• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.25 no.12
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• pp.2125-2134
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• 2015

IrrE is a highly conserved global regulator in the Deinococcus genus and contributes to survival from high doses of UV radiation, ionizing radiation, and desiccation. Drad-IrrE and Dgob-IrrE from Deinococcus radiodurans and Deinococcus gobiensis I-0 each share 66% sequence identity. However, Dgob-IrrE showed a stronger protection phenotype against UV radiation than Drad-IrrE in the D. radiodurans irrE-deletion mutant (ΔirrE), which may be due to amino acid residues differences around the DNA-binding HTH domain. Site-directed mutagenesis was used to generate a Drad-IrrE A184S single mutant, which has been characterized and compared with the ΔirrE mutant complemented strain with Drad-irrE, designated ΔirrE-E. The effects of the A184S mutation following UV radiation and mitomycin C (MMC) shock were determined. The A184S mutant displayed significantly increased resistance to UV radiation and MMC shock. The corresponding A184 site in Dgob-IrrE was inversely mutated, generating the S131A mutant, which exhibited a loss of resistance against UV radiation, MMC shock, and desiccation. qPCR analysis revealed that critical genes in the DNA repair system, such as recA, pprA, uvrA, and ddrB, were remarkably induced after UV radiation and MMC shock in the ΔirrE-IE and A184S mutants. These data suggested that A184S improves the ability against UV radiation and MMC shock, providing new insights into the modification of IrrE. We speculated that the serine residue may determine the efficiency of DNA binding, leading to the increased expression of IrrE-dependent genes important for protection against DNA damage.

• Journal of KIISE:Databases
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.528-545
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• 2007

Recently ontology has been an attractive technology along with the business strategy of providing a plenty of more intelligent services. The essential problem in application domains using ontology is that all members, agents, and application programs in the domains must share the same ontology concepts. However, a variety of mobile devices, sensing devices, and network components manufactured by various companies, a variety of common carriers, and a variety of contents providers make multiple heterogeneous ontologies more likely to coexist. We can see many past researches fallen into resolving this semantic interoperability. Such methods can be broadly classified into by-mapping, by-merging, and by-translation. In this research, we focus on by-translation among them which uses a translation rule directly made between two heterogeneous ontology data like OntoMorph. However, the manual composition of the direct translation rule is not convenient by itself and if there are N ontologies, the direct method has the rule composition complexity of $O(N^2)$ in the worst case. Therefore, in this paper we introduce the cascade composition of translation rules based on web openness in order to improve the complexity. The research result made us recognize some important factors in an ontology translation system, that is speediness of translation, and conveniency of translation rule composition, and some experiments and comparing analysis with existing methods showed that our cascade method has more conveniency with insuring the speediness and the correctness.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.11
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• pp.93-100
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• 2015

Purpose - The objective of this research is to investigate whether national culture influences consumers' service evaluations. The services industry is receiving increasing attention from academia and practitioners as its position grows in global markets. Standardization or localization is a traditional managerial decision in global business. As the boundaries of services expand across national borders, firms are required to decide whether to standardize services or adjust to local needs. Though it is imperative to reflect global perspectives in marketing theories, these perspectives are mostly based on Western conceptualization of the world. Through a comparison of consumer groups from two culturally remote countries, service quality evaluation mechanisms are examined based on similar stimuli. The study tries to expand service marketing perspectives across national borders. Research design, data, and methodology - Eastern and Western countries are known to be culturally distinct. One Eastern and one Western country were chosen: an Anglo-Saxon country (the U.S., England, and Australia) and South Korea. In Hofstede's cultural dimensions, the differences between the two are pronounced. The Anglo-Saxon based countries share many similarities. Samples of the same sites are targeted. Questionnaires using a service quality scale (SERVQUAL) and a customer satisfaction scale were distributed. Utilizing Hofstede's typology of culture, the service evaluation mechanisms of the respondents from the two groups are evaluated. Three hypotheses are proposed from the review of the literature. These are service evaluation habits, importance of service quality dimensions for the individualistic/collectivistic countries, and strong/weak uncertainty avoidance cultures. Consumers from the individualistic countries are considered to care about themselves and demand a higher level of responsiveness and assurance. On the other hand, consumers from high uncertainty avoidance cultures are assumed to rely more on tangible questions of service quality, as these are the only predictable service quality indicators. A t-test and regression analysis are applied to validate the constructs. Results - The respondents from the Anglo-Saxon countries are more generous on service evaluations than Koreans. Researchers have indicated that Americans tend to give higher service evolution scores than European, Mexican, and Korean counterparts. The tendency is the same here. The sample from Anglo-Saxon countries demonstrated higher service evaluation scores on every dimension of SERVQUAL. For the second hypothesis, the respondents from the collectivistic culture rely less on core service dimensions (assurance and responsiveness) due to their tendency to place more value on group harmony than individual interest. However, the third hypothesis was not validated. Conclusions - The study attempted to expand the scope of service marketing to reflect cross-national perspectives. Service quality is known to have a strong influence on customer satisfaction and loyalty behavior. However, this research demonstrated that individuals from different cultural territories respond heterogeneously to the same stimuli. Scholars argue that national cultures are main factors in such deviated behavior. Scholars and global managers should be aware of differences in consumer value judgment mechanisms such as satisfaction, expectations, and perceptions.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.89-98
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• 2020

