We have investigated microscale experiments on chemiluminescence for primary schoolchildren. Our purpose of this study is to carry out the experiments more safely and more simply. We are interested in a commercial chemical light and changing the quantity of the reagent to use. Because the commercial chemical light contains harmful hydrogen peroxide H₂0₂ for an oxidizing agent, we have substituted H₂0₂ with commercial products, such as bleaches and eye drops.
This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 24915008.

View full abstract

The present paper is a complete guide to the English textbooks currently used at junior high schools in Japan, introducing the contents of all the 18 books, 6 different sets issued by six publishing companies: the so-called Big Three (NEW HORIZON, SUNSHINE, NEW CROWN), ONE WORLD, TOTAL ENGLISH, and a newcomer, Mitsumura Tosho's COLUMBUS 21, all of which were authorized by the Japanese Ministry of Education in 2011. In comparison with high school textbooks, they are much more interesting, full of encouragement to read, write, listen to, and speak English. Although the textbooks for the third year students tend to become more serious and moralistic like typical high school textbooks, they still retain humorous and touching elements, strangely enough, which are lacking almost completely in the high school counterparts. It is obvious that junior high English textbooks are well-made for beginners with ingenious methods: above all, each publishing company has created anime/manga-like characters just the same age of the students and made the three-year textbooks in the form of a novel. This paper shows how charming these characters are and what good effects they have on the students as well as the story itself. Despite the fact that the 80 to 90 percent market share has been exclusively secured by the three major publishers, it can be said that TOTAL ENGLISH is excellent in character designs and COLUMBUS 21 the best as a teenage novel.

View full abstract

The present paper is the sequel to "'English Communication I': A Guide to New Textbooks Authorized by the Ministry of Education in Japan" (March, 2013), dealing with twenty new "English Communication II" textbooks authorized by the Japanese Ministry of Education in 2013. Seemingly panicked by the disastrous results of its erroneous yutori policy, the Ministry has started a revised educational program, not only making the English textbooks far more difficult, but also ordering all the Japanese high school teachers of English to teach the foreign language to Japanese students in English itself. After all the confusion that the responsible Ministry caused perhaps unintentionally in the previous year, the newly published textbooks for the second year students, which are going to be used for upcoming four years, from 2014 to 2017, seem to have returned to the former state: the instructive pages of "Classroom English" printed in English Communication I textbooks having almost completely disappeared, the contents of English Communication II textbooks look both old and familiar in spite of being the newly- named subject with the key word "communication." This paper consists of the general introduction and the brief outline of each textbook, including some critical comments on the typical, too moralistic themes which have nothing to do with the study of English and undoubtedly will only prevent ambitious teenagers from enjoying learning the international language, ironically again, contrary to the good intentions of Japan's Ministry of Education.

View full abstract

The present paper is intended as a useful guide to Compass Classic Readers, the complete set of 60 books with MP3 CDs, which are divided into 6 levels from 400 to 1500 headwords. Compared with other major publishing companies' counterparts, the Compass books may look inferior due to their cheap- looking cover designs. Some of the attached CDs are also badly made with narrators' poor performances and mismatched music. Of course, there are good points that can cover these defects: the MP3 CDs include "Playlet" where each title is partly or wholly made into a short play probably in order to accustom the learners to English conversations; on the whole Compass Classic Readers are nicely selected and properly retold almost always true to the originals. It might be surprising that foreign learners of English with their limited vocabularies can gain easy access to wonderful masterpieces such as Shakespeare's comedies and tragedies like A Midsummer Night's Dream, Twelfth Night, Othello, Macbeth, and so forth. It is true that most of the Compass classics are so famous that they are available in other publishers' versions, and Japanese people can read them in full-length translation from the originals; yet it is certain that Compass Classic Readers are one of the easiest ways to catch a glimpse of world classics, especially those by British and American authors. It is strongly recommended that Compass Classic Readers should be read as an ideal introduction to get acquainted with great novels and plays that Western civilization has ever produced.

View full abstract

Servo motor education will requires some experiments to catch the feedback concept. So, we developed a low cost experimental setup incorporated AC servo motor for teaching the servo control technique. LinuxCNC is an open source working on Ubuntu 10.04, and allows us to develop the digital PID, real-time control by using a personal computer. It usually controls with step and direction signals through a standard parallel port. In order to transfer the analog signals of the velocity data from PC to the servo drivers we prepared two types signal connecting boards. One uses analog switching devices, the other uses an arduino microcomputer. Developed experimental setup is easy to use and students can experience PID control and an advanced motion control by one's perception. In addition, velocity, position and encoder feedback signals can be monitored directly by an oscilloscope without a damping, or with a small damping.

View full abstract

Fractal image coding is a block-based scheme that exploits the self-similarity hiding with an image. The main problem of fractal coding is the very high computing time needed to encode images. On the other hand, GPGPU (General Purpose computing on Graphic Processing Unit) attracts a great deal of attention, which is used for general-purpose computations like numerical calculations as well as graphic processing. In this study, we present an implementation of adaptive fractal coding on GPUs (Graphics Processing Units). We also evaluate the encoding performance comparing with MPI (Message Passing Interface). Finally, we discuss about a standard parallel computation algorithm of fractal coding.

