• English & American cultural studies
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.219-239
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• 2014

Arjun Appadurai contends that "the new global cultural economy has to be seen as a complex, overlapping, disjunctive order that cannot any longer be understood in terms of existing center-periphery models" (32); though discerning and perhaps becoming more and more apt, Appadurai's observation of the breakdown of the "center-periphery" binary appears as mere "academic jargon" in the lives of new immigrants, tackling the murky waters of identity politics in the transcultural technoscape of modern America in Kunzru's Transmission. Kunzru's antihero is Arjun Mehta, a software technician, who comes to America with high hopes of realizing the "American Dream." To a certain extent, Arjun himself is culpable of resurrecting the "center" as he prioritizes America and its values over all else. Despite his best efforts, Arjun cannot prevail in the perilous politics of exclusion/inclusion, and is relegated into a "high-tech coolie," exploited for his technological savvy. Even as the "center-periphery" binary stays intact in the production of an (Asian) American identity, it becomes undone in the hands of this "would-be" American; ultimately denied inclusion into America, Arjun unleashes a destructive virus that has major global consequences. In a sense, the boundary that separates the center and the periphery comes down as both collectively become victims to Arjun's retributive malfeasance. Arjun seems to rely on the "American" promise that old allegiances (to a national identity) are now defunct and new ones can be easily forged; as Kunzru's Transmission demonstrates with the tragic story of Arjun, the complex politics of identity production in America does not necessarily deliver on this promise. This essay hence aims to examine the politics of (national) belonging in the age of transnationalism.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2011.02a
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• pp.17-18
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• 2011

Plasma in liquid phase has attracted great attention in the last few years by the wide domain of applications in material processing, decomposition of organic and inorganic chemical compounds and sterilization of water. The plasma in liquid is characterized by three main regions which interact each - other during the plasma operation: the liquid phase, which supply the plasma gas phase with various chemical compounds and ions, the plasma in the gas phase at atmospheric pressure and the interface between these two regions. The most complex region, but extremely interesting from the fundamental, chemical and physical processes which occur here, is the boundary between the liquid phase and the plasma gas phase. In our laboratory, plasma in liquid which behaves as a glow discharge type, is generated by using a bipolar pulsed power supply, with variable pulse width, in the range of 0.5~10 ${\mu}s$ and 10 to 30 kHz repetition rate. Plasma in water and other different solutions was characterized by electrical and optical measurements. Strong emissions of OH and H radicals dominate the optical spectra. Generally water with 500 ${\mu}S/cm$ conductivity has a breakdown voltage around 2 kV, depending on the pulse width and the repetition rate of the power supply. The characteristics of the plasma initiated in ultrapure water between pairs of different materials used for electrodes (W and Ta) were investigated by the time-resolved optical emission and the broad-band absorption spectroscopy. The deexcitation processes of the reactive species formed in the water plasma depend on the electrode material, but have been independent on the polarity of the applied voltage pulses. Recently, Coherent anti-Stokes Raman Spectroscopy method was employed to investigate the chemistry in the liquid phase and at the interface between the gas and the liquid phases of the solution plasma system. The use of the solution plasma allows rapid fabrication of the metal nanoparticles without being necessary the addition of different reducing agents, because plasma in the liquid phase provides a reaction field with a highly excited energy radicals. We successfully synthesized gold nanoparticles using a glow discharge in aqueous solution. Nanoparticles with an average size of less than 10 nm were obtained using chlorauric acid solutions as the metal source. Carbon/Pt hybrid nanostructures have been obtained by treating carbon balls, synthesized in a CVD chamber, with hexachloro- platinum acid in a solution plasma system. The solution plasma was successfully used to remove the template remained after the mesoporous silica synthesis. Surface functionalization of the carbon structures and the silica surface with different chemical groups and nanoparticles, was also performed by processing these materials in the liquid plasma.

• 한국해양학회지
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.204-222
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• 1991

The annual cycles of plant major nutrients and dissolved oxygen in a nutrients-rich semi-enclosed coastal inlet, chinhae Bay, of the southern coast of the Korean Peninsula are first presented. The water column of the bay is stratified during summer (April-late September) and well0mixed during winter (October-March). During the summer stratification period, dissolved oxygen contents exceed 400uM in the surface but diminish to less than 50uM in the near bottom waters, which often results in an anoxic environment in the inner part of Chinhae Bay. After the breakdown of the stratification in October, dissolved oxygen concentration remains undersaturated until February. The evidence of allochthonous input of N-nutrients throughout the year is readily seen in the water column: however. crude budget calculations show that the nutrients are efficiently utilized within the bay ecosystem, and that export of the nutrients from the bay to the shelf must be negligible. There is no sign of the enrichment of the nutrients in the water column. The eutrophication phenomenon sensu stricto is not observed in chinhae Bay. Using the standing stock of dissolved oxygen and estimation of the oxygen fluxes across the air-sea boundary, a benthic oxygen respiration rate during winter is estimated conservatively at 21-24 mmol Cm/SUP -2/d/SUP -1/. this oxygen respiration rate accounts for about 20% of the total phytoplankton production in winter.