• Clinics in Shoulder and Elbow
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.173-181
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• 2022

Background: Healing of the tendon itself is not always related to successful clinical outcomes after rotator cuff repair. It was hypothesized that certain radiologic factors affecting clinical outcomes could exist in case of the retear after arthroscopic rotator cuff repair (ARCR) and the radiologic factors could help predict clinical process. The purpose of this study was to identify the radiologic factors associated with clinical outcomes of the retear after ARCR. Methods: Between January 2012 and December 2019, among patients with sufficient footprint coverage for ARCR, 96 patients with Sugaya classification 4 or higher retear on follow-up magnetic resonance imaging were included. The association between clinical outcomes such as American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons (ASES) score, Constant score and range of motion and radiologic variables such as initial tear dimension, retear dimension, variance of tear dimension, critical shoulder angle, acromial index, and acromiohumeral distance was analyzed. Results: Preoperatively, the ASES and Constant scores were 59.81±17.02 and 64.30±15.27, respectively. And at the last follow-up, they improved to 81.56±16.29 and 78.62±14.16, respectively (p<0.01 and p<0.01). In multiple linear regression analysis, the variance of the mediolateral dimension of tear had statistically significant association with the ASES and Constant scores (p<0.01 and p=0.01). Conclusions: In patients with the retear after ARCR, the variance in the mediolateral dimension of tear had significantly negative association with the clinical outcomes. This could be considered to be reference as relative criteria and needed more sample and mechanical study.

• Wind and Structures
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.385-394
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• 2022

Global Warming has been driven majorly by the consumption of fossil fuels. Harnessing energy from wind is viable solution towards reducing carbon footprint created due to burning such fuels, However, wind turbines have their problems of flow separation and aerodynamic stall to tackle with. In an attempt to delay the stall angle and improve the aerodynamic characteristics of the NACA 0015 symmetrical aerofoil, lateral cylindrical ridges were attached to its suction surface, at chord positions ranging from 0.1c to 0.5c. The characteristics of the original and ridged aerofoils were obtained using simultaneous pressure readings taken in a wind tunnel, at a free stream Reynolds number of R_e = 2.81 × 10⁵ for a wide range of free stream angles of attack ranging from -45° to 45°. Depending on the ridge size, a delay in stall angle varying from 5° to 20° was achieved together with the maximum increase in lift in the post-stall phases. Additionally, efforts were made to identify the optimum position for each ridge.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.69-77
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• 2022

PURPOSE: In this study, we sought to investigate the effect of conservative ankle strengthening exercise programs using a Bosu® ball or taping, on the hallux valgus angle and the pain of hallux valgus patients in their 20s. METHODS: The hallux valgus angle, balance, and pain after measuring the hallux valgus were measured to select suitable subjects. In the ankle strengthening exercise group (ASG) an ankle strengthening exercise program using a Bosu® ball was performed for two sessions weekly for four weeks and the taping group (TG) was given Kinesiotaping® for two sessions weekly, two days per session, for four weeks. Before and after the experiment, a footprint was used to examine the changes in the hallux valgus angle and the visual analog scale (VAS) was used to measure pain. RESULTS: An evaluation of the post-experiment changes in the hallux valgus angle and pain showed statistically significant improvement in both groups. There was no statistically significant improvement between groups. CONCLUSION: These results show that both ankle strengthening exercises and Kinesiotaping® have a positive effect on the hallux valgus angle and pain.

• Journal of Veterinary Clinics
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• v.39 no.4
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• pp.173-176
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• 2022

Intravenous catheterization is a common procedure in human and veterinary medicine. Occasionally, a catheter might break within the blood vessel, and the fragment may cause embolization, infections, or other severe complications, and therefore must be removed promptly. For a successful and low-risk removal, the fragment should be localized accurately; however, ultrasound may be challenging to perform on small dogs due to inadequate probes. We report the case of a 2-year-old, 2.6 kg, intact female toy poodle that presented to the veterinary medical center owing to a recent onion intake; the owner requested to induce emesis. A 24 gauge peripheral intravenous catheter was inserted into the cephalic vein prior to the emetic injection. When the clinician removed the catheter, a device breakage was observed. A tourniquet was applied immediately proximal to the elbow. Ultrasonography was performed with a high-frequency small-footprint linear array transducer, also called a hockey-stick probe, to localize the fragment. An additional ultrasound was performed before surgery to confirm the location of the catheter piece, which migrated 5 cm proximally. Afterward, a surgical intervention allowed us to retrieve the fragment. This report highlights the effectiveness of a hockey-stick probe to determine the location of a catheter fragment in small breed dogs.

• ETRI Journal
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• v.44 no.6
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• pp.1034-1046
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• 2022

The learning-based multiview stereo (MVS) methods for three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction generally use 3D volumes for depth inference. The quality of the reconstructed depth maps and the corresponding point clouds is directly influenced by the spatial resolution of the 3D volume. Consequently, these methods produce point clouds with sparse local regions because of the lack of the memory required to encode a high volume of information. Here, we apply the atrous spatial pyramid pooling (ASPP) module in MVS methods to obtain dense feature maps with multiscale, long-range, contextual information using high receptive fields. For a given 3D volume with the same spatial resolution as that in the MVS methods, the dense feature maps from the ASPP module encoded with superior information can produce dense point clouds without a high memory footprint. Furthermore, we propose a 3D loss for training the MVS networks, which improves the predicted depth values by 24.44%. The ASPP module provides state-of-the-art qualitative results by constructing relatively dense point clouds, which improves the DTU MVS dataset benchmarks by 2.25% compared with those achieved in the previous MVS methods.

