Utsunomiya University

About: Utsunomiya University is a education organization based out in Utsunomiya, Japan. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Laser & Holography. The organization has 4139 authors who have published 6812 publications receiving 91975 citations. The organization is also known as: Utsunomiya daigaku.

Yield Stability of Aromatic Upland Rice with High Yielding Ability in Indonesia

Abstract: Aromatic rice variety, Mentikwangi, was crossed with high-yielding upland rice variety, Poso, and the pedigree was selected to obtain lines with high yielding and aromatic characters. The objectives of the research were to study the yield stability of aromatic upland genotypes across different locations and to select aromatic upland rice genotypes having wide adaptability, and or specific location adaptability. Yield stability of genotypes was estimated by using regression lines proposed by Finlay and Wilkinson. Some genotypes showed high yield stability and wide adaptability in different locations, and others showed good adaptability to a specific location. The lines having high yield stability and wide adaptability were G10 (405 g m-2), G19 (400 g m-2), G39 (418 g m-2), and G136 (411 g m-2), which may be considered as candidates of new aromatic upland rice cultivars. Situpatenggang had specific adaptability at the fertile locations; and Poso and G13 at the infertile locations. Genotype x locatio...

Frankliniella cephalica, a New Vector for Tomato spotted wilt virus.

Abstract: Frankliniella cephalica (Crawford) is an invasive species of thrips found in the islands of Yaeyama in the Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. During the late 1990s to early 2000s, a species of thrips was isolated from wild flowers of Bidens pilosa L. and Ipomoea batatas L. growing close to cultivated fields. They were subsequently identified as F. cephalica using fine morphological characteristics with the help of Steve Nakahara (U.S. Department of Agriculture, Beltsville, MD) and Laurence Mound (CSIRO, Australia). Voucher specimens were deposited in the Laboratory of Insect Resources, Faculty of Agriculture, Tokyo University of Agriculture by Shuji Okajima (2). We investigated the ability of F. cephalica to vector Tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV) by experimentally determining virus transmission efficiency. Newly hatched larvae as much as 12 h old underwent a viral acquisition-access period (AAP) of 24 h, during which they fed on the leaves of Datura stramonium infected with TSWV-O, a Japanese type isolate. Transmission efficiency of adults 4 days after emergence from molt (14 days after the AAP) was determined by a petunia leaf disk assay (3) in which the adults were individually allowed to feed for successive 24-h inoculation access periods (IAP) on two different leaf disks of Petunia × hybrida cv. Polo Blue. Transmission of the virus by the adults was considered positive if at least one of the leaf disks showed viral necrotic spot. We tested 20 randomly selected leaf disks with clear necrotic spots using a simplified rapid immunofilter paper assay. All selected disks were positive for TWSV. The transmission efficiencies were 24.6% for female (n = 57) and 54.4% for male (n = 125) adults. The efficiency was significantly different between sexes (Fisher's exact probability test, P < 0.001). We also examined changes in the virus infection site at different developmental stages in thrips using immunofluorescence microscopy with a polyclonal antibody to N protein of the virus (4). After a 6-h AAP feeding by first instar larvae, the virus was found initially to infect the epithelial cells and then spread throughout the midgut tissue in the second instar larvae 5 days after acquisition of the virus. In viruliferous adults, the virus was present in the salivary glands and on the basement membrane of the midgut tissue. These data indicate that F. cephalica is a new insect vector for TSWV. F. cephalica is a major insect pest of tropical crops in tropical and subtropical coastal belts (1). The presence of a thrips vector in weed hosts surrounding cultivated fields might increase the chance of crops in this habitat becoming infected with viruses. References: (1) M. Lamberts and J. H. Crane. Page 337 in: Advances in New Crops. J. Janick and J. E. Simon, eds. Timber Press, Portland, OR, 1990. (2) M. Masumoto and S. Okajima. Jpn. J. Appl. Entomol. Zool. 48:225, 2004. (3) T. Sakurai et al. Appl. Entomol. Zool. 39:71, 2004. (4) S. Tsuda et al. Ann. Phytopathol. Soc. Jpn. 60:216, 1994.

Genetic algorithms for designing loop layout manufacturing systems

Abstract: A common layout for flexible manufacturing system is loop network with machines arranged in a cycle and materials transported in only one direction around the cycle. Congestion is a common measure for evaluating a loop layout. This paper investigates the problem of designing loop layout system with both of minsum and minmax congestion measures. A hybrid heuristic of genetic algorithms and neighborhood search is developed for solving such problem and preliminary computational results are reported.

An adaptive comb filtering method as applied to acoustic analyses of pathological voice

Abstract: An adaptive comb filtering method, which was initially investigated by Frazier et al. [5] for the enhancement of degraded speech due to additive noise, is applied for estimating vocal noise generated at the glottis due to pathological changes of the vocal folds. In applying the method, special emphasis is placed on the accurate determination of pitch period durations. The amount of estimated vocal noise is quantified by a novel acoustic measure, normalized noise energy(NNE). Experiments with vowel samples spoken by 64 normal control subjects and 50 patients with glottic cancer have shown that the NNE is useful for the distinction between normal and pathological voice status.