• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.20-29
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• 1991

The system analysis for Korean nuclear power reactor option is made on the basis of reliability, cost minimization, finite uranium resource availability and nuclear engineering manpower supply constraints. The reference reactor scenarios are developed considering the future electricity demand, nuclear share, current nuclear power plant standardization program and manufacturing capacity. The levelized power generation cost, uranium requirement and nuclear engineering professionals demand are estimated for each reference reactor scenarios and nuclear fuel cycle options from the year 1990 up to the year 2030. Based on the outcomes of the analysis, uranium resource utilization, reliability and nuclear engineering manpower requirements are sensitive to the nuclear reactor strategy and associated fuel cycle whereas the system cost is not. APWR, CANDU longrightarrow FBR strategy is to be the best option for Korea. However, APWR, CANDU longrightarrow Passive Safe Reactor(PSR）longrightarrowFBR strategy should be also considered as a contingency for growing national concerns on nuclear safety and public acceptance deterioration in the future. FBR development and establishment of related fuel cycle should be started as soon as possible considering the uranium shortage anticipated between 2007 and 2032. It should be noted that the increasing use of nuclear energy to minimize the greenhouse effects in the early 21st century would accelerate the uranium resource depletion. The study also concludes that the current level of nuclear engineering professionals employment is not sufficient until 2010 for the establishment of nuclear infrastructure.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.32-39
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• 2019

The present study investigated hydration of alkali activated slag incorporating sulfate as a form of anhydrite by employing thermodynamic modeling using the Gibbs free energy minimization approach. Various parameters were evaluated in the thermodynamic calculations, such as presence of sulfide, precipitation/dissolution of AFt/AFm phase, and the effect of oxic condition on the predicted reaction. The calculations suggested no significant difference in the void volume and chemical shrinkage, which might influence the performance of the mixtures, in spite of various changes of the parameters. Although the types of hydration products and their amount varied according to the input conditions, their variations were smaller range than that induced by water-to-binder ratio. Moreover, it did not affect the amount of C-(N-)A-S-H which was the most important hydration product.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.42 no.6
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• pp.779-789
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• 2022

This work presents a non-linear cylindrical bending analysis of functionally graded plate reinforced by single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) in thermal environment using a simple integral higher-order shear deformation theory (HSDT). This theory does not require shear correction factors and the transverse shear stresses vary parabolically through the thickness. The material properties of SWCNTs are assumed to be temperature-dependent and are obtained from molecular dynamics simulations. The material properties of functionally graded carbon nanotube-reinforced composites (FG-CNTCRs) are considered to be graded in the thickness direction, and are estimated through a micromechanical model. The non-linear strain-displacement relations in the Von Karman sense are used to study the effect of geometric non-linearity and the solution is obtained by minimization of the total potential energy. The numerical illustrations concern the nonlinear bending response of FG-CNTRC plates under different sets of thermal environmental conditions, from which results for uniformly distributed CNTRC plates are obtained as benchmarks.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.55 no.spc1
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• pp.1271-1282
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• 2022

The optimal design of Water Distribution System (WDS) is used in various ways according to the purpose set by the user. The optimal design of WDS has various purposes, such as minimizing costs and minimizing energy generated when manufacturing pipes. In this study, based on the Modified Hybrid Vision Correction Algorithm (MHVCA), a cost-optimal design was conducted for various WDSs. We also propose a new evaluation index, Best Rate (BR). BR is an evaluation index developed based on the K-mean Clustering Algorithm. Through BR, a comparison was made on the possibility of searching for the optimal design of each algorithm used in the optimal design of WDS. The results of MHVCA for WDS were compared with Vision Correction Algorithm (VCA) and Hybrid Vision Correction Algorithm (HVCA). MHVCA showed a lower cost design than VCA and HVCA. In addition, MHVCA showed better probability of lower cost designs than VCA and HVCA. MHVCA will be able to show good results when applied to the optimal design of WDS for various purposes as well as the optimal design of WDS for cost minimization applied in this study.

