• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.23 no.9
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• pp.33-40
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• 2022

Sedimentation and pH neutralization has been investigated as preteatment of acid contaminate water. The settling and neutralizing process derive more effective degradation efficiency as the pre-treatment process before the removal process of adsorption, volatile, biodegradation, or oxidation. Settling velocity, uniformity coefficient, coefficient of curvature, and grain size index can define in the sedimentation process for characteristics of the soil. The stainless steel sieve has been used to separate each particle size of the dry soil by assembling in order of 4, 10, 20, 40, 80, 100, and 200 mesh sizes. The soil from Gamcheon Port in Busan drops upper side of the sieve and shakes back and forth to separate each different size of the particle. The 1L of Imhoff cone and 200 mL of the mass cylinder were used as settling tanks to calculate settling velocity. Stokes' equation was used to figure out the average density of dry soil with a value from settling velocity. In the results, the average particle density and lowest settling velocity were 1.93 g/cm³ and 0.11 cm/s, respectively. These values can detect the range of settling points of sediment to prevent chemical accidents. In pH neutralization, the initial pH of 2, 3, 4, and 5 of nitric acid and sulfuric acid are used as an acid solution; 0.1, 0.01, and 0.001 M of sodium hydroxide and calcium hydroxide are used as a base solution. The main goal of this experiment is to figure out the volume percentage of the acid solution becomes pH 7. The concentration of 0.001 M of base solution exceeds all the conditions, 0.01 M exceeds partially, and 0.1 M does not exceed 5 v/v% except pH 2. Calcium hydroxide present less volume than sodium hydroxide at pH neutralization both sulfuric and nitric acid.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.65-77
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• 2022

A study was conducted in Korea on the leaching behavior and possibility of recovery of vanadium and other valuable metals from domestic vanadium titanomagnetite (VTM) by direct acid leaching. In this study, a VTM concentrate containing 0.8% V₂O₅ was used, and the ratio of magnetite to ilmenite was calculated as 1.9:1 by using the HSC program. The leaching behavior of vanadium from the VTM was similar to that of iron, and it was affected by the concentration of sulfuric acid and temperature. Further, titanium could be leached in the form of TiOSO₄ at a temperature higher than 75℃. To improve the leaching efficiency of V, Fe, and Ti in VTM, reductive sulfuric acid and oxidative sulfuric acid leaching were performed. When Na₂SO₃ was used as a reducing agent, the leaching rate of vanadium was 80% of that in that case of leaching by sulfuric acid. Similarly, the leaching rate of titanium increased from 20% to 50%. When Na₂S₂O₈ was used as an oxidation agent, most of the vanadium was leached, and the main residue found by XRD analysis was ilmenite. In studies on the possibility of recovering valuable metals, the selective extraction of metals is hardly achieved by solvent extraction from oxidation leaching solutions; however, in this study, Cyanex 923, a solvation extractant from reductive leaching solutions, could selectively extract Ti.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.56 no.1
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• pp.36-44
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• 2023

Environmental DNA (eDNA) can exist in both intracellular and extracellular forms in natural ecosystems. When targeting harmful cyanobacteria, extracellular eDNA indicates the presence of traces of cyanobacteria, while intracellular eDNA indicates the potential for cyanobacteria to occur. However, identifying the "actual" potential for harmful cyanobacteria to occur is difficult using the existing sediment eDNA analysis method, which uses silica beads and cannot distinguish between these two forms of eDNA. This study analyzes the applicability of a density gradient centrifugation method (Ludox method) that can selectively analyze intracellular eDNA in sediment to overcome the limitations of conventional sediment eDNA analysis. PCR was used to amplify the extracted eDNA based on the two different methods, and the relative amount of gene amplification was compared using electrophoresis and Image J application. While the conventional bead beating method uses sediment as it is to extract eDNA, it is unknown whether the mic gene amplified from eDNA exists in the cyanobacterial cell or only outside of the cell. However, since the Ludox method concentrates the intracellular eDNA of the sediment through filtration and density gradient, only the mic gene present in the cyanobacteria cells could be amplified. Furthermore, the bead beating method can analyze up to 1 g of sediment at a time, whereas the Ludox method can analyze 5 g to 30 g at a time. This gram of sediments makes it possible to search for even a small amount of mic gene that cannot be searched by conventional bead beating method. In this study, the Ludox method secured sufficient intracellular gene concentration and clearly distinguished intracellular and extracellular eDNA, enabling more accurate and detailed potential analysis. By using the Ludox method for environmental RNA expression and next-generation sequencing (NGS) of harmful cyanobacteria in the sediment, it will be possible to analyze the potential more realistically.

