The control of crop diseases still largely relies on spray applications of standard synthetic fungicides. As a result, the development of fungicide resistance by pathogens is a major limiting factor for the control of diseases. In this paper, the recent outbreak of practical resistance to fungicides including sterol demethylation inhibitor (DMI), Quinone outside inhibitor (QoI), and succinate dehydrogenase inhibitor (SDHI) fungicides as well as the progress of related research will be discussed. To combat resistance development, the Research Committee on Fungicide Resistance, the Phytopathological Society of Japan, was established in 1991 and has been conducting several activities. The Committee made a guideline indicating how to use at-risk fungicides. The occurrence of fungicide resistance may rather increase in the future as the choice of fungicides is often difficult due to the lack of effective alternatives. Development and integration of disease management tools such as disease-resistant or -tolerant cultivars and non-fungitoxic disease resistance inducers need to be accelerated more rapidly not only to dissolve the problem of fungicide resistance but also to reply public concerns about agrochemicals.

Lotus-type porous nickel with cylindrical pores was fabricated by unidirectional solidification under an Ar gas atmosphere using the thermal decomposition method of the compounds such as sodium hydroxide, calcium hydroxide, calcium carbonate, and titanium hydride. The decomposed gas does form the pores in liquid nickel, and then, the pores become the cylindrical pores during unidirectional solidification. The decomposed particles from the compounds do play a rule on nucleation sites of the pores. The behavior of pore growth was controlled by atmosphere pressure, which can be explained by Boyle's law. The porosity and pore size decreased with increasing Ar gas pressure when the pores contain hydrogen gas decomposed from calcium and sodium hydroxide and titanium hydride, ; however it they did not change when the pores contain containing carbon dioxide decomposed from calcium carbonate. These results indicate that nickel does not have the solubility of carbon dioxide. Lotus-type porous metals can be easily fabricated by the thermal decomposition method, which is superior to the conventional fabrication method used to pressurized gas atmospheres.

Eczema due to contact allergy is usually produced by simple chemicals with the molecules less than 500 KD. A total of 100 cultivated house dust mites (HDM) were extracted with their lipid components in hexane, and they were analyzed by mass measuring gas chromatography. The same components were mixed in petrolatum at 5% or less, and patch tested using Finn Chambers, and the results were read by ICDRG standards. α-Acaridial, contained in Tyrophagus putrescentiae, turned out to have been a primary sensitizer, and could make prurigo reactions. Geranial, a main lipid component in dermatophagoides, showed positive rates at 58.8% at 5% concentration in atopic dermatitis and was expected to cross react to geraniol in cosmetics and soaps. It means that when one is sensitized by HDM, eczema can be provoked and maintained by the usage of ordinary soaps, shampoos and cosmetics, containing geraniol.

The sintered parts are mainly used for automobile industry, and a part of air conditioners. In automobile industry, the application range of sintered parts is very broad and use for a driving and a lubricating system. And air conditioner uses them for compressor. Grinding of compressor and pump parts is very difficult these days, because these parts use High hardness materials and require high precision grinding. Tool life has to be extended to decrease production cost. We analyzed processing mechanism and developed new grinding wheels for Double Disk Grinding. And, we introduce new truing technology that improved tool-life and precision.

From a viewpoint of heat stress at high temperatures and contact thermal resistance, it is confirmed that the optimal structure is the skeleton structure using Cu substrate on the cooling side, which has excellent heat conductivity and the optimal installation method is to adopt a carbon sheet and a mica sheet to the high temperature side, where Si grease is applied to the low temperature side, under pressurized condition. The power of the developed modules indicated 0.5W in an module and 3.8 W with a SiGe module at 823K, respectively.