• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.31-34
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• 2004

White blood cells (WBCs) are present in most human ejaculates, but abnormally high concentration of seminal leukocytes may reflect an underlying pathological condition. The World Health Organization (WHO) has defined leukocytospermia as status of more than $10^6$ WBC/mL of semen. The purpose of this study was firstly, to compare the outcomes between conventional IVF and ICSI in leukocytospermia, and secondly, to investigate whether ICSI may be an alternation treatment for patients with leukocytospermia. Total 346 cycles of conventional IVF and ICSI candidates underwent IVF cycles at Eulji Hospital Infertility Clinic. Semen Parameters including concentration, motility, morphology of spermatozoa and concentration of leukocytes were assessed from the raw ejaculates. There was no difference in sperm concentration, motility and morphology. The rates of fertilization and good embryo development from ICSI were significantly higher than those from conventional IVF in leukocytospermia (60.4% ＆ 32.5%, respectively for ICSI group and 44.4% ＆ 28.5%, respectively for IVF group, P<0.00l). The pregnancy rate after ICSI was also higher than that from conventional IVF (34.0% vs 29.1 %, P<0.05). These results indicate that the presence of seminal leukocyes (> 1$\times10^6$ WBC/mL of semen) is adversely related with fertilization, embryo development and pregnancy rate. Therfore the measurement of seminal leukocytes in routine semen analysis appears to be of prognostic value with regard to male fertilizing potential. In conclusion, it is suggested that ICSI is an alternative choice of treatment for patients with leukocytospermia.

• KEPCO Journal on Electric Power and Energy
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.631-638
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• 2016

Offshore wind power can be an alternative for onshore wind power which suffers from not only civil complaints regarding to landscape damage and noise but also wind power siting due to lack of onshore site candidates. Compared to onshore wind power, offshore wind power is free from these problems considering that generally the sites are far enough from the coast. And more electricity is generated in offshore wind turbines due to abundant offshore wind resources. However high installation costs of offshore turbines could deteriorate the economical efficiency. The main cause of the high installation costs comes from a long-term lease of the heavy marine equipment and the consequential high rental cost. In this paper, the conceptual design of the support structure for offshore wind turbines will be suggested for the installation of them with less heavy marine equipment.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.02a
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• pp.118-119
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• 2013

High power, short wavelength red laser diodes (LDs) have attracted significant interests in a variety of fields due to their advantages in terms of reliability, compactness and cost. The higher brightness for human eyes is required, the shorter wavelength like 630 nm is necessary with higher output power. In this respect, LDs are promising as alternative candidates of gas or dye lasers for such applications due to their small size, high optical/electrical power conversion efficiency, robustness and so on. The crystalline quality of GaInP-AlGaInP multiple quantum wells (MQWs) and AlInP cladding layers is a crucial part in the device performance of GaInP red LDs. Here, we first investigated the effect of Si diffusion on the optical properties of GaInP-AlGaInP MQWs grown with different growth temperatures. Secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) measurements revealed that both the Mg and Si diffusion into MQW active region was significant. To reduce such diffusion, we employed undoped Mg and Si diffusion barrier and could improve the properties.Without both Mg and Si diffusion barriers, no lasing emission was observed. However, lasing emission was observed clearly for the red LDs with both Mg and Si diffusion barriers. We then investigated the temperature dependent optical properties of MQW layers grown with different well thicknesses (6, 8 and 10 nm). When the well thickness was 10 nm, the better crystalline quality was obtained. However, the observed LD performances were similar, probably due to the defects and impurities in the AlGaInP layer. Further investigation with the detailed analyses will be presented later.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.181-187
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• 2008

Recently, alternative fuels are drawing more attentions due to the increasing need for lower emission characteristics and fuel consumption rate in automotive engines. The GTL(gas to luquid) is the one of most favored candidates. It has higher cetane number(more than 75) and almost negligible sulphur and aromatic contents. Therefore, enhanced emission characteristics are expected even in the application in diesel engines without any modification. In this study, the cylinder pressure and heat release, emission characteristics with fuel injection timings are compared between diesel and GTL fuel in the single cylinder diesel engine. Noticeable reduction in PM, THC and CO emission are observed due to lower sulphur and aromatic contents in GTL. Also, the ignition delay decreased due to higher cetane number of GTL, which slightly decreased the amount of NOx emissions. With the retards of main injection timing, NOx decreases more for the case of GTL, while the level of THC and CO emissions still remains lower than the case of diesel. Therefore, there is much room for the control of injection timing for NOx reduction without sacrificing THC and CO emissions. With the retards of main injection timing, Small size distribution of PM became lager and there amount increased. But from all conditions, size distribution of PM for the case GTL was lower than Diesel.

