• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.65-72
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• 2016

This study presented an analytical method for detecting radium in soils using a liquid scintillation counter (LSC). The isotope ²²⁶Ra was extracted from soil using the fusion method and then separated from interfering radionuclides using the precipitation method. Radium was coprecipitated as sulfate salts with barium (Ba) and then converted into Ba(Ra)CO₃, which is soluble in an acidic solution. The isotope ²²²Rn, the decay progeny of ²²⁶Ra, was trapped in a water immiscible cocktail and analyzed by LSC. The pulse shape analysis (PSA) level was estimated using ⁹⁰Sr and ²²⁶Ra standard solutions. The figure of merit was the highest at PSA 80, while the alpha spillover was the lowest at PSA 80. The counting efficiency was 243 ± 2% in a glass vial. This analytical method was verified with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reference materials, including IAEA-312, IAEA-314, and IAEA-315. The recovery ranged from 60–82%, while the relative bias between the measured value and the recommended value was less than 10%. The minimum detectable activity was 2.1 Bq kg⁻¹ with dry mass 1 g, the background count rate of 0.02 cpm, the recovery rate of 70% and counting time of 30 min.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.27-34
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• 2012

After Fukushima Nuclear Accident on Mar11, 2011, to grasp the thought of university students in Korea on radiation and medical radiation and seek for the right mass communication on the radiation safety of the people and the proper teaching method on radiation, 790 questionnaires from the universities which had a four-year department of radiological science in 5 provinces(Gyeonggi, Gangwon, Chungcheong, Jeolla, and Gyeongsang-do) all over the country were collected and analyzed. The questionnaire was composed of 36 items, and it was analyzed that one of the important causes that made them feel that radiation was dangerous was 'even if they were exposed to the small quantity of radiation, they could have trouble later.' ($3.28{\pm}1.05$). In the item of the control of radiation, there were the respondents who answered that the government should take action rather than an individual($3.87{\pm}0.89$). In the item of 'Fukushima Nuclear Accident made me think that 'We should not keep nuclear power generation', the result was $2.79{\pm}0.95$. In the item of 'My thought on the medical radiation has negatively changed since Fukushima Nuclear Accident', the students who hadn't taken the course related with radiation showed a negative thought on the medical radiation, such as, there was $2.64{\pm}1.02$ as a whole, $2.31{\pm}1.00$ in department of radiological science, $2.94{\pm}0.95$ in department of dental hygiene, and $3.13{\pm}0.82$ in other departments. And also, those who thought that the education of radiation was necessary were 82.28%, and T.V or Internet was thought as the most effective teaching method.

• Journal of the Korea Concrete Institute
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.197-204
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• 2016

Concrete walls of neutron generating facilities such as fusion reactors and fission reactors become radioactive by neutron irradiation. Both low-activation and neutron shielding are a critical concern at the dismantling stage after the shutdown of facilities with a requirement of radioactive waste management. To tackle this, two types of additives were investigated in fabricating mortar specimens: synthetic high polymers and boron carbide. It is well known that a hydrogen atom is effective in neutron shielding by an elastic scattering because its mass is almost the same as that of the neutron. And boron is an effective neutron absorber with a big neutron absorption cross section. In this study, the effect of the type, shape, and size of polymers were investigated as well as that of boron carbide. Total 16 mix designs were prepared to reveal the effect of polymers on mechanical properties and neutron shielding performance. The neutron does equivalent of polymers-based mortar for fast neutrons decreased by 36 %, and the count rate of boron carbide-based mortar with regard to thermal neutrons decreased by 90 % compared to conventional mortar. These results showed that a combination of polymers and boron carbide compounds has potential to reduce the thickness of neutron shields as well as radioactive waste from reactors.

