• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.48 no.5
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• pp.255-265
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• 2022

Background: Research in environmental health (EH) is of crucial strategic importance for contemporary society. It is becoming even more critical in light of the increasingly rapid pace of environmental changes, opportunities, and threats. Objectives: This study aimed to identify trends and the prospective of environmental health research using SWOT analysis. Methods: The trends in environmental health research were reviewed in previous studies and reports. Reviewed manuscripts were searched for using the keywords of 'environmental health' and 'environmental hygiene' in the KCI (Korean Journal of Citation Index), KISS (Korean Academic Information), PubMed, and Google Scholar. Results: It is essential to center the EH research agenda around key priorities focusing on technological innovation, job creation, and the increasingly prominent role of the private sector. Given the rapidly evolving global sustainability agenda, greater clarity on the ever-increasing sources of complexity and growing expectations of the public might be needed. This requires the identification of criteria to identify EH research priorities with the ultimate goal of maximizing societal benefit. Public health relevance, such as extent and severity of health impact, level of exposure, and inequalities of effects, could be included. Conclusions: Considering the recent interest in and importance of environmental health, a comprehensive approach to environmental health research should be required through the application of the latest science and technology, citizen participation, and environmental health surveillance systems.

• Journal of Yeungnam Medical Science
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• v.41 no.1
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• pp.48-52
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• 2024

While simultaneous bilateral partial nephrectomy with a conventional multiport robot has been consistently reported since the 2010s, the introduction of the DaVinci SP system (Intuitive Surgical, Sunnyvale, CA, USA) could provide a novel way to perform surgery on bilateral kidneys while innovatively reducing the number of incisions. In our first report worldwide, the patient with bilateral small renal mass (2.0 cm for the left and 1.5 cm for the right side) and preoperative normal renal function was placed in the lateral decubitus position on an inverted bed. After tilting the bed to be as horizontal as possible, a 4-cm incision was made in the lower part of the umbilicus for the floating trocar technique. The partial nephrectomy was performed reliably as with the conventional transperitoneal approach, and then the patient could be repositioned to the contralateral side for the same procedure, maintaining all trocars. Total operation time (skin to skin), total console time, and the left- and right-side warm ischemic times were 260, 164, 27, and 23 minutes, respectively, without applying the early declamping technique. The estimated blood loss was 200 mL. The serum creatinine right after the operation, on the first day, 3 days, and 90 days after surgery were 0.92, 0.77, 0.79, and 0.81 mg/dL, respectively. For 90 days after the procedure, no complications or radiologic recurrence were observed. Further clinical studies will reveal the advantages of using the DaVinci SP device for this procedure over traditional multiport surgery, maximizing the benefit of a single port-based approach.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.10 no.10
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• pp.1347-1355
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• 2007

A sensor network is composed of a large number of tiny devices, scattered and deployed in a specified regions. Each sensing device has processing and wireless communication capabilities, which enable it to gather information from the sensing area and to transfer report messages to a base station. The energy-efficient routing paths are established when the base station requests a query, since each node has several characteristics such as low-power, constrained energy, and limited capacity. The established paths are recovered while minimizing the total transmit energy and maximizing the network lifetime when the paths are broken. In this paper, we propose a routing algorithm that each sensor node reports its adjacent link information to the sink node when a sink node broadcasts a query. The sink node manages the total topology and establishes routing paths. This algorithm has a benefit to find an alternative path by reducing the negotiating messages for establishing paths when the established paths are broken. To reduce the overhead of collection information, each node has a link information before reporting to the sink. Because the node recognizes which nodes are adjacent. The proposed algorithm reduces the number of required messages, because sensor nodes receive and report routing messages for establishment at the beginning of configuring routing paths, since each node keeps topology information to establish a routing path, which is useful to report sensing tasks in monitoring environments.

• Magazine of the Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.125-137
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• 1987

The purpose of this paper is to examine some difficulties in water management of agricultural reservoirs in Korea, for there are approximately more than 15,000 reservoirs which are now being utilized for the purpose of irrigation, along with the much amount of expenses and labors to be invested against droughts and floods periodically occurred. Recently, the effective use of water resources in the agricultural reservoirs with a single purpose, is becomming multiple according to the alterable environment of water use. Therefore, the task to allocate agricultural water rationally and economically must be solved for the multiple use of agricultural reservoirs. On the basis of the above statement, this study aims at suggesting the rational method of water management by introducing an optimal technique to allocate the water in an existing agricultural reservoir rationally, for the sake of maximizing the economic effect. To achieve this objective, a reservoir, called "0-Bongje" as a sample of the case study, is selected for an agricultural water development proiect of medium scale. As a model for the optimum allocation of water in the multi-purpose use of reservoirs a linear programming model is developed and analyzed. As a result, findings of the study are as follows : First, a linear programing model is developed for the optimum allocation of water in the multi-purpose use of agricultural reservoirs. By adopting the model in the case of reservoir called "O-Bongje," the optimum solution for such various objects as irrigation area, the amount of domestic water supply, the size of power generation, and the size of reservoir storage, etc., can be obtained. Second, by comparing the net benefits in each object under the changing condition of inflow into the reservoir, the factors which can most affect the yearly total net benefit can be drawn, and they are in the order of the amount of domestic water supply, irrigation area, and power generation. Third, the sensitivity analysis for the decision variable of irrigation which may have a first priority among the objects indicate that the effective method of water management can be rapidly suggested in accordance with a condition under the decreasing area of irrigation. Fourth, in the case of decision making on the water allocation policy in an existing multi-purpose reservoir, the rapid comparison of numerous alternatives can be possible by adopting the linear programming model. Besides, as the resources can be analyed in connection with various activities, it can be concluded that the linear programing model developed in this study is more quantitative than the traditional methods of analysis. Fifth, all the possible constraint equations, in using a linear programming model for adopting a water allocation problem in the agricultural reservoirs, are presented, and the method of analysis is also suggested in this study. Finally, as the linear programming model in this study is found comprehensive, the model can be adopted in any different kind of conditions of agricultural reservoirs for the purpose of analyzing optimum water allocation, if the economic and technical coefficients are known, and the decision variable is changed in accordance with the changing condition of irrigation area.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.209-237
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• 2012

