• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.100-112
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• 2001

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to establish optimal imaging acquisition conditions for the GE $Advance^{TM}$ PET imaging system by performing the acceptance tests designed by National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) protocol and General Electric Medical Systems (GEMS) test procedures. Materials and Methods: Performance tests were carried out with $^{18}FDG$ radioactivity source and phantoms by using a standard acquisition mode. Transaxial resolution and scatter traction tests were performed with a line source and axial resolution with a point source, respectively. A cylindrical phantom made of polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) was used to measure sensitivity, count rate losses and randoms, uniformity correction, and attenuation inserts were added to measure remaining tests. The test results were acquired in a diagnostic acquisition mode and analyzed mainly on high sensitivity mode. Results: Transaxial resolution and axial resolution were measured as average of 4.65 mm and 3.98 mm at 0 cm, and 6.02 mm and 6.71 mm at 20 cm on high sensitivity mode, respectively. Average scatter fraction was 9.87%, and sensitivity was $225.8kcps/{\mu}Ci/cc$ of trues. Activity at 50% deadtime was $4.6{\mu}Ci/cc$, and the error of count rate correction at that activity was from 1.49% to 3.83%. Average nonuniformity for total slice w3s 8.37%. The accuracy of scatter correction was -0.95%. The accuracies of attenuation correction were 5.68% for air, 0.04% for water and -6.51% for polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE). Conclusion: The results satisfied most acceptance criteria, indicating that the GE $Advance^{TM}$ PET system can be optimally used for clinical applications.

• Journal of Advanced Marine Engineering and Technology
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• v.36 no.6
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• pp.794-801
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• 2012

Finite Element Method is a strong tool to analyse static and dynamic problem of a structure. FEM is a good method for static problem, but for dynamic problem there are some differences between real phenomena and analyzed phenomena. Therefore some modifications are needed to identify two results. In this paper authors propose a genetic algorithm method 1) to adjust dimensions of plate for identifying natural frequencies, 2) to fit amplitude of FEM Frequency Response Function(FRF) onto it of real FRF. Analysis by raw FEM data gave questions if the results were for the same object. By only adjusting Young's modulus much better accordances were obtained, but limitation existed still. Very good agreements were achieved by shape modification and damping coefficient identification.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.594-605
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• 2003

Pinching is an important property of reinforced concrete member which characterizes its cyclic behavior. In the present study, numerical studies were performed to investigate the characteristics of pinching behavior and the energy dissipation capacity of flexure-dominated reinforced concrete members. By investigating existing experiments and numerical results, it was found that flexural pinching which has no relation with shear action appears in RC members subject to axial compression force. However, members with specific arrangement and amount of re-bars, have the same energy dissipation capacity regardless of the magnitude of the axial force applied even though the shape of the cyclic curve varies due to the effect of the axial force. This indicates that concrete as a brittle material does not significantly contribute to the energy dissipation capacity though its effect on the behavior increases as the axial force increases, and that energy dissipation occurs primarily by re-bars. Therefore, the energy dissipation capacity of flexure-dominated member can be calculated by the analysis on the cross-section subject to pure bending, regardless of the actual compressive force applied. Based on the findings, a practical method and the related design equations for estimating energy dissipation capacity and damping modification factor was developed, and their validity was verified by the comparisons with existing experiments. The proposed method can be conveniently used in design practice because it accurately estimates energy dissipation capacity with general design parameters.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.93-101
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• 2015