• Genomics & Informatics
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.7.1-7.11
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• 2023

The gram-positive bacterium Listeria monocytogenes is an important foodborne intracellular pathogen that is widespread in the environment. The functions of hypothetical proteins (HP) from various pathogenic bacteria have been successfully annotated using a variety of bioinformatics strategies. In this study, a HP Imo0888 (NP_464414.1) from the Listeria monocytogenes EGD-e strain was annotated using several bioinformatics tools. Various techniques, including CELLO, PSORTb, and SOSUIGramN, identified the candidate protein as cytoplasmic. Domain and motif analysis revealed that the target protein is a PemK/MazF-like toxin protein of the type II toxin-antitoxin system (TAS) which was consistent with BLASTp analysis. Through secondary structure analysis, we found the random coil to be the most frequent. The Alpha Fold 2 Protein Structure Prediction Database was used to determine the three-dimensional (3D) structure of the HP using the template structure of a type II TAS PemK/MazF family toxin protein (DB ID_AFDB: A0A4B9HQB9) with 99.1% sequence identity. Various quality evaluation tools, such as PROCHECK, ERRAT, Verify 3D, and QMEAN were used to validate the 3D structure. Following the YASARA energy minimization method, the target protein's 3D structure became more stable. The active site of the developed 3D structure was determined by the CASTp server. Most pathogens that harbor TAS create a crucial risk to human health. Our aim to annotate the HP Imo088 found in Listeria could offer a chance to understand bacterial pathogenicity and identify a number of potential targets for drug development.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.51-57
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• 2024

The purpose of this study is to compare and analyze the impact range of explosion damage due to gas leaks at LPG filling stations, focusing on propane and butane, which are components of vehicle LPG. The scenarios were designed based on the explosion incident at an LPG filling station in Gangwon-do, where an actual gas leak accident occurred, resulting in Scenario I and Scenario II. The ALOHA program, developed by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), was used as the tool to analyze the impact range of the explosion damage for both substances. The results of the study indicated that, under identical conditions, propane had a wider impact range of damage than butane. This is presumed to be due to the greater explosion energy of propane, attributable to its physicochemical properties. Therefore, when preparing for LPG leak accidents, measures for propane need to be prioritized. As safety measures for propane, two suggestions were made to minimize human casualties. First, from a preventive perspective, it is suggested to educate workers about propane. Second, from the perspective of response measures and damage minimization, it is suggested to thoroughly prepare emergency evacuation and rescue plans, evacuation routes, designated shelters, and emergency response teams. This study compares and analyzes the impact range of radiative heat damage based on LPG components. However, hazardous accidents are critically influenced by the type of leaking substance, the form of the leak, and meteorological factors affecting the diffusion pattern of the substance. Therefore, for future research, it is proposed to model various leakage scenarios for the same substance to conduct a comprehensive risk assessment.

• Interdisciplinary Bio Central
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.3.1-3.6
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• 2009

Introduction: GTPases known as translation factor play a vital role as ribosomal subunit assembly chaperone. The bacterial Obg proteins ($Spo{\underline{0B}}$-associated ${\underline{G}}TP$-binding protein) belong to the subfamily of P-loop GTPase proteins and now it is considered as one of the new target for antibacterial drug. The majority of bacterial Obgs have been commonly found to be associated with ribosome, implying that these proteins may play a fundamental role in ribosome assembly or maturation. In addition, one of the experimental evidences suggested that Bacillus subtilis Obg (BsObg) protein binds to the L13 ribosomal protein (BsL13) which is known to be one of the early assembly proteins of the 50S ribosomal subunit in Escherichia coli. In order to investigate binding mode between the BsObg and the BsL13, protein-protein docking simulation was carried out after generating 3D structure of the BsL13 structure using homology modeling method. Materials and Methods: Homology model structure of BsL13 was generated using the EcL13 crystal structure as a template. Protein-protein docking of BsObg protein with ribosomal protein BsL13 was performed by DOT, a macro-molecular docking software, in order to predict a reasonable binding mode. The solvated energy minimization calculation of the docked conformation was carried out to refine the structure. Results and Discussion: The possible binding conformation of BsL13 along with activated Obg fold in BsObg was predicted by computational docking study. The final structure is obtained from the solvated energy minimization. From the analysis, three important H-bond interactions between the Obg fold and the L13 were detected: Obg:Tyr27-L13:Glu32, Obg:Asn76-L13:Glu139, and Obg:Ala136-L13:Glu142. The interaction between the BsObg and BsL13 structures were also analyzed by electrostatic potential calculations to examine the interface surfaces. From the results, the key residues for hydrogen bonding and hydrophobic interaction between the two proteins were predicted. Conclusion and Prospects: In this study, we have focused on the binding mode of the BsObg protein with the ribosomal BsL13 protein. The interaction between the activated Obg and target protein was investigated with protein-protein docking calculations. The binding pattern can be further used as a base for structure-based drug design to find a novel antibacterial drug.

