• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.505-509
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• 2012

Background: Matrix metalloproteinases (MMP) are proteolytic enzymes that are essentially involved in turnover of the extracellular matrix (ECM). The aim was to investigate the diagnostic value of MMP-7 and MMP-10 as tumor markers in pleural effusion (PE) and evaluate the value of combining MMP-7, MMP-10 and carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) assays as diagnostic aids for malignant cells. Materials and Methods: A total of 179 patients with PE (87 malignant and 92 benign) were included in this study. The levels of MMP-7 and MMP-10 were measured using ELISA. Results: Values for MMP-7 and MMP-10 were significantly higher in malignant PE than those in benign PE (P<0.01). Among all variables evaluated, logistic regression found that MMP-7 and MMP-10 were significantly correlated with the presence of malignant disease (P<0.01). Analysis of receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curves showed that the area under the curve of MMP-10 (0.806) was significantly larger than that of MMP-7 (0.771) and CEA (0.789) (P<0.01). With parallel interpretation, the combination of MMP-10 and CEA achieved the higher sensitivity of 94.6%. The combination of MMP-7 and CEA in serial interpretation was able to boost the specificity to 95.7%. The combination of MMP-7, MMP-10 and CEA produced better sensitivity, specificity, PPV and NPV than MMP-7 and MMP-10 alone. Conclusion: MMP-7 and MMP-10 in PE may represent helpful adjuncts to conventional diagnostic tools in ruling out malignancy as a probable diagnosis, thus guiding the selection of patients who might benefit from further invasive procedures.

• Journal of Gastric Cancer
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.385-394
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• 2020

Purpose: Patients with gastric cancer who receive neoadjuvant therapy are staged before treatment (cStage) and after treatment (ypStage). We aimed to compare the prognostic reliability of cStage and ypStage, alone and in combination. Materials and Methods: Data for all patients who received neoadjuvant therapy followed by surgery for gastric adenocarcinoma from 2004 to 2015 were extracted from the National Cancer Database. Kaplan-Meier (KM)curves were used to model overall survival based on cStage alone, ypStage alone, cStage stratified by ypStage, and ypStage stratified by cStage. P-values were generated to summarize the differences in KM curves. The discriminatory power of survival prediction was examined using Harrell's C-statistics. Results: We included 8,977 patients in the analysis. As expected, increasing cStage and ypStage were associated with worse survival. The discriminatory prognostic power provided by cStage was poor (C-statistic 0.548), while that provided by ypStage was moderate (C-statistic 0.634). Within each cStage, the addition of ypStage information significantly altered the prognosis (P<0.0001 within cStages I-IV). However, for each ypStage, the addition of cStage information generally did not alter the prognosis (P=0.2874, 0.027, 0.061, 0.049, and 0.007 within ypStages 0-IV, respectively). The discriminatory prognostic power provided by the combination of cStage and ypStage was similar to that of ypStage alone (C-statistic 0.636 vs. 0.634). Conclusions: The cStage is unreliable for prognosis, and ypStage is moderately reliable. Combining cStage and ypStage does not improve the discriminatory prognostic power provided by ypStage alone. A ypStage-based prognosis is minimally affected by the initial cStage.

• International Journal of Oral Biology
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.243-251
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• 2016

This study was undertaken to achieve a high bleaching efficacy with plasma, through longer application and reparative bleaching processes, by different shade evaluation methods. Extracted human teeth were divided into 6 groups (n=10). All teeth were treated in pairs. Low concentration of 15% carbamide peroxide (CP) was applied, with and without plasma, for 10, 20, and 30-min tooth bleaching, respectively. The bleaching procedure was repeated once daily for four days. The teeth were maintained in a moist environment provided by artificial saliva. The Vitapan Classical shade guide and Commission Internationale de L'Eclairage (CIELAB) color system were collectively used to measure the bleaching efficacy. Color evaluation was statistically analyzed using Student t-test and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) complemented by Tukey's test. Combining the plasma with 15% CP showed significantly greater color changes compared to bleaching without plasma (p<0.05). A high bleaching efficacy with plasma is proportional to the repetitive application and the treatment time. A 30-min application with plasma provided the best bleaching. Repetitive bleaching showed lower probability of color relapse of the bleached tooth. The color change by shade guide correlated with the changes in CIELAB color system. A value of 1 color change units (CCU) conversion factor for overall color change (${\Delta}E$) values comparisons was 3.724 values. The two measuring methods provide a more accurate correspondence of color change. The repetitive and longer application for tooth bleaching, combined with plasma, has a strong bleaching effect and produces whiter teeth.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.1-14
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• 2021