• IEMEK Journal of Embedded Systems and Applications
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.163-172
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• 2012

A driver assistance system is critical to improve a convenience and stability of vehicle driving. Several systems have been already commercialized such as adaptive cruise control system and forward collision warning system. Efficient vehicle detection is very important to improve such driver assistance systems. Most existing vehicle detection systems are based on a radar system, which measures distance between a host and leading (or oncoming) vehicles under various weather conditions. However, it requires high deployment cost and complexity overload when there are many vehicles. A camera based vehicle detection technique is also good alternative method because of low cost and simple implementation. In general, night time vehicle detection is more complicated than day time vehicle detection, because it is much more difficult to distinguish the vehicle's features such as outline and color under the dim environment. This paper proposes a method to detect vehicles at night time using analysis of a captured color space with reduction of reflection and other light sources in images. Four colors spaces, namely RGB, YCbCr, normalized RGB and Ruta-RGB, are compared each other and evaluated. A suboptimal threshold value is determined by Otsu algorithm and applied to extract candidates of taillights of leading vehicles. Statistical features such as mean, variance, skewness, kurtosis, and entropy are extracted from the candidate regions and used as feature vector for SVM(Support Vector Machine) classifier. According to our simulation results, the proposed statistical feature based SVM provides relatively high performances of leading vehicle detection with various distances in variable nighttime environments.

• Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.267-275
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• 2009

To investigate the possible applications of plants to remediate heavy-metal-contaminated soil, a pilot experiment was performed for four years in a reclaimed dredging area using two Alnus species, i.e., Alnus firma and Alnus hirsuta. In a comparison of phytomass of the two species at two different planting densities, the phytomass of Alnus planted at low density was twice as high as that of Alnus planted at high density after four years. The Alnus species showed active acclimation to the heavy-metal-contaminated soil in a reclaimed dredging area. A. hirsuta showed greater accumulation of phytomass than A. firma, indicating that it is the better candidate for the phytoremediation of heavy-metal-contaminated soils. In the pilot system, Alnus plants took metals up from the soil in the following order; Pb > Zn > Cu > Cr > As > Cd. Uptake rates of heavy metals per individual phytomass was higher for Alnus spp. planted at low density than those planted at high density in the pilot system. Low plant density resulted in higher heavy metal uptake per plant, but the total heavy metal concentration was not different for plants planted at low and high density, suggesting that the plant density effect might not be important with regard to total uptake by plants. The quantity of leached heavy metals below ground was far in excess of that taken up by plants, indicating that an alternative measurement is required for the removal of heavy metals that have leached into ground water and deeper soil. We conclude that Alnus species are potential candidates for phytoremediation of heavy-metal- contaminated surface soil in a reclaimed dredging area.

• Advances in Traditional Medicine
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.51-64
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• 2007

Mucus is an aqueous gel complex with a constitution of about 95% water, high molecular weight glycoprotein (mucin), lipid, salts etc. Mucus appears to represent a significant barrier to the absorption of some compounds. Natural mucoadhesive agent was isolated and purified from the aqueous extract of the seeds of prosopis pallida (PP). Formulated tablet with the isolated material by wet granulation method. Some natural edible substances are in consideration for candidates as mucoadhesive agents to claim more effective controlled drug delivery as an alternative to the currently used synthetic mucoadhesive polymers. Subjected the materials obtained from natural source i.e. PP and standard synthetic substance, sodium carboxymethyl cellulose for evaluation of mucoadhesive property by various in vitro and in vivo methods. Through standard dissolution test and a model developed with rabbit, evaluated in vitro controlled release and bioadhesive property of theophylline formulation. Mucoadhesive agent obtained from PP showed good mucoadhesive potential in the demonstrated in vitro and in viνo models. The results suggest that the mucoadhesive agent showed controlled release properties by their application, substantially. In order to assess the gastrointestinal transit time in vivo, a radio opaque X-ray study performed in healthy rabbit testing the same controlled release formulation with and without bioadhesive polymer. Plasma levels of theophylline determined by the HPLC method and those allowed correlations to the in vitro mucoadhesive study results. Better correlation found between the results in different models. PP may acts as a better natural mucoadhesive agent in the extended drug delivery system.

