• Title/Summary/Keyword: MR studies

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CONTRAST-ENHANCED MR ANGIOGRAPHY : PRINCIPLES, IMPLEMENTATION, AND APPLICATIONS

  • Riederer, Stephen J.
    • Proceedings of the KSMRM Conference
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    • 2002.11a
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    • pp.117-122
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    • 2002
  • Contrast-enhanced MR angiography has become a widely used method useful for clinical diagnosis. Early studies identified a number of technical issues, and many of these have been addressed with various MRI physics innovations over the last several years. The quality of the results is high enough that CE MRA is replacing conventional x-ray angiography methods at many institutions. Ongoing research is expected to provide further improvements in performance, most notably in additional reductions in examination time, in time-resolved 3D imaging, and in improved imaging of the peripheral vasculature with extended fields of view.

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Vibration isolation with smart fluid dampers: a benchmarking study

  • Batterbee, D.C.;Sims, N.D.
    • Smart Structures and Systems
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    • v.1 no.3
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    • pp.235-256
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    • 2005
  • The non-linear behaviour of electrorheological (ER) and magnetorheological (MR) dampers makes it difficult to design effective control strategies, and as a consequence a wide range of control systems have been proposed in the literature. These previous studies have not always compared the performance to equivalent passive systems, alternative control designs, or idealised active systems. As a result it is often impossible to compare the performance of different smart damper control strategies. This article provides some insight into the relative performance of two MR damper control strategies: on/off control and feedback linearisation. The performance of both strategies is benchmarked against ideal passive, semi-active and fully active damping. The study relies upon a previously developed model of an MR damper, which in this work is validated experimentally under closed-loop conditions with a broadband mechanical excitation. Two vibration isolation case studies are investigated: a single-degree-of-freedom mass-isolator, and a two-degree-of-freedom system that represents a vehicle suspension system. In both cases, a variety of broadband mechanical excitations are used and the results analysed in the frequency domain. It is shown that although on/off control is more straightforward to implement, its performance is worse than the feedback linearisation strategy, and can be extremely sensitive to the excitation conditions.

Systematic Studies on the Fishes of the Family Cobitidae (Order Cypriniformes) in Korea: I. Three Unrecorded Species and Subspecies of the Genus Cobitis from Korea

  • Kim, Ik-Soo
    • The Korean Journal of Zoology
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    • v.23 no.4
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    • pp.239-250
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    • 1980
  • I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Dr. Ki Chul Choi, emeritus professor of Seoul National University and Dr. Il Young Joo, professor of Chung-ang University for their helpful advices, and Dr. T. Nalbant and Dr. P. Banarescu of National History Museum, Rumania, Mr. Y. Fusioka, associate professor of Yamaguchi University, Mr. K. Hosoya of Kyoto University, and Mr. Y. Sawada of Hokkaido University for their help in sending the specimens of C. taenia taenia and C. taenia striata by mail. I am also indebted to the Asan Foundation for the financial support of this research.

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A Variational Model For Longitudinal Brain Tissue Segmentation

  • Tang, Mingjun;Chen, Renwen;You, Zijuan
    • KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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    • v.16 no.11
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    • pp.3479-3492
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    • 2022
  • Longitudinal quantification of brain changes due to development, aging or disease plays an important role in the filed of personalized-medicine applications. However, due to the temporal variability in shape and different imaging equipment and parameters, estimating anatomical changes in longitudinal studies is significantly challenging. In this paper, a longitudinal Magnetic Resonance(MR) brain image segmentation algorithm proposed by combining intensity information and anisotropic smoothness term which contain a spatial smoothness constraint and longitudinal consistent constraint into a variational framework. The minimization of the proposed energy functional is strictly and effectively derived from a fast optimization algorithm. A large number of experimental results show that the proposed method can guarantee segmentation accuracy and longitudinal consistency in both simulated and real longitudinal MR brain images for analysis of anatomical changes over time.

MR Imaging of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome : The Usefulness of MRI in Treatment Decisions (수근관 증후군의 자기공명 영상 : 치료 결정의 유용성)

