The purpose of this study is to examine how similarities between product designs manifest themselves in various aspects and how these influences purchasing and usage behavior. Product design similarity evokes positive images, such as a sense of security and familiarity, as well as negative images, such as mimicry and copying. For example, if you have just transferred to another school and your uniform does not match everyone else's, you might feel alienated. On the other hand, in parks and on street corners, wearing the same clothes and belongings can lead to an awkward moment. In the realm of psychology, the former is called the bandwagon effect and the latter is the snob effect. In contrast to the snob effect, which emphasizes scarcity, the bandwagon effect can create fads and hits. People experience both of these emotions, and it is said that using them appropriately and combining them leads to an effective marketing strategy.

Laccase (Lcc; EC 1.10.3.2) belongs to a group of polyphenol oxidases, which catalyzed the oxidation of single-electron from phenolic substrates or aromatic amines. Many organisms possess several lcc encoding genes, and their biological functions diverge into many branches. There are many studies on biochemical function of Lccs, however, there are few studies about biological functions of one Lcc in detail. We researched on biological function of Lcc1, which is most abundantly secreted enzyme from vegetative mycelia into liquid culture in L. edodes. In our previous study, lcc1 gene was down regulated by RNAi method in L. edodes, and then ivrL1#32 was selected as a completely lcc1 dowaregulated transformant. We revealed that fruiting body development in ivrL1#32 was significantly suppressed compared to wild type strain. In this study, we observed the hyphal morphology of ivrL1#32. IvrL1#32 did not form thick aerial mycelium mat when grown on MYPG agar plate. From the observation using scanning electron microscope (SEM), hyphae of ivrL1#32 had many abnormal short branches and their mycelial density was lower than that of wild type strain. From transmission electron microscope observation (TEM), ivrL1#32 lacked obviously distinguishable outer and inner layer in their cell wall. In addition, the fibrous layer of ivrL1#32, which connected hyphae, obviously decreased. These morphological phenotypes would be caused by the absence of Lcc1 in L. edodes. Our results provide a clue to resolve of the biological function of Lcc1 in L. edodes.

Fabrication of bulk alloy has been performed through the consolidation of rapidly solidified ribbons. The bulk alloy exhibited excellent mechanical properties, high tensile yield strength of 530 MPa, and large elongation of 3 %. Microstructure of the alloy was characterized by equiaxed fine grains that consist of -Mg, long period ordered (LPO) structure phase, and -type cubic compound. The strengthening of the alloys may be due to fine grains with LPO structure phase and -type compound.

We developed a telescope control system called ASTROS for the VST1 and VST2, which are specially designed radio telescopes to make a survey and have a 60-cm main dish. ASTROS is designed on the distributed intelligence concept and structurized programming. The hardware of the system is composed of several intelligent devices connected with de facto standard interfaces and main control unit is PC. The program is coded in the C language and its structure is object oriented in order to make easy to replace the component devices. ASTROS is now running on two twin telescopes, VST1 and VST2. VST1 is installed at Nobeyama in Japan and VST2 is installed at La Silla in Chile. They are making a galactic plane survey in CO (J=2-1) with 9 arcmin beam semi-automatically.