Side-to-side differences of three-dimensional knee kinematics during walking by normal subjects.

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to determine the normal range of the side-to-side difference in three dimensional knee kinematics measured by the point cluster technique (PCT). [Subjects] The subjects were twenty-one healthy normal volunteers without knee pain or an episode of injury to the legs. [Methods] The subjects were tested bilaterally at a self-selected normal walking speed and six degrees of freedom knee kinematics were measured using the PCT, and the 95% confidence intervals of the average side-to-side differences in flexion-extension (FE), adduction-abduction (AA), internal-external (IE) rotation, and anterior-posterior (AP), medial-lateral (ML), superior-inferior (SI) translation in each stage of the gait cycle were determined.

Polyhydroxyalkanoate production by a novel bacterium Massilia sp. UMI-21 isolated from seaweed, and molecular cloning of its polyhydroxyalkanoate synthase gene.

We successfully isolated one microorganism (UMI-21) from Ulva, a green algae that contains starch. The strain UMI-21 can produce polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) from starch, maltotriose, or maltose as a sole carbon source. Taxonomic studies and 16S rDNA sequence analysis revealed that strain UMI-21 was phylogenetically related to species of the genus Massilia.

Retinoid storage in the egg of reptiles and birds.

Storage of retinal has been confirmed in eggs from a range of anamniotic vertebrates (teleosts and amphibians) and an ascidian, but the retinoid-storage state in eggs of oviparous amniotic vertebrates (reptiles and birds) has yet to be clarified in detail. We studied four reptilian and five avian species and found that retinal was commonly stored in their egg yolk. Furthermore, retinal was the major retinoid in reptilian eggs, with only low levels of retinol, whereas significant amounts of retinol as well as retinal were stored in avian eggs.

Simultaneous measurements of instantaneous heart rate and breathing activity in newly hatched chicks.

1. Among three types of fluctuations of instantaneous heart rate (IHR) found previously in newly hatched chicks, a high frequency oscillation with a mean frequency of about 0.7 Hz (Type I) appeared to be concurrent with breathing (Moriya et al.

Lactic acid production using two food processing wastes, canned pineapple syrup and grape invertase, as substrate and enzyme.

Canned pineapple syrup, a food processing waste, was utilized as a substrate for lactic acid production by Lactococcus lactis. To improve the utilization of sucrose from the syrup, grape invertase from grape juice derived from wine production was used for sucrose hydrolysis. The highest lactic acid concentrations achieved were 20 and 92 g l-1 from 20 and 100 g total sugars l-1, respectively, without a lag period for sucrose consumption.

Development of immunoadjuvants for immunotherapy of cancer.

Previously, we have reported that cell-wall skeleton (CWS) fraction was the major adjuvant-active principle of mycobacterial cells which were used in Freund's complete adjuvant (FCA). We have described the biochemical and immunological properties of CWS of mycobacteria and related bacteria, especially the CWS of Mycobacterium bovis BCG strain (BCG-CWS) in detail. The effectiveness of BCG-CWS for the cancer immunotherapy in patients was shown in several clinical trials.

Removal of cadmium from scallop hepatopancreas by microbial processes.

A microbial process for removing cadmium from a homogenate of hepatopancreas, a waste of scallop processing, was devised to use this waste for value-added protein resources. Microorganisms were screened on the basis of the ability to remove cadmium from a medium with the initial concentration of 10 mg/l of cadmium. One soil isolate, identified as Xanthomonas sp.