• 대한후두음성언어의학회지
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• 제27권1호
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• pp.40-44
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• 2016

Background and Objectives : Surgery is considered the primary treatment for intracordal cyst. However, patients who had undergone surgery are still subject to recurrence and continued voice changes. Intracordal cysts naturally disappear in some patient population. Cyst does not always recur in patients who had received partial surgical removal, too. Contradicting results raises a question whether complete surgical removal of intracordal cyst is necessary and demonstrate need for better treatment. Herein, the author proposes novel surgical method technique intralaryngeal needle technique (INT), a technique using surgical needle for not only injection but also for aspiration and excision of cyst. This study aims to examine the potential of intralaryngeal needle technique in treating intracordal cysts. Materials and Methods : Surgical procedures were done on in-patients diagnosed with intracordal cyst. 23 patients received follow-up screening after the surgery for one year. Patients' subjective satisfaction levels, acoustic measures, aerodynamic measures, laryngeal stroboscopic results were compared before and after the treatment. Results : Overall patients were satisfied with novel surgical excision method. In terms of aerodynamic measures, maximum phonation time, mean air flow rate improved after the surgery. In terms of acoustic measures, Jitter, Shimmer, NHR, and voice pitch changes after the treatment showed statistically significant differences. Laryngeal stroboscopy results showed significant decreases in cyst sizes. Post-surgery patients had improved mucosal waves and amplitudes values. Conclusion : The results show the validity of intralaryngeal needle technique in reducing intracordal cyst size by excision, aspiration, and injection. The author believes this novel technique can be used as an alternative surgical method for intracordal cysts.

• Journal of Korean Medical Science
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• 제33권43호
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• pp.239.1-239.12
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• 2018

Background: We described a novel multi-step retinal fundus image reading system for providing high-quality large data for machine learning algorithms, and assessed the grader variability in the large-scale dataset generated with this system. Methods: A 5-step retinal fundus image reading tool was developed that rates image quality, presence of abnormality, findings with location information, diagnoses, and clinical significance. Each image was evaluated by 3 different graders. Agreements among graders for each decision were evaluated. Results: The 234,242 readings of 79,458 images were collected from 55 licensed ophthalmologists during 6 months. The 34,364 images were graded as abnormal by at-least one rater. Of these, all three raters agreed in 46.6% in abnormality, while 69.9% of the images were rated as abnormal by two or more raters. Agreement rate of at-least two raters on a certain finding was 26.7%-65.2%, and complete agreement rate of all-three raters was 5.7%-43.3%. As for diagnoses, agreement of at-least two raters was 35.6%-65.6%, and complete agreement rate was 11.0%-40.0%. Agreement of findings and diagnoses were higher when restricted to images with prior complete agreement on abnormality. Retinal/glaucoma specialists showed higher agreements on findings and diagnoses of their corresponding subspecialties. Conclusion: This novel reading tool for retinal fundus images generated a large-scale dataset with high level of information, which can be utilized in future development of machine learning-based algorithms for automated identification of abnormal conditions and clinical decision supporting system. These results emphasize the importance of addressing grader variability in algorithm developments.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• 제15권16호
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• pp.6685-6689
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• 2014

Background: Alterations in gene expression levels or mutations of tyrosine kinases are detected in some human cancers. In this study, we examined whether serine threonine tyrosine kinase 1 (STYK1)/novel oncogene with kinase domain (NOK) is overexpressed in patients with colorectal cancer. We also examined the clinical relevance of STYK1/NOK expression in cancer tissues. Materials and Methods: In tumor samples of patients with colorectal cancer and their matched non-cancerous samples, STYK1/NOK messenger RNA (mRNA) expression was analyzed by quantitative reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction. Associations between the expression levels of STYK1/NOK and clinicopathological characteristics of colorectal cancer were also assessed using Mann-Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis tests. Results: Upregulation of STYK1/NOK was found in cancer tissues even at early stage of colorectal cancer compared to normal adjacent tissues. The optimal cutoff point of 0.198 the STYK1/NOK expression showed 0.78 sensitivity and 0.75 specificity for diagnosis. Overexpressed STYK1/NOK was correlated with tumor size but had no association with other clinicopathological characteristics of colorectal cancer. Conclusions: These results indicate that STYK1/NOK mRNA is widely expressed in the patients with colorectal cancer and suggest that inhibition of this molecule could potentially serve as a novel therapeutic target.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• 제44권1호
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• pp.15-25
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• 2019

