The triglucoside of sesaminol, i.e., 2,6-O-di(β-D-glucopyranosyl)-β-D- glucopyranosylsesaminol (STG), occurs abundantly in sesame seeds and sesame oil cake and serves as an inexpensive source for the industrial production of sesaminol, an anti-oxidant that displays a number of bioactivities beneficial to human health. However, STG has been shown to be highly resistant to the action of β-glucosidases, in part due to its branched-chain glycon structure, and these circumstances hampered the efficient utilization of STG. We found that a strain (KB0549) of the genus Paenibacillus produced a novel enzyme capable of efficiently hydrolyzing STG. This enzyme, termed PSTG, was a tetrameric protein consisting of identical subunits with an approximate molecular mass of 80 kDa. The PSTG gene was cloned on the basis of the partial amino acid sequences of the purified enzyme. Sequence comparison showed that the enzyme belonged to the glycoside hydrolase family 3, with significant similarities to the Paenibacillus glucocerebrosidase (63% identity) and to Bgl3B of Thermotoga neapolitana (37% identity). The recombinant enzyme (rPSTG) was highly specific for β-glucosidic linkage, and k cat and k cat/K m values for the rPSTG-catalyzed hydrolysis of p-nitrophenyl-β-glucopyraniside at 37°C and pH 6.5 were 44 s−1 and 426 s−1 mM−1, respectively. The specificity analyses also revealed that the enzyme acted more efficiently on sophorose than on cellobiose and gentiobiose. Thus, rPSTG is the first example of a β-glucosidase with higher reactivity for β-1,2-glucosidic linkage than for β-1,4- and β-1,6-glucosidic linkages, as far as could be ascertained. This unique specificity is, at least in part, responsible for the enzyme’s ability to efficiently decompose STG.

Methods of reducing overdrive memory using fixed block truncation coding (FBTC) have been studied since 2002, and the effects have been described from time to time. To date, our study has developed a timing controller for liquid crystal panels (TCON), and located in this panel, are a compression feedforward driving (cFFD) unit, which constitutes the basic structure, and a motion adaptive CODEC feedforward driving (macFFD) unit, which switches the structure according to the motion. Both driving units are available for the overdrive of 1/3 compressed images. Further in 2006, we proposed a high compression feedforward driving (hcFFD) algorithm for 1/6 compressed image overdrive. This paper reports the technology of hcFFD integrated into a single LSI, in which the performance has been improved and the circuit has been simplified through a review of the algorithm.

This paper provides some interpretations of the Laser TV which we have successfully developed [1]. The Laser TV is an HDTV that adopts solid state lasers involving three primary colors, red, green and blue for the light source. The adoption of a laser light source helped us realize an HDTV with a dramatically wide color gamut, namely 190% the color gamut of ITU-R BT.709. In addition, we have also developed an LSI that can deal with the extended color space xvYCC, which is a new international standard, and mounted the LSI in the HDTV. The display of colorful and natural video pictures has been achieved through the effective use of the wide color gamut involved in the laser light source supported by a video signal processing circuit that complies with the xvYCC standard and Natural Color Matrix, a color management technique.

We have developed High Compression Feedforward Driving (hcFFD) that can compress the image data stored in the frame memory of overdrive down to 1/6. Together with the optimization of the encoding parameters of macFFD, which belongs to the previous generation, this hcFFD technique corrects the response time of liquid crystal with smaller and less memory by means of a system that dynamically controls the bit rate allocated to the luminance signal and the color signal. This 1/6 reduction of image data allows us to structure a memory interface with a 16-bit data bus even on high-definition LCD panels, ensuring both low cost and secured performance.

We have developed the 6 primary color PTV. Because of the newly developed 6-color color wheel, the 6-color light engine combined with the high-efficiency UHP lamp and our independent Plush1080p TM technology, the newly developed PTV ensures high brightness, a wide color gamut and high contrast.