Excessive development and urbanization have destroyed animal, plant, habitats and reduced biodiversity. In order to preserve species diversity, habitat prediction studies are have been conducted at home and overseas using various modeling techniques. This study was conducted to suggest optimal habitat modeling research by comparing HSI and MaxEnt, which are widely used among habitat modeling techniques. The study was targeted on the endangered species of Prionailurus bengalensis in nearby areas (5460.35km2) including Cheonan City, and the same data were used for analysis to compare those models. According to the HSI analysis, Prionailurus bengalensis's habitat probability was 74.65% for less than 0.5 and 25.34% for more than 0.5 and the top 30% were forest (99.07%). MaxEnt's analysis showed that 56.22% of those below 0.5 and 43.79% of those above 0.5 were found to have a high explanatory power of 78.3% of AUC. The Paired Wilcoxn test, which evaluated the significance of thoes models, confirmed that the mean difference between the two models was statistically significant (p<0.05). Analysis of the differences in the results of those models using the matrix table shows that score 24.43% HSI and MaxEnt was accordance,12.44% of the 0.0 to 0.2 section, 7.22% of the 0.2 to 0.4 section, 2.73% of the 0.4 to 0.6 section, 1.96% of the 0.6 to 0.8, and 0.08% of the 0.9 to 1.0. To verify where the score difference appears, the result values of those models were reset to values from 1 to 5 and overlaid. Overlapping analysis resulted in 30.26% of the Strongly agree values, 56.77% of the agree values, and 11.92% of the Disagree values. The places where the difference in scores occurs were analyzed in the order of forest (45.23%), agricultural land (34.57%), and urbanization area (7.65%). This confirmed that the analysis of the same target species within the same target site also has differences in forecasts depending on the modelling method. Therefore, a novel analysis method combining the advantages of each modeling in habitat prediction studies should be developed, and future study may be used to select Prionailurus bengalensis and species-protected areas and species protection areas in the future. Further research is judged to require higher accuracy studies through the use of various modeling techniques and on-site verification.

• The KIPS Transactions:PartC
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• v.11C no.6 s.95
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• pp.835-842
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• 2004

In this paper, we have analyzed the MC-DS/CDMA system with input signal synchronized completely through adjustment of the gain in the PLL loop, by using the hybrid SC/MRC-(2/3) technique, which is said to one of the optimal diversity techniques under the multi-path fading environment, assuming that phase error is defined to the phase difference between the received signal from the multi-path and the reference signal in the PLL of the receiver. Also, assuming that the regarded radio channel model for the mobile communication is subject to the Nakagami-m fading channel, we have developed the expressions and performed the simulation under the consideration of various factor, in the MC/DS-CDMA system with the hybrid SC.MRC-(2/3) diversity method, such as the Nakagami fading index(m), $the\;number\;of\;paths\;(L_p),$ the number of hybrid SC.MRC-(2/3) $diversity\;branches\;(L,\;L_c),$ the number of users (K), the number of subcarriers (U), and the gain in the PLL loop. As a result of the simulation, it has been confirmed that the performance improvement of the system can be achieved by adjusting properly the PLL loop in order for the MC/DS-CDMA system with the hybrid SC/MRC-(2/3) diversity method to receive a fully synchronized signal. And the value of the gain in the PLL loop should exceed 7dB in order for the system to receive the signal with prefect synchronization, even though there might be a slight difference according to the values of the fading index and the spread processing gain of the subcarrier.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.32 no.5
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• pp.701-710
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• 2019

Objective: This study investigated the effect of different acute heat stress (HS) levels on chicken meat quality and ultra-structure. Methods: Chickens were randomly divided into 7 groups to receive different HS treatments: i) $36^{\circ}C$ for 1 h, ii) $36^{\circ}C$ for 2 h, iii) $38^{\circ}C$ for 1 h, iv) $38^{\circ}C$ for 2 h, v) $40^{\circ}C$ for 1 h, vi) $40^{\circ}C$ for 2 h, and vii) un-stressed control group ($25^{\circ}C$). Blood cortisol level, breasts initial temperature, color, pH, water holding capacity (WHC), protein solubility and ultra-structure were analyzed. Results: HS temperatures had significant effects on breast meat temperature, lightness ($L^*$), redness ($a^*$), cooking loss and protein solubility (p<0.05). The HS at $36^{\circ}C$ increased $L^*{_{24h}}$ value (p<0.01) and increased the cooking loss (p<0.05), but decreased $a^*{_{24h}}$ value (p<0.05). However, as the temperature increased to $38^{\circ}C$ and $40^{\circ}C$, all the values of $L^*{_{24h}}$, cooking loss and protein denaturation level decreased, and the differences disappeared compared to control group (p>0.05). Only the ultimate $pH_{24h}$ at $40^{\circ}C$ decreased compared to the control group (p<0.01). The pH in $36^{\circ}C$ group declined greater than other heat-stressed group in the first hour postmortem, which contributed breast muscle protein degeneration combining with high body temperature, and these variations reflected on poor meat quality parameters. The muscle fiber integrity level in group $40^{\circ}C$ was much better than those in $36^{\circ}C$ with the denatured position mainly focused on the interval of muscle fibers which probably contributes WHC and light reflection. Conclusion: HS at higher temperature (above $38^{\circ}C$) before slaughter did not always lead to more pale and lower WHC breast meat. Breast meat quality parameters had a regression trend as HS temperature raised from $36^{\circ}C$. The interval of muscle fibers at 24 h postmortem and greater pH decline rate with high body temperature in early postmortem period could be a reasonable explanation for the variation of meat quality parameters.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.476-489
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• 2017