Purpose: The growth of online commerce is now becoming a major threat and a new opportunity for retailers. Existing offline retailers struggle to cope with new online retailers' threats by utilizing offline infrastructure. Besides, online retailers expand their online strengths to offline sales by opening their offline stores. Many retailers are paying close attention to the O2O business and the resulting changes. Thus, this research focuses on the O2O business model and process that retailers can adopt. Research design, data and methodology: Considering the features of products that retailers sell, this paper divides O2O business process with the following criteria: delivery lead-time and delivery area. And This research uses the business model canvas to define the features of O2O commerce business process. This paper also uses nine key elements in the business model canvas for analyzing the structure of O2O commerce business. Results: This paper suggests the delivery model of retailers respond to offline customer orders and summarizes the following results. (1) Considering characteristics such as logistics process, delivery area, and product type, we define the features of O2O business models: wide-area (warehouse) based O2O business model, regional area (store) based O2O business model and time-separated O2O business model. (2) This study checks the availability of the business model through the business cases of O2O business models. (3) This study also analyzes the O2O business model of domestic retail companies by the factors defined in the business model canvas. Conclusions: Retailers can adopt the O2O business process to fit their business requirements and strategy. The online retailers who deal with normal consumer products mainly have the wide-area based O2O business model. The wide-area based O2O business model can be suitable for retailers who manage inventory centrally. The time-separated O2O business model can be a good solution for fresh food retailers to operate the logistics process efficiently. And to shorten the delivery lead-time of fresh foods, the regional area based O2O business model can be fit to the retailer that utilizes its offline logistics or sales infrastructure. It may be much more important for retailers to share the inventory information with other branches and to change the role of offline stores.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.73-79
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• 2014

Purpose - The Korean government has revised the distribution industry development law to regulate large-scale retailer operations to protecting medium- and small-scale retailers and traditional markets. According to the revised law, large-scale retailers must follow regulations on operating hours and compulsory store closures two days per month. Based on the revised distribution industry development law, most local governments regulate operation hours and they have adopted compulsory closure programs for large-scale retail stores. However, it is argued that fresh food producers suffer from a decrease in sales based on the compulsory closure of stores operated by large-scale retailers. Large-scale retailers reduce their fresh food orders from agricultural and fishery producers because of the compulsory store closures. Fresh food producers also suffer from a decrease in prices because reduced orders lead to a decrease in auction prices based on the availability of excess goods in wholesale markets. This paper investigates the effects of operation regulations for large-scale retailers on agricultural producers by surveying agricultural and fishery producer organizations. Research design, data, methodology - A survey was conducted on 117 producer organizations of fruits and vegetables, cereals, fisheries, and livestock products from September 10 to October 4, 2012. Survey items are annual sales, shares of sales accounted for by large-scale retailers, reduction of orders and prices from large-scale retailers, methods to deal with the sales reduction, unfair trade practices of large-scale retailers, opinion of the large-scale retailer regulations, and so on. The average sales of the sampled producer organizations are 13.7 billion won and the average share of sales accounted for by large-scale retailers is 35.4%. Results - Survey results show that the sample producer organizations' sales decreased 10.1% because of the compulsory closures of stores operated by large-scale retailers. It is estimated that the total sales of producer organizations decreased 371.2 billion won because of the regulations on the operation of large-scale retailers. In addition to the direct effect of a sales decrease due to order reduction, agricultural and fishery producer organizations suffered from the secondary effect of price reduction in wholesale markets. When orders from large-scale retailers decreased, most agricultural and fishery producer organizations shipped redundant products to wholesale markets, decreasing auction prices. It was estimated that the price received decreased 21.9% when sold in other marketing channels. As producer organization sales decreased, it was reported that the labor force employed by producer organizations also decreased by 15.1%. Therefore, we can conclude that the regulations for large-scale retailer operations resulted in negative impacts on agricultural producers. Conclusions - Although the sales reduction due to the regulations for large-scale retailer operations are not great, the cumulative effects due to the continued compulsory closure of stores operated by large-scale retailers could be great. This paper suggests governmental programs that could help agricultural producer organizations to find new and effective marketing channels such as direct marketing, farmers' markets, exports, Internet shopping, and so on.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.23-33
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• 2013