  • Lee, Kyu-Yong;Lee, Young Joo;Kim, Seung Hyun;Song, Hyoung Gon;Kim, Juhan
    • Annals of Clinical Neurophysiology
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    • v.4 no.2
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    • pp.114-118
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    • 2002
  • Backgrounds : Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) is a common condition that is usually diagnosed by electrophysiologic studies. However, CTS provide limited information to determine the causes of CTS and to choose the treatment method. We evaluated diagnostic sensitivity of MR imaging and treatment decisions by MR imaging in electrodiagnosed CTS. Methods : 14 patients (26 wrists) with electrodiagnosed CTS were studied using MR imaging. In 26 wrists for which axial T1 & T2 weighted images were obtained at 1.5T with a decided wrist coil. Previously described MR imaging of CTS such as increased median nerve signal, flattening of median nerve, reticular bowing, tenosynovitis and space occupying lesions were retrospectively evaluated. Degree of improvement was evaluated by global symptom score (GSS). The GSS rated symptoms from 0 (no symptoms) to 10 (severe) in each of five categories: pain, numbness, paresthesia, weakness/clumsiness, and nocturnal awakening. Subjects' GSS was recorded at baseline, 2 weeks, 1 month, 6 months after treatment. We decided to medical treatment that showed mainly inflammatory sign such as increased median nerve signal, tenosinovitis and to surgical treatment such as space occupying lesion, high canal pressure sign. Results : MR imaging showed that increased median nerve signal were in 20 wrists (77%), flattening of median nerve were in 6 wrists (23%), reticular bowing were in 3 wrists (12%), tenosynovitis were in 8 wrists (32%), decreased canal size in 2 wrists (7.6%), space occupying lesion were in 1 wrist (4%). A good outcome was revealed in 21 wrists by medical treatment that showed mainly increased median nerve signal, tenosynovitis. The mean GSS were 27.7 at baseline, 11.2 at 2 weeks, 11.0 at 6 months in medical treatment group. Another 5 wrist had surgical treatment shown by ganglion and high canal pressure sign such as median nerve flattening, reticular bowing, decreased canal size: 3 wrists had good prognosis, but 2 wrists (one patient) had no significant improvement due to small carpal tunnel size. Conclusions : Our results are in agreement with most previously described MR imaging signs of CTS. MR imaging plays an important role in several cases and especially in the assessment of failure of surgical treatment. Knowledge of MR findings may permit more rational choice of treatment.

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Effect of asymmetric magnetic fields on the interface shape in Czochralski silicon crystals (Cz 실리콘 단결정에서 비대칭 자기장이 고액 계면에 미치는 영향)

  • Hong, Young-Ho;Shim, Kwang-Bo
    • Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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    • v.18 no.4
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    • pp.140-145
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    • 2008
  • Silicon single crystals are grown by Czochralski (CZ) method in different growing conditions. The different shapes of the crystal-melt interface are obtained with various magnetic fields. Effects of zero-Gauss plane (ZGP) shape and magnetic intensity (MI) on the crystal-melt interface in the crystal experimentally are investigated. The shape of ZGP is not only flat but also parabolic, which is due to magnetic ratio (MR) of the lower to upper current densities in the configurations of the cusp-magnetic fields. As the MR increases, the crystal-melt interface becomes more concave. It means that the hot melt can be easily transported to the crystal-melt interface with increasing the MR. Effective shape of the crystal-melt interface is found to depend on the magnetic field in cusp-magnetic CZ method. The experimental results are compared with other studies and discussed.

Accuracy Evaluation of Three-Dimensional Multimodal Image Registration Using a Brain Phantom (뇌팬톰을 이용한 삼차원 다중영상정합의 정확성 평가)

  • 진호상;송주영;주라형;정수교;최보영;이형구;서태석
    • Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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    • v.25 no.1
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    • pp.33-41
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    • 2004
  • Accuracy of registration between images acquired from various medical image modalities is one of the critical issues in radiation treatment planing. In this study, a method of accuracy evaluation of image registration using a homemade brain phantom was investigated. Chamfer matching of CT-MR and CT-SPECT imaging was applied for the multimodal image registration. The accuracy of image correlation was evaluated by comparing the center points of the inserted targets of the phantom. The three dimensional root-mean-square translation deviations of the CT-MR and CT-SPECT registration were 2.1${\pm}$0.8 mm and 2.8${\pm}$1.4 mm, respectively. The rotational errors were < 2$^{\circ}$ for the three orthogonal axes. These errors were within a reasonable margin compared with the previous phantom studies. A visual inspection of the superimposed CT-MR and CT- SPECT images also showed good matching results.

