Kyoto University of Advanced Science

Female athletes frequently experience lateral ankle sprains (LAS) during unilateral jump-landing activities and face a significant risk of recurrent ankle injury. LAS has been associated with reduced diaphragm contractility and altered breathing mechanics. The diaphragm and breathing mechanics are crucial for mitigating landing impact, which is typically impaired in individuals with LAS. Given this connection, innovative rehabilitation approaches that address dysfunctional breathing mechanics may be warranted. To date, no research has investigated associations between breathing mechanics and landing kinetics in adolescent female athletes with LAS. This study aimed to compare ground reaction force (GRF) and dynamic stability during a single-leg stabilization task between female athletes with a history of LAS who exhibited diaphragmatic breathing patterns and those who had dysfunctional breathing patterns. Case-control study. Two hundred eighty-three competitive female athletes with a previous history of LAS were recruited from middle school, high school, and Division I college teams. The Hi-Lo test was utilized to categorize participants as dysfunctional breathers or diaphragmatic breathers according to their breathing patterns. Each participant completed 3 trials of a single-leg drop-landing task. Normalized peak vertical and posterior GRF data were extracted, and the average loading rate was calculated from the normalized vertical GRF. The norm of the horizontal component of the GRF was used to calculate time to stabilization. Forty female athletes with LAS history (14.1%) were classified as diaphragmatic breathers, and 243 (85.9%) were classified as dysfunctional breathers. Female athletes with LAS history who exhibited dysfunctional breathing patterns demonstrated a greater peak posterior GRF (P = .01) and longer time to stabilization (P = .04) compared with those who had diaphragmatic breathing patterns. Dysfunctional breathing patterns may contribute to decreased dynamic stability and force attenuation capabilities during single-leg landing tasks following LAS. Assessing the biomechanical dimension of breathing patterns may help clinicians identify patient-specific impairments in individuals with LAS, particularly those with deficits in dynamic postural stability and force attenuation.

Human group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2s) are key regulators of chronic inflammation in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). In contrast, autoimmune-mediated inflammation is characteristic of type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM), particularly slowly progressive insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (SPIDDM). However, whether ILC2-mediated inflammation observed in T2DM is also present in SPIDDM remains unclear. We hypothesized that ILC2 profiling could help distinguish T2DM from SPIDDM and aimed to characterize ILC2s in Japanese patients. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were obtained from Japanese patients with T1DM or T2DM participating in a diabetic cohort study. Ex vivo flow cytometric immunophenotyping was performed, and innate lymphoid cell fractions were quantified using fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS). The frequency of ILC2s was determined by FACS, and ILC2 proliferation was assessed ex vivo in PBMCs exposed to saturated fatty acids mimicking conditions of worsening T2DM. Mean (SD) ILC2 frequencies were 5.50 (2.30) % in T2DM and 3.42 (2.16) % in SPIDDM. Frequencies were significantly higher in T2DM than in SPIDDM (p = 0.007) and were also elevated compared with other T1DM subtypes. ILC2 proliferation was influenced by saturated fatty acids associated with T2DM progression. This study demonstrated that numerical differences in ILC2s were observed in T2DM but not in SPIDDM.

Abstract Background Chronic kidney disease (CKD) represents a significant global public health concern, impairing patients' quality of life, functional status, and increases overall morbidity and mortality. Although exercise therapy has demonstrated potential benefits for the management of non-dialysis-dependent CKD (NDD-CKD), the evidence base remains to be consolidated. Therefore, this review aims to evaluate the effectiveness and the safety of exercise intervention on NDD-CKD patients by integrating the available high-quality studies. Methods A systematic literature search was conducted using PubMed and Ichushi-Web, a database of Japanese medical literature, up to February 29, 2024. We pooled only randomized controlled trials (RCTs) comparing exercise intervention with usual care, and conducted meta-analyses based on a random effects inverse variance model. Results A systematic literature search identified 9131 articles, and after screening, 19 RCTs were included for qualitative evaluation. We included 15 RCTs in the quantitative meta-analysis. No RCTs investigated the effects of exercise on all-cause mortality or hospitalization. The meta-analysis of kidney function, including the estimated glomerular filtration rate using serum creatinine (eGFRcr) and the degree of albuminuria/proteinuria showed no significant difference between the intervention and control groups. However, a pooled analysis on eGFRcr suggested an attenuated decline in the intervention group (mean difference: 0.96 mL/min/1.73 m 2 ; 95% CI, − 1.25 to 3.17). In addition, exercise intervention led to significant improvements in several secondary outcomes: exercise capacity (VO 2 peak increased by 2.13 mL/kg/min), ambulatory function (6-minute walk distance increased by 51.16 m), and Health-Related Quality of Life (HR-QoL) (significant improvements across multiple subscales of KDQOL, as well as SF-12/36 Physical and Mental Component Summaries). No significant increase in the incidence of adverse events, such as musculoskeletal injuries, was observed in the intervention groups. Conclusions Exercise therapy is a safe and effective strategy for improving exercise capacity, ambulatory function, and HR-QoL in patients with NDD-CKD. These findings support its incorporation into routine clinical care.