Purpose - Numerous studies have tried to assess the role of a warranty as an explanatory instrument for product quality. While one study argued that manufacturers signal their superior quality to consumers by extending the duration of a warranty, quality is not necessarily related to warranty and a warranty for a short duration is a sign of high product quality. However, there are limitations to measuring product quality in terms of a single variable such as a warranty. Some other studies have evaluated the influence of brand power or value and price on the supposed quality of a product while the influence of warranty was found to be insignificant. Research design, data, methodology - The study analyzes the influence of brand power and the country of origin effect on consumers' perception of product quality in line with warranty and establishes a priority strategy. Especially, consumer experience has a significant influence on state of the art technology products like applied home electronics as these goods are generally quite expensive and consumers expend significant energy in purchasing them, so the associated warranty and brand can have a critical role in the decision making process. The price of the product was excluded in this discussion as it continually varies with the market share of the product. Results - The results of the analysis are as follows: First, each of the factors such as the standard of the warranty, brand power, and country of origin effect influences the degree of satisfaction of an individual. Second, the factors brand power and quality of the warranty interact both complementarily and synergistically at a time, depending on the brand power. As brand power is more significant, the degree of satisfaction is greater in case of products with low quality warranty compared to those with high quality warranty. Third, the brand power and country of origin effect present a complementary interaction. Fourth, the country of origin effect and quality of a warranty interact synergistically. Conclusions - Thus, the higher the quality of warranty, greater is the increment in the degree of satisfaction. The comprehensive study on the effect of the country of origin on the purchase decision process and the degree of satisfaction compared to the other elements shows that in case of Japanese and Korean markets the brand power of a company is desirable in sustaining the quality of warranty to the industrial average. Also, there is no significant improvement in the perceived quality of the product when the quality of the warranty is lowered. Therefore, the warranty effect diminishes when the value of the brand is known, while it perishes when both the brand power and the country of origin effect are strong enough.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.7-17
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• 2012

The aim of this study is to empirically explore micro and macroeconomic factors affecting the Pakistani sugar industries and searching the energy potential of this industry, through the survey of literature. The empirical part has been explored by employing Vector Autoregression (VAR), Granger Causality tests and simultaneous equation models through quarterly data for the period of 1991q2-2008q4. The study also aims to devise policies for the development of sugar industries and identify its growing importance for the energy sector of Pakistan. Empirical tests applied on the domestic prices of sugar, domestic interest rates, and exchange rate, productive capacities of sugar mills, per capita income, world sugar prices on cultivable area and sugar production reveal very useful results. Results reveal an improvement of productive capacity of the sugar mills of Pakistan on account of increasing crushing capacity of this sector. Negative effect of rising wholesale prices on the harvesting area was also observed. Profit earnings of the sugar mills significantly increase with the rise of sugar prices but the system does not exist for the farming community to share the rising prices of sugar. The models indicate positive and significant effect of local prices of sugar on its volume of import. Another of the findings of this study positively relates the local sugar markets with the international prices of sugar. Additionally, the causality tests results reveal exchange rate, harvesting area and overall output of sugarcane to have significant effects on the local prices of sugar. Similarly, import of sugar, interest rate, per capita consumption of sugar, per capita national income and the international prices of sugar also significantly affect currency exchange rate of Pakistani rupee in terms of US$. The study also finds sugar as an essential and basic necessity of the Pakistani consumers. That is why there are no significant income and price effects on the per capita consumption of sugar in Pakistan. All the empirical methods reiterate the relationship of variables. Economic policy makers are recommended to improve governance and management in the production, stock taking, internal and external trading and distribution of sugar in Pakistan using bumper crop policies. Macroeconomic variables such as interest rate, exchange rate per capita income and consumption are closely connected with the production and distribution of sugar in Pakistan. The cartelized role of the sugar industries should also be examined by further studies. There is need to further explore sugar sector of Pakistan with the perspective of energy generation through this sector; cartelized sugar markets in Pakistan and many more other dimensions of this sector. Exact appraisal of sugar industries for energy generation can be done appropriately by the experts from applied sciences.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.7 no.8
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• pp.234-244
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• 2007

