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The 193 nm deep UV immersion lithography is leveraged to fabricate highly dense and uniform arrays of Au-capped Si nanopillars on a 300 mm wafer level, and the substrates are applied in surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy for reliable molecule detection. Due to the sub-10 nm gap sizes and ultra-high array density with the lattice constant less than 100 nm, our nanopillar based substrates outperform the current commercial products in terms of the signal intensity, reproducibility and fabrication scale.

This laser diagnosis system makes it easy to detect the existence of caries under a pit and fissure sealant during a routine check-up.

Time-resolved dynamical x-ray imaging of individual DNA molecules with picometer-scale precision is demonstrated for the first time. Diffracted x-ray tracking (DXT), a single-molecule experiment with x rays, monitors the rotating motions, rather than the translational motions, of a labeled nanocrystal. DXT can obtain information about the dynamics of single molecules through a quantitative analysis, since the signals from DXT are independent of the chemical conditions.

A sequence of two strike-slip earthquakes occurred on April 14 and 16, 2016 in the intraplate region of Kyushu Island, Japan, apart from subduction zones, and caused significant damage and disruption to the Kumamoto region. The analyses of regional seismic catalog and available strong motion recordings reveal striking characteristics of the events, such as migrating seismicity, earthquake surface rupture, and major foreshock-mainshock earthquake sequences. To gain valuable lessons from the events, a UK Earthquake Engineering Field Investigation Team (EEFIT) was dispatched to Kumamoto, and earthquake damage surveys were conducted to relate observed earthquake characteristics to building and infrastructure damage caused by the earthquakes. The lessons learnt from the reconnaissance mission have important implications on current seismic design practice regarding the required seismic resistance of structures under multiple shocks and the seismic design of infrastructure subject to large ground deformation. The observations also highlight the consequences of cascading geological hazards on community resilience. To share the gathered damage data widely, geo-tagged photos are organized using Google Earth and the kmz file is made publicly available.

Horizontal distributions of wind over Lake Biwa have been measured almost simultaneously using three boats. Time changes in wind were also measured at several coastal points. These data, including AMeDAS and continuous records in Shiga Prefecture, were analyzed to find the characteristics of wind fields over and around Lake Biwa. Results show that the wind is not spatially uniform, and that the dominant strong northerly wind has a positive curl in the northern area of the lake and a negative curl in the south. This wind distribution is considered to be one of the most important maintenance mechanisms of the horizontal water circulation (gyres) often observed in Lake Biwa. This possibility is confirmed in part by numerical calculations with a simple two-layer circulation model.

Five new alkaloids have been isolated from the plant Daphniphyllum gracile Gage, and their structures also been elucidated on the basis of their spectral and chemical evidences. Particularly, daphnigraciline methiodide (VI) was directly converted into yuzurine methiodide (VII). Furthermore, application of 13C NMR spectra plays an important role in the structural elucidation.