• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.85 no.3
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• pp.618-630
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• 2024

Purpose To compare the efficacy and safety of radiofrequency ablation (RFA) and ethanol ablation (EA) followed by RFA in treating mixed cystic and solid thyroid nodules. Materials and Methods We included 243 nodules from 243 patients who underwent RFA for mixed cystic and solid benign nodules. The nodules were divided into two groups (RFA alone and EA + RFA). We evaluated volume reduction rate (VRR), therapeutic success rate, improvement in symptomatic and cosmetic issues, complications, and adverse effects. Results The RFA group included 204 patients, and the EA + RFA group included 39 patients. The long-term success rates in the RFA only and EA + RFA groups were 90.2% and 97.4%, respectively. The mean VRR at the last follow-up in the RFA and EA + RFA groups were 81.6% and 87.2%, respectively. Therapeutic results were similar in both groups at the last followup. Cosmetic and symptomatic problems markedly improved in both groups. No major complications were observed. Conclusion Both RFA alone and EA + RA are safe and effective methods for treating mixed cystic and solid thyroid nodules, although EA + RFA is slightly more effective.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.99-105
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• 1986

This study was carried out to compare the soil profile development indices of Sinjeong series according to the distribution areas in Yeongnam district. The results obtained were as follows; 1. The soils studied were belong to fine loamy family of hilly residual soils derived from conglomerate. These soils were well drained and dominantly had 30-60% slopes, and used for forest. 2. The surfaces were typified by brownish red (5YR) or brownish yellow (10YR) loam, subsoils were clay loam of reddish brown (5YR) or reddish yellow (7.5YR) and the substrata were in dark reddish brown (5YR) or pink (7.5YR) sandy loam. 3. The indices of horizon development of the soils studied were from 0.18 to 0.38 and the index in illuvial horizons with clay films were over 0.36, that were higher than the others. The profile development indices were similar to each other ranging from 30.18 to 35.93. 4. Positive correlations were observed among horizon development indices and normalized values of structure, texture and consistences, but the relationship between profile development indices and consistences were not the same. 5. The amount of clay minerals formed in the soil horizons per 100g of parent materials were 1.1-1.6g and the rates of the clay leached were around 4.4-5.9%. 6. The sphericity and roundness of the gravels contained in the soils studied were 0.741 and 0.715, respectively. These similarity of "well rounded" gravels certify that the parent rocks were formed under similar environments.

• Korean Journal of Medicinal Crop Science
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.234-242
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• 2000

There are two cultivars, 'Jeongsun' and 'Mishima' of Bupleurum falcatum L., a medicinal plant, have been cultivated in Korea. Two cultivars were evaluated and compared in details for major growth characters and their seasonal changes. Jeongsun was higher in stem length and root weight per plant, and earlier in maturity than Mishima, while Mishima was higher in top weight per plant and the ratio of outer phloem layer(OPL) to whole root, and more in branch number. Coefficients of variations of most growth characters were higher in Mishima than in Jeongsun. In relationship between root and shoot growth characters, root weight, root diameter, etc. were positively correlated with stem thickness, top weight, branch number, etc. in both cultivars. In comparison of seasonal changes for growth characters between two cultivars, stem length and node number were almost not increased after September, but root length and branch number tended to increase until November. There were continuous increases of top and root weights in both cultivars after September. Increase rates of top and root weights were higher in Mishima and Jeongsun, respectively. The weight ratio of root part to whole plant in Jeongsun and the ratio of OPL to whole root in Mishima were higher during whole growth stages; especially Mishima showed their continuous increases after October. Jeongsun flowered earlier (August 17) than Mishima (September 16) by one month. Complete flowering date was on August 30 in Jeongsun and on September 30 in Mishima. Basic difference in plant growth between two cultivars was maturity, so shoot growth almost stopped after October in Jeongsun, and continued vegetative growth until November in Mishima with late flowering habit. These results indicate that higher root weight in Jeongsun is due to its earlier flowering character leading to relatively longer time for root growth, as compared with Mishima.