Both competent authorities and private entrepreneurs face plenty of risks when negotiating BTO(Build Transfer Operation) methods of PPI(Private Participations in Infrastructures) projects. Also, success and failure of projects largely depend on the concession agreement contract. In this study, for more efficient negotiation, major issues are examined, and quantitatively analyzed to find out not only the relationship but also the characteristics of which these issues share. Questionnaire research was conducted through both research and by experts who were divided into an ordering agency, design company and constructor. Characteristics of major issues were quantitatively analyzed using the Likert index method, ANOVA(ANalysis of VAriance) and AHP(Analytic Hierarchy Process) analysis. Case studies were examined in order to estimate construction cost, rates of return, government finance support, level of operation-revenues guarantees, estimating operational costs and usage fees. With these 6 items, relative priority, relative impression which is sensible to risk and extent of difficulty in presenting data which is objective were quantitatively analyzed by the ordering agency, design company and constructor groups. From the analysis, there were some similarities between the design company and constructor groups while there was less of similarities between the ordering agency and design company or constructor. The government is diversifying the methods of project promotion, and PPI project from infrastructure-centered to public culture facilities are being expand. The current study will provide not only supporting efficient negotiation but also revitalizing PPI projects.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.271-276
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• 2014

The purpose of this study was to survey Suwon citizens over the age of 20 in order to provide basic data on the extent of coverage of the city's water reclamation system and to set guidelines for a policy on water reuse. The survey used a questionnaire with two fields, rainwater use and wastewater recycling, for analyzing factors that influenced water reuse. A factor analysis of 19 questionnaires gave a Cronbach's alpha coefficient greater than 0.4. Factors that influenced rainwater use were environmental protection, water charges, and the risk of climate change. Of the total explanatory power, the share of rainwater use and environmental protection was 39.7% and 28.1% respectively. Environmental protection (explanatory power 24.2%) had an effect on the explanatory power of wastewater reuse. When factors influencing wastewater recycling, like cost of recycling, water management policy, climate change, and suspension of tap water supply were included, the explanatory power of each of these factors went up by 4.3%, 2.8%, 3.3%, and 1.1%, respectively. For more effective wastewater recycling, a water management policy that factors in the above is required, along with a campaign to educate citizens on water management and environment conservation. Additionally, it may be necessary to improve the reliability and the quality of water supply.

• The Transactions of the Korea Information Processing Society
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.122-133
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• 1999

Uses can share information and use resources effectively by using TCP/IP-based networks. So, a protocol to manage complex networks effectively is needed. For the management of the distributed networks, the SNMP(Simple Network Management Protocol) has been adopted as an international standard in 1989, and the SNMPv2 in which a security function was added was published in 1993. There are two encryption schemes in SNMPv2, the one is a DES using symmetric encryption scheme and the other is a MD5(Message Digest5) hash function for authentication. But the DES has demerits that a key length is a few short and the encryption and the authentication is executed respectively. In order to solve these problems, wer use a RSA cryptography in this paper. In this paper, we examine the items related with SNMP. In addition to DES and MD5 propose in SNMPv3, we chance security functionality by adopting RSA, a public key algorithm executing the encryption and the authentication simultaneously. The proposed SNMPv3 security module is written in JAVA under Windows NT environment.