• Clean Technology
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.31-38
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• 2023

Due to water shortages caused by water pollution and climate change, total organic carbon (TOC) standards have been implemented for wastewater discharged from public sewage treatment facilities. Furthermore, there is a growing interest and body of research pertaining to the reuse of sewage treatment water as a secure alternative water resource. The membrane bio-reactor (MBR) method is commonly used for advanced wastewater treatment because it can remove organic and inorganic ions and it does not require or emit any chemicals. However, the MBR process uses a separation membrane (MF), which requires frequent film cleaning due to fouling caused by a high concentration of mixed liquor suspended solid (MLSS). In this study, process improvement and microbubble cleaning efficiency were evaluated to improve the differential pressure, water flow, and MF fouling, which are the biggest disadvantages of operating the MF. The existing MBR method was improved by installing a precipitation tank between the air tank and the MBR tank in which raw water was introduced. Microbubbles were injected into a separation membrane tank into which the supernatant water from the precipitation tank was introduced. The microbubble generator was operated with a 15 day on, 15 day off cycle for 5 months to collect discharged water samples (4L) and measure TOC. As the supernatant water from the precipitation tank flowed into the separation membrane tank, about 95% of the supernatant water MLSS was removed so the MF fouling from biological contamination was prevented. Due to the application of microbubbles to supernatant water from the precipitation tank, the differential pressure of the separation membrane tank decreased by 1.6 to 2.3 times and the water flow increased by 1.4 times. Applying microbubbles increased the TOC removal rate by more than 58%. This study showed that separately operating the air tank and the separation membrane tank can reduce fouling, and suggested that applying additional microbubbles could improve the differential pressure, water flow, and fouling to provide a more efficient advanced treatment method.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.40 no.3
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• pp.267-274
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• 2022

Excess nitrogen (N) flowing from livestock manure to water systems poses a serious threat to the natural environment. Thus, livestock wastewater management has recently drawn attention to this related field. This study first attempted to obtain the optimal conditions for the further volatilization of NH₃ gas generated from pig wastewater by adjusting the amount of injected magnesia (MgO). At 0.8 wt.% of MgO (by pig wastewater weight), the volatility rate of NH₃ increased to 75.5% after a day of aeration compared to untreated samples (pig wastewater itself). This phenomenon was attributed to increases in the pH of pig wastewater as MgO dissolved in it, increasing the volatilization efficiency of NH₃. The initial pH of pig wastewater was 8.4, and the pH was 9.2 when MgO was added up to 0.8 wt.%. Second, the residual ammonia nitrogen (NH₄⁺-N) in pig wastewater was removed by precipitation in the form of struvite (NH₄MgPO₄·6H₂O) by adjusting the pH after adding MgO and H₃PO₄. Struvite produced in the pig wastewater was identified by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis. White precipitates began to form at pH 6, and the higher the pH, the lower the concentration of NH₄⁺-N in pig wastewater. Of the total 86.1% of NH₄⁺-N removed, 62.4% was achieved at pH 6, which was the highest removal rate. Furthermore, how struvite changes with pH was investigated. Under conditions of pH 11 or higher, the synthesized struvite was completely decomposed. The yield of struvite in the precipitate was determined to be between 68% and 84% through a variety of analyses.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.42-49
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• 1983

In order to find out the possibility of predicting fertilizer K requirement from the K supplying capacity of soil, the relative K activity ratio, Kas/kai, the potential buffering capacity of $K^+$ ($PBC^k$ ; the liner regression coefficient) and its activity ratio ($AR^k_o$ ; $^{k+}$/${\sqrt{Ca^{+2}+Mg^{+2}}}$ in mol/l) at ${\delta}K$ = O, in the Q/I relationships of Beckett(1964), were determined for the soils before flooding and the samples taken at heading stage of transplanted rice in pot experiment. These parameters assumed as the K supplying capacity of soils were subjected for the investigation through correlation stady between themselves and other factors such as grain yield or the amounts of $K_2O$ uptake by rice plant at harvest. The results may be summarized as follows; 1. The potassium supplying power of the flooded soil was considered to be ruled by the amounts of exchangeable K before flooding, since there was little change in exchangeable K concentration from no-exchangeable K during the incubation periods of 67 days. 2. The $PBC^k$ values, in soils before flooding were 0.027, 0.014 and 0.009, where as the $AR^k_o{\times}10^{-3}$ values were 9.1, 7.6, and 15.4, respectively, in clay, loamy and sandy loam soils. 3. The $PBC^k$ values, determined in the soil samples taken at heading stage, varied little compared with the values of orignal soil, regardless of those different fertilizer treatments and textures, showing the possibility of using them as a factor for the improvement of soil to increase the efficiency of fertilizer K. 4. The significant yield responses to potassium fertilizer application were observed wherever the $AR^k_o$ values in soil at heading stage drop down to the original $AR^k_o$ values, regardless of any levels of fertilizer application. 5. The higher correlations between the gain yield or the amounts of $K_2O$ uptake and by the use of both soil factors of $PBC^k$ and $AR^k_o$ at heading stage were observed compared with the use of any single factor. 6. The Kas/Kai value in the soil, estimated prior to the experiment, had high possitive correlation with the $AR^k_o$ determined in the soil at heading stage and could be used as a soil factor for predicting potassium fertilizer requirement.