• BMB Reports
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• v.40 no.6
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• pp.911-920
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• 2007

Tuberculosis, caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis, continues to be one of the leading infectious diseases to humans. It is urgent to discover novel drug targets for the development of antitubercular agents. The 2-C-methyl-Derythritol-4-phosphate (MEP) pathway for isoprenoid biosynthesis has been considered as an attractive target for the discovery of novel antibiotics for its essentiality in bacteria and absence in mammals. MEP cytidyltransferase (IspD), the third-step enzyme of the pathway, catalyzes MEP and CTP to form 4-diphosphocytidyl-2-C-methylerythritol (CDP-ME) and PPi. In the work, ispD gene from M. tuberculosis H37Rv (MtIspD) was cloned and expressed. With N-terminal fusion of a histidine-tagged sequence, MtIspD could be purified to homogeneity by one-step nickel affinity chromatography. MtIspD exists as a homodimer with an apparent molecular mass of 52 kDa. Enzyme property analysis revealed that MtIspD has high specificity for pyrimidine bases and narrow divalent cation requirements, with maximal activity found in the presence of CTP and $Mg^{2+}$. The turnover number of MtIspD is $3.4 s^{-1}$. The Km for MEP and CTP are 43 and $92{\mu}M$, respectively. Furthermore, MtIspD shows thermal instable above $50^{\circ}C$. Circular dichroism spectra revealed that the alteration of tertiary conformation is closely related with sharp loss of enzyme activity at higher temperature. This study is expected to help better understand the features of IspD and provide useful information for the development of novel antibiotics to treat M. tuberculosis.

• KSBB Journal
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.17-26
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• 2004

In this study the extracellular production of 5-aminolevulinic aicd (ALA) by recombinant E. coli BL2l (DE3) pLysS harboring the plasmid pFLS45 are investigated. Optimum concentrations of succinic acid and glycine for cell growth and ALA production were found to be 30 mM and 15 mM, respectively. Levulinic acid (LA) as an inhibitor of ALAD was added to the culture medium in the end of exponential cell growth phase and its optimum concentration was 30 mM. Growth of recombinant E. coli BL2l (DE3) pLysS (pFLS45) was largely dependent upon the pH value of culture medium. When the pH of culture medium was in the range of 6.0 and 6.5, high cell mass and ALA production were obtained. IPTG induction for the expression of the fusion gene did not enhance the production of ALA. Recombinant cell grew at 30't faster than at 37$^{\circ}C$, but ALA productivity was lower than at 37$^{\circ}C$. Repeated addition of glycine, succinic acid, and LA increased the production of ALA and the inhibition of intracellular ALA dehydratase activity, with up to 1.3 g/L ALA having been produced in the cultivation.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.28 no.10
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• pp.1749-1759
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• 2018

Recombinant (rec) prion protein (PrP) is an extremely useful resource for studying protein misfolding and subsequent protein aggregation events. Here, we report mass production of high-purity rec-polypeptide encoding the C-terminal globular domain of PrP; (90-230) for human and (89-231) for murine PrP. These proteins were expressed as His-tagged fusion proteins in E. coli cultured by a high cell-density aerobic fermentation method. RecPrPs recovered from inclusion bodies were slowly refolded under reducing conditions. Purification was performed by a sequence of metal-affinity, cation-exchange, and reverse-phase chromatography. The current procedure yielded several dozens of milligrams of recPrP per liter with >95% purity. The purified recPrPs predominantly adopted an ${\alpha}$-helix-rich conformation and were functionally sufficient as substrates to measure the seeding activity of human and animal prions. Establishment of a procedure for high-level production of high-purity recPrP supports the advancement of in vitro investigations of PrP including diagnosis for prion diseases.

• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.69-76
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• 2011

This study describes the effect of myo-inositol on sustained cell division and plant regeneration from cotyledon-derived protoplast of cabbage (Brassica oleracea var. capitata). Freshly isolated protoplasts were cultured in modified Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium removed ammonia ions and containing $0.4\;mg\;l^{-1}$ thiamine HCl, $100\;mg\;l^{-1}$ myo-inositol, $2\;mgl^{-1}$ 2,4-D, $0.5\;mgl^{-1}$ BA, $30\;gl^{-1}$ sucrose and several concentrations of myo-inositol (2, 4, 6, 8, 10% (w/v)) as an osmotic stabilizer. After 3 weeks of culture in the dark at $25^{\circ}C$, the plating efficiency of cabbage protoplasts reached to $22.5{\pm}2.9%$ when cultured in modified MS medium supplemented with $2\;mgl^{-1}$ 2,4-D, $0.5\;mgl^{-1}$ BA, $30\;gl^{-1}$ sucrose and 8% (w/v) of myo-inositol at a density of $2{\times}10^5$ protoplasts/ml. Rapidly growing cell colonies after 3 weeks of culture were transferred to the same culture medium removed osmoticum. To induce shoot regeneration from calluses, calluses with about 2 mm in diameter were transferred to the MS medium containing $2\;mgl^{-1}$ BA and $0.5\;mgl^{-1}$ NAA. After further three weeks of incubation onto the medium in the light, green shoots were formed on the surface of calluses at a frequency of 30%. Upon transfer to half-strength MS basal medium, roots were formed onto the bottom of regenerated shoots without auxin treatments. These regenerated plantlets were successfully acclimatized to soil transfer, grown to normal mature plants. The cabbage protoplast culture system established in this study could be applied for production of somatic hybrids or cybrids by asymmetric protoplast fusion and mass proliferation of elite somatic clones of cabbage.