• Korean Journal of Weed Science
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.279-288
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• 2011

To suggest the weed management technique for environment friendly rice cultivation, we investigated occurrence patterns of weeds, the actual condition of weed management, and rice yield at the environment friendly agricultural complex located in Honam and Chungnam regions. The practical performance of weed management was relatively satisfactory in decreasing order of agricultural technique with golden-apple-snail (GAS) > agricultural technique with duck (Duck) > agricultural technique with rice bran (RB) > agricultural technique with soft-shelled turtle (ST). In the rice fields employed by agricultural technique with GAS, the dominant weeds were Echinochloa crus-galli, Ludwigia prostrata, Monochoria vaginalis, Sagittaria trifolia, and Aneilema keisak. However, E. crus-galli, M. vaginalis, L. prostrata, Aeschynomene indica and Bidens frondosa were found as dominant weeds at the fields using the Duck and E. crus-galli, M. vaginalis, L. prostrata, Polyganum hydropiper and Eleocharis kuroguwai at the fields using RB. In comparison of rice yield ($5.2\;MT\;ha^{-1}$) obtained from the conventional cultivation using herbicides, about 93% was reached by Duck, about 91% by GAS, about 92% by RB, and about 78% by ST. When rice qualities obtained from environment friendly rice cultivation were compared with those from the conventional cultivation, the producing rates of perfect kernel, immature kernel, immature opaque kernel, cracked rice, and damaged kernel were lower in the former cultivation, whereas contents of protein, amylose, and fatty acid were similar in the two cultivation methods. The problems found in the environment friendly agriculture were poor plowing and harrowing, carless irrigation management, and geological poor condition as cultivation area with cold water. These have caused severe infestation of weeds, frequent incident of disease and insect pest, and rice lodging. This resulted in reduction of rice yield as high as about 32 to 79% as compared with the conventional cultivation using herbicides.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.5-10
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• 2012

There is a still unsettled issue about the comparison of long-term clinical effects between sirolimus-(SES) and paclitaxel-eluting stents (PES) for the patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI). Therefore, we performed a retrospective analysis to evaluate the 4-year clinical outcome of SES as compared with PES after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in patients with AMI. From January 2004 to August 2006, all consecutive patients with acute ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) underwent primary PCI and acute NSTEMI underwent PCI by implantation either SES or PES were enrolled. The occurrence of death, cardiac death, recurrent infarction, target vessel revascularization (TVR) and stent thrombosis were analyzed. The composite of major adverse cardiac events (MACE; death, recurrent infarction and TVR) were also analyzed. During the study period, total 668 AMI patients had visited. Of them, total 522 patients (299 with SES and 223 with PES) were enrolled. During 4-year clinical follow-up, there were similar occurrences of death ($18.3{\pm}3.0%$ vs. $14.6{\pm}2.2%$, p=0.26), cardiac death ($11.2{\pm}2.6%$ vs. $6.8{\pm}1.52%$, p=0.39), re-infarction ($6.4{\pm}1.8%$ vs. $3.3{\pm}1.1%$, p=0.31), and stent thrombosis ($5.4{\pm}1.7%$ vs. $3.2{\pm}1.1%$, p=0.53) between the two groups, consecutively. The occurrences of TVR ($10.0{\pm}3.0%$ vs. $4.0{\pm}1.2%$, p=0.008) and MACE ($29.4{\pm}3.5%$ vs. $19.4{\pm}2.5%$, p=0.003) were significantly higher in patients treated with PES than SES. In AMI patients treated with either SES or PES implantation, SES had a significantly lower risk of TVR and MACE during 4-year clinical follow-up. Rates of death, cardiac death or recurrent infarction, and stent thrombosis were similar.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.19-43
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• 2016