• Journal of Soil and Groundwater Environment
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.40-46
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• 2009

The applicability of a well-type autotrophic sulfur-oxidizing reactive barrier (L $\times$ W $\times$ D = $3m\;{\times}\;4\;m\;{\times}\;2\;m$) as a long-term treatment option for nitrate removal in groundwater was evaluated. Pilot-scale (L $\times$ W $\times$ D = $8m\;{\times}\;4\;m\;{\times}\;2\;m$) flow-tank experiments were conducted to examine remedial efficacy of the well-type reactive barrier. A total of 80 kg sulfur granules as an electron donor and Thiobacillus denitrificans as an active bacterial species were prepared. Thiobacillus denitrificans was successfully colonized on the surface of the sulfur granules and the microflora transformed nitrate with removal efficiency of ~12% (0.07 mM) for 11 days, ~24% (1.3 mM) for 18 days, ~45% (2.4 mM) for 32 days, and ~52% (2.8 mM) for 60 days. Sulfur granules attached to Thiobacillus denitrificans were used to construct the well-type reactive barrier comprising three discrete barriers installed at 1-m interval downstream. Average initial nitrate concentrations were 181 mg/L for the first 28 days and 281 mg/L for the next 14 days. For the 181 mg/L (2.9 mM) plume, nitrate concentrations decreased by ~2% (0.06 mM), ~9% (0.27 mM), and ~15% (0.44 mM) after $1^{st}$, $2^{nd}$, and $3^{rd}$ barriers, respectively. For the 281 mg/L (4.5 mM) plume, nitrate concentrations decreased by ~1% (0.02 mM), ~6% (0.27 mM), and ~8% (0.37 mM) after $1^{st}$, $2^{nd}$, and $3^{rd}$ barriers, respectively. Nitrate plume was flowed through the flow-tank for 49 days by supplying $1.24\;m^3/d$ of nitrate solution. During nitrate treatment, flow velocity (0.44 m/d), pH (6.7 to 8.3), and DO (0.9~2.8 mg/L) showed little variations. Incomplete destruction of nitrate plume was attributed to the lack of retention time, rarely transverse dispersion, and inhibiting the activity of denitrification enzymes caused by relatively high DO concentrations. For field applications, it should be considered increments of retention time, modification of well placements, and intrinsic DO concentration.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.85-107
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• 2019

Online consumers browse products belonging to a particular product line or brand for purchase, or simply leave a wide range of navigation without making purchase. The research on the behavior and purchase of online consumers has been steadily progressed, and related services and applications based on behavior data of consumers have been developed in practice. In recent years, customization strategies and recommendation systems of consumers have been utilized due to the development of big data technology, and attempts are being made to optimize users' shopping experience. However, even in such an attempt, it is very unlikely that online consumers will actually be able to visit the website and switch to the purchase stage. This is because online consumers do not just visit the website to purchase products but use and browse the websites differently according to their shopping motives and purposes. Therefore, it is important to analyze various types of visits as well as visits to purchase, which is important for understanding the behaviors of online consumers. In this study, we explored the clustering analysis of session based on click stream data of e-commerce company in order to explain diversity and complexity of search behavior of online consumers and typified search behavior. For the analysis, we converted data points of more than 8 million pages units into visit units' sessions, resulting in a total of over 500,000 website visit sessions. For each visit session, 12 characteristics such as page view, duration, search diversity, and page type concentration were extracted for clustering analysis. Considering the size of the data set, we performed the analysis using the Mini-Batch K-means algorithm, which has advantages in terms of learning speed and efficiency while maintaining the clustering performance similar to that of the clustering algorithm K-means. The most optimized number of clusters was derived from four, and the differences in session unit characteristics and purchasing rates were identified for each cluster. The online consumer visits the website several times and learns about the product and decides the purchase. In order to analyze the purchasing process over several visits of the online consumer, we constructed the visiting sequence data of the consumer based on the navigation patterns in the web site derived clustering analysis. The visit sequence data includes a series of visiting sequences until one purchase is made, and the items constituting one sequence become cluster labels derived from the foregoing. We have separately established a sequence data for consumers who have made purchases and data on visits for consumers who have only explored products without making purchases during the same period of time. And then sequential pattern mining was applied to extract frequent patterns from each sequence data. The minimum support is set to 10%, and frequent patterns consist of a sequence of cluster labels. While there are common derived patterns in both sequence data, there are also frequent patterns derived only from one side of sequence data. We found that the consumers who made purchases through the comparative analysis of the extracted frequent patterns showed the visiting pattern to decide to purchase the product repeatedly while searching for the specific product. The implication of this study is that we analyze the search type of online consumers by using large - scale click stream data and analyze the patterns of them to explain the behavior of purchasing process with data-driven point. Most studies that typology of online consumers have focused on the characteristics of the type and what factors are key in distinguishing that type. In this study, we carried out an analysis to type the behavior of online consumers, and further analyzed what order the types could be organized into one another and become a series of search patterns. In addition, online retailers will be able to try to improve their purchasing conversion through marketing strategies and recommendations for various types of visit and will be able to evaluate the effect of the strategy through changes in consumers' visit patterns.