In the past 4 years, incidences of endemic or epidemic respiratory diseases associated with canine influenza H3N2 virus in Asian dogs have been reported in countries such as South Korea and China. Canine species were considered to be the new natural hosts for this virus. However, at the beginning of 2010, influenza-like respiratory signs, such as dyspnoea, were also observed among cats as well as in dogs in an animal shelter located in Seoul, South Korea. The affected cats showed 100 % morbidity and 40 % mortality. We were able to isolate a virus from a lung specimen of a dead cat, which had suffered from the respiratory disease, in embryonated-chicken eggs. The eight viral genes isolated were almost identical to those of the canine influenza H3N2 virus, suggesting interspecies transmission of canine influenza H3N2 virus to the cat. Moreover, three domestic cats infected with intranasal canine/Korea/GCVP01/07 (H3N2) all showed elevated rectal temperatures, nasal virus shedding and severe pulmonary lesions, such as suppurative bronchopneumonia. Our study shows, for the first time, that cats are susceptible to canine influenza H3N2 infection, suggesting that cats may play an intermediate host role in transmitting the H3N2 virus among feline and canine species, which could lead to the endemic establishment of the virus in companion animals. Such a scenario raises a public health concern, as the possibility of the emergence of new recombinant feline or canine influenza viruses in companion animals with the potential to act as a zoonotic infection cannot be excluded.

We report a discovery of a fusion plasma regime suitable for commercial fusion reactor where the ion temperature was sustained above 100 million degree about 20 s for the rst time. Nuclear fusion as a promising technology for replacing carbon-dependent energy sources has currently many issues to be resolved to enable its large-scale use as a sustainable energy source. State-of-the-art fusion reactors cannot yet achieve the high levels of fusion performance, high temperature, and absence of instabilities required for steady-state operation for a long period of time on the order of hundreds of seconds. This is a pressing challenge within the eld, as the development of methods that would enable such capabilities is essential for the successful construction of commercial fusion reactor. Here, a new plasma con nement regime called fast ion roled enhancement (FIRE) mode is presented. This mode is realized at Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR) and subsequently characterized to show that it meets most of the requirements for fusion reactor commercialization. Through a comparison to other well-known plasma con nement regimes, the favourable properties of FIRE mode are further elucidated and concluded that the novelty lies in the high fraction of fast ions, which acts to stabilize turbulence and achieve steady-state operation for up to 20 s by self-organization. We propose this mode as a promising path towards commercial fusion reactors.

Spiral CT is a reliable method for detecting vascular invasion and unresectable tumors. However, it has limitations in detecting variations of the bile duct or the intraductal extent of tumor.

A rtifi cial neural networks have become a common tool for modeling complex "input-output" dependencies. In the past, neural network models have been used as a special class of pedotransfer functions (PTFs) using feed-forward back propagation or radial basis functions to approximate any continuous (nonlinear) function (Hecht-Nielsen, 1990; Pachepsky et al.

This paper deals with design and fabrication of 2-and 3-dimensional microchip type flow cytometers hydrodynamically driven. Flow rate and pressure distrubution have been calculated from Poiseuille flow theory and results were confirmed by computational fluid dynamics. The flow focusing has been evaluated in 2-and 3-dimensional microchip type flow cytometers fabricated with Polydimetylsiloxane molding process. The shape of focused flow was detected with a laser scanning microscope and favourably compared with calculations based on Poiseuille flow assumptions and CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) simulation. Simulation and calculation results showed good correlations to each other, and also to the visualized shape of focused flow in microchip. The 3-dimensional focused flow showed the more stable focusing status in laser induced fluorescence measurements than that in 2-dimensional case.