• Journal of the Korean Geosynthetics Society
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.1-7
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• 2024

Various innovative technologies and methods are being applied to ensure the stability of steep rock slopes. However, there are design limitations concerning site ground conditions, leading to discrepancies between the designed and actual ground conditions during construction. In the case of the retaining wall in Yeosu, where the study area is located, although the construction of a 5-stage retaining wall is planned, at the current completion of the second stage, cracks on the upper part of the wall, settlement in the front of the wall, and seepage have been observed. After the completion of stages one and two, issues regarding cracks and settlement on the upper part of the wall and seepage in the front of the wall were discovered. Thus, there was a need to reevaluate the results of the existing stability assessment. It was confirmed that the issue was due to groundwater leakage, attributed to the lack of clear assessment of the colluvial soil layer during the initial design stage. Therefore, to conservatively reflect groundwater level conditions, a groundwater level contour was positioned at the top of the wall to conduct a slope stability assessment. The assessment results indicated that the safety factor during the rainy season exceeded the required value of 1.3, with a calculated safety factor of 1.31. However, during seismic events, the safety factor was determined to be 1.12, falling short of the required safety factor of 1.3. Therefore, it is suggested that the existing retaining walls constructed during stages one and two undergo reinforcement using methods such as micro-piles with grouting, and additional work should be carried out to ensure a clear assessment of the colluvial soil layer.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.57 no.2
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• pp.271-280
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• 2024

This study examines the European Union (EU)'s policies on managing nitrate contamination in groundwater and provides implications for the future groundwater management in South Korea. Initiated by the 1991 Nitrate Directive, the EU has pursued a multifaceted approach to reduce agricultural nitrate pollution through sustainable ('good') farming practices, regular nitrate level monitoring, and designating Nitrate Vulnerable Zones. Further policy integrations, like the Water Framework Directive and Groundwater Directive, have established comprehensive protection strategies, including the use of pollutant threshold values. Recently, the 2019 Green Deal escalated efforts against nitrates, aligning with broader environmental and climate objectives. This review aims to explore these developments, highlighting key mitigation strategies against nitrate pollution, and providing valuable insights for the future sustainable groundwater nitrate management in South Korea, emphasizing the importance of preventive measures and collaborative efforts to restore and improve groundwater quality.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.57 no.1
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• pp.51-71
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• 2024

Seismic exploration is one of the widely used geophysical exploration methods with various applications such as resource development, geotechnical investigation, and subsurface monitoring. It is essential for interpreting the geological characteristics of subsurface by providing accurate images of stratum structures. Typically, geological features are interpreted by visually analyzing seismic sections. However, recently, quantitative analysis of seismic data has been extensively researched to accurately extract and interpret target geological features. Seismic attribute analysis can provide quantitative information for geological interpretation based on seismic data. Therefore, it is widely used in various fields, including the analysis of oil and gas reservoirs, investigation of fault and fracture, and assessment of shallow gas distributions. However, seismic attribute analysis is sensitive to noise within the seismic data, thus additional noise attenuation is required to enhance the accuracy of the seismic attribute analysis. In this study, four kinds of seismic noise attenuation methods are applied and compared to mitigate random noise of poststack seismic data and enhance the attribute analysis results. FX deconvolution, DSMF, Noise2Noise, and DnCNN are applied to the Youngil Bay high-resolution seismic data to remove seismic random noise. Energy, sweetness, and similarity attributes are calculated from noise-removed seismic data. Subsequently, the characteristics of each noise attenuation method, noise removal results, and seismic attribute analysis results are qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed. Based on the advantages and disadvantages of each noise attenuation method and the characteristics of each seismic attribute analysis, we propose a suitable noise attenuation method to improve the result of seismic attribute analysis.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.185-195
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• 2024

The Incheon Metro Line 1 Geomdan Extension Phase 1 is the first project in South Korea where both a roadheader and TBM (Tunnel Boring Machine) are being used together. The shield TBM tunnel section is 1,057 m long, and is mostly composed of rock, including the section beneath the Airport Railroad and the Gyeongin Ara Waterway. A 7.8 m earth pressure balance shield TBM was used for tunnel excavation. The average monthly advance rate for both the North and South tracks is 239.1 m, with a maximum monthly advance rate of 334.5 m. This technical article comprehensively evaluates the productivity of the shield TBM, focusing on the TBM excavation performance. Above all, it aims to provide useful reference material for the successful execution of shield TBM tunnel construction.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.208-217
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• 2024

There is so much research effort for developing and implementing deep learning-based surveillance systems to manage health and safety issues in construction sites. Especially, the development of deep learning-based object detection in various environmental changes has been progressing because those affect decreasing searching performance of the model. Among the various environmental variables, the accuracy of the object detection model is significantly dropped under low illuminance, and consistent object detection accuracy cannot be secured even the model is trained using low-light images. Accordingly, there is a need of low-light enhancement to keep the performance under low illuminance. Therefore, this paper conducts a comparative study of various deep learning-based low-light image enhancement models (GLADNet, KinD, LLFlow, Zero-DCE) using the acquired construction site image data. The low-light enhanced image was visually verified, and it was quantitatively analyzed by adopting image quality evaluation metrics such as PSNR, SSIM, Delta-E. As a result of the experiment, the low-light image enhancement performance of GLADNet showed excellent results in quantitative and qualitative evaluation, and it was analyzed to be suitable as a low-light image enhancement model. If the low-light image enhancement technique is applied as an image preprocessing to the deep learning-based object detection model in the future, it is expected to secure consistent object detection performance in a low-light environment.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.218-230
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• 2024

