• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.27 no.11
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• pp.1971-1982
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• 2017

Piliated Lactobacillus rhamnosus (pLR) strains possess higher adherent capacity than non-piliated strains. The objective of this study was to isolate and characterize probiotic pLR strains in human fecal samples. To this end, mouse polyclonal antiserum (anti-SpaA) against the recombinant pilus protein (SpaA) of L. rhamnosus strain GG (LGG) was prepared and tested for its reactivity and specificity. With the anti-SpaA, a method combining the de Man, Rogosa, and Sharpe (MRS) agar plating separation and colony immunoblotting (CIB) was developed to isolate pLR from 124 human fecal samples. The genetic and phenotypic characteristics of the resultant pLR isolates were compared by randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) fingerprinting, and examination of adhesion to Caco-2 cells, hydrophobicity, autoaggregation, and in vitro gastrointestinal tolerance. Anti-SpaA specifically reacted with three pLR strains of 25 test strains, as assessed by western blotting, immunofluorescence flow cytometry, and immunoelectron microscopy (IEM) assays. The optimized MRS agar separation plus anti-SpaA-based CIB procedure could quantitatively detect $2.5{\times}10^3CFU/ml$ of pLR colonies spiked in $10^6CFU/ml$ of background bacteria. Eight pLR strains were identified in 124 human fecal samples, and were confirmed by 16S RNA gene sequencing and IEM identification. RAPD fingerprinting of the pLR strains revealed seven different patterns, of which only two isolates from infants showed the same RAPD profiles with LGG. Strain PLR06 was obtained with high adhesion and autoaggregation activities, hydrophobicity, and gastrointestinal tolerance. Anti-SpaA-based CIB is a rapid and inexpensive method for the preliminary screening of novel adherent L. rhamnosus strains for commercial purposes.

• Membrane Journal
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.307-319
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• 2018

Ion-exchange membrane (IEM) has fixed charge groups and is a separation membrane which is capable of selectively transporting ions of the opposite polarity. Recently, the interest in IEMs has been increasing as the importance of the desalination and energy conversion processes using them as the key components has increased. Since the IEMs determine the efficiency of the above process, it is necessary to improve the separation performance and durability of them and also to lower the expensive membrane price, which is a hindrance to the widening application of the IEM process. Therefore, it is urgent to develop high-performance and low-cost IEMs. Among various types of IEMs, pore-filled membranes prepared by filling ionomer into a porous polymer substrate are intermediate forms of homogeneous membranes and heterogeneous membranes. The production cost would be cheap like the case of heterogeneous membranes because of the use of inexpensive supports and the reduction of the amount used of raw materials, and at the same time, they exhibit excellent electrochemical characteristics close to homogeneous membranes. In this review, major research and development trends of pore-filled IEMs, which are attracting attention as high-performance and low-cost IEMs, have been summarized and reported according to the application fields.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.62 no.4
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• pp.562-565
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• 2013

A new variable rate speech coding technique is proposed. The method is based on the observation that the speech signal approximately looks linear for a very short period of time. The information transmitted is the location and data value of inflection points. If the distance between the inflection points is large, the mid point location and its data value are also delivered. Thus, the encoder transmits both the location and the data value for the inflection samples, but the location only for the non-inflection points. The location information is expressed using one bit for each sample, 0 for non-inflection and 1 for inflection point. At the receiver, using the interpolation, the decoder estimates the untransmitted sample values for non-inflection locations from the received sample values for the inflection samples. With 50 % of computational cost of the existing CVSD delta modulation, the proposed method is expected to achieve the data rate of 36 to 38 kbps and the SNR of 10 to 13 dB.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.13-37
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• 2010

The performance of an electrodialyzer for concentrating seawater is predicted by means of a computer simulation, which includes the following five steps; Step 1 mass transport; Step 2 current density distribution; Step 3 cell voltage; Step 4 NaCl concentration in a concentrated solution and energy consumption; Step 5 limiting current density. The program is developed on the basis of the following assumption; (1) Solution leakage and electric current leakage in an electrodialyzer are negligible. (2) Direct current electric resistance of a membrane includes the electric resistance of a boundary layer formed on the desalting surface of the membrane due to concentration polarization. (3) Frequency distribution of solution velocity ratio in desalting cells is equated by the normal distribution. (4) Current density i at x distant from the inlets of desalting cells is approximated by the quadratic equation. (5) Voltage difference between the electrodes at the entrance of desalting cells is equal to the value at the exits. (6) Limiting current density of an electrodialyzer is defined as average current density applied to an electrodialyzer when current density reaches the limit of an ion exchange membrane at the outlet of a desalting cell in which linear velocity and electrolyte concentration are the least. (7) Concentrated solutions are extracted from concentrating cells to the outside of the process. The validity of the computer simulation model is demonstrated by comparing the computed results with the performance of electrodialyzers operating in salt-manufacturing plants. The model makes it possible to discuss optimum specifications and operating conditions of a practical-scale electrodialyzer.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Intelligent Systems
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.563-567
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• 2001

We generalize the widebane P0-weyl symbol (P0WS) and the widebane spreading function (WSF) using the generalized warping function . The new generalized P0WS and WSF are useful for analyzing system and communication channels producing generalized time shifts. We also investigated the relationship between the affine Wey1 symbol(AWS) and the P0WS. By using specific warping functions, we derive new P0WS and WSF as analysis tools for systems and communication channels with non-linear group delary characteristics. The new P0WS preserves specific types of changes imposed on random processes. The new WSF provides a new interpretation of output of system and communication channel as weighted superpositions of non-linear time shifts on the input. It is compared to the conventional method obtaining output of system and communication channel as a convention integration of the input with the impulse response of the system and the communication channel. The convolution integration can be interpreted as weighted superpositions of liner time shifts on the input where the weight is the impulse response of the system and the communication channel. Application examples in analysis and detection demonstrate the advantages of our new results.

