• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.107-114
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• 2007

This study aimed to investigate the hexachlorobenzene (HCB) dechlorinating ability of sediment microbes collected from a natural canal receiving secondary effluents from an industrial estate and nearby factories. Nine sites along the stream and one in the estuary in the Gulf of Thailand into which the canal spills were specified and sampling for sediment and water. Preliminary analysis of the sediments showed that the first four sites nearest to the discharging location were contaminated by HCB within the range of 0.18 to 1.25 ppm. Apart from that, 1,3,5-trichlorobenzene which has never been commercially produced or used in any manufacturing processes except for the transformation from higher chlorinated benzene was also identified in the range of 0.16 to 0.24 ppm. This suggested a possibility of sporadically HCB contamination in this stream. Of more important, people in the community along this canal earn their living by coastal fishery; hence, posing a risk of spreading HCB and its less chlorinated congeners via food chain from caught marine creatures to human. As a result, there is an urgent need to understand the behavior of HCB dechlorination in this stream sediment which can lead to a clean-up action in the future. Serum bottles with sediment slurries (sediment to water ratio of 1:1 (v/v) and filtered to remove particles larger than 0.7 mm) from each site were inoculated with 2 mg/l of HCB, kept anaerobically in the dark at room temperature without any nourishment, and analyzed for HCB and its less-chlorinated congeners every 6 days. Total chemical oxygen demand, suspended solids, and volatile suspended solids were in the range of 21,492-73,584, 158,100-518,100 and 6,000-32,700 mg/l, respectively. It was found that all sediment slurries began to dechlorinate HCB in 12 to 30 days and the HCB was completely removed within 42 to 60 days or so. On the other hand, there was no HCB dechlorination occurred in the controlled set which was sterilized by autoclaving prior to the addition of HCB. This implies that the HCB transformation was solely due to microorganisms' activities. HCB was dechlorinated principally via pentachlolobenzene to 1,2,3,5-tetrachlorobenzene and terminated at 1,3,5-trichlorobenzene which is the major pathway as reported by many researchers. Dichlorobenzene has not been detected in any samples within the dechlorination period of 60 days. The results indicate that the microbial matrix in the sediment of this stream has an outstanding capability to dechlorinate HCB. Existing substrates and nutrients which mainly sorbed onto the solid phase and the typical temperature in Thailand were sufficient and suitable to promote the activities of these HCB-dechlorinating microbes.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.95-110
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• 2011

Deepening of the global competitive environment due to changes in operating environment and business, domestic and abroad companies in automotive industry are trying to optimize their production and logistics, to enhance their supply chain competitiveness and to promote information strategic planning to maximize their IT-enabled capabilities. In particular, the automotive industry is showing the various efforts to build the demand-based production system for responding to the market changes and preparing the global production and sales system. Despite of their various effors, the IT deployment and utilization levels of parts suppliers in the field of production/logistics companies are shown as higher in comparison with other area supplies, but the levels are shown as a very low condition compared to the parts suppliers of other manufacturing sectors. In this sense, the subject of this study, 'A' company (SMEs), has the challenges for improving the IS utilization and the accuracy of the information system according to the inefficiency of manual and field validation. Consequently, to improve and enhance the utilization of information systems, A company is carrying out the project to improve the ERP and POP operations by in-house approach, but they have shown the limitation in introducing and applying the latest technology.

• Industrial Engineering and Management Systems
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.189-196
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• 2008

This paper proposes a way of designing of a global logistics system for "the international cooperative global complementary production system" (ICGCPS) constructed in ASEAN region. ICGCPS is a global production system with several production bases located in a number of countries. In order to assemble the final products and sell them in the domestic market, each production base produces only special kinds of components and parts with the total demand required all the participating countries, and supplies them to the other production bases each other. In the ICGCPS, there are a number of important decision-making problems such as identifying which countries are suitable to produce specified components and parts, and deciding how to transport components and parts between the production bases. In the initial period of this system, each production base focused on its domestic market so that the final products it produced were sold only in the country where the base was located. Recently, some production bases have expanded sales to overseas markets. Taking this fact into account, we propose a production and transportation planning model in this paper that takes into account the export quantity of the final products, formulating it into a mathematical programming problem. Using this, we propose a way for managing the supply chain processes of the ICGCPS in order to improve performance measurements such as the total lead-time, the inventory quantity at the depot and the average rate of loading. A numerical example is presented to clarify the procedure proposed in this paper.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.2893-2900
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• 2014