• The Journal of the Petrological Society of Korea
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.141-147
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• 2015

Using laser-ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS), we evaluated the reliability of trace element abundance data measured from the silicate rock references of JR-3, JG-3, JGb-1 and JB-1b using glass discs made by alkali fusion. For 28 elements including rare earth elements, relative standard deviations (RSD) are better than 7% in case when the concentrations of the elements in the rock samples are greater than 10 ppm. However, RSD shows somewhat increased values for the concentrations less than 10 ppm, but never exceeds 25%. Compared with previously reported averages of the compiled abundance data, our data display satisfactory results for the most cases with differences less than 10%. We suggest that LA-ICP-MS analysis using fused glass beads is a reliable, precise and time-saving method of trace element analysis for the silicate rocks spanning from mafic to felsic compositions.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.52 no.12
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• pp.2860-2866
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• 2020

Oxide dispersion-strengthened materials W-1wt%Pr₂O₃ and W-1wt%La₂O₃ were synthesized by wet chemical method and spark plasma sintering. The field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) analysis, XRD and Vickers microhardness measurements were conducted to characterize the samples. The irradiations were carried out with a 5 keV helium ion beam to fluences up to 5.0 × 10²¹ ions/m² under 600 ℃ using the low-energy ion irradiation system. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) study was performed to investigate the microstructural evolution in W-1wt%Pr₂O₃ and W-1wt%La₂O₃. At 1.0 × 10²⁰ He⁺/m², the average loops size of the W-1wt%Pr₂O₃ was 4.3 nm, much lower than W-1wt% La₂O₃ of 8.5 nm. However, helium bubbles were not observed throughout in both doped W materials. The effects of pre-irradiation with 1.0 × 10²¹ He⁺/m² on trapping of injected deuterium in doped W was studied by thermal desorption spectrometry (TDS) technique using quadrupole mass spectrometer. Compared with the samples without He⁺ pre-irradiation, deuterium (D) retention of doped W materials increased after He⁺ irradiation, whose retention was unsaturated at the damage level of 1.0 × 10²²D₂⁺/m². The present results implied that irradiation effect of He⁺ ions must be taken into account to evaluate the deuterium retention in fusion material applications.

• Journal of Korean Home Economics Education Association
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.81-93
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• 2021

The purpose of this study was to analyze the image, perception, and preference type of high school students of Hanbok and examine the differences according to gender and participation in Hanbok classes. For this purpose, a survey was conducted with 438 high school students in Busan. Frequency analysis, chi-square test, t-test, and F-test were performed using the SPSS and the results were as follows. Firstly, for most high school students, Hanbok has an elegant image, but it was also confirmed that they perceive Hanbok to have a splendid image due to its exposure in mass media and SNS. The image of Hanbok differed by gender and participation in Hanbok classes. A higher percentage of male students than female students perceived Hanbok to have rustic image. Secondly, the type of hanbok that high school students prefer was traditional Hanbok, followed by fusion Hanbok, casual Hanbok, and fashion Hanbok. Hanbok preference type differed by gender and participation in classes. Group participating in hanbok classes showed a higher preference for fashion Hanbok than those who did not. Thirdly, high school students' perception of traditional Hanbok was above average. By subcomponents, it was shown in the order of 'esthetics', 'sustainability', and 'practicality'. It was found that there were statistically significant differences in traditional Hanbok perception according to gender and participation in Hanbok classes. Female students evaluated more positively for traditional Hanbok than male students and students who participate in Hanbok classes evaluated traditional Hanbok more positively than non-participating students.