Purpose In SPECT image, scatter count is the cause of quantitative count error and image quality degradation. Thus, a wide range of scatter correction(SC) methods have been studied and this study is to evaluate the accuracy of CT based SC(CTSC) used in SPECT/CT as the comparison with existing energy window based SC(EWSC). Materials and Methods SPECT/CT images were obtained after filling air in order to acquire a reference image without the influence of scatter count inside the Triple line insert phantom setting hot rod(74.0 MBq) in the middle and each SPECT/CT image was obtained each separately after filling water instead of air in order to derive the influence of scatter count under the same conditions. In both conditions, Astonish(iterative : 4 subset : 16) reconstruction method and CT attenuation correction were commonly applied and three types of SC methods such as non-scatter correction(NSC), EWSC, CTSC were used in images filled with image. For EWSC, 9 sub-energy windows were set additionally in addition to main(=peak) energy window(140 keV, 20%) and then, images were acquired at the same time and five types of EWSC including DPW(dual photo-peak window)10%, DEW(dual energy window)20%, TEW(triple energy window)10%, TEW5.0%, TEW2.5% were used. Under the condition without fluctuations in primary count, total count was measured by drawing volume of interest (VOI) in the images of the two conditions and then, the ratio of scatter count of total counts was calculated as percent scatter fraction(%SF) and the count error with image filled with water was evaluated with percent normalized mean-square error(%NMSE) based on the image filled with air. Results Based on the image filled with air, %SF of images filled with water to which each SC method was applied is NSC 37.44, DPW 27.41, DEW 21.84, TEW10% 19.60, TEW5% 17.02, TEW2.5% 14.68, CTSC 5.57 and the most scattering counts were removed in CTSC and %NMSE is NSC 35.80, DPW 14.28, DEW 7.81, TEW10% 5.94, TEW5% 4.21, TEW2.5% 2.96, CTSC 0.35 and the error in CTSC was found to be the lowest. Conclusion In SPECT/CT images, the application of each scatter correction method used in the experiment could improve the quantitative count error caused by the influence of scatter count. In particular, CTSC showed the lowest %NMSE(=0.35) compared to existing EWSC methods, enabling relatively accurate scatter correction.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.548-559
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• 1996

A series of performance measurements of positron emission tomography (PET) were performed following the recommendations of the Computer and Instrumentation Council of the Society of Nuclear Medicine and the National Electrical Manufacturers Association. We investigated the performance of the General Electric $Advance^{TM}$ PET. The measurements include the basic intrinsic tests of spatial resolution, scatter fraction, sensitivity, and count rate losses and randoms. They also include the tests of the accuracy of corrections: count rate linearity correction, uniformity correction, scatter correction and attenuation correction. GE $Advance^{TM}$ PET has bismuth germanate oxide crystals (4.0mm transaxial ${\times}$ 8.1mm axial ${\times}$ 30.0mm radial) in 18 rings, which form 35 imaging planes spaced by 4.25mm. The system has retractable tungsten septa 1mm thick and 12cm long. Transaxial resolution was 4.92mm FWHM in 2D and 5.14mm FWHM in 3D at the center. Average axial resolution in 2D decreased from 3.91mm FWHM at the center to 6.49mm FWHM at R=20cm. Average scatter fraction of direct and cross slices was 9.57%. Dead-time losses of 50% corresponded to a radioactivity concentration of $4.86{\mu}Ci/cc$ and a true count rate of 519 kcps in 2D. The accuracy of count rate linearity correction was 1.84% at the activity of $4.50{\mu}Ci/cc$. Non-uniformity was 2.06% in 2D and 2.93% in 3D. Remnant errors after scatter correction were 0.55% in 2D and 4.12% in 3D. The errors of attenuation correction were 6.21% (air), 0.20% (water), -6.32% (teflon) in 2D and 5.00% (air), 6.94% (water), 3.01% (teflon) in 3D. The results indicate the performance of GE $Advance^{TM}$ PET scanner to be well suited for clinical and research applications.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.235-240
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• 2008

