Anatomical variations of the inferior mesenteric artery (IMA) are uncommon. Generally, the IMA is very stable, arises directly from the abdominal aorta at the level of the third lumbar vertebra. We describe here an extremely rare case in which the IMA arose from the superior mesenteric artery. The findings were made during routine dissection of the cadaver of a 79-year-old Japanese man. This present case is the ninth report of this variation and was associated with gastrophrenic trunk, hepatosplenic trunk, hypoplastic spleen and accessory spleen. Clinically, cases like this highlight the importance of knowing the IMA anatomy and the possibility of its numerous variations in surgical procedures such as right hemicolectomy, resection of the transverse colon, left hemicolectomy, sigmoidectomy, and en bloc resection of the head of the pancreas and the superior mesenteric vessels. The developmental significance of this variation is also discussed with a detailed review of the literature.

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Summary: In recent years, partial laryngectomy and partial reconstruction are increasingly intended for conservation of functions of phonation and swallowing. In partial reconstruction, it is important to comprehend morphological characteristics of the blood vessels distributed in the larynx, but there have been only few reports discussing detailed information about them. Previous reports on laryngeal blood vessels have shown that branches of some arteries show remarkable ''meandering''. In the present study, we devised a method for objectively determining the morphological nature, ''meandering'' and assessed functions of the arteries. Intralaryngeal arteries were excised from the larynx of cadavers prepared for practice in anatomy, and images of the ''meandering'' artery were analyzed with NIH Image. The extent of ''meandering'' was expressed mainly as the ratio of the total length of the blood vessel to the distance between the starting point and the end point of meandering. The results showed that there was a significant difference in the extent of meandering between superior posterior and medial posterior branches of superior laryngeal artery. These arteries, which were distributed in the arytenoid region, were found to be of primary importance in partial laryngectomy and partial reconstruction of the larynx.

The effect of hydrogen reduction on the composition, structure, and catalytic activity of dichromium(III) copper(II) tetraoxide (copper chromite), CuCr2O4, was investigated. In this oxide, the surface and the bulk CuII was reduced into CuI and further to Cu0 by heating in hydrogen. The methanol decomposition on fresh copper chromite proceeded in a manner similar to that on metallic copper formed as the result of strong reduction and dispersed on chromium(III) oxide. The contribution of CuII, CuI, and Cu0 species to catalytic activity was examined and the similarity in the character of reaction on these two samples with different surface states was discussed. The role of Cr2O3 interacting with zerovalent copper was postulated.

Summary: In this paper, using full-body CT images of elderly and advanced elderly Japanese cadavers, we measure maxillary and other paranasal sinus volumes in order to examine the effects of age, sex, presence or absence of maxillary molars, and other factors on changes to maxillary sinus volume. The research subjects consisted of 77 of 95 cadavers donated to the Kanagawa Dental University between 2012 and 2014, which average age was 82.6 ± 10 years (33 were male, average age 79.3 ± 8.3 years, and 44 were female, average age 85.1 ± 11.7 years). Sinus volume was measured from full-body CT images on the horizontal plane and computed using the 3D volume rendering software. The average maxillary sinus volume was 31.3 ± 13.2 cm3 (average value ± one standard deviation; hereafter the same), with values of 32.9 ± 13.2 cm3 (6.7 cm 3 ~ 55.7 cm 3 ) for males and 29.6 ± 12.5 cm 3 (5.5 cm 3 ~ 52.9 cm 3 ) for females. In this report, we studied the effects of aging, sex, and state of remaining molars on changes to paranasal sinus volume in the maxillary sinus. These results give additional information about maxillary sinus volume of Japanese oldest-old peoples.