• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.461-470
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• 2007

Human can learn how to shape their brain electrical activity in a desired direction through continuous feedback of the electroencephalogram (EEG), and this technique is known as Neurofeedback (or EEG biofeedback), which has been used since the late 1960s in clinical applications. In this study, a portable wireless EEG (named wEEG) has been designed and implemented, which consists of a mobile station (a wireless two-channel EEG acquisition device) and a base station (a bridge between mobile station and computer). Moreover, a SensoriMotor Rhythm (SMR) training system was also implemented with the wEEG for enhancing attention with virtual environment. Experiment results based on 16 volunteers' (8 females and 8 males, average age is $27{\pm}4$) were reported in this paper. The results show that the SMR ratio of 87.5% subjects increased about 0.7% in training status than that in the stable status. With the proposed system, many training protocol scan be designed easily and can be done at home in our daily life conveniently. Additionally, the proposed system will be useful for disabled and aged people.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.64 no.2
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• pp.304-309
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• 2015

Applicable range of Photoplethysmography (PPG) becomes wider as a non-invasive physiological measurement technique. However, PPG waveform is easy to be distorted by ambient light or vascular variation from temperature changes. Especially, irregular variation of PPG waveform caused by ambient temperature not only severely distorts the PPG, but also leads miss interpretation in clinical applications. Therefore, the investigation of between temperature and PPG waveform is quite important in using PPG. The purpose of this research is to quantify the PPG waveform characteristic and to investigate the waveform variation following the temperature change on measuring site. To quantify the fluctuation of PPG waveform, we use two techniques; detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) and AC/DC analysis of PPG. We record PPG under temperature stress, which applied by medical use heat pack ($40^{\circ}C$) and ice pack ($0^{\circ}C$). Ten participants were applied to the experiment, and the result was evaluated to approve the temperature effect with statistical method, Wilcoxon signed rank test. The result shows that the AC component (p<0.05) and perfusion index DFS scale exponent (p<0.01) of PPG have the significance to temperature stress except for a DC component of PPG.

• Journal of Veterinary Clinics
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.68-77
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• 2012

Whenever planning a study design or preparing a research proposal it is highly recommended that investigators decide the optimum sample size that is required to yield an outcome of interest with a predetermined level of precision. This is because that, all else being equal, if a study with less than the optimum sample size would not detect the significance of differences in reality, and similarly, if a study with more than the optimum sample size will be costly. For these reasons, the majority of peer reviewed biomedical journals assess the adequacy of sample size requirements. The calculated sample size is used as a target number of samples to be collected to provide an estimate of the parameter with the desired and predetermined level of accuracy, and the sample size is a major determinant of the probability of detecting diseased animals from the population. There is no single method of calculating sample size for any given study design. In this context, the purpose of this article is to provide a collection of formulas and examples for some typical situations likely to be encountered in veterinary clinical practice and to highlight the importance of performing prospective sample size calculations when planning a research. Specifically, this paper is concerned with the basic principle of sample size calculation, and considerations for methodological applications were illustrated for a given data set. Also included in this paper is factors influencing sample size calculations using a statistically valid techniques. Appropriate methods to consider these factors are presented.

• Development and Reproduction
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.9-16
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• 2001

Biogenic monoamines are divided into three categories; catecholamines(dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine), indoleamine(serotonin and melatonin) and histamine. Among them, serotonin has been intensively studied by many researchers with a broad spectrum of biomedical interests. A concise overview of serotonin-related topics such as biosynthetic pathway, receptor subtypes, and roles in reproduction will be provided. In particular, serotonergic efffect on the regulation of hypothalamus-pituitary-gonad hormonal axis and sexual behaviors will be emphasized. Though our Knowledge on the biological roles and its clinical applications are still limited, these topics are quite promising subjects which will be helpful for improving our 'quality of life' in near future.