Under partial shading conditions (PSCs), multiple maximums may be exhibited on the P-U curve of string inverter photovoltaic (PV) systems. Under such conditions, heuristic methods are invalid for extracting a global maximum power point (GMPP); intelligent algorithms are time-consuming; and model-based methods are complex and costly. To overcome these shortcomings, a novel hybrid MPPT (MPF-IP&O) based on a model-based peak forecasting (MPF) method and an improved perturbation and observation (IP&O) method is proposed. The MPF considers the influence of temperature and does not require solar radiation measurements. In addition, it can forecast all of the peak values of the PV string without complex computation under PSCs, and it can determine the candidate GMPP after a comparison. Hence, the MPF narrows the searching range tremendously and accelerates the convergence to the GMPP. Additionally, the IP&O with a successive approximation strategy searches for the real GMPP in the neighborhood of the candidate one, which can significantly enhance the tracking efficiency. Finally, simulation and experiment results show that the proposed method has a higher tracking speed and accuracy than the perturbation and observation (P&O) and particle swarm optimization (PSO) methods under PSCs.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.58 no.2
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• pp.277-300
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• 2016

Cold-formed steel (CFS) sections are becoming an increasingly popular solution for constructing floors in residential, healthcare and education buildings. Their reduced weight, however, makes them prone to excessive vibrations, increasing the need for accurate prediction of CFS floor modal properties. By combining experimental modal analysis of a full-scale CFS framed building and its floors and their numerical finite element (FE) modelling this paper demonstrates that the existing methods (based on the best engineering judgement) for predicting CFS floor modal properties are unreliable. They can yield over 40% difference between the predicted and measured natural frequencies for important modes of vibration. This is because the methods were adopted from other floor types (e.g., timber or standard steel-concrete composite floors) and do not take into account specific features of CFS floors. Using the adjusted and then updated FE model, featuring semi-rigid connections led to markedly improved results. The first four measured and calculated CFS floor natural frequencies matched exactly and all relevant modal assurance criterion (MAC) values were above 90%. The introduction of flexible supports and more realistic modelling of the floor boundary conditions, as well as non-structural $fa{\c{c}}ade$ walls, proved to be crucial in the development of the new more successful modelling strategy. The process used to develop 10 identified and experimentally verified FE modelling parameters is based on published information and parameter adjustment resulting from FE model updating. This can be utilised for future design of similar lightweight steel floors in prefabricated buildings when checking their vibration serviceability, likely to be their governing design criterion.

• Korean Journal of Food Science and Technology
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.482-489
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• 1985

The model foods similar to Korean typical foods were propared by combining moisture, protein and starch, and their thermal conductivities were investigated. Thermal conductivity of the model foods had a close relationship with food components such as moisture, protein and starch content. The interaction between the thermal conductivity and food components was not found. Thermal conductivity was proportionally increased as the moisture content increased, and thermal conductivity of starch food was lower than that of protein foods under the same level of moisture content of the model foods. The regression equation between thermal condutivity of the model foods. The regression equation between thermal conductivity of the model foods and moisture, protein and starch content at $20^{\circ}C$ was as follows; k = 0.00421M + 0.03152P + 0.05181. Correlation coefficient between calculated by above equation and measured values showed highly significant ($r=0.8418^{\ast}{\ast}$).

• Restorative Dentistry and Endodontics
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.399-408
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• 2001

Tooth bleaching has been prevailing recently for its ability to recover the color and shape of natural teeth without reduction of tooth material. However, it has been reported that bleaching procedure adversely affects the adhesive bond strength of composite resin to tooth. At the same time the bond strength was reported to be regained by application of some chemical agents. The purpose of this in vitro study was to investigate the effect of the removal of residual peroxide on the composite- enamel adhesion and also evaluated fracture mode between resin and enamel after bleaching. Sixty extracted human anterior and premolars teeth were divided into 5 groups and bleached by combined technique using of office bleaching with 35 % hydrogen peroxide and matrix bleaching with 10% carbamide peroxide for 4 weeks. After bleaching, the labial surfaces of each tooth were treated with catalase, 70% ethyl alcohol, distilled water and filled with composite resin. Shear bond strength was tested and the fractured surfaces were also examined with SEM. Analysis revealed significantly higher bond strength values. (p＜0.05) for catalase-treated specimens, but water-treated specimens showed reduction of bond strength, alcohol- treated specimens had medium value between the two groups(p＜0.05). The fracture mode was shown that the catalase group and the alcohol group had cohesive failure but the water sprayed group had adhesive failure. It was concluded that the peroxide residues in tooth after bleaching seems to be removed by gradual diffusion and the free radical oxygen from peroxide prevents polymerization by combining catalyst in the resin monomer. Therefore it may be possible to eliminate the adverse effect on the adhesion of composite resin to enamel after bleaching by using water displacement solution or dentin bonding agent including it for effective removal of residual peroxide.