This study examines the causes of the Asian exchange rate crisis and compares it to the European Monetary System crisis. In 1997, emerging countries in Asia experienced financial crises. Previously in 1992, currencies in the European Monetary System had undergone the same experience. This was followed by Mexico in 1994. The objective of this paper lies in the generation of useful insights from these crises. This research presents a comparison of South Korea, United Kingdom and Mexico, and then compares three different models for prediction. Previous studies of economic crisis focused largely on the manual construction of causal models using linear techniques. However, the weakness of such models stems from the prevalence of nonlinear factors in reality. This paper uses a structural equation model to analyze the causes, followed by a neural network model to circumvent the linear model's weaknesses. The models are examined in the context of predicting exchange rates In this paper, data were quarterly ones, and Consumer Price Index, Gross Domestic Product, Interest Rate, Stock Index, Current Account, Foreign Reserves were independent variables for the prediction. However, time periods of each country's data are different. Lisrel is an emerging method and as such requires a fresh approach to financial crisis prediction model design, along with the flexibility to accommodate unexpected change. This paper indicates the neural network model has the greater prediction performance in Korea, Mexico, and United Kingdom. However, in Korea, the multiple regression shows the better performance. In Mexico, the multiple regression is almost indifferent to the Lisrel. Although Lisrel doesn't show the significant performance, the refined model is expected to show the better result. The structural model in this paper should contain the psychological factor and other invisible areas in the future work. The reason of the low hit ratio is that the alternative model in this paper uses only the financial market data. Thus, we cannot consider the other important part. Korea's hit ratio is lower than that of United Kingdom. So, there must be the other construct that affects the financial market. So does Mexico. However, the United Kingdom's financial market is more influenced and explained by the financial factors than Korea and Mexico.

• Korean Journal of Poultry Science
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.29-37
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• 2009

This study was conducted to determine the effects of dietary supplementation with chitosan feeding levels and feeding forms on the performance, proximate composition, pH, thiobarbituric acid reactive substance (TBARS), water holding capacity (WHC), shear force, meat color, and fatty acid of chicken thigh meat. Two hundred broilers (Arbor Acre Broiler, male) were randomly assigned to five groups and were fed for five weeks and slaughtered. Thigh muscle was evaluated in this experiment. The amounts of proximate composition, crude fat of control and T3 for the chitosan-treated groups were significantly higher as compared with T2 (P<0.05), but no significant effects were detected on moisture, crude protein, and crude ash. By comparison, pH was significantly increased when chitosan was included at 2% into diet or more than 1% into drinking water. TBARS was significantly lower at chitosan treated groups it was decreased with increasing chitosan level in the diets (P<0.05). Therefore, chitosan had the possibility to improve shelf life of chicken meat. Higher chitosan levels and feeding additive increased high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) and reduced total cholesterol and low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) (P<0.05). $L^*$ and $a^*$ of chitosan treated group was higher than the control. As the dietary chitosan levels increase, the composition of palmitic acid and oleic acid levels was increased, however, those but the rates of linoleic acid and arachidonic acid were decreased. It is concluded that dietary chitosan has a positive effect on increasing HDL-C and oleic acid and decreasing total-C, LDL-C and TBARS values. Therefore, the treatment with the most significant effects in the current study was the high level of chitosan.

• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.221-227
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• 2013