Purpose: At the beginning of PET/CT, Computed Tomography was mainly used only for Attenuation Correction (AC), but as the performance of the CT have been increase, it could give improved diagnostic information with Contrast Media. But it was controversial that Contrast Media could affect AC on PET/CT scan. Some submitted thesis' show that Contrast Media could overestimate when it is for AC data processing. On the contrary, the opinion that Contrast Media could be possible to affect the alteration of SUV because of the overestimated AC. But it does not have a definite effect on the diagnosis. Thus, the affection of Contrast Media on AC was investigated in this study. Materials and Methods: Patient inclusion criteria required a history of a malignancy and performance of an integrated PET/CT scan and contrast- enhanced CT scan within a 1-day period. Thirty oncologic patients who had PET/CT scan from December 2007 to June 2008 underwent staging evaluation and met these criteria. All patients fasted for at least 6 hr before the IV injection of approximately 5.6 MBq/kg (0.15 mCi/kg) of $^{18}F$-FDG and were scanned about 60 min after injection. All patients had a whole body PET/CT performed without IV contrast media followed by a contrast-enhanced CT on the Discovery STe PET/CT scanner. CT data were used for AC and PET images came out after AC. The ROIs drew and measured SUV. A paired t-test of these results was performed to assess the significance of the difference between the SUV obtained from the two attenuation corrected PET images. Results: The mean and maximum Standardized Uptake Values (SUV) for different regions averaged over all Patients. Comparing before using Contrast Media and after using, Most of ROIs have the increased SUV when it did Contrast Enhanced CT compare to Non-Contrast enhanced CT. All regions have increased SUV and also their p value was under 0.05 except the mean SUV of the Heart region. Conclusion: In this regard, the effect on SUV measurements that occurs when a contrast-enhanced CT is used for attenuation correction could have significant clinical ramifications. But some submitted thesis insisted that the percentage change in SUV that can determine or modify clinical management of oncology patients is small. Because there was not much difference that could be discovered by interpreter. But obviously the numerical change was occurred and on the stage finding primary region, small change would be base line, such as the region of liver which has greater change than the other regions needs more attention.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.49-61
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• 2014

Purpose: With the aging of the population, the attack rate of osteoporotic vertebral compression fracture is in the increasing trend, and percutaneous vertebroplasty (PVP) is the most commonly performed standardized treatment. Although there is a research report of the excellence of usefulness of the SPECT/CT examination in terns of the exact diagnosis before and after the procedure, the bone cement material used in the procedure influences the image quality by forming an artifact in the CT image. Therefore, the objective of the research lies on evaluating the effect the bone cement gives to a SPECT/CT image. Materials and Methods: The images were acquired by inserting a model cement to each cylinder, after setting the background (3.6 kBq/mL), hot cylinder (29.6 kBq/mL) and cold cylinder (water) to the NEMA-1994 phantom. It was reconstructed with Astonish (Iterative: 4 Subset: 16), and non attenuation correction (NAC), attenuation correction (AC+SC-) and attenuation and scatter correction (AC+SC+) were used for the CT correction method. The mean count by each correction method and the count change ratio by the existence of the cement material were compared and the contrast recovery coefficient (CRC) was obtained. Additionally, the bone/soft tissue ratio (B/S ratio) was obtained after measuring the mean count of the 4 places including the soft tissue(spine erector muscle) after dividing the vertebral body into fracture region, normal region and cement by selecting the 20 patients those have performed PVP from the 107 patients diagnosed of compression fracture. Results: The mean count by the existence of a cement material showed the rate of increase of 12.4%, 6.5%, 1.5% at the hot cylinder of the phantom by NAC, AC+SC- and AC+SC+ when cement existed, 75.2%, 85.4%, 102.9% at the cold cylinder, 13.6%, 18.2%, 9.1% at the background, 33.1%, 41.4%, 63.5% at the fracture region of the clinical image, 53.1%, 61.6%, 67.7% at the normal region and 10.0%, 4.7%, 3.6% at the soft tissue. Meanwhile, a relative count reduction could be verified at the cement adjacent part at the inside of the cylinder, and the phantom image on the lesion and the count increase ratio of the clinical image showed a contrary phase. CRC implying the contrast ratio and B/S ratio was improved in the order of NAC, AC+SC-, AC+SC+, and was constant without a big change in the cold cylinder of the phantom. AC+SC- for the quantitative count, and AC+SC+ for the contrast ratio was analyzed to be the highest. Conclusion: It is considered to be useful in a clinical diagnosis if the application of AC+SC+ that improves the contrast ratio is combined, as it increases the noise count of the soft tissue and the scatter region as well along with the effect of the bone cement in contrast to the fact that the use of AC+SC- in the spine SPECT/CT examination of a PVP performed patient drastically increases the image count and enables a high density of image of the lesion(fracture).

