• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.3067-3074
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• 2013

Background: Faced with highly prevalent and recalcitrant cancer-related fatigue (CRF), together with the absence of any official guidelines on management, numerous groups have been striving to seek and test alternative therapies including acupuncture and moxibustion. However, different patients have various feedbacks, and the many clinical trials have given rise to varied conclusions. In terms of the therapeutic effect of acupuncture and moxibustion, there exist vast inconsistencies. Objective: The aim of the study was to evaluate the auxiliary effectiveness of acupuncture and moxibustion in the treatment of CRF, and to provide more reliable evidence to guide clinical practice. Methods: Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published before December 2012 were all aggregated, focusing on evaluation of acupuncture or moxibustion for CRF. The quality of the included studies was assessed basing on Cochrane handbook 5.1.0, and the available data were analyzed with RevMan software (version 5.2.0). Descriptive techniques were performed when no available data could be used. Results: A total of 7 studies involving 804 participants were eligible. With real acupuncture versus sham acupuncture, subjects receiving true acupuncture benefited more in the reduction of fatigue. With real acupuncture versus acupressure or sham acupressure, fatigue level appeared 36% improved in the acupuncture group, but 19% in the acupressure group and only 0.6% with sham acupressure. When real acupuncture plus enhanced routine care was compared with enhanced routine care, the combination group improved mean scores for general fatigue, together with physical and mental fatigue. With real acupuncture versus sham acupuncture or wait list controls, the real acupuncture group displayed significant advantages over the wait list controls at 2 weeks for fatigue improvement and better well-being effects at 6 weeks. When moxibustion plus routine care was compared with routine care alone, the meta-analyses demonstrated the combination had a relatively significant benefit in improving severe fatigue and QLQ-C30. Conclusion: Up to the search date, there exist few high quality RCTs to evaluate the effect of acupuncture and moxibustion, especially moxibustion in English. Yet acupuncture and moxibustion still appeared to be efficacious auxiliary therapeutic methods for CRF, in spite of several inherent defects of the included studies. Much more high-quality studies are urgently needed.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.24
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• pp.10905-10909
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• 2015

Purpose: The aim of this study was to evaluate the diagnostic value of FNA-Tg for detecting lymph node metastases in patients with a history of differentiated thyroid cancer (DTC). Materials and Methods: A total of 58 patients with DTC diagnosis and evidence of single or multiple suspicious cervical lymph nodes were assessed. All underwent total or near-total thyroidectomy with (35 cases) or without (23 cases) radioiodine (RAI) ablation, followed by thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH) suppression therapy. A total of 68 lymph nodes were examined by ultrasound-guided fine needle aspiration (US-FNA) for both cytological examination and FNA-Tg measurement. Serum Tg and anti-thyroglobulin antibody (TgAb) levels were also measured. Diagnostic performance including sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, positive (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV) of FNAC and FNA-Tg were calculated and compared. The Spearman's rank correlation coefficient was used to estimate the relationship between FNA-Tg and serum TgAb. Results: The FNA-Tg levels were significantly higher with DTC metastatic lymph nodes (median 927.7 ng/mL, interquartile range 602.9 ng/mL) than non-metastatic lymph nodes (median 0.1 ng/mL, interquartile range 0.4 ng/mL) (p<0.01). Considering 1.0 ng/mL as a threshold value for FNA-Tg, the sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, PPV and NPV of FNA-Tg were 95.7%, 95.5%, 95.6%, 97.8% and 91.3%, respectively. The sensitivity and accuracy of the combination of FNAC and FNA-Tg were significantly higher than that of FNAC alone (p<0.05). The diagnostic performance of FNA-Tg was not significantly different between cases with or without RAI ablation, and the serum TgAb levels did not interfere with FNA-Tg measurements. Conclusions: Measurement of FNA-Tg is useful. The combination of FNAC and FNA-Tg is more sensitive and accurate for detecting lymph node metastases in patients with a history of DTC than FNAC alone. Serum TgAbs appear to be irrelevant for measurement of FNA-Tg.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.387-407
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• 2005