• Journal of the Korea Computer Graphics Society
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.21-29
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• 2016

Cell segmentation is an important but time-consuming and laborious task in biological image analysis. An automated, robust, and fast method is required to overcome such burdensome processes. These needs are, however, challenging due to various cell shapes, intensity, and incomplete boundaries. A precise cell segmentation will allow to making a pathological diagnosis of tissue samples. A vast body of literature exists on cell segmentation in microscopy images [1]. The majority of existing work is based on input images and predefined feature models only - for example, using a deformable model to extract edge boundaries in the image. Only a handful of recent methods employ data-driven approaches, such as supervised learning. In this paper, we propose a novel data-driven cell segmentation algorithm for bright-field microscopy images. The proposed method minimizes an energy formula defined by two dictionaries - one is for input images and the other is for their manual segmentation results - and a common sparse code, which aims to find the pixel-level classification by deploying the learned dictionaries on new images. In contrast to deformable models, we do not need to know a prior knowledge of objects. We also employed convolutional sparse coding and Alternating Direction of Multiplier Method (ADMM) for fast dictionary learning and energy minimization. Unlike an existing method [1], our method trains both dictionaries concurrently, and is implemented using the GPU device for faster performance.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.1054-1065
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• 1993

A computer simulation is performed on the effectiveness of the active minimization of harmonically excited enclosed sound fields for producing global reduction in the amplitude of the pressure fluctuations. In this study for the appreciable reductions in total time averaged acoustic potential energy, $E_{pp}$, the transducer location strategies for three dimensional active noise control is presented based on a state space modal which approximates the closed acoustic field.In this study, the above theoretical basis is used to investigate the application of active control to sound fields of low modal density. By the used of room-like 3-dimensional rectangular enclosure it is demonstrated that the reductions in $E_{pp}$ can be achieved by using a single secondary source, provided that the source is placed within the half a wavelength from the primary source and placed away from nodal line of the sound field. Concerning the reductions in $E_{pp}$ by minimzing the pressure in sound fields by the use of 3-dimensional rectangular enclosure, the effects of the number of sensors and the locations of these sensors are investigated. When a few modes dominate the response it is found that if only a limited number of sensors are located away from nodal line and located at the pressure maxima of the sound field such as at each corner of a rectangular enclosure.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.19 no.4 s.74
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• pp.407-418
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• 2006

In this paper, an efficient yet accurate stress analysis based on the first-order shear deformation theory (FSDT) is presented. The transverse shear strain energy is modified via the mixed variational theorem, so that the shear correction factors are automatically involved in the formulation. In the mixed variational formulation, the transverse stresses are taken to be functions subject to variations. The transverse shear stresses based on an efficient higher order plate theory (EHOPT, Cho and Parmerter, 1993) are utilized and modified, while the transverse normal stress is assumed to be the third-order polynomial of thickness coordinates, which satisfies both zero transverse shear stresses and prescribed surface fractions in top and bottom surfaces. On the other hand, the displacements are assumed to be those of the FSDT Resulting strain energy expressions are referred to as an EFSDTM3D that stands for an enhanced first-order shear deformation theory based on the mixed formulation for three dimensional elasticity, The developed EFSDTM3D preserves the computational advantage of the classical FSDT while allowing for important local through-the-thickness variations of displacements and stresses through the recovery procedure that is based on the least square minimization of in-plane stresses. Comparisons of displacements and stresses of both laminated and sandwich plates using the present theory are made with the classical FSDT, three-dimensional exact solutions, and available data in the literature.