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.383-389
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• 2011

In this paper, a statistical calibration method is proposed in order to identify the variability of complex modulus for a rubber material due to operational temperature and experimental/model errors. To describe temperature- and frequency-dependent material properties, a fractional derivative model and a shift factor relationship are used. A likelihood function is defined as a product of the probability density functions where experimental values lie on the model. The variation of the fractional derivative model parameters is obtained by maximizing the likelihood function. Using the proposed method, the variability of a synthetic rubber material is estimated and applied to a rubber mount problem. The dynamic characteristics of the rubber mount are calculated using a finite element model of which material properties are sampled from Monte Carlo simulation. The calculated dynamic stiffnesses show very large variation.

• Proceedings of the Korea Water Resources Association Conference
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• 2012.05a
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• pp.277-277
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• 2012

국립기상연구소(National Institute of Meteorological Research; NIMR)는 기상청 이중편파 레이더 현업운영에 대비하여 2009년 X-band 연구용 이중편파 레이더를 도입하였고, 편파변수의 산출과 대기수상체 분류를 포함한 강수추정 등의 효용 가능성에 대한 연구를 지난 2년간 수행하고 있다. 이중편파 레이더는 반사도( )뿐만 아니라 차등반사도($Z_R$), 비차등 위상($K_{DP}$), 상관계수($_v$)등의 편파 변수의 산출로 강우감쇠보정과 기상에코-비기상의 에코(ground clutter, insects, birds, chaff)의 구별이 가능하다. 이러한 장점들을 이용해 레이더 자료품질 개선과 정량적 강수추정의 상당한 개선에 도움이 된다. 본 연구에서는 강수추정 관계식 R-Z, 감쇠 보정된 R-Z, R-$K_{DP}$ 관계식을 이용하여 레이더 관측 반경 내에 존재 하는 81개의 지상 우량계 자료와 강수량 추정의 정확도 비교 검증을 실시하였다. 그리고 Fuzzy logic 기법을 이용한 대기수상체 분류 알고리즘을 사용하였고 관측사례는 2011년 수도권 관측을 통해 강설/강수 에코 구별과 우박에코 사례를 분석하였다. 본 연구를 통해 이중 편파 레이더에서 산출된 고품질의 레이더기상자료를 기반으로 현업 예보지원 및 정량적 강우예측 향상에도 기여할 것으로 사료된다.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.35-43
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• 2012

Purpose : PET/CT performed CT-based attenuation correction generates the beam hardening artifact by metallic implant. The attenuation correction causes over or underestimate of the area adjacent to metallic hip prosthetic material and change of $^{18}F$-FDG uptake. Also, the image quality and the diagnosability on genitourinary disease are reduced. Therefore, this study will evaluate the usefulness of MAR (Metal Artifact Reduction) algorithm method to improve the image quality on PET/CT. Materials and Methods : PET/CT was performed by fixing hip prosthesis in SPECT/PET phantom. In PET images with and Without MAR algorithm, the Bright streak, Dark streak, Metal region and Background area that appeared on CT were confirmed, and the change of each SUV (standardized uptake value) was analyzed. Also, in 15 patients who underwent total hip arthroplasty, each MAR algorithm and Without MAR algorithm and non attenuation correction was evaluated. Results : In PET image Without MAR algorithm, SUV of Bright streak region was $0.98{\pm}0.48$ g/ml; Dark streak region was $0.88{\pm}0.02$ g/ml; Metal region was $0.24{\pm}0.16$ g/ml, Background area was $0.91{\pm}0.18$ g/ml. In SUV of PET image with MAR algorithm, Bright streak region was $0.88{\pm}0.49$ g/ml, Dark streak region was $0.63{\pm}0.21$ g/ml, Metal region was $0.06{\pm}0.07$ g/ml, Background was $0.90{\pm}0.02$ g/ml. SUV generally decreased when applying MAR algorithm. In PET image Without MAR algorithm, SUVs of Bright region were higher than those measured in the Background, and it was false positive uptake. But, in PET image with MAR algorithm, SUVs of Bright region were similar to the Background, and false positive uptake disappeared. Conclusion : MAR algorithm could reduce an increase of $^{18}F$-FDG uptake due to attenuation correction in the hip surrounding tissue. However, decrease of SUV in Dark streak region should be considered in the future. Therefore, this study propose that the diagnostic accuracy can be improved in genitourinary diseases adjacent to metallic hip prosthesis, if provided PET images with and Without MAR algorithm, and non attenuation correction images at the same time.