A Studyonthe Effect of Oral Practice of Sound Changes on EFL Students' Listening Abilities.

本研究の目的は、音変化を伴う発話の口頭発表練習を行うことが、日本人EFL学習者の聴解力向上に、有効であるかどうかを明らかにすることである。被験者は、新潟県内の短大の1年生96名で、中学校と高等学校で6年間英語を外国語として学習した経験がある。実験では、被験者を実験群と統制群の2つのグループに分け、1996年4月から7月の前期の授業で学習を実施した。実験前には、両群のリスニング能力に有為差は認められなかった。実験群では、学習者は、ビデオ教材の特定のシーンにある会話文の音変化の聞き取り方や発音の方法を学習し、その後役割練習を口頭発表練習として行った。統制群では、学習者は、実験群と同じシーンの音変化の聞き取り方のみを学習するにとどめた。学習後2つのグループに、リスニングの能力に差が見られるかどうかを測定するために、JACET Basic Listening Comprehension Testを用いた。テスト結果に対し、分散分析を行った結果、両群ともに、リスニングの力は向上したが、処遇とテストの交互作用は、有意ではなかった。The purpose of this study is to clarify the effect of oral practice of sound changes on Japanese EFL learners. The subjects were ninety - five freshmen students at a college in Niigata. Their first language is Japanese. They were given a series of aural-oral practices focusing on sound changes in "authentic" English during the first semester in 1996. They were divided into two groups. In the experimental group, learners studied how to listen to and speak expressions which contain sound changes in rapid colloquial style occurring in video segments, and role - played a few scenes as oral practice. The control group, on the other hand, studied only how to listen to the sound changes in the same video segments. The listening abilities of both groups were measured and analyzed by Analysis of Variance. The results of this study indicated that though the subjects in both groups improved significantly in understanding English sound changes from the pretest to the post-test, as far as the result of the post-test is concerned there was no significant difference in understanding English sound changes between the experimental group and the control group.departmental bulletin pape

Strategy Cascading for Regional Revitalization in Japan

departmental bulletin pape

Dual contribution of TRPV4 antagonism in the regulatory effect of vasoinhibins on blood-retinal barrier permeability: Diabetic milieu makes a difference

Abstract Breakdown of the blood-retinal barrier (BRB), as occurs in diabetic retinopathy and other chronic retinal diseases, results in vasogenic edema and neural tissue damage, causing vision loss. Vasoinhibins are N-terminal fragments of prolactin that prevent BRB breakdown during diabetes. They modulate the expression of some transient receptor potential (TRP) family members, yet their role in regulating the TRP vanilloid subtype 4 (TRPV4) remains unknown. TRPV4 is a calcium-permeable channel involved in barrier permeability, which blockade has been shown to prevent and resolve pulmonary edema. We found TRPV4 expression in the endothelium and retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) components of the BRB, and that TRPV4-selective antagonists (RN-1734 and GSK2193874) resolve BRB breakdown in diabetic rats. Using human RPE (ARPE-19) cell monolayers and endothelial cell systems, we further observed that (i) GSK2193874 does not seem to contribute to the regulation of BRB and RPE permeability by vasoinhibins under diabetic or hyperglycemic-mimicking conditions, but that (ii) vasoinhibins can block TRPV4 to maintain BRB and endothelial permeability. Our results provide important insights into the pathogenesis of diabetic retinopathy that will further guide us toward rationally-guided new therapies: synergistic combination of selective TRPV4 blockers and vasoinhibins can be proposed to mitigate diabetes-evoked BRB breakdown

Perinatal dioxin exposure and neurodevelopment of 2-year-old Vietnamese children in the most contaminated area from Agent Orange in Vietnam

金沢医科大学博士（医学）2019thesi

Severity of left ventricular remodeling defines outcomes and response to therapy in heart failure Valsartan heart failure trial (Val-HeFT) echocardiographic data

AbstractObjectivesThe objective of this study was to test the hypothesis that the severity of left ventricular remodeling predicts the response to treatment and outcomes in chronic heart failure.BackgroundReversal of remodeling should produce the most favorable outcome in patients with the most severe remodeling.MethodsIn 5,010 heart failure patients on background therapy and randomized to valsartan and placebo, serial recordings of left ventricular internal diastolic diameter (LVIDd) and ejection fraction (EF) were read at sites that had to meet qualifying standards before participating. Baseline LVIDd and EF were pooled across treatments and retrospectively grouped by quartiles Q1 to Q4, representing best to worst. Kaplan-Meier survival curves were obtained by the log-rank test. Q1 was compared with Q4 for mortality and combined mortality and morbidity (M + M) from Cox regression risk ratios (RRs). Valsartan versus placebo changes from baseline in LVIDd and EF were analyzed by quartiles from analysis of covariance. Valsartan and placebo were compared by RRs for M + M.ResultsSurvival rates were greater in the better quartiles for LVIDd and EF (p < 0.00001). The RR for Q1 versus Q4 in events approached 0.5 for both LVIDd and EF (p < 0.0001). An LVIDd decrease and EF increase were quartile-dependent and greater with valsartan than placebo at virtually all time points. The RR for M + M outcomes favored valsartan in the worse quartiles.ConclusionsStratification by baseline severity of remodeling showed that patients with worse LVIDd and EF are at highest risk for an event, yet appear to gain the most anti-remodeling effect and clinical benefit with valsartan treatment