• Proceedings of the KSRS Conference
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• v.1
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• pp.520-523
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• 2006

Whereas it is well known that the surface roughness parameters, the RMS height and the correlation length, of a natural soil surface are underestimated with a short surface profile, it is not clear how much the underestimated surface parameters affect the backscattering coefficients of the surface for various incidence angles and polarizations. The backscattering coefficients of simulated and measured surface profiles are computed using the integral equation method (IEM) and analyzed in this paper to answer this question. It is shown that the RMS error of the backscattering coefficients between 5-m- and 1-m-long measured surface profiles is 1.7 dB for vv-polarization and 0.5 dB for hh-polarization at a medium range of incidence angle ($15^{\circ}{\leq}{\theta}{\leq}70^{\circ}$), while the surface roughness parameters are significantly reduced; from 2.4 cm to 1.5 cm for the RMS height s and from 35.1 cm to 10.0 cm for the autocorrelation length l. This result is verified with numerous simulations with various roughness conditions and various wavelengths.

• Journal of mucopolysaccharidosis and rare diseases
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.7-10
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• 2018

Rare diseases are life threatening or chronically debilitating diseases with a low prevalence (less than 2,000 people in a population), which includes lysosomal storage diseases. These diseases are often seen as unimportant especially in developing countries, such as Indonesia, due to small number of patients. National Rare Disease Center in Indonesia was pioneered almost 20 years ago and officially established in 2017 by the Indonesian Minister of Health. Lysosomal storage disease become the most commonly found inborn errors of metabolism (IEM) in Indonesia due to easily accessible diagnostic facilities. Currently there are 7 patients receiving ERT in this mixed-donation scheme, one patient with Gaucher disease and 6 patients with MPS type II. Few challenges for ERT in Indonesia include importation through special access scheme, preparation of ERT infusion in intensive care settting, and cost of treatment. Even with limited resources, healthcare professionals in Indonesia have been giving the best care possible for rare disease patients, especially to provide diagnostic facilities through collaboration and treatment options for treatable rare diseases. Improvements in care for rare disease patients are still needed.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.62 no.2
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• pp.93-98
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• 2018

Bis-GMA, TEGDMA, and camphorquinone were used as the main material, cross-linking agent, and photoinitiator, respectively. In addition, 2-isocyanatoethyl methacrylate was used as an additive for high strength, while the 3-hydroxypyridine was used as an additive for antibacterial activity. Photopolymerization was also carried out at a 440-480 nm wavelength and at about $1000mW/cm^2$ intensity for about 40 seconds. The breaking strength measurement of the samples showed that the breaking strength increased along with increasing the addition ratio of IEM, while it took less time until the polymerization was complete, thereby suggesting that the degree of polymerization has the tendency to increase. And also, compared to the size of the clear zone formed by ampicillin, the 3-hydroxypyridine group exhibited antimicrobial activity induced by ampicillin. The results of this study suggest that the use of 2-isocyanatoethyl methacrylate as an additive for high strength and 3-hydroxypyridine as an additive for improved antibacterial activity would improve the usability of the fabricated polymer as a dental resin cement material with high functionality.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.63-76
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• 2012

Mother liquid discharged from a salt-manufacturing plant was electrodialyzed at 25 and $40^{\circ}C$ in a continuous process integrated with $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ion low-permeable anion-exchange membranes to remove $Na_2SO_4$ and recover NaCl in the mother liquid. Performance of electrodialysis was evaluated by measuring ion concentration in a concentrated solution, permselectivity coefficient of $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ions against $Cl^-$ ions, current efficiency, cell voltage, energy consumption to obtain one ton of NaCl and membrane pair characteristics. The permselectivity coefficient of $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ions against $Cl^-$ ions was low enough particularly at $40^{\circ}C$ and $SO_4{^{2-}}$ transport across anion-exchange membranes was prevented successfully. Applying the overall mass transport equation, $Cl^-$ ion and $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ion transport across anion-exchange membranes is evaluated. $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ion transport number is decreased due to the decrease of electro-migration of $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ions across the anion-exchange membranes. $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ion concentration in desalting cells becomes higher than that in concentration cells and $SO_4{^{2-}}$ ion diffusion is accelerated across the anion-exchange membranes from desalting cells toward concentrating cells.

• Applied Microscopy
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.527-538
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• 1998

This study was performed to investigate the activity of antibodies in the tissues of Paragonimus westermani at the different developmental stages. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and Immunelectron microscopy (IEM) were applied, using the dog sera infected with metacercariae isolated from Cambaroides similis. These dog sera were obtained from 3rd to 96th week after infection by bleeding. The supernatants of homogenated worms for worm antigen were used. The worm tissues were embedded in Lowicryl HM 20 medium, treated with infected serum and protein A gold complex (particle size; 12 nm) and observed by electron microscope. In the pattern of antibody levels by ELISA test in all developemental worm antigens, the activity of antibody was very weak in the 3rd week, but strong in the worm antibody from 4th to 20th week after infection. Its activity was maintained even till 96th week. The antibody level of the L2th week worm antigen was higher than those of the 20th and 48th week worm antigens. Generally, many gold particles were observed on the secretory granules and the epithelial lamellae. Thus, it was concluded that the antigenic materials in the developmental worm tissues were especially concentrated on the secretory granules in the parenchymal tissues and the epithelial lamellae in the lumen of the caecum.