Background: Statistical methods are very important to precisely measure breast cancer patient survival times for healthcare management. Previous studies considered basic statistics to measure survival times without incorporating statistical modeling strategies. The objective of this study was to develop a data-based statistical probability model from the female breast cancer patients' survival times by using the Bayesian approach to predict future inferences of survival times. Materials and Methods: A random sample of 500 female patients was selected from the Surveillance Epidemiology and End Results cancer registry database. For goodness of fit, the standard model building criteria were used. The Bayesian approach is used to obtain the predictive survival times from the data-based Exponentiated Exponential Model. Markov Chain Monte Carlo method was used to obtain the summary results for predictive inference. Results: The highest number of female breast cancer patients was found in California and the lowest in New Mexico. The majority of them were married. The mean (SD) age at diagnosis (in years) was 60.92 (14.92). The mean (SD) survival time (in months) for female patients was 90.33 (83.10). The Exponentiated Exponential Model found better fits for the female survival times compared to the Exponentiated Weibull Model. The Bayesian method is used to obtain predictive inference for future survival times. Conclusions: The findings with the proposed modeling strategy will assist healthcare researchers and providers to precisely predict future survival estimates as the recent growing challenges of analyzing healthcare data have created new demand for model-based survival estimates. The application of Bayesian will produce precise estimates of future survival times.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.6 no.9
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• pp.2285-2301
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• 2012

Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networks are becoming more and more popular in video content delivery services, such as Video on Demand (VoD). Scalability feature of P2P allows a higher number of simultaneous users at a given server load and bandwidth to use stream service. However, the quality of service (QoS) in these networks is difficult to be guaranteed because of the free-riding problem that nodes download the recourses while never uploading recourses, which degrades the performance of P2P VoD networks. In this paper, a distributed trust model is designed to reduce node's free-riding phenomenon in P2P VoD networks. In this model, the P2P network is abstracted to be a super node hierarchical structure to monitor the reputation of nodes. In order to calculate the reputation of nodes, the Hidden Markov Model (HMM) is introduced in this paper. Besides, a distinction algorithm is proposed to distinguish the free-riders and malicious nodes. The free-riders are the nodes which have a low frequency to free-ride. And the malicious nodes have a high frequency to free-ride. The distinction algorithm takes different measures to response to the request of these two kinds of free-riders. The simulation results demonstrate that this proposed trust model can improve QoS effectively in P2P VoD networks.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.109-116
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• 2015

This paper is concerned with the single vendor single buyer integrated production inventory problem. To make this problem more practical, space restriction and lead time proportional to lot size are considered. Since the space for the inventory is limited in most practical inventory system, the space restriction for the inventory of a vendor and a buyer is considered. As product's quantity to be manufactured by the vendor is increased, the lead time for the order is usually increased. Therefore, lead time for the product is proportional to the order quantity by the buyer. Demand is assumed to be stochastic and the continuous review inventory policy is used by the buyer. If the buyer places an order, then the vendor will start to manufacture products and the products will be transferred to the buyer with equal shipments many times. The mathematical formulation with space restriction for the inventory of a vendor and a buyer is suggested in this paper. This problem is constrained nonlinear integer programming problem. Order quantity, reorder points for the buyer, and the number of shipments are required to be determined. A Lagrangian relaxation approach, a popular solution method for constrained problem, is developed to find lower bound of this problem. Since a Lagrangian relaxation approach cannot guarantee the feasible solution, the solution method based on the Lagrangian relaxation approach is proposed to provide with a good feasible solution. Total costs by the proposed method are pretty close to those by the Lagrangian relaxation approach. Sensitivity analysis for space restriction for the vendor and the buyer is done to figure out the relationships between parameters.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.16 no.11
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• pp.137-147
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• 2018

To prepare for and implement policies for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, which is characterized by convergence, super-connectivity, and AI, this study summarized the effects and characteristics of individual technologies on our society and discussed the issues with humanity and social science perspectives. As a result, in terms of AI technology, the issues of job losses, project-type works, basic income and robot taxes, accountability of AI, and algorithm inequality were dealt with. Security, cyber hacking and privacy infringement issues were highlighted in big-data technology. In the part of block-chain and bioengineering, the society of decentralization, the concentration, digital divide, and ethical issues were discussed. On-demand economic aspects highlighted the problems of civil ethics and human commercialization. Lastly, the development of VR is discussed including side effects such as cyber-syndrom, avoidance of reality, and so on.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.365-379
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• 2023

