• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.79-86
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• 2015

$^3He$ gas has been used for neutron monitors as the neutron converter owing to its advantages such as high sensitivity, good ${\gamma}$-discrimination capability, and long-term stability. However, $^3He$ is becoming more difficult to obtain in last few years due to a global shortage of $^3He$ gas. Accordingly, the cost of a neutron monitor using $^3He$ gas as a neutron converter is becoming more expensive. Demand on a neutron monitor using an alternative neutron conversion material is widely increased. $^{10}B$ has many advantages among various $^3He$ alternative materials, as a neutron converter. In order to develop a neutron converter using $^{10}B$ (actually $B_4C$), we calculated the optimal thickness of a neutron converter with a Monte Carlo simulation using MCNP6. In addition, a neutron converter was fabricated by the Ar sputtering method and the neutron signal detection efficiencies were measured with respect to various thicknesses of fabricated a neutron converter. Also, we developed a 2-dimensional multi-wire proportional chamber (MWPC) for neutron beam profile monitoring using the fabricated a neutron converter, and performed experiments for neutron response of the neutron monitor at the 30 MW research reactor HANARO at the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute. The 2-dimensional MWPC with boron ($B_4C$) neutron converter was proved to be useful for neutron beam monitoring, and can be applied to other types of neutron imaging.

• Neonatal Medicine
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.64-74
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• 2010

Purpose : The aim of this study was to determine the risk factors, clinical characteristics and prognosis for the development of periventricular leukomalacia (PVL) in preterm infants according to the extent and site of the PVL. Methods : The medical records of infants (under 36 weeks of gestational age) delivered from January 1999 to December 2008 were reviewed. Twenty-five preterm infants with were PVL were diagnosed by brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and an addition 50preterm infants with no brain lesions were enrolled in this study. The perinatal and neonatal risk factors for the development of PVL was determine in these infants. Mental and Psychomotor Developmental Indices (MDI, PDI) were assessed by a clinical psychologist using the Bayley Scales of Infant Development II. We compared the differences of the clinical characteristics and prognosis according to brain MRI findings. Results : Maternal fever, young maternal age, extended oxygen use, hypotension within the first week of birth, use of inotropics within the first week of birth, and respiratory distress syndrome were the risk factors associated with PVL (P <0.05). In the multivariate analysis, maternal fever and extended oxygen use were statistically significant independent risk factors (P <0.05). The mean MDI and PDI scores of the PVL group (74.4$\pm$ 27.8 and 58.0$\pm$17.7) were significantly lower than those of the control group (103.5$\pm$8.9 and 101.7$\pm$16.1, P <0.05). Conclusion : Maternal fever and extended oxygen use were independent risk factors for PVL. We should pay attention to infants who had the risk factors and follow them up closely by brain imaging study and Bayley Scales of Infant Development II.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.40 no.8
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• pp.542-548
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• 1996

Electrodes modified with threonine, methionine and serine as ligands, which are incorporated by ion exchange into a polycationic film of electropolymerized $[Ru(v-bpy)_3]^{2+}$, have been employed in the determination of mercury in solution. The redox response of the surface-immobilized mercury/ligand complex was used as the analytical signal. When the polymeric film was electropolymerized, the supporting electrolytes were TBAP and $KPF_6$ to compare the morphology and anodic stripping of resulted polymer electrodes. At the case of the latter, the film had high porosity to give an easy incorporation of dopant anions into polymeric film matrix and a high sensitivity in determination of mercury ion. Especially, this polymer modified electrode exhibited possibility of multiple use in mercury determination over ten times. In all cases, calibration curves which were plotted by log of the surface coverage-normalized redox response vs. log[Hg] exhibited an excellent correlation (r=0.99) for mercury concentrations ranging from 1.0{\times}10^{-8}{\sim}1.0{\times}10^{-2}M$. At these curves relative standard deviation was 5∼8% and saturation response was not observed at high concentration region. Serine of the employed ligands had the best sensitivity in analytical application, which had greater stability constant in forming a complex with mercury than others as $pK_{Hg}=8.54$. The formation constants of threonine and methionine were respectively 7.04 and 7.80.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.38 no.6
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• pp.342-351
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• 2017