This paper is to study globalization motives and strategies of Japanese and Korean industries by analyzing the causes and patterns of foreign direct investment (FDI) of the firms of the two countries during the 1980s and 1990s. First we develop a FDI function from the profit maximizing model of firms. Then we use regression analysis to determine internally driving-out factors and externally-inducing factors. Japanese FDI strategy has gone through three different stages; from natural resource-seeking investment in the 1950s and 1960s to market-expansion investment in the 1970s and 1980s and to a combination of cost-reducing (low-cost labor-seeking) investment and market-penetrating investment in the 1990s. On the other hand, Korean FDI behavior has gone through four different stages; from the learning stage with small investments in the 1970s, to natural resource-seeking investment in the early and mid 1980s, to the growth stage in the late 1980s and the early 1990s, to the maturity stage of the mid and late 1990s. The last two stages were characterized by a combination of cost-reducing investment and market-seeking investment. As a late comer, Korea began its FDI two decades later than Japan, but caught up the patterns of Japanese FDI by the mid 1990s and is in a competing position with Japan. Our findings show that both Japanese FDI and Korean FDI in Asia and other developing countries tendto be in labor-intensive sectors where their firms are losing their comparative advantages at home. The main motive for FDI into these regions is low-cost resource seeking. On the other hand, both Japanese FDI and Korean FDI in the U.S. and Europe tend to be knowledge-intensive sectors where Japanese and Korean firms attempt to internalize transaction and information costs by globalizing its production. The main motive for FDI into these regions is market-seeking. Firms in both countries have increased their investments in Mexico and Western and Eastern Europe in order to penetrate large economic blocs such as the EU and NAFTA area. Korean firms are more aggressive in expanding into new and untested markets than are their counterpart in Japan. Evidence of this can be seen in the scarcity of Japanese FDI and abundance of Korean FDI in Eastern Europe and China.

• Korean Journal of Veterinary Research
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.433-439
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• 2004

This study was carried out to investigate the efficacy of rifampin with or without streptomycin in male Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats experimentally inoculated with Brucella abortus. Thirty rats were intraperitoneally inoculated with $1.0{\times}10^9$colony-forming units of B. abortus. They were divided into 3 groups by treatment with antibiotic. 10 rats in Group A were orally administrated with rifampin, 10 rats in Group B with rifampin orally and with streptomycin intramuscularly over 12 weeks starting at 1 week post infection (PI). A placebo recipient in Group C was inoculated with sterile saline without antibiotics. All animals were monitored by tube agglutination test (TAT) and AMOS-PCR to evaluate the efficiency of the antibiotics to B. abortus infection. The antibody titers in Groups A, B and C were 1:400, 1:400 and 1:800 as measured by TAT at the first week PI, respectively. The antibody titer in Group A decreased to 1:100 by the 13th week PI. That in the control group was observed as high antibody titer until 13th weeks PI, but the antibody response in Group B was low(1:50) from the 5th week to the 13th week PI. AMOS-PCR there was evidence of relapse of B. abortus in group A in liver and spleen specimens at the 13th week PI. B. abortus DNA was detected in Group C in liver and spleen specimens from the 1st week to 13th week PI by AMOS-PCR. However AMOS-PCR could not detect any organism in Group B from the 3rd week PI until the end of the study. This study demonstrated that administration of a combination of rifampin and streptomycin was more efficacious than administration of rifampin alone. A significant reduction in antibody titer was observed when a combination of 15 mg/kg/day of rifampin per os and 15 mg/kg/day streptomycin intramuscularly was used in comparison with the antibody of control group.

• Nutrition Research and Practice
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• v.16 no.sup1
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• pp.113-125
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• 2022

