A spherical cat's-eye retroreflector made from a glass material having a refractive index of two was developed. The geometrical sphericity of the cat's eye and the sphericity examined optically were approximately 100 nm and 500 nm respectively. The discrepancy between these two values is discussed. This optical device is very versatile in terms of applications since it is free from viewing angle restrictions.

The results of the APMP key comparisons on ball plate and hole plate (APMP.L-K6.2007) are reported. Both transfer standards were provided by NMIJ, Japan. The ball plate standard is 532 mm by 532 mm in nominal dimension and 25 spheres are embedded. Thirteen National Metrology Institutes (8 from APMP, 5 from other Regional Metrology Organizations) participated in the ball plate measurement comparison. The hole plate standard is 550 mm by 550 mm in nominal dimension and there are 44 cylindrical holes in it. Nine National Metrology Institutes (5 from APMP, 4 from other Regional Metrology Organizations) participated in the hole plate measurement comparison. The comparison started in May 2006 and finished in October 2008. The participants used different measurement techniques which were used for their routine calibration services. For determining the key comparison reference values, a two-dimensional coordinates-based analysis was performed. The measurement results on the ball plate show good agreement in ten out of thirteen participants. In contrast, those on the hole plate are in agreement for five out of nine participants.Main text. To reach the main text of this paper, click on Final Report. Note that this text is that which appears in Appendix B of the BIPM key comparison database kcdb.bipm.org/.The final report has been peer-reviewed and approved for publication by the CCL, according to the provisions of the CIPM Mutual Recognition Arrangement (CIPM MRA).

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Background. Colorectal cancer (CRC) is among the most common cancers diagnosed worldwide. Although genome-wide association studies have effectively identified the genetic basis of CRC, there is still unexplained variability in genetic risk. Transcriptome-wide association studies (TWAS) integrate summary statistics from CRC genome-wide association studies (GWAS) with gene expression data to prioritize these GWAS findings and uncover additional gene-trait correlations. Methods. First, we carried out a post-GWAS analysis using summary statistics from a large-scale GWAS of CRC ( n = 4,562 cases, n = 382,756 controls). Second, combined with the expression weight sets from GTEx (v7), susceptibility genes were identified with the FUSION software. Colocalization, conditional and fine-mapping analyses, phenome-wide association study (pheWAS), and Mendelian randomization were employed to further characterize the observed correlations. Results. In the post-GWAS analyses, we first identified new genome-wide significant associations: three genomic risk loci were identified at 8q24.21 (rs6983267, P = 6.98 × 10 − 12 ), 15q13.3 (rs58658771, P = 1.40 × 10 − 10 ), and 18q21.1 (rs6507874, P = 1.91 × 10 − 14 ). In addition, the TWAS also identified four loci statistically significantly associated with CRC risk, largely explained by expression regulation, including six candidate genes (DUSP10, POU5F1B, C11orf53, COLCA1, COLCA2, and GREM1-AS1). We further discovered evidence that low expression of COLCA2 is correlated with CRC risk with Mendelian randomization. Conclusions. We discovered novel CRC risk loci and candidate functional genes by merging gene expression and GWAS summary data, offering new insight into the molecular processes underlying CRC development. This makes it easier to prioritize potential genes for follow-up functional research in CRC.