This paper describes the effects of Al/Ni rapid heating on the mechanical reliability of sintered Ag die-attach assemblies. The sintered Ag layer, which includes multiple voids, undergoes degradation, such as cracking and aging, due to temperature fluctuations. After the sintered Ag die-attach process, Al/Ni rapid heating was adopted into the sintered layer. The porosity of the sintered Ag film prepared under low-pressure conditions was drastically reduced by applying Al/Ni post-heating. Uniaxial tensile testing revealed that Al/Ni-treated low-pressure sintered films had a Young’s modulus of 63 GPa and a tensile strength of 240 MPa, respectively, which is comparable to that of untreated high-pressure sintered Ag. In the thermal shock test, the crack propagation rate after 60 MPa sintering was similar whether or not Al/Ni treatment was applied. In contrast, the positive effect of the post-heating was observed on the degradation rate after 5 MPa sintering. Cracking phenomena are discussed based on cross-sectional scanning electron microscopy results, which describe the pore distribution in the sintered Ag layer after Al/Ni post-heating.

Effective herding of animals is essential for tasks such as livestock management and wildlife conservation, and multi-robot systems offer a promising solution to automate such processes. Existing approaches include reactive methods, which are efficient and straightforward but struggle with inconsistent animal behavior, and formation-based methods, which handle variability but face scalability issues as animals resist being fully encircled. We propose a novel, decentralized herding algorithm that combines the strengths of both approaches. The key contribution of this work is a novel partial containment formation enabled by control barrier functions (CBFs) that constrain animal movements and guide them toward a particular direction. Theoretical analyses highlight convergence and stability properties, and empirical results also reveal the role of animal aggregation preferences in herding performance, an aspect largely overlooked in prior work. Extensive simulations and real-robot experiments validate the theoretical analysis, demonstrating consistent performance and efficiency under various scenarios and disturbances. Finally, benchmarks against other state-of-the-art herding algorithms indicate that the proposed algorithm performs more consistently across diverse scenarios.

Mushrooms from Pleurotus genus produce unique two-component pore-forming toxins consisting of a lipid-binding aegerolysin protein and a membrane-attack complex/perforin (MACPF) domain-containing protein, pleurotolysin B (PlyB). Here, we investigated the interaction between a well-characterized aegerolysin, ostreolysin A6 (OlyA6), and PlyB on membranes composed of ceramide phosphoethanolamine (CPE) and cholesterol (Chol). The binding of PlyB to OlyA6 induced its oligomerization and the formation of porous structures on the membrane. However, the efficiency of oligomerization depended strongly on the density of membrane-bound OlyA6. High OlyA6 density hindered the oligomerization process, resulting predominantly in arc-shaped oligomers rather than ring-shaped structures. This crowding also impaired the pore formation process. Our results suggest that the association of PlyB with OlyA6 occurs on the membrane surface, and the subsequent oligomerization and pore formation are highly regulated by the OlyA6/PlyB molar ratio, consistent with previous observations of inefficient pore formation at high OlyA6/PlyB molar ratios.

Abstract This study proposes a process model for sharing ambiguous category concepts in virtual reality (VR) using an active inference framework. The model executes a dual-layer Bayesian update after observing both self and partner actions and predicts actions that minimize free energy. A disagreement in category judgment was added to the free energy as a risk term (corresponding to expected surprise in active inference). As the weight of this term, gaze synchrony measured by Dynamic Time Warping (DTW), assumed to re- flect joint attention, was used. The hypothesis was that higher weighting of gaze synchrony would improve prediction accuracy. To validate the model, an object classification task in VR including ambiguous items was created. The experiment was conducted first under a bot avatar condition, in which gaze was not synchronized and ambiguous category judgments were always incorrect, and then under a human–human pair condition. This design allowed verification of the collaborative learning process by which human pairs reached agreement. Analysis of experimental data from 14 participants showed that the model achieved high prediction accuracy for observed values as learning progressed. Introducing DTW as a model parameter further improved prediction accuracy, with optimal performance at synchrony weights of γ 0 = 0 . 5 - 0 . 9 . This approach provides a new framework for modeling shared social cognition using active inference.

Abstract Non-technical summary The Earth is approaching irreversible tipping points. Markets, democracy, and technology alone cannot address these complex crises. Future Design (FD) tackles these challenges by activating human ability to prioritise future generations’ happiness over immediate gains. This research expands the FD framework and reviews a decade’s worth of studies, deepening our understanding of FD’s potential in creating mechanisms for long-term societal well-being and environmental sustainability. Technical summary The Earth is approaching irreversible tipping points across multiple domains. Despite advances in markets, democracy, and science, these systems systematically fail to prioritise future generations’ well-being – creating what we term ‘future failures’. New mechanisms are needed, such as FD. Originating in Japan in the early 2010s, FD aims to design, experiment with, and implement mechanisms that activate our futurability – the ability to prioritise the happiness of future generations over immediate gains – to tackle future failures. This paper introduces presentability and pastability alongside futurability, extending the FD framework. Placing various FD studies from the past decade within this framework, this study reviews mechanisms for activating these abilities and examines how activating one ability affects the others. These abilities are ‘leverage points’, as defined by Meadows. We explore the path to a paradigm shift by designing and using mechanisms that activate these points. This paper also highlights unknowns about FD and potential directions for its development, providing a comprehensive overview of its current state and future prospects in addressing global challenges. Social media summary Future Design: A new approach to global crises, prioritising future generations over immediate gains.