In the current years, it has now become necessary to establish standards for micronutrient intake based on scientific evidence. This review discusses issues related to the development of the 2020 Dietary Reference Intakes for Koreans (KDRI) for magnesium (Mg), zinc (Zn), and copper (Cu), and future research directions. Following issues were encountered when establishing the KDRI for these minerals. First, characteristics of Korean subjects need to be applied to estimate nutrient requirements. When calculating the estimated average requirement (EAR), the KDRI used the results of balance studies for Mg absorption and factorial analysis for Zn, which is defined as the minimum amount to offset endogenous losses for Zn and Mg. For Cu, a combination of indicators, such as depletion/repletion studies, were applied, wherein all reference values were based on data obtained from other countries. Second, there was a limitation in that it was difficult to determine whether reference values of Mg, Zn, and Cu intakes in the 2020 KDRI were achievable. This might be due to the lack of representative previous studies on intakes of these nutrients, and an insufficient database for Mg, Zn, and Cu contents in foods. This lack of database for mineral content in food poses a problem when evaluating the appropriateness of intake. Third, data was insufficient to assess the adequacy of Mg, Zn, and Cu intakes from supplements when calculating reference values, considering the rise in both demand and intake of mineral supplements. Mg is more likely to be consumed as a multi-nutrient supplement in combination with other minerals than as a single supplement. Moreover, Zn-Cu interactions in the body need to be considered when determining the reference intake values of Zn and Cu. It is recommended to discuss these issues present in the 2020 KDRI development for Mg, Zn, and Cu intakes in a systematic way, and to find relevant solutions.

• Herbal Formula Science
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.361-371
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• 2023

Objectives : Gastric cancer is a malignant tumor of the digestive tract that not only has a high mortality rate, but also affects quality of life. In Traditional Korean Medicine, acupuncture and herbal medicines can increase the survival rate for Gastric cancer and improve the quality of life. Traditional Korean Medicine treatment played an important role when used alone or in combination with chemotherapy. However, there is still insufficient evidence to support the efficacy and safety of Traditional Korean Medicine in patients undergoing chemotherapy after surgery. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to systematically evaluate the effect of oriental medicine treatment on patients as a complementary therapy for Gastric cancer. Methods : 2 researchers will search using EMBASE, Pubmed, CNKI, Cochrane Library, CiNii, KMBASE, KISS, OASIS, RISS, ScienceON. The search period of the database is from inception until June 2022. This study will include a randomized controlled trial of GC for acupuncture and herbal treatment. Primary outcomes include anti-cancer effects. Secondary outcomes evaluate survival rates and improvements in quality of life. The data uses Review Manager Software 5.4. Results : This study will provide a systematic evaluation by synthesizing the anti-cancer effect, survival rate and quality of life of Gastric cancer when Traditional Korean Medicine is combined with chemotherapy. Conclusion : The conclusion of this study will provide a basis for determining whether Traditional Korean Medicine treatment for Gastric cancer treatment is an effective and safe treatment method in clinical practice.

• Journal of Sericultural and Entomological Science
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.11-19
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• 1979

This has been carried out how the sericin insoluble fixations of raw silk should be with potassium alum. This is learned from the leather tanning technique which the process works with collagen, a kind of proteins. Former reports had shown such works, however, they did not consider the moisture absorbability after their process reports by using chromium alum, formalin or vinyl acetate grafting. This report, however, paid attention to protect such absorbability as well as sericin fixation, so far it may be useful for plactical use of silk. In order to clear how the sericin is fixed with such chemicals, fundermental mechanism of weding process and chemical reaction against proteins were also discussed. The obtained results of the report are as followings. 1. Alum should not be treated for raw silk with high temperature bath like other reports because such treat induces raw silk to be stiffly after the treat. 2. It is recommended that raw silk should be treated with alum solution at room temperature for more than three hours. Even in this case, the use of only alum with raw silk could to fix sericin some how, but it increased the water proofness of the silk. 3. 1% of alum solution was found to be able to fix the sericin of raw silk. 4. In case we consider only sericin fixations, a combination treat of 1% alum for three hours and 0.5% NaOH for ten minutes method showed the best result. 5. In case we consider sericin insoluble fixation and moisture absorbility, the reversive combination of the above process was found to be the best results. 6. Sericin fixing evidence was shown with drying feature curves of wed each treated silk where we could to analyze how the chemical nature is changed after each treat. 7. Deguming ratio may be obtained up to 4.3% after the alum combination treat with regular raw silk. Such ratio was considered to be good enough for the purpose when the textile is washed with warm soap water. 8. Moisture absorbability of the combination treat of alum and NaOH was found to be good enough as well as non treated silk. 9. The tenacity and elongation of the treated silk did not change even after three month. 10. Above all, this method is considered to be better process than other coloured fixing (tannin method. Cr-alum method) or smell fixing (formalin method. vinyl acetate method).