Background: Psammaplin A (PsA) is a radiosensitizer whereas its clinical application is hampered by poor bioavailability. This study aimed to synthesize novel radiosensitizers using PsA as the lead compound. Materials and Methods: Eight homodimeric disulfides were synthesized from corresponding acid and cystamine dihydrochloride in N-hydroxysuccinimide and dicyclohexylcarbodiimide coupling conditions. One monomeric thiol analog was obtained by reduction of homodimeric disulfide with dithiothreitol. Clonogenic assay was used to measure cell survival after irradiation and drug treatment in human lung cancer (A549) and glioblastoma (U373MG) cells. Results and Discussion: Using the PsA backbone, nine compounds were synthesized. Eight compounds showed variable cytotoxicity with 50% inhibitory concentrations ranging $16.14{\mu}M$ to $150.10{\mu}M$ (A549), and $13.25{\mu}M$ to $50.15{\mu}M$ (U373MG). Four and six compounds radiosensitized A549 and U373MG cells, respectively. Two compounds that radiosensitized both cell lines were tested for its inhibitory effects on DNMT1. One of them was shown to significantly inhibit DNMT1 activity. Conclusion: Novel compounds with radiosensitizing activity were synthesized. These compounds have a great potential to serve as a basis for the development of future radiosensitizers. Further investigation is warranted for their clinical application.

• Journal of Cardiovascular Imaging
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• 제31권3호
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• pp.135-141
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• 2023

BACKGROUND: Global longitudinal strain (GLS) is an accurate and reproducible parameter of left ventricular (LV) systolic function which has shown meaningful prognostic value. Fast, user-friendly, and accurate tools are required for its widespread implementation. We aim to compare a novel web-based tool with two established algorithms for strain analysis and test its reproducibility. METHODS: Thirty echocardiographic datasets with focused LV acquisitions were analyzed using three different semi-automated endocardial GLS algorithms by two readers. Analyses were repeated by one reader for the purpose of intra-observer variability. CAAS Qardia (Pie Medical Imaging) was compared with 2DCPA and AutoLV (TomTec). RESULTS: Mean GLS values were -15.0 ± 3.5% from Qardia, -15.3 ± 4.0% from 2DCPA, and -15.2 ± 3.8% from AutoLV. Mean GLS between Qardia and 2DCPA were not statistically different (p = 0.359), with a bias of -0.3%, limits of agreement (LOA) of 3.7%, and an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of 0.88. Mean GLS between Qardia and AutoLV were not statistically different (p = 0.637), with a bias of -0.2%, LOA of 3.4%, and an ICC of 0.89. The coefficient of variation (CV) for intra-observer variability was 4.4% for Qardia, 8.4% 2DCPA, and 7.7% AutoLV. The CV for inter-observer variability was 4.5%, 8.1%, and 8.0%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: In echocardiographic datasets of good image quality analyzed at an independent core laboratory using a standardized annotation method, a novel web-based tool for GLS analysis showed consistent results when compared with two algorithms of an established platform. Moreover, inter- and intra-observer reproducibility results were excellent.