• Journal of Animal Science and Technology
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• v.65 no.2
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• pp.427-440
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• 2023

The current study evaluated carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions from beef and pork production and distribution chains in the South Korean meat industry. Data from industrial example farms and slaughterhouses were assessed on the basis of both the guidelines from the United Kingdom's Publicly Available Specification (PAS) 2050:2011 and the Korea Environmental Industry & Technology Institute carbon footprint calculation. The main factors for our estimations were animal feeds, manure waste, transportation, energy and water, refrigerants, and package data. Our analyses show that 16.55 kg CO₂ equivalent (eq) was emitted during the production of 1 kg of live cattle. When retail yields and packing processes were considered, the CO₂-eq of 1 kg of packaged Hanwoo beef was 27.86 kg. As for pigs, emissions from 1 kg of live pigs and packaged pork meat were 2.62 and 12.75 kg CO₂-eq, respectively. While we gathered data from only two farms and slaughterhouses and our findings can therefore not be extrapolated to all meats produced in the South Korean meat industry, they indicate that manure waste is the greatest factor affecting ultimate CO₂ emissions of packaged meats.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.2
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• pp.587-594
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• 2023

This study investigates the impacts of nuclear energy consumption on environmental quality from a different perspective by focusing on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, ecological footprint, and load capacity factor. In this context, the South Korea case, which is a leading country producing and consuming nuclear energy, is investigated by considering also economic growth, and the 1997 Asian crisis from 1977 to 2018. To this end, the study employs the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach. Different from previous literature, this study proposes a load capacity curve (LCC) and tests the LCC and environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypotheses simultaneously. The analysis results reveal that (i) the LCC and EKC hypotheses are valid in South Korea; (ii) nuclear energy has an improving effect on the environmental quality; (iii) renewable energy does not have a significant long-term impact on the environment; (iv) the 1997 Asian crisis had an increasing effect on the load capacity factor; (v) South Korea has not yet reached the turning point, identified as $55,411, where per capita income improves environmental quality. Overall, the results show the validity of the LCC and EKC hypotheses and prove the positive contribution of nuclear energy to South Korea's green development strategies.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.4
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• pp.1244-1249
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• 2023

Recently, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) announced the development of first-of-a-kind(FOAK) and most advanced futuristic vertical city and named as 'The LINE'. The project will have zero carbon dioxide emissions and will be powered by clean energy sources. Therefore, a study was designed to understand which clean energy sources might be a better choice. Because of its nearly carbon-free footprint, nuclear energy may be a good choice. Nowadays, the development of very small modular reactors (vSMRs) is gaining attention due to many salient features such as cost efficiency and zero carbon emissions. These reactors are one step down to actual small modular reactors (SMRs) in terms of power and size. SMRs typically have a power range of 20 MWe to 300 MWe, while vSMRs have a power range of 1-20 MWe. Therefore, a study was conducted to discuss different vSMRs in terms of design, technology types, safety features, capabilities, potential, and economics. After conducting the comparative test and analysis, the fuel cycle modeling of optimal and suitable reactor was calculated. Furthermore, the levelized unit cost of electricity for each reactor was compared to determine the most suitable vSMR, which is then compared other generation SMRs to evaluate the cost variations per MWe in terms of size and operation. The main objective of the research was to identify the most cost effective and simple vSMR that can be easily installed and deployed.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.86 no.5
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• pp.687-704
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• 2023

This study aims to examine the structural response of glass fibre-reinforced polymer (Glass-FRP) reinforced geopolymer electronic waste aggregate concrete (GEWC) compression elements under axial compression for sustainable development. The research includes the fabrication of nine GEWC circular compression elements with different reinforcement ratios and a 3-D nonlinear finite element model using ABAQUS. The study involves a detailed parametric analysis to examine the impact of various parameters on the behavior of GEWC compression elements. The results indicate that reducing the vertical distance of glass-FRP ties improves the ductility of GEWC compression elements, and those with eight longitudinal rebars have higher axial load-carrying capacities. The finite element predictions were in good agreement with the testing results, and the put forwarded empirical model shows higher accuracy than previous models by involving the confinement effect of lateral glass-FRP ties on the axial strength of GEWC compression elements. This research work contributes to minimizing the carbon footprint of cement manufacturing and electronic waste materials for sustainable development.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.5
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• pp.1878-1884
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• 2023

To lay a solid basis for prosperity and competitiveness, countries should achieve balance in the three fundamental aspects: energy availability, energy affordability and ecological balance. Nuclear energy has attracted international interest as one of the most crucial environmental quality strategies. The objective of this study is to analyze the non-linear link between nuclear energy and environmental quality in the top-10 nuclear energy consumer countries (USA, China, Russia, France, Canada, Spain, Sweden, South Korea, Ukraine, and Germany). Earlier research employed panel data methodologies to examine the linkage between nuclear energy and the environment, despite the fact that many nations did not independently demonstrate such a correlation. On the alternative, this study uses a novel approach known as 'Quantile-on-Quantile,' which allows for the analysis of time-series dependence in each country by giving universal yet country-specific insights into the relationship between the variables. Estimates show that the consumption of nuclear energy improves environmental quality by lowering ecological footprint in the majority of the nations studied at certain quantiles of data. Moreover, the data demonstrate that the degree of asymmetries between our variables changes by nation, emphasizing the importance of policymakers exercising caution when adopting nuclear energy and environmental quality regulations.