• Journal of KIISE:Software and Applications
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.678-689
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• 2000

This paper describes an automatic summarization approach that constructs a summary by extracting sentences that are likely to represent the main theme of a document. As a way of selecting summary sentences, the system uses a model that takes into account lexical and statistical information obtained from a document corpus. As such, the system consists of two parts: the training part and the summarization part. The former processes sentences that have been manually tagged for summary sentences and extracts necessary statistical information of various kinds, and the latter uses the information to calculate the likelihood that a given sentence is to be included in the summary. There are at least three unique aspects of this research. First of all, the system uses a text component identification model to categorize sentences into one of the text components. This allows us to eliminate parts of text that are not likely to contain summary sentences. Second, although our statistically-based model stems from an existing one developed for English texts, it applies the framework to individual features separately and computes the final score for each sentence by combining the pieces of evidence using the Dempster-Shafer combination rule. Third, not only were new features introduced but also all the features were tested for their effectiveness in the summarization framework.

• Clinical and Experimental Pediatrics
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• v.53 no.7
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• pp.745-752
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• 2010

Purpose: There is currently little evidence to support intravenous immune globulin (IVIG) therapy for pediatric myocarditis. The purpose of our retrospective study was to assess the effects of IVIG therapy in patients with presumed myocarditis on survival and recovery of ventricular function and to determine the factors associated with its poor outcome. Methods: We reviewed all consecutive cases of patients with myocarditis with left ventricular dysfunction verified by echocardiogram who had visited 3 university hospitals between January 2000 and September 2009. These patients were divided into 2 groups. Group 1 consisted of 23 patients (69.6%) who received IVIG alone or IVIG in combination with steroids, and group 2 consisted of 10 patients (30.3%) who received neither IVIG nor other immunosuppressive agents. Clinical manifestations, laboratory results, echocardiographic findings, and outcomes were compared between these 2 groups. Results: One year after the initial presentation, the difference in the probability of survival did not show statistical significance in IVIGtreated patients ($P$=0.607). Of the echocardiographic parameters on admission, a shortening fraction of less than 15% was associated with unremitting cardiac failure. Furthermore, anemic patients were more likely to have elevated N-terminal fragment levels of the B-type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) in the progressed group ($P$=0.036). Conclusion: There was no difference between the IVIG-treated patients and the control patients in the degree of recovery of left ventricular function and survival. Prospective, randomized, clinical studies are needed to elucidate the effects of IVIG treatment during the acute stage of myocarditis on ultimate outcomes.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.85.2-86
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• 2015

The YORP effect is non-gravitational force that changes the spin-status of asteroid. So far this effect has been directly detected only from the Near-Earth asteroids (Taylor et al. 2007; Lowry et al. 2007, 2014; Breiter et al. 2011; Durech et al. 2008, 2012). Pravec at el. 2008 found the evidences for changing spin rate of small asteroids (3 - 15 km) by the YORP effect in the Main-Belt and Mars-crossing asteroids. The Mars-crossing asteroids (1.3 < q < 1.66 AU) are objects that cross orbit of the Mars. The Mars-crossing asteroids are regarded as one of the main sources for the Near-Earth asteroids. We expect that rotation of Mars-crossing asteroids would be influenced by the YORP effect. We try to search observational evidence of the YORP effect for the Mars-crossing asteroid. Our target 2078 Nanking is a population of the Mars-crossing asteroid. First light-curve of 2078 Nanking was obtained from Mohamed et al. 1994, and Warner et al. 2015 recently published new observational data. We observed this asteroid on 26th Nov. 2014 and 17th Jan. 2015 using SOAO (Sobaeksan Optical Astronomy Observatory) 0.61 m telescope with 4K CCD. Using light-curve inversion method (Kaasalainen & Torppa 2001; Kaasalainen et al. 2001), we try to determine the pole orientation and shape model of this asteroid based on the combination of our light-curve and literature photometric data. Knowing spin parameters, such as rotational period and spin axis, are essential for studying the YORP effect. In this presentation, we provide some preliminary results of our recent study: light-curve and processing of shape modeling of 2078 Nanking. We plan to find observational clue for the YORP effect on the Mars-crossing asteroids.