Biomedical subjects

Takashi Omori

Publications and source records attributed to Takashi Omori.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Is the midnight-to-midnight average concentration of pollutants an appropriate exposure index for a daily mortality study?

Midnight-to-midnight average pollutant concentration has been widely used as the exposure index in many epidemiological studies. This index, however, does not take account of the variability of time of death, because it simply takes 24-h average concentration from midnight to midnight, and this is equivalent to assuming that all deaths happened at the end of the day. This assumption is clearly inappropriate in the real situation, and might be a significant information bias in the exposure assessment. In order to take account of the variability of time of death, a new exposure index, the number-of-death-weighted 24-h average, is introduced in this study. This new index is calculated for each subject by taking 24-h average concentration preceding the time of death. In this study, this new index is applied to the suspended particulate matter (SPM) exposure assessment in Japan, and compared with the result obtained from the conventional index, the midnight-to-midnight average. There are quite large differences in the SPM average concentration between these two indices. Moreover, risk ratio calculated by the new index at time lag 0, where the mortality data and the average concentration data on the same day are used, is a lot larger than that obtained by the conventional one. In addition to the difference in its magnitude, time lag structure (from 1-5 days) also shows the different patterns between these two indices. This study suggests that the conventional exposure index, the midnight-to-midnight average, may evaluate the risk of SPM incorrectly, because of its inadequacy of capturing the temporal variability.

Air Pollutants↗

PubMed2006

Modeling of autonomous problem solving process by dynamic construction of task models in multiple tasks environment.

Traditional reinforcement learning (RL) supposes a complex but single task to be solved. When a RL agent faces a task similar to a learned one, the agent must re-learn the task from the beginning because it doesn't reuse the past learned results. This is the problem of quick action learning, which is the foundation of decision making in the real world. In this paper, we suppose agents that can solve a set of tasks similar to each other in a multiple tasks environment, where we encounter various problems one after another, and propose a technique of action learning that can quickly solve similar tasks by reusing previously learned knowledge. In our method, a model-based RL uses a task model constructed by combining primitive local predictors for predicting task and environmental dynamics. To evaluate the proposed method, we performed a computer simulation using a simple ping-pong game with variations.

Animals↗

PubMed2006

Mouse lymphoma thymidine kinase gene mutation assay: follow-up meeting of the International Workshop on Genotoxicity Testing--Aberdeen, Scotland, 2003--Assay acceptance criteria, positive controls, and data evaluation.

The Mouse Lymphoma Assay (MLA) Workgroup of the International Workshop on Genotoxicity Testing (IWGT), comprised of experts from Japan, Europe, and the United States, met on August 29, 2003, in Aberdeen, Scotland, United Kingdom. This meeting of the MLA Workgroup was devoted to reaching a consensus on the appropriate approach to data evaluation and on acceptance criteria for both the positive and negative/vehicle controls. The Workgroup reached consensus on the acceptance criteria for both the agar and microwell versions of the MLA. Recommendations include acceptable ranges for mutant frequency, cloning efficiency, and suspension growth of the negative/vehicle controls and on criteria to define an acceptable positive control response. The recommendation for the determination of a positive/negative test chemical response includes both the requirement that the response exceeds a defined value [the global evaluation factor (GEF)] and that there also be a positive dose-response (evaluated by an appropriate statistical method).

Animals↗

PubMed2003

Mouse lymphoma thymidine kinase gene mutation assay: International Workshop on Genotoxicity Tests Workgroup report--Plymouth, UK 2002.

The Mouse Lymphoma Assay (MLA) Workgroup of the International Workshop on Genotoxicity Tests (IWGT) met on June 28th and 29th, 2002, in Plymouth, England. This meeting of the MLA group was devoted to discussing the criteria for assay acceptance and appropriate approaches to data evaluation. Prior to the meeting, the group conducted an extensive analysis of data from both the microwell and soft agar versions of the assay. For the establishment of criteria for assay acceptance, 10 laboratories (6 using the microwell method and 4 using soft agar) provided data on their background mutant frequencies, plating efficiencies of the negative/vehicle control, cell suspension growth, and positive control mutant frequencies. Using the distribution curves generated from this data, the Workgroup reached consensus on the range of values that should be used to determine whether an individual experiment is acceptable. In order to establish appropriate approaches for data evaluation, the group used a number of statistical methods to evaluate approximately 400 experimental data sets from 10 laboratories entered into a database created for the earlier MLA Workshop held in New Orleans [Environ. Mol. Mutagen. 40 (2002) 292]. While the Workgroup could not, during this meeting, make a final recommendation for the evaluation of data, a general strategy was developed and the Workgroup members agreed to evaluate this new proposed approach using their own laboratory data. This evaluation should lead to a consensus global approach for data evaluation in the near future.

Animals↗

PubMed2003

Effects of particulate matter on daily mortality in 13 Japanese cities.

BACKGROUND: In recent years, numerous reports demonstrating the relationship between an increase in the concentration of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and daily mortality have been released in the United States and Europe. There have been few studies that clearly characterize the short-term effects of particulate matter on the mortality in Japan. We conducted data analysis to investigate the short-term effects of suspended particulate matter (SPM) on mortality in Japan. METHODS: In this study, we used data sets from the 13 largest cities containing data on the daily mortality of residents aged 65 years or older, concentrations of air pollutants including SPM, temperature, and humidity. Risk ratios for mortality resulting from respiratory diseases, cardiovascular diseases, and all causes other than accidents, from 1990 through 1994, were summarized using a generalized additive model (GAM) and a meta-analysis of random effect model. RESULTS: The risk ratios for an increase of 10 microg/m3 in SPM concentrations adjusted for SO2, NO2, CO, Ox, temperature, and humidity were 1.0077 for all causes of mortality, 1.0109 for respiratory diseases, and 1.0091 for cardiovascular diseases, and the lower limits of the 95% confidence intervals for the risk ratios were greater than one for all cases. With regards to the effects of time lag, risk ratios were higher for the SPM concentrations on the day when the mortality was recorded, and the preceding day. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest a positive relationship between SPM concentrations and daily mortality in Japan.

Aged↗

PubMed2002

A new statistical method for evaluation of L5178Ytk(+/-) mammalian cell mutation data using microwell method.

A statistical method to evaluate data from the mouse lymphoma L5178Y/tk assay (MLA) using microwell method is proposed. This proposed method is designed for data obtained from a single culture protocol instead of the duplicate culture recommended by United Kingdom Environmental Mutagen Society (UKEMS). The proposed method consists of the following three steps: (1) to apply Dunnett type test for identifying clear negative; (2) to apply a Simpson-Margolin procedure for detecting downturn data; and (3) to apply a trend test to evaluate the dose-dependent increase in mutant frequency (MF). The performance of the proposed method was evaluated through a Monte Carlo study and a case study. False positive rates realized in the Monte Carlo study were comparable with the UKEMS method modified for a single culture protocol with the heterogeneity factors being kept at 1.0. False negative rates were less than those of the modified UKEMS method for dose response patterns with a sharp uprise in higher dose groups, whereas, they were comparable for other patterns. The results of evaluating the data from an International Collaborative Study by the proposed method seem comparable with the UKEMS method. The proposed method enables us to evaluate data from the microwell MLA with a single culture protocol.

Animals↗