• Journal of Dairy Science and Biotechnology
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.51-58
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• 2013

Emerging studies suggest that vegetables or fruit juices deemed to be potential alternative base medium for lactic acid bacteria fermentation. Until now, limited studies have been carried out to evaluate such applications. Thus, the objective of present study is that lactic acid bacteria were evaluated for their viability at low pH, growth during storage at low temperature, and $CO_2$ formation. Furthermore, the effects of grapefruit extract with respect to cell viability, sensory ability, and organic acid production were evaluated for these strains. The probiotic properties of the strains, including acid tolerance, bile tolerance, and adhesion to human intestinal epithelial cells (HT-29 cells), prebiotic characteristics, and safety features were examined. All strains survived in MRS medium broth adjusted to pH 3.8, at $10^{\circ}C$ for 6 days, and did not produce $CO_2$ to check post fermentation. The medium of grapefruit extract fermentation by Lactobacillus plantarum CJIH 203 resulted in maximal viable counts, compared with other strains, and the extract subsequently tasted sour due to the presence of lactic acid. Lactobacillus plantarum CJIH203 was highly resistant to artificial gastric juice and intestinal juice, while Lactococcus lactis SJ09 strongly adhered to HT-29 cells. Tagatose showed the greatest ability to enhance the growth of L. plantarum SJ21, relative to the other strains. All strains were verified by safety tests such as hemolysis, gelatin hydration, and urea degradation. Therefore, these strains could be promising candidates for use in reducing excessive post-fermentation and functional products.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.44 no.1
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• pp.15-18
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• 2008

Objective : C2 laminar screw fixation is considered as an excellent alternative to Magerl's transfacetal approach or Harms construct for the atlantoaxial stabilization. However, to our knowledge, there is no report on the feasibility of the new approach to Korean population. We investigated morphometric parameters of the dorsal arch of the C2 to provide the quantitative data for the feasibility of laminar screw fixation. Methods : One-hundred-and-two patients' cervical computed tomography had been reconstructed and investigated on the anatomical parameters related with C2 laminar screw placement. Sixty patients were male and forty-two patients were female. Measurements included the laminar thickness and slope, spino-laminar angle, and maximal screw length. Results : Ages ranged from 20 to 81 and the mean age was 48.4. Mean laminar thickness was 5.7 mm (${\pm}1.0$) (5.8 mm in male and 5.4 mm in female). Fifty-one patients (50%) had a laminar thickness smaller than 5.5 mm at least unilaterally, therefore the patients were considered as inappropriate candidates for the laminar screw fixation in the smaller side of the laminae. Mean value of maximal length of screw was 33.3 mm (34.3 mm in male and 31.9 mm in female). Mean spino-laminar angle was $43.2^{\circ}$ and mean slope angle was $32.9^{\circ}$. Conclusion : Half of patients had inappropriate laminar profiles to accommodate a 3.5 mm screw in at least one side of the axis. The three-dimensional computed tomography reconstruction is mandatory for the preoperative assessment for the feasibility of the C2 lamina.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.1-9
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• 2014

The vast stores of biomass available in the worldwide have the potential to displace significant amounts of petroleum fuels. Fast pyrolysis of biomass is one of several paths by which we can convert biomass to higher value products. The wood pyrolysis oil (WPO) has been regarded as an alternative fuel for petroleum fuels to be used in diesel engine. However, the use of WPO in a diesel engine requires modifications due to low energy density, high water contents, high acidity, high viscosity, and low cetane number of the WPO. One possible method by which the shortcomings may be circumvented is to co-fire WPO with other petroleum fuels. WPO has poor miscibility with light petroleum fuel oils; the most suitable candidates fuels for direct fuel mixing are methanol or ethanol. Early mixing with methanol or ethanol has the added benefit of significantly improving the storage and handling properties of the WPO. For separate injection co-firing, a WPO-ethanol blended fuel can be fired through diesel pilot injection in a dual-injection dieel engine. In this study, the performance and emission characteristics of a dual-injection diesel engine fuelled with diesel (pilot injection) and WPO-ethanol blend (main injection) were experimentally investigated. Results showed that although stable engine operation was possible with separate injection co-firing, the fuel conversion efficiency was slightly decreased due to high water contents of WPO compare to diesel combustion.