• 원예과학기술지
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• 제33권4호
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• pp.559-565
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• 2015

The rind phenotype of watermelon fruits is an important agronomic characteristic in the watermelon market. Inheritance and linkage analyses were performed for three rind-related traits that together determine the rind phenotype: foreground stripe pattern, rind background color, and depth of rind color. The inheritance of the foreground stripe pattern was analyzed using three different $F_2$ populations, showing that the striped pattern is dominant over the non-striped pattern. The inheritance analysis of the rind background color was performed using $F_2$ populations of the '10909' and '109905', and the depth of rind color was analyzed using $F_2$ populations of the '90509' and '109905'. Yellow color was found to be dominant over green color, and a deep color was dominant over the standard color. Linkage analysis of the three traits was conducted using three $F_2$ populations in which two traits were segregating. Each pair of traits was inherited independently, which demonstrated that the three traits are not linked. Therefore, we propose a three-locus model for the determination of rind phenotype, providing novel insight that rind phenotype is determined by the combination of three genetically independent loci.

• 지능정보연구
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• 제9권2호
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• pp.1-18
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• 2003

The automatic recognition of transport containers using image processing is very hard because of the irregular size and position of identifiers, diverse colors of background and identifiers, and the impaired shapes of identifiers caused by container damages and the bent surface of container, etc. We proposed and evaluated the novel recognition algorithm of container identifiers that overcomes effectively the hardness and recognizes identifiers from container images captured in the various environments. The proposed algorithm, first, extracts the area including only all identifiers from container images by using CANNY masking and bi-directional histogram method. The extracted identifier area is binarized by the fuzzy binarization method newly proposed in this paper and by applying contour tracking method to the binarized area, container identifiers which are targets of recognition are extracted. We proposed and applied the ART2-based RBF network for recognition of container identifiers. The results of experiment for performance evaluation on the real container images showed that the proposed algorithm has more improved performance in the extraction and recognition of container identifiers than the previous algorithms.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• 제12권1호
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• pp.436-442
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• 2017

A novel method of Skin lesion segmentation based on the combination of Texture and Neural Network is proposed in this paper. This paper combines the textures of different pixels in the skin images in order to increase the performance of lesion segmentation. For segmenting skin lesions, a two-step process is done. First, automatic border detection is performed to separate the lesion from the background skin. This begins by identifying the features that represent the lesion border clearly by the process of Texture analysis. In the second step, the obtained features are given as input towards the Recurrent Echo state neural networks in order to obtain the segmented skin lesion region. The proposed algorithm is trained and tested for 862 skin lesion images in order to evaluate the accuracy of segmentation. Overall accuracy of the proposed method is compared with existing algorithms. An average accuracy of 98.8% for segmenting skin lesion images has been obtained.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• 제8권9호
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• pp.3196-3210
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• 2014

This paper presents a novel video metrology approach based on robust tracking. From videos acquired by an uncalibrated stationary camera, the foreground likelihood map is obtained by using the Codebook background modeling algorithm, and the multiple moving objects are tracked by a combined tracking algorithm. Then, we compute vanishing line of the ground plane and the vertical vanishing point of the scene, and extract the head feature points and the feet feature points in each frame of video sequences. Finally, we apply a single view mensuration algorithm to each of the frames to obtain height measurements and fuse the multi-frame measurements using RANSAC algorithm. Compared with other popular methods, our proposed algorithm does not require calibrating the camera, and can track the multiple moving objects when occlusion occurs. Therefore, it reduces the complexity of calculation and improves the accuracy of measurement simultaneously. The experimental results demonstrate that our method is effective and robust to occlusion.

• 영어어문교육
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• 제8권2호
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• pp.39-54
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• 2003

This paper looks into the ideological discourse embedded in D. H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers. Sons and Lovers is an autobiographical novel which necessarily carries the author's own experiences. For this reason, it reflects the social and historical background upon which the narrative is displayed. Sons and Lovers is full of the historical characteristics of the late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century England. This essay closely reads the class struggles of the time in Sons and Lovers. In most of Lawrence's novels, the class struggles appear in the form of the marriage of two people from different classes. In Sons and Lovers, the hegemonic conflicts between Walter Morel and Gertrude Morel clearly show the class struggles of the time. Also, this paper disentangles the complicated stories of William and Paul and shows the general tragedy of English young men of the time. In the end, it will show that Sons and Lovers is a fully loaded ideological discourse.