Purpose - Our previous study (Chang & Lee, 2023) presented observations on the recent changes in the year-on-year (YoY) Consumer Price Index (CPI) of the Republic of Korea (ROK) after the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of this article is to present an integrated analysis and interpretation of the recent changes in CPI and the Aggregate Import Price Index (IPI) by incorporating recent data, specifically data from September 2022 to December 2022. Design/methodology/approach - This study collected CPI (YoY) data in the ROK from January 2019 to December 2022 using e-National Indicator System provided by the ROK. Statistical analysis was employed to analyze the data. Findings - First, we confirm the extended results of the existing study by Chang and Lee (2023). Second, we demonstrate that the Aggregate IPI in ROK increased significantly in 2022 compared to 2021. We then provide an integrated interpretation on the significant increase in CPI and aggregate IPI in ROK, which complements Chang and Lee (2023) that limits their discussion to YoY CPI. Moreover, we show that the IPI of the semiconductor in ROK decreased significantly in 2022 compared to 2021. Research implications or Originality - Our results provide important insights into the recent changes in the CPI in the ROK. The results suggest that these changes can be partially attributed to various factors, such as the global supply chain disruptions resulting from the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and the prolonged war between Russia and Ukraine, the side effect of quantitative easing by the US Federal Reserve, heat waves and droughts caused by climate change in ROK, a surge in demand following a gradual daily recovery, US-China trade conflict, etc. Our study shows statistically comprehensive results compared to the studies that limit their discussion to YoY average growth rate.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.61-79
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• 2010

As the interest and the importance of environmental protection increases rapidly, the environment considers to be not only the item that requires a control and a duty fundamental element but the fundamental element to enhance the internection icompetitiveness n so. Along with the collapse of the foreign trade barrier and the quality improvement of a customer's life qu life of a an object is shortened liforder to sectsfy the customer's lemands and as the result of it quaother critical issues rmparding the waste treatment and recasles are now thought to be momentou onlyaddition to the issue of the greenhou e gases reduction that is considered as one of me q issues among many internection ienvironmental issues. To keep up the pace with the environmental flow qube notd countries have nlreal iput their attempts to solve this environmental problems through a number of rmpulactios and acctios and they have showed a great concern for it as it is an internection iproblem that they should aasroaeronlythe aspect of not just a compan isr a country but of the wte e globn ivillage. Sueroenvironmental flow alemaned the logistic stratmpy of a compan iand it brought up the demand for the reverse logistics in a supply chain. For the reason above, the concept of reverse logistics and classification, the comparison with any similar concepts and its necessity are studied in this research through the theoretical consideration and the current state of the reverse logistics is organized in this research by acknowledging the domestic development process and the properties regarding the recycles of resources. In addition, the way to apply to the nation was investigated by comparing with the environmentalism development process, the reverse logistics policies and examples of advanced countries in logistics. The research proposed building of intimate cooperative system between a shipper and logistic service provider for the reverse logistics throughout the whole supply chain, the financial support, amendment of regulations, support Eco-friendly logistic technology development and the propagation, effective logistic system development and others and it is expected to bring a significant meaning to the reverse logistic policy and operation later on.

• Proceedings of the Korea Water Resources Association Conference
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• 2019.05a
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• pp.408-408
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• 2019

The persistence of drought periods and water scarcity is a growing public concern, as climate change projections indicate a more critical scenario in the future. The sustainability of water resources for the increasing population, and to ensuring crop production will unarguably be a daunting task for the water resources managers, with a projected 9.8 billion people by 2050 as well as the need to increase food production by 70 to 100%. Consequently, there is a need for significant irrigation water use for more crop production in the face of stiff competition among water users. However, the available natural resources are already over-constrained, and the allocation of more resources for food production is not feasible. Currently, about two-thirds of global water withdrawer is used by the agricultural sector while 48% of water resources in Korea is used for agricultural production. Despite the apparent ecological deficit and unfavorable conditions of resources utilization, a staggering amount of food waste occurs in the country. Moreover, wastage of food translates to waste of all the resources involved in the food production including water resources. Food waste can also be considered a serious potential for economic and environmental problems. Hence, exploring an alternative approach to efficient resources utilization in a more sustainable way can ensure considerable resources conservation. We hypothesized that reducing food waste will decline the demand for food production and consequently reduce the pressure on water resources. We investigated the food wastage across the food supply chain using the top-down datasets based on the FAO mass balance model. Furthermore, the water footprint of the estimated food wastage was assessed using the representative of selected food crops. The study revealed that the average annual food wastage across the food supply chain is 9.05 million tonnes, signifying 0.51 kg/capita/day and 48% of domestic food production. Similarly, an average of $6.29Gm^3$ per annum of water resources was lost to food wastage, which translates to 40% of the total allotted water resources for agriculture in the country. These considerable resources could have been conserved or efficiently used for other purposes. This study demonstrated that zero food waste generation would significantly reduce the impact on freshwater resources and ensure its conservation. There is a need for further investigation on the food waste study using the bottom-up approach, specifically at the consumer food waste, since the top-down approach is based on estimations and many assumptions were made.