• Communications for Statistical Applications and Methods
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.291-309
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• 2023

Longitudinal count data has been widely collected in biomedical research, public health, and clinical trials. These repeated measurements over time on the same subjects need to account for an appropriate dependency. The Poisson regression model is the first choice to model the expected count of interest, however, this may not be an appropriate when data exhibit over-dispersion or under-dispersion. Recently, Conway-Maxwell-Poisson (CMP) distribution is popularly used as the distribution offers a flexibility to capture a wide range of dispersion in the data. In this article, we propose a Bayesian CMP regression model to accommodate over and under-dispersion in modeling longitudinal count data. Specifically, we develop a regression model with random intercept and slope to capture subject heterogeneity and estimate covariate effects to be different across subjects. We implement a Bayesian computation via Hamiltonian MCMC (HMCMC) algorithm for posterior sampling. We then compute Bayesian model assessment measures for model comparison. Simulation studies are conducted to assess the accuracy and effectiveness of our methodology. The usefulness of the proposed methodology is demonstrated by a well-known example of epilepsy data.

• Archives of Plastic Surgery
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• v.45 no.3
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• pp.207-213
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• 2018

This review article presents an assessment of trends in statistical methods and an evaluation of their appropriateness in articles published in the Archives of Plastic Surgery (APS) from 2012 to 2017. We reviewed 388 original articles published in APS between 2012 and 2017. We categorized the articles that used statistical methods according to the type of statistical method, the number of statistical methods, and the type of statistical software used. We checked whether there were errors in the description of statistical methods and results. A total of 230 articles (59.3%) published in APS between 2012 and 2017 used one or more statistical method. Within these articles, there were 261 applications of statistical methods with continuous or ordinal outcomes, and 139 applications of statistical methods with categorical outcome. The Pearson chi-square test (17.4%) and the Mann-Whitney U test (14.4%) were the most frequently used methods. Errors in describing statistical methods and results were found in 133 of the 230 articles (57.8%). Inadequate description of P-values was the most common error (39.1%). Among the 230 articles that used statistical methods, 71.7% provided details about the statistical software programs used for the analyses. SPSS was predominantly used in the articles that presented statistical analyses. We found that the use of statistical methods in APS has increased over the last 6 years. It seems that researchers have been paying more attention to the proper use of statistics in recent years. It is expected that these positive trends will continue in APS.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Laboratory Science
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• v.52 no.1
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• pp.18-27
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• 2020

The correct distinction of carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) and ccarbapenemase producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE) and the rapid detection of CPE are important for instituting the correct treatment and management of clinical infections. Screening protocols are mainly based on cultures of rectal swab specimens on selective media followed by phenotypic tests to confirm a carbapenem-hydrolyzing activity, the rapid carbapenem inactivation method, lateral flow immunoassay, the matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time-of-flight test and molecular methods. The CPE is accurate for detection, and is essential for the clinical treatment and prevention of infections. A variety of phenotypic methods and gene-based methods are available for the rapid detection of carbapenemases, and these are expected to be routinely used in clinical microbiology laboratories. Therefore, to control the spread of carbapenemase, many laboratories around the world will need to use reliable, fast, high efficiency, simple and low cost methods. Optimal effects in patient applications would require rapid testing of CRE to provide reproducible support for antimicrobial management interventions or the treatment by various types of clinicians. For the optimal test method, it is necessary to combine complementary test methods to discriminate between various resistant bacterial species and to discover the genetic diversity of various types of carbapenemase for arriving at the best infection control strategy.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.275-280
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• 2003

The method of simultaneous data acquisition of arteries and veins(SAAV) was suggested to obtain MR angiography of arteries and veins at 0.3T low filed MRI system (Magfinder, AlLab. Korea). Two separated artery- and vein-images were put together using AVCM(Artery-Vein Color Mapping) algorithm and presented in the same image. In this study, artery- and vein-separated angiograms of volunteer's neck were obtained. Two dimensioal blood-enhanced images wre sequentially obtained using SAAV pulse sequence based on time-of-flight(TOF) method with flow compensation. Imaging parameters were TR/TE=70/12msec. FOV=230mm, slice thickness = 3mm, flip angle=90$^{\circ}$, matrix size=256${\times}$256${\times}$64mm. TSat TH/SPA=15/20mm, Ts_v=10msec and Ts_a=40ms. 3D MRA images were reconstructed using the maximum intensity projection(MIP) and the artery-vein color mapping(AVCM) algorithm. This study showed good possibility of clinical applications of MRA in 0.3T which provides valuable diagnostic information of clinical vascular diseases.