View full abstract

We report the activities and issues on the Smart Science School (SSS) for junior high students. The junior high school students have learned at Gunma National College of Technology and carried out several experiments . In this paper, three lectures for junior high students are reported. The first theme is ceramics materials. The participants learned the synthesis and characterization of the ruby crystals and fluorescent materials. A clone culture of plants is the second theme. DNA analysis of carrots and cucumbers were carried out. The third theme is electric batteries. The participants made Voltaic pile, Daniell cell, and Pb batteries. The experiments of solar cell and fuel cell were carried out.

View full abstract

This paper reports an attempt to introduce a web-based English vocabulary learning system as a tool for efficient and continuous English learning at Gunma National College of Technology. GNCT is a five-year school that covers high school and two years of college. This new system was launched on the college website for fourth year students, who are faced with the necessity of enhancing English vocabulary for various purposes geared towards their post-graduation careers, such as taking TOEIC, TOEFL, and transfer admission examinations for four-year universities. The first goal of the new system, however, has been to promote learning aimed at improving scores in regular examinations at school. The English vocabulary page of the school website is updated at intervals during the semester, and offers students information about target vocabulary words selected from their textbook. It is too early to judge the effects on standardized tests and entrance exams, but the website has been useful not only to promote learning, but also for encouraging students to keep up their English language studies and continually add new words to their English vocabulary.

View full abstract

In this paper we described newly synthesized Fullerene derivative (3). It has three branched alkyl chains and it showed liquid phase at room temperature. So, the new derivative expected as C₆₀ based soft material with electrical function.

View full abstract

The purpose of this paper is to give the absolute mathematics for the prime set. Absolute mathematics was introduced by N.Kurokawa in order to solve the Riemann conjecture. One of the idea for absolute mathematics is the prime differential on the rational integer Z. We analyze all possible arithmetic generalizations of symplectic and contact structures on a prime set. There are two different types of structures according to the Lagrangian subspace and Legendrian subspace. Main result is that the prime set is characterized by the Lagrangian subspace of absolute symplectic space (T*P, ω). We also define a notion of the absolute Weyl algebra.

View full abstract

We introduced photo engraving on wood to NC machine training for students. The engraving has many V grooves changed cutting depth according to light and shade of a photograph. Even for students can easily generate the NC code using CAM. Also the machining time is short(about fifteen minutes).We used a printed circuit board manufacturing machine for the engraving because of a suppressing warping mechanism and a high speed spindle. We engraved some kinds of wood and found the cutting conditions. Students set the conditions and simulated the engraving using CAM. They engraved famous people, anime, vehicle, etc. And then, they had a big interest in their engravings.

View full abstract

The toxicity of asbestos is widely known, and various methods are being investigated to decompose asbestos into harmless compounds. The authors previously reported that asbestos-cement composites, a general waste material including asbestos, can be decomposed into harmless substances by adding small amounts of CaCl₂ and then heating to 700℃ [1-3]. Recycling decomposed asbestos as a raw ingredient for cement is crucial in using this result industrially. However, compounds including chlorine form in decomposed asbestos, preventing of use in production of cement.
The authors investigated additives other than CaCl₂ in decomposition, and found that reagent-grade asbestos can be decomposed by adding 5mass% of additive and heating for 15 seconds at a low temperature of 900℃.

View full abstract

In this paper the authors report on demonstrational operations of M[you]sic, an interactive music system for public spaces, for community events for children held in Maebashi every year. These are case studies of utilizing M[you]sic for promoting events. The system was configured to entertain the participants: Twittering birds in 2011, Find animals! in 2012 and Various footsteps in 2013. The participants enjoyed M[you]sic as an amusement atraction. Positive appliciation and effects were yielded and problems for further development have been found through the operations.

View full abstract

Social interest in "Planning for Crime Prevention", for the purpose of improving urban crime prevention, is increasing. The previous studies that elucidated the urban environmental factors that affected the crime played a major part in Planning for Crime Prevention, and, furthermore, these findings from the previous studies have been used when we discovered a potentially dangerous area. However, in fact, the urban environmental factors affecting the crime do not cause a crime, and these factors are only hazard of the crimes. Therefore a purpose of this study is to extract crime hazards through literature review to investigate urban environmental indexes that are capable of helping a risk evaluation or analysis. Specifically, the following were conducted. 1) From among domestic journals published from 1980 through 2011, the articles on the relationship between urban environment and crime were sorted; 2) The crime hazards regarding street crimes were extracted from these articles.

View full abstract

We have studied photoconductive properties for a phthalocyanine (H₂PC)-ZnO system in order to advance the photovoltaic properties of this economical system composed of their nanoparticles. The H₂PC-ZnO paste containing a binding polymer has been prepared to fabricate the photoconductive films on ITO substrates. It has been shown that dispersion of ZnO nanoparticles has dominated I-V characteristics of the films. Large photocurrent and rectification have been observed for the film in which ZnO nanoparticles have fully been dispersed.

View full abstract