The methane oxidation characteristics at the top and bottom layers in up-flow biofilters were investigated. Two biofilters were packed with perlite and tobermolite (biofilter A: respectively top and bottom; biofilter B: respectively bottom and top) and then compared. The methane oxidation rate was analyzed with the packed bed of the biofilter layers. The bacterial population in the biofilter was characterized using quantitative real-time PCR. For the methane oxidation rate of the biofilter A column, the perlite top part ($845.16{\pm}64.78{\mu}mol{\cdot}VS^{-1}{\cdot}h^{-1}$) gave a relatively higher value than the tobermolite bottom part ($381.85{\pm}42.00{\mu}mol{\cdot}VS^{-1}{\cdot}h^{-1}$). For the methane oxidation rate of the biofilter B column, the tobermolite top part ($601.25{\pm}37.78{\mu}mol{\cdot}VS^{-1}{\cdot}h^{-1}$) provided a relatively higher value than the perlite bottom part ($411.07{\pm}53.02{\mu}mol{\cdot}VS^{-1}{\cdot}h^{-1}$). The pmoA gene copy numbers, responsible for methanotrophs, in the top layer of biofilter A (1.27E+13 pmoA gene copy number/mg-VSS) was higher than in the bottom layer (3.33E+13 pmoA gene copy number/mg-VSS). However, the population of methanotrophs in biofilter B was not significantly different between the top and bottom layers. These results suggest that although the methane oxidation rates of perlite and tobermolite in the top parts of biofilter A and B were high, methanotroph populations were higher in the bottom parts of both biofilters, with a rapid decline in methane concentrations within the biofilters.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.20 no.10
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• pp.1532-1537
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• 2010

This study compared the inhibitory effects of methanol extracts from yellow and black soybeans (black soybean, Seomoktae and Seoritae) on mutagenicity using the Ames test and growth of human cancer cells (AGS human gastric adenocarcinoma, HT-29 human colon cancer, Hep 3B hepatocellular carcinoma cells). In the Ames test system using Salmonella typhimurium TA100, aflatoxin $B_1$ ($AFB_1$)-induced mutagenicity was significantly inhibited by treatments with the methanol extracts from either yellow or black soybeans in a dose dependent manner (p<0.05). The methanol extracts from various black soybeans tended to have a greater inhibitory effect compared to those from yellow soybeans. As for N-methyl-N'-nitro-N-nitrosoguamidine (MNNG)-induced mutagenicity, the methanol extracts (5 mg/assay) from black soybean, Seomoktae and Seoritae showed 51%, 61% and 53% inhibitory rates, respectively, indicating that Seomoktae, a type of black soybean, had a stronger antimutagenic activity against mutagens (both $AFB_1$ and MNNG). Methanol extracts from black soybeans showed an inhibitory rate of greater than 50% on the growth of human cancer cells (AGS, HT-29 and Hep 3B) and the inhibition was more effective in the methanol extract from Seomoktae. Our results suggested that the methanol extracts from black soybeans showed stronger inhibitory effects on mutagenicity and growth of cancer cells than those from yellow soybean. It is concluded that intake of black soybean can be recommended for improving health.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.50 no.1
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• pp.42-51
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• 2001

Background : Recently, cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPX) has become a popular diagnostic method for differentiating the main cause of exertional dyspnea or exercise limitation. We evaluated the difference in the CPX results according to interpretative algorithms and the methals of exercise in Korea. Method : Sixty-six patients with chronic lung disease and 48 adults with dyspneic symptoms, but with no abnormalities in a spirometry performed symptom limited CPX, were included in this study. The results were interpreted using both Wasserman's(WA) and Eschenbacher's algorithm (EA), and a comparison between both algorithms was made. Thirty-three healthy medical students performed the CPX with a cycle ergometer and treadmill. The results were interpreted with EA and the concurrence in interpretations was evaluated accord ing to the methods of exercise. Results : 1. In patients with chronic lung disease, the overall concordance rate between the two algorithms was 63.6%. The concordance rates waw 69.8% in patients with obstructive, 25.0% in those with restrictive, and 66.7% in those with mixed pulmonary insufficiency. In patients with dyspneic symptoms but normal findings in resting spirometry, the concordance rate was 60.4%. 2. In healthy medical students, in results inter preted with EA, the concordance rate between the cycle ergometer and treadmill exercise was 25.0%. Conclusion : Both interpretative algorithms and methods of exercise may affect the CPX results. In using CPX as a diagnostic test for the causes of dyspnea in the Korean population. the interpretative algorithms and method of exercise need to be standardized, and a predictive $VO_2$max equation needs to be established.