The neural decoding is a procedure that uses spike trains fired by neurons to estimate features of original stimulus. This is a fundamental step for understanding how neurons talk each other and, ultimately, how brains manage information. In this paper, the strategies of neural decoding are classified into three methodologies: rate decoding, temporal decoding, and population decoding, which are explained. Rate decoding is the firstly used and simplest decoding method in which the stimulus is reconstructed from the numbers of the spike at given time (e. g. spike rates). Since spike number is a discrete number, the spike rate itself is often not continuous and quantized, therefore if the stimulus is not static and simple, rate decoding may not provide good estimation for stimulus. Temporal decoding is the decoding method in which stimulus is reconstructed from the timing information when the spike fires. It can be useful even for rapidly changing stimulus, and our sensory system is believed to have temporal rather than rate decoding strategy. Since the use of large numbers of neurons is one of the operating principles of most nervous systems, population decoding has advantages such as reduction of uncertainty due to neuronal variability and the ability to represent a stimulus attributes simultaneously. Here, in this paper, three different decoding methods are introduced, how the information theory can be used in the neural decoding area is also given, and at the last machinelearning based algorithms for neural decoding are introduced.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.47 no.6
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• pp.715-719
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• 2009

The phase change electrode board for the bio-information detection through electrical property response of phase change material was developed in this study. We manufactured the electrode board using Aluminum first that is widely used in conventional semiconductor device process. Without further treatment, these aluminum electrodes tend to contain voids in PETEOS(plasma enhanced tetraethyoxysilane) material that are easily detected by cross-sectional SEM(Scanning Electron Microscope). The voids can be easily attacked and transformed into holes in between PETEOS and electrodes after etch back and washing process. In order to resolve this issue of Al electrode board, we developed a electrode board manufacturing method using low resistivity TiN, which has advantages in terms of the step-coverage of phase change($Ge_2Sb_2Te_5$, GST) thin film as well as thermodynamic stability, without etch back and washing process. This TiN material serves as the top and bottom electrode in PRAM(Phase-change Random Access Memory). The good connection between the TiN electrode and GST thin film was confirmed by observing the cross-section of TiN electrode board using SEM. The resistances of amorphous and crystalline GST thin film on TiN electrodes were also measured, and 1000 times difference between the amorphous and crystalline resistance of GST thin film was obtained, which is well enough for the signal detection.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.49-62
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• 2017

In order to understand response of geo-structures to the freezing-thawing process in the ground, it is necessary to consider phase change of the pore water of the ground and also to understand soil interaction with structures. In this study, numerical analysis was carried out for freezing and thawing effect on the modular road system. Neumann's theoretical equation for freezing-thawing processes in porous media can be used to estimate frozen depth and heaving from basic soil properties and ground and surface temperature, but its application is limited to the case for the sediment with fully saturated condition and zero unfrozen water content. Numerical analysis of the modular road system was performed on various soil types and different ground water table as the varying freezing index. The amount of heaving in the silty soil was much larger than those in granite weathered soil or sandy soil, and lowering groundwater level reduced ground heaving induced by freezing. Numerical analysis for temperature history of the ground surface predicted residual heaving near the surface by the freeze-thaw process in silty soil. It ought to reduce stiffness and bearing capacity of the ground so that it will impair stability and serviceability of new road system. However, the amount of residual heaving was insignificant for the road system installed in weathered soil granite and sandy soil. Since modular road system is a pavement structure mounted on the supporting substructure unlike the prevalent road pavement system, strict criteria should be applied for uniform and differential settlement of the pavement system.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.709-714
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• 2018

This study researched the reasons for changing polarity in accordance with junction properties in an interface of semiconductors. The contact properties of semiconductors are related to the effect of the semiconductor's device. Therefore, it is an important factor for understanding the junction characteristics in the semiconductor to increase the efficiency of devices. For generation of various junction properties, carbon-doped silicon oxide (SiOC) was deposited with various argon (Ar) gas flow rates, and the characteristics of the SiOC was varied based on the polarity in accordance with the Ar gas flows. Tin-doped zinc oxide (ZTO) as the conductor was deposited on the SiOC as an insulator to research the conductivity. The properties of the SiOC were determined from the formation of a depletion layer by the ionization reaction with various Ar gas flow rates due to the plasma energy. Schottky contact was good in the condition of the depletion layer, with a high potential barrier between the silicon (Si) wafer and the SiOC. The rate of ionization reactions increased when increasing the Ar gas flow rate, and then the potential barrier of the depletion layer was also increased owing to deficient ions from electron-hole recombination at the junction. The dielectric properties of the depletion layer changed to the properties of an insulator, which is favorable for Schottky contact. When the ZTO was deposited on the SiOC with Schottky contact, the stability of the ZTO was improved by the ionic recombination at the interface between the SiOC and the ZTO. The conductivity of ZTO/SiOC was also increased on SiOC film with ideal Schottky contact, in spite of the decreasing charge carriers. It increases the demand on the Schottky contact to improve the thin semiconductor device, and this study confirmed a high-performance device owing to Schottky contact in a low current system. Finally, the amount of current increased in the device owing to ideal Schottky contact.

