ABSTRACT
This article examines five separate but interrelated cases concerning scientific instruments in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Japan. Instruments like telescopes and clocks were not typically traded goods on the early modern Japanese market, but their use and production show us the inventive activities carried out in later Edo Japan. The first two cases highlight academic activities in Osaka, where scholars, in collaboration with craftsmen, made and used instruments in order to study Western natural sciences. Their activities were possible thanks to wealthy merchants, who promoted the active circulation of things and information. The three other cases are ingenious craftsmen who demonstrate the importance of their contact with academic intellectuals for making and elaborating optical and mechanical instruments. An analysis of their career paths reveals to what extent the goals and outcomes of their inventive activities were constrained and promoted by their social and occupational standing in the feudal society.
Subject(s)
Telescopes , JapanABSTRACT
We herein report a case of recurrent mediastinal cyst infection followed by bacteremia after endobronchial ultrasound-guide transbronchial needle aspiration (EBUS-TBNA). A 65-year-old Japanese male with sarcoidosis presented with 4 L progressive lymph node adenopathy and was diagnosed with mediastinal cyst by EBUS-TBNA. After bronchoscopy, he suffered from a high fever. Chest computed tomography showed enlargement of the 4 L lymph node with low attenuation areas, the elevation of mediastinal fat concentration. Blood cultures were positive for Streptococcus anginosus. Antimicrobial agents were administered for a total of 12 weeks, at which point the size of the lymph node was reduced. However, at 5 months after the discontinuation of antimicrobial agents, the mediastinal cyst infection recurred. It is important to conduct careful follow-up because mediastinal cyst infection following ebus-tbna may relapse with conservative treatment without invasive surgery.
