacific remain largely unknown. Phylogenetic analysis using mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I gene sequences of host gastropods from the Manus, North Fiji, and Lau Back-Arc Basins in the Southwest Pacific has revealed a new host lineage in a Alviniconcha gastropod from the Lau Basin and the occurrence of the host lineage Alviniconcha sp.