Studies on the Growth Rate of Silkworm Bombyx mori (L.) (Lepidoptera: Bombycidae) Fed with Control and Silver Nanoparticles (AgNps) Treated MR2 Mulberry Leaves

  • Prabu, Ponraj Ganesh;Sabhanayakam, Selvi;Mathivanan, Veeranarayanan;Balasundaram, Dhananjayan
    • International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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    • v.22 no.2
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    • pp.39-44
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    • 2011
  • To evaluate the growth rate of larval and pupal parameters of silkworm Bombyx mori fed with Silver Nanoparticles (AgNps) treated $MR_2$ mulberry leaves, the following works have been considered. The AgNp was synthesized by chemical reduction method, it was diluted by different concentrations such as 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% (without dilution). Fresh mulberry leaves (Morus alba L.) were sprayed by each concentration and were fed to silkworms, from $3^{rd}$, $4^{th}$ and $5^{th}$ instar, five feedings/day. Group $T_1$ larvae received $MR_2$ mulberry leaves sprayed with distilled water and served as control, group $T_2$, $T_3$, $T_4$ and $T_5$ larvae received 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% AgNps sprayed mulberry leaves, respectively. Silkworm larvae fed on M. alba ($MR_2$) leaves sprayed with 25% concentration of AgNps (group $T_2$) was significantly increased the larvae and cocoon length, width and weight as compared to those fed on control (group $T_1$) $MR_2$ mulberry leaves and other groups ($T_3$, $T_4$ and $T_5$). Hence, 25% AgNps dose was fixed as an effective dose. It has been observed from the present study that 25% AgNps treated (group $T_2$) leaves fed by silkworms have enhanced the larval and pupal growth and quantity of silk production than control.

Association Between Plasma Homocysteine Level and Mortality: A Mendelian Randomization Study

  • Chang Kyun Choi ;Sun-Seog Kweon;Young-Hoon Lee;Hae-Sung Nam;Seong-Woo Choi;Hye-Yeon Kim;Min-Ho Shin
    • Korean Circulation Journal
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    • v.53 no.10
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    • pp.710-719
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    • 2023
  • Background and Objectives: In previous studies, high homocysteine levels were associated with high cardiovascular mortality. However, these results were inconsistent with those of randomized controlled trials. We aimed to evaluate the causal role of homocysteine on allcause and cardiovascular mortality using Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis. Methods: This study included the 10,005 participants in the Namwon Study. In conventional observational analysis, age, sex, survey years, lifestyles, body mass index, comorbidities, and serum folate level were adjusted using multivariate Cox proportional regression. MR using 2-stage least squares regression was used to evaluate the association between genetically predicted plasma homocysteine levels and mortality. Age, sex, and survey years were adjusted for each stage. The methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) polymorphism was used as an instrumental variable for predicting plasma homocysteine levels. Results: Observed homocysteine levels were positively associated with all-cause (hazard ratio [HR], 1.40; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.26-1.54) and cardiovascular (HR, 1.62; 95% CI, 1.28-2.06) mortality when plasma homocysteine levels doubled. However, these associations were not significant in MR analysis. The HRs of doubling genetically predicted plasma homocysteine levels for all-cause and cardiovascular mortality were 0.99 (95% CI, 0.62-1.57) and 1.76 (95% CI, 0.54-5.77), respectively. Conclusions: This MR analysis did not support a causal role for elevated plasma homocysteine concentrations in premature deaths.

Differentiation of Malignant from Benign Soft-Tissue Solid Tumors: Clinical and MR Finding Complex (연조직고형종양의 악성과 양성 감별: 임상과 자기공명영상 복합소견)

  • Moon, Tae-Yong;Kim, Jung-Il;Shin, Su-Mi;Choo, Hye-Jeung;Choi, Hyun-Wook;Kim, Soo-Jin
    • The Journal of the Korean bone and joint tumor society
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    • v.10 no.2
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    • pp.79-87
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    • 2004
  • Purpose: The recent development of MR has made to possible radiological diagnosis in various soft tssue tumors. But multifarious components within soft tissue tumors and their periodic change have made to difficult even differentiation of malignant from benign soft tissue tumors solely on the MR. So authors retry to differentiate malignant from benign soft tissue tumors with clinical and MR finding complex. Materials and methods: We were analysed 82 pathologically confirmed soft tissue solid tumors (37 cases as malignancy including intermediate tumors and 45 cases as benign including inflammatory masses) which are correlated with clinical findings such as age, size, and location, MR findings such as tumor border, texture on T2 and contrast-T1 images, and enhancement area retrospectively. Many typical lipoma and cysts including of ganglion and abscess are rejected in the benign soft tissue tumor group because not difficult to diagnose on MR. Results: Malignant soft tissue tumors were more frequent in 21~40 and 61~80 years old of the age, above 3.0 cm of the size, trunk-pelvis-lower extremities of the location, and MR findings with irregular border and above 50% of the enhancement area than those of benign soft tissue tumors. Conclusion: The clinical finding that divided to two locations as trunk-pelvis-lower extremities and upper extremities-shoulder-spine was statistically significant to differentiate malignant from benign soft tissue solid tumors. However, the others would provide some useful informations to differentiate them never specific.

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