Recently, many studies have been conducted for safety management in construction sites by incorporating computer vision. Anchor box parameters are used in state-of-the-art deep learning-based object detection and segmentation, and the optimized parameters are critical in the training process to ensure consistent accuracy. Those parameters are generally tuned by fixing the shape and size by the user's heuristic method, and a single parameter controls the training rate in the model. However, the anchor box parameters are sensitive depending on the type of object and the size of the object, and as the number of training data increases. There is a limit to reflecting all the characteristics of the training data with a single parameter. Therefore, this paper suggests a method of applying multiple parameters optimized through data split to solve the above-mentioned problem. Criteria for efficiently segmenting integrated training data according to object size, number of objects, and shape of objects were established, and the effectiveness of the proposed data split method was verified through a comparative study of conventional scheme and proposed methods.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.231-247
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• 2024

In the field of high-level radioactive waste disposal targeting deep rock environments, hydraulic characteristic information serves as the most important key factor in selecting relevant disposal sites, detailed design of disposal facilities, derivation of optimal construction plans, and safety evaluation during operation. Since various rock types are mixed and distributed in a small area in Korea, it is important to conduct preliminary work to analyze the hydrogeological characteristics of rock aquifers for various rock types and compile the resulting data into a database. In this paper, we obtained hydraulic conductivity data, which is the most representative field hydraulic characteristic of a high-depth volcanic bedrock aquifer, and also analyzed and evaluated the field data. To acquire field data, we used a high-performance hydraulic testing system developed in-house and applied standardized test methods and investigation procedures. In the process of hydraulic characteristic data analysis, hydraulic conductivity values were obtained for each depth, and the pattern of groundwater flow through permeable rock joints located in the test section was also evaluated. It is expected that the series of data acquisition methods, procedures, and analysis results proposed in this report can be used to build a database of hydraulic characteristics data for high-depth rock aquifers in Korea. In addition, it is expected that it will play a role in improving technical know-how to be applied to research on hydraulic characteristic according to various bedrock types in the future.

• Smart Media Journal
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• v.12 no.11
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• pp.185-197
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• 2023

This study was conducted using text mining and network theory to extract useful information for application for occupancy and performance of permit tasks contained in the permit contents from the permit register, which is used only for the simple purpose of recording occupancy permit information. Based on text mining, we analyzed and compared the frequency of vocabulary occurrence and topic modeling in five regions, including Seoul, Gyeonggi, Gyeongsang, Jeolla, Chungcheong, and Gangwon, as well as normalization processes such as stopword removal and morpheme analysis. By applying four types of centrality algorithms, including stage, proximity, mediation, and eigenvector, which are widely used in network theory, we looked at keywords that are in a central position or act as an intermediary in the network. Through a comprehensive analysis of vocabulary appearance frequency, topic modeling, and network centrality, it was found that the 'installation' keyword was the most influential in all regions. This is believed to be the result of the Ministry of Environment's permit management office issuing many permits for constructing facilities or installing structures. In addition, it was found that keywords related to road facilities, flood control facilities, underground facilities, power/communication facilities, sports/park facilities, etc. were at a central position or played a role as an intermediary in topic modeling and networks. Most of the keywords appeared to have a Zipf's law statistical distribution with low frequency of occurrence and low distribution ratio.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.39-45
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• 2024

Seismic safety of expansion joints for piping systems has been underscored by water pipe ruptures and leaks resulting from the Gyeongju and Pohang earthquakes. Metal bellows in piping systems are applied to prevent damage from earthquakes and road subsidence in soft ground. Designed with a series of corrugated segments called convolutions, metal bellows exhibit flexibility to accommodate displacements. Several studies have examined variations in convolution shapes and layers based on the intended performance to be evaluated. Nonetheless, the research on the seismic performance of complex bellows having multiple corrugation heights is limited. In this study, monotonic loading tests, cyclic loading tests, and fatigue tests were conducted to evaluate the shear performance in seismic conditions, of metal bellows with variable convolution heights. Single- and triple-layer bellows were considered for the experimentation. The results reveal that triple-layer bellows exhibit larger maximum deformation and fatigue life than single-layer bellows. However, the high stiffness of triple-layer bellows in resisting internal pressure poses certain disadvantages. The convolutions are less flexible at lower displacements and experience leakage at a rate related to the variable height of the convolutions in certain conditions. At lower deformation rates, the fatigue life is rated higher as the number of layers increase. It converges to a similar fatigue life at higher deformation rates.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.32-38
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• 2024

In the case of apartment building, it is difficult to conduct non-destructive testing due to the actual presence of people and the dust and noise generated during the core test, so inspections are performed each time in the common area and underground parking lot, and the tests are conducted on the finishing material rather than on the concrete surface due to low-cost orders. As the process progresses, poor inspection is inevitable. In addition, the proposed formulas for strength estimation have large fluctuations depending on the differences in test conditions and environments, and even if they show the same measured value, the deviation between each proposed formula is large, making it difficult to accurately estimate strength, making it difficult to use. Accordingly, we would like to select finishing materials mainly used in apartment complexes and compare and evaluate the compressive strength of concrete according to the type of finishing material by using non-destructive testing methods directly on the finishing materials without removing the finishing materials. The reliability evaluation results of the estimated compressive strength of concrete using the ultrasonic velocity method according to the type of finishing material are as follows. The error rate between the estimated compressive strength and compressive strength derived through the ultrasonic velocity method shows a wide range of variation, ranging from 21.83% to 58.89%. The effect of the presence or absence of finishing materials on the estimated compressive strength was found to be insignificant. Accordingly, it is necessary to select more types of finishing materials and study ultrasonic velocity methods according to the presence or absence of finishing materials, and to study estimation techniques that can increase reliability.