• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.275-283
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• 2008

Objective: This study was conducted to investigate the effects of the artificial shrinkage and assisted hatching (PZD; patial zona dissetion) before vitrification on the development of vitrified mouse expanding blastocyst. Methods: Mouse 2-cell embryos were collected and cultured in G1.1 and G2.2 to expanding blastocyst. For artificial shrinkage (AS) the micro injection pipette was inserted into blastocoele cavity and blastocoele fluid was aspirated. For assisted hatching (AH) PZD method was used. Control group was -AS/-AH and treatment groups were -AS/+AH, +AS/-AH and +AS/+AH. After AS and AH mouse blastocysts were equillibrated in G10 and G10E20 for 3 mins, respectively, and vitrified in G25E25 after loading on capped pulled-straw. Vitrified mouse blastocysts were thawed and cultured for 24 hrs. The survival and hatching rate was compared among one control and three treatment groups. Results: The survival rates were 99%, 92% in +AS/+AH and +AS/-AH groups and 54%, 58% in -AS/-AH and -AS/+AH group, respectively. The survival rate was significantly higher in +AS group than in -AS group (p<0.01). Hatching rates were 34%, 96% in -AS/-AH and -AS/+AH groups and 41%, 100% in +AS/-AH and +AS/+AH, respectively. The hatching rates was higher in +AH group than in -AH group (p<0.01). After thawing recovery rates were 100%. Loading on capped pulled-straw, that is effective and useful method on vitrification. Conclusion: This study showed that artificial shrinkage of blastocoele cavity and assisted hatching (PZD) significantly improved the development of the vitrified mouse expanding blastocysts.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.56 no.2
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• pp.125-138
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• 2023

Most of previous cesium (Cs) sorbents have limitations on the treatment in the large-scale water system having low Cs concentration and high ion strength. In this study, the new Cs sorbent that is eco-friendly and has a high Cs removal efficiency was developed by improving the coal mine drainage treated sludge (hereafter 'CMDS') with the addition of Na and S. The sludge produced through the treatment process for the mine drainage originating from the abandoned coal mine was used as the primary material for developing the new Cs sorbent because of its high Ca and Fe contents. The CMDS was improved by adding Na and S during the heat treatment process (hereafter 'Na-S-CMDS' for the developed sorbent in this study). Laboratory experiments and the sorption model studies were performed to evaluate the Cs sorption capacity and to understand the Cs sorption mechanisms of the Na-S-CMDS. The physicochemical and mineralogical properties of the Na-S-CMDS were also investigated through various analyses, such as XRF, XRD, SEM/EDS, XPS, etc. From results of batch sorption experiments, the Na-S-CMDS showed the fast sorption rate (in equilibrium within few hours) and the very high Cs removal efficiency (> 90.0%) even at the low Cs concentration in solution (< 0.5 mg/L). The experimental results were well fitted to the Langmuir isotherm model, suggesting the mostly monolayer coverage sorption of the Cs on the Na-S-CMDS. The Cs sorption kinetic model studies supported that the Cs sorption tendency of the Na-S-CMDS was similar to the pseudo-second-order model curve and more complicated chemical sorption process could occur rather than the simple physical adsorption. Results of XRF and XRD analyses for the Na-S-CMDS after the Cs sorption showed that the Na content clearly decreased in the Na-S-CMDS and the erdite (NaFeS₂·2(H₂O)) was disappeared, suggesting that the active ion exchange between Na⁺ and Cs⁺ occurred on the Na-S-CMDS during the Cs sorption process. From results of the XPS analysis, the strong interaction between Cs and S in Na-S-CMDS was investigated and the high Cs sorption capacity was resulted from the binding between Cs and S (or S-complex). Results from this study supported that the Na-S-CMDS has an outstanding potential to remove the Cs from radioactive contaminated water systems such as seawater and groundwater, which have high ion strength but low Cs concentration.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.303-309
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• 2004

Pyrochlores were known as promising materials for the immobilization of radioactive actinide. Accordingly, we synthesized pyrochlores with Gd$_2$Ti$_2$$O_7$ and Gd$_2$Zr$_2$$O_7$compositions by sintering method, and studied its properties and phase relations in Gd-Ti-O and Gd-Zr-O system. The mixed powders were pressed into pellets under 200-400 kgf/cm$^2$ at room temperature. and then sintered at 1000-1$600^{\circ}C$ for 0.5-40 hours. The synthesized samples were analyzed and were identified with XRD and SEM/EDS analyses. The optimal synthetic conditions of pyrochlores with Gd$_2$Ti$_2$$O_7$composition were at 140$0^{\circ}C$/0.5hrs, 130$0^{\circ}C$/3hrs and 120$0^{\circ}C$/20hrs. Its chemical composition was $Gd_{2.0-2.1}$$Ti_{1.9-2.0}$$O_7$ and similar to the stoichiometric composition without any relationship in temperature and atmosphere. The optimal synthetic conditions of pyrochlores with $Gd_{2}$$Zr_{2}$$O_7$composition were at 155$0^{\circ}C$/40hrs and 1$600^{\circ}C$/30hrs. The compositions of pyrochlore synthesized from these optimal conditions were irregular with $Gd_{1.5-2.4}$$Zr_{1.7-2.4}$$O_7$. Such heterogeneity indicates that the reaction rate of pyrochlore with Gd$_2$Zr$_2$$O_7$composition is very low, and then its equilibrium state could not be attained even for 40 hours which was the longest sintering time in this research.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.66 no.2
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• pp.78-85
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• 2022