• Maxillofacial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.478-484
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• 2009

Three-dimensional porous scaffolds play an important role in tissue engineering strategies. They provide a void volume in which vascularization, new tissue formation, and remodeling can occur. Like any grafted materials, the ideal scaffold for bone tissue engineering should be biocompatible without causing an inflammatory response. It should also possess biodegradability, which provides a suitable three-dimensional environment for the cell function together with the capacity for gradual resorption and replacement by host bone tissue. Various scaffolds have already been developed for bone tissue engineering applications, including naturally derived materials, bioceramics, and synthetic polymers. The advantages of biodegradable synthetic polymers include the ability to tailor specific functions. The purpose of this study was to examine the osteogenic activity of periosteal-derived cells in a polydioxanone/pluronic F127 scaffold. Periosteal-derived cells were successfully differentiated into osteoblasts in the polydioxanone/pluronic F127 scaffold. ALP activity showed its peak level at 2 weeks of culture, followed by decreased activity during the culture period. Similar to biochemical data, the level of ALP mRNA in the periosteal-derived cells was also largely elevated at 2 weeks of culture. The level of osteocalcin mRNA was gradually increased during entire culture period. Calcium content was detactable at 1 week and increased in a time-dependent manner up to the entire duration of culture. Our results suggest that polydioxanone/pluronic F127 could be a suitable scaffold of periosteal-derived cells for bone tissue engineering.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.43 no.5
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• pp.341-352
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• 2022

Medical image segmentation is the most important task in radiation therapy. Especially, when segmenting medical images, the liver is one of the most difficult organs to segment because it has various shapes and is close to other organs. Therefore, automatic segmentation of the liver in computed tomography (CT) images is a difficult task. Since tumors also have low contrast in surrounding tissues, and the shape, location, size, and number of tumors vary from patient to patient, accurate tumor segmentation takes a long time. In this study, we propose a method algorithm for automatically segmenting the liver and tumor for this purpose. As an advantage of setting the boundaries of the tumor, the liver and tumor were automatically segmented from the CT image using the 2D CoordConv DeepLab V3+ model using the CoordConv layer. For tumors, only cropped liver images were used to improve accuracy. Additionally, to increase the segmentation accuracy, augmentation, preprocess, loss function, and hyperparameter were used to find optimal values. We compared the CoordConv DeepLab v3+ model using the CoordConv layer and the DeepLab V3+ model without the CoordConv layer to determine whether they affected the segmentation accuracy. The data sets used included 131 hepatic tumor segmentation (LiTS) challenge data sets (100 train sets, 16 validation sets, and 15 test sets). Additional learned data were tested using 15 clinical data from Seoul St. Mary's Hospital. The evaluation was compared with the study results learned with a two-dimensional deep learning-based model. Dice values without the CoordConv layer achieved 0.965 ± 0.01 for liver segmentation and 0.925 ± 0.04 for tumor segmentation using the LiTS data set. Results from the clinical data set achieved 0.927 ± 0.02 for liver division and 0.903 ± 0.05 for tumor division. The dice values using the CoordConv layer achieved 0.989 ± 0.02 for liver segmentation and 0.937 ± 0.07 for tumor segmentation using the LiTS data set. Results from the clinical data set achieved 0.944 ± 0.02 for liver division and 0.916 ± 0.18 for tumor division. The use of CoordConv layers improves the segmentation accuracy. The highest of the most recently published values were 0.960 and 0.749 for liver and tumor division, respectively. However, better performance was achieved with 0.989 and 0.937 results for liver and tumor, which would have been used with the algorithm proposed in this study. The algorithm proposed in this study can play a useful role in treatment planning by improving contouring accuracy and reducing time when segmentation evaluation of liver and tumor is performed. And accurate identification of liver anatomy in medical imaging applications, such as surgical planning, as well as radiotherapy, which can leverage the findings of this study, can help clinical evaluation of the risks and benefits of liver intervention.