We have been developing a new tactile sensory measurement device capable of early detection of somatosensory impairment. This device involves a small precision automatic stage, where lateral skin stretch is presented in a direction horizontal, to measure the tactile sensitivity of the plantar skin. In our previous study, the utility of the measuring method was established in healthy participants. However, it was unclear whether the posture and laterality during the measurement affect the results. This study evaluated the tactile sensitivity of younger healthy participants by using the tactile device on multiple regions of the participants’ plantar skin, and measured of foot pressure in the standing and sitting posture. By using twoway analysis of variance, we analyzed the effect of the posture and laterality on the tactile sensitivity. We revealed that tactile sensitivity of the fifth toe tend to be lower in both standing and sitting postures. The foot pressure of the fifth toe was extremely small, compared to that of other regions of the measurement points. In conclusion, this study showed that the measurement data of tactile sensitivity is not affected by posture and plantar region during measurement.

We reassessed the residual protein quantitative method, combining 0.2 M NaOH extraction and the Coomassie brilliant blue (CBB) assay for the cleanliness evaluation of reusable medical devices. The bovine serum albumin (BSA) calibration curve slopes using various protein assay kits were significantly reduced under alkaline conditions, except with the Bradford reagent. When evaluating the characteristics of four CBB reagents, the Coomassie plus Protein Assay Kit and Protein Quantification Kit-Rapid directly quantified a small amount of BSA even under alkaline conditions. Variation in the BSA recovery rate was observed with Pierce^TM 660 nm Protein Assay Reagent modified for micro assay and the Bradford reagent. In case of two assay kits other than CBB, contrary to the Sensolyte OPA Quantification Kit, the Micro BCA Assay Kit showed remarkable quantitativeness even under alkaline conditions. The recovery rate of the serum protein spiked on the stainless steel plate with alkaline extraction was comparable to the extraction with water or mammalian protein extraction reagent. Polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis showed that BSA was significantly decomposed to peptide fragments by hydrolysis after alkaline treatments. These results indicated that residual protein extraction with 0.2 M NaOH is not essential, and accurate quantification depends upon the proper selection of a protein assay kit and the pH and protein concentration of the test solution.