Natural white clay was treated with 6 M of H₂SO₄ and heated at 80℃ for 6 h under mechanical stirring and the resulting acid active clay was used as an adsorbent for the removal of Cs⁺ in water. The physicochemical changes of natural white clay and acid active clay were observed by X-ray Fluorescence Spectrometry (XRF), BET Surface Area Analyser and Energy Dispersive X-line Spectrometer (EDX). While activating natural white clay with acid, the part of Al₂O₃, CaO, MgO, SO₃ and Fe₂O₃ was dissolved firstly from the crystal lattice, which bring about the increase in the specific surface area and the pore volume as well as active sites. The specific surface area and the pore volume of acid active clay were roughly twice as high compared with natural white clay. The adsorption of Cs⁺ on acid active clay was increased rapidly within 1 min and reached equilibrium at 60 min. At 25 mg L^- of Cs⁺ concentration, 96.88% of adsorption capacity was accomplished by acid active clay. The adsorption data of Cs⁺ were fitted to the adsorption isotherm and kinetic models. It was found that Langmuir isotherm was described well to the adsorption behavior of Cs⁺ on acid active clay rather than Freundlich isotherm. For adsorption Cs⁺ on acid active clay, the Langmuir isotherm coefficients, Q, was found to be 10.52 mg g^-1. In acid active clay/water system, the pseudo-second-order kinetic model was more suitable for adsorption of Cs⁺ than the pseudo-first-order kinetic model owing to the higher correlation coefficient R² and the more proximity value of the experimental value q_e,exp and the calculated value q_e,cal. The overall results of study showed that acid active clay could be used as an efficient adsorbent for the removal of Cs⁺ from water.

• Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.227-237
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• 2008

Arsenic has recently become of the most serious environmental concerns, and the worldwide regulation of arsenic fur drinking water has been reinforced. Arsenic contaminated groundwater and soil have been frequently revealed as well, and arsenic contamination and its treatment and measures have been domestically raised as one of the most important environmental issues. Arsenic behavior in geo-environment is principally affected by oxides and clay minerals, and particularly iron (oxy)hydroxides have been well known to be most effective in controlling arsenic. Among a number of iron (oxy)hydroxides, for this reason, 2-line ferrihydrite was selected in this study to investigate its effect on arsenic behavior. Adsorption of 2-line ferrihydrite was characterized and compared between As(III) and As(V) which are known to be the most ubiquitous species among arsenic forms in natural environment. Two-line ferrihydrite synthesized in the lab as the adsorbent of arsenic had $10\sim200$ nm for diameter, $247m^{2}/g$ for specific surface area, and 8.2 for pH of zero charge, and those representative properties of 2-line ferrihydrite appeared to be greatly suitable to be used as adsorbent of arsenic. The experimental results on equilibrium adsorption indicate that As(III) showed much stronger adsorption affinity onto 2-line ferrihydrite than As(V). In addition, the maximum adsorptions of As(III) and As(V) were observed at pH 7.0 and 2.0, respectively. In particular, the adsorption of As(III) did not show any difference between pH conditions, except for pH 12.2. On the contrary, the As(V) adsorption was remarkably decreased with increase in pH. The results obtained from the detailed experiments investigating pH effect on arsenic adsorption show that As(III) adsorption increased up to pH 8.0 and dramatically decreased above pH 9.2. In case of As(V), its adsorption steadily decreased with increase in pH. The reason the adsorption characteristics became totally different depending on arsenic species is attributed to the fact that chemical speciation of arsenic and surface charge of 2-line ferrihydrite are significantly affected by pH, and it is speculated that those composite phenomena cause the difference in adsorption between As(III) and As(V). From the view point of adsorption kinetics, adsorption of arsenic species onto 2-line ferrihydrite was investigated to be mostly completed within the duration of 2 hours. Among the kinetic models proposed so for, power function and elovich model were evaluated to be the most suitable ones which can simulate adsorption kinetics of two kinds of arsenic species onto 2-line ferrihydrite.