1. Research Purpose Consumers rely on various clues to evaluate their decision to patronize a retail store, and store brand is one of them (Dodds 1991; Grewal et al. 1998). As consumers find ever increasing variety of contact points connecting them to specific store, the value of experiential shopping as a means of increasing store's brand equity warrants greater attention from scholars of retail management. Retail shopping values are credited for creating not only cognitive experiences like brand knowledge but also emotional experiences such as shopping pleasure and pride (Schmitt 1999). This may be because today's consumers place emphasis on emotional values associated with shopping pleasure, lifestyle brought to life, brand relationship, and store atmosphere more than utilitarian values such as product quality and price. Many previous literature found this to be true (Ahn and Lee 2011; Mathwick et al. 2001). This brings forth important research issues and questions regarding the roles of shopping experiential values and brand equity with regard to consumer's retail patronage choice. However, despite this importance, research on this area remains quite inadequate (Hwang 2010). For this reason, this study aims to verify the relationships among experiential shopping values, retail store brand equity and tries to link that with customer loyalty by surveying large-scale discount store shoppers in Korea and China. 2. Research Contents In order to carry out the research objective, this study conducted comprehensive literature survey on previous literature by discussing major findings and implications with regard to shopping values and retail brand equity and store loyalty. For data collection, researcher employed survey-based research method where data were collected in two major cities of Korea (Seoul) and China (Bejing) and sampling frame was based on patrons of large discount stores in both countries. Specific research questions raised in this study are as follows; RQ1: How do Korean and Chinese consumers differently perceive of shopping values regarding shopping at large-sclae discount stores? RQ2: Are there differences in consumers' emotional consumption propensities? RQ3: Do Korean and Chinese consumers display different perceptions of brand equity towards large-scale discount stores? RQ4: Are there differences in relationships between shopping values and brand equity for Korean and Chinese consumers? For statistical analysis, SPSS17.0, AMOS17.0 and SmartPLS were employed. 3. Research Results The data collected through face-to-face survey conducted in Seoul and Bejing revealed appropriate data validity and reliability as a result of exploratory/confirmatory factor analysis and reliability tests, andh SEM model yielding satisfactory model fitness. The result of the study may be summarized by three main points. First, as a result of testing differences in consumption dispositions, Chinese consumers showed higher scores in aesthetic and symbolic dispositions, whereas Korean consumers scored higher in hedonic disposition. Second, testing on perceptions toward brand equity of large discount stores showed that Korean consumers exhibited more positive perceptions of brand awareness and brand image than Chinese counterparts. Third, the result of exploratory factor analysis on the experiential shopping values revealed different factors for each country. On Korean side, consumer interest value, aesthetic value, and hedonic value were prominent, whereas on Chinese side, hedonic value, aesthetic value, consumer interest value, and service excellence value were found salient. 4. Research Implications While many previous studies on inter-country differences in retailing area mainly focused on cultural dispositions or orientations to explain the differences, this study sets itself apart by specifically targeting individual consumer's shopping values from an experiential viewpoint. The study result provides important theoretical as well as practical implications for large-scale discount store, especially the impotance of fully exploring the linkage between shopping values and brand equity, which has significant influence on loyalty. Therefore, the specific implications deriving from the result shed some important insights upon the consumption values based on shopping experiences and brand equity. The differences found in store shoppers between the two countries may also provide useful insights for Korean and Chinese retailers who plan to expand their operations globally. Related strategic implications derived from this study is the importance of localizing retail strategy which is based on the differences found in experiential shopping values between the two country groups. Especially the finding that Chinese consumers value consumer interest and service excellence, whereas Koreans place importance on hedonic or aesthetic values indicates the need to differentiate the consumer's psychographical profiles when it comes to expanding retail operations globally. Particularly important will be to pursue price-orienated strategy in China in consideration of the high emphasis on consumer interests and service excellence, but to emphasize the symbolic aspects of brand equity in Korea by maximizing the brand equity associated with aesthetic values and hedonic orientations. 5. Recommendations This study focused on generic retail branded discount stores in both countries, thus making it difficult to tease out store-specific strategies based on specific retail brands. Future studies may benefit fro employing actual brand names in survey questionnaire to verify relationship between shopping values and brand-based store strategy. As with other studies of this nature, this study needs to strengthen the result's generalizability by selecting respondents from a wider spectrum of respondents.