• Journal of agriculture & life science
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.163-176
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• 2012

TTo increase productivity of a strong extracellular alkaline protease (BCAP), stable strains of Bacillus clausii I-52 carrying another copy of BCAP gene in the chromosome were developed. Integrative vector, pHPS9-fuBCAP carrying BCAP promoter, ribosome binding site, signal sequence and active protease gene was constructed and transferred into B. clausii I-52, and integration of the constructed plasmid into chromosome was identified by PCR. An investigation was carried out on BCAP production by B. clausii I-52 and transformant C5 showing the highest relative activity of alkaline protease using submerged fermentation. Maximum enzyme activity was produced when cells were grown under the submerged fermentation conditions at $37^{\circ}C$ for 48 h with an aeration rate of 1 vvm and agitation rate of 650 rpm in a optimized medium (soybean meal 2%, wheat flour 1%, sodium citrate 0.5%, $K_2HPO_4$ 0.4%, $Na_2HPO_4$ 0.1%, NaCl 0.4%, $MgSO_47H_2O$ 0.01%, $FeSO_47H_2O$ 0.05%, liquid maltose 2.5%, $Na_2CO_3$ 0.6%). A protease yield of approximately 134,670U/ml was achieved using an optimized media, which show an increase of approximately 1.6-fold compared to that of non-transformant (83,960 U/ml). When the stability of transformant C5 was examined, the integrated plasmid pHPS9-fuBCAP was detected in the transformant after cultivation for 8 days, suggesting that it maintained stably in the chromosomal DNA of transformant C5.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.352-361
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• 2021

An underwater positioning method that can be applied to structures for underwater construction is being developed at the Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology. The method uses an extended Kalman filter (EKF) based on an inertial navigation system for precise and continuous position estimation. The observation matrix was configured to be variable in order to apply asynchronous measured sensor data in the correction step of the EKF. A Doppler velocity logger (DVL) can acquire signals only when attached to the bottom of an underwater structure, and it is difficult to install and recover. Therefore, a complex sensor device for underwater structure attachment was developed without a DVL in consideration of an underwater construction environment, installation location, system operation convenience, etc.. Its performance was verified through a water tank test. The results are the measured underwater position using an ultra-short baseline, the estimated position using only a position vector, and the estimated position using position/velocity vectors. The results were compared and evaluated using the circular error probability (CEP). As a result, the CEP of the USBL alone was 0.02 m, the CEP of the position estimation with only the position vector corrected was 3.76 m, and the CEP of the position estimation with the position and velocity vectors corrected was 0.06 m. Through this research, it was confirmed that stable underwater positioning can be carried out using asynchronous sensors without a DVL.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.40 no.3
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• pp.85-91
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• 2024

To realize stable use of ground treated with cementitious materials, the curing process must be evaluated. In this study, a time domain reflectometry (TDR) measurement system was employed to evaluate the curing process of cementitious grout based on the electromagnetic property. A coated probe was manufactured to prevent electrical connection between the electrodes by the electrically conductive cementitious grout, and a calibration process was performed to estimate the actual relative permittivity using the coated probe. To assess the curing process of cementitious grout using the TDR measurement system, cementitious grout with added retarder was prepared with a water-to-cement ratio of 45%. A preliminary measurement was conducted immediately after pouring the cementitious grout into the mold to test the applicability of the coated probe, and TDR signals and relative permittivity were measured at 3~288 hours of curing time. The experimental results demonstrate that the relative permittivity of the cementitious grout immediately after pouring was greater than 100, decreased rapidly over time, and converged to approximately 13.8 at 144 hours, which is considered the fully cured time. This findings of this study demonstrate that the TDR measurement system with a coated probe is applicable to electrically conductive materials. In addition, the TDR measurement system can be used effectively to monitor the curing process of cementitious grout based on electromagnetic properties.