• Progress in Superconductivity
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.28-35
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• 2005

We propose a method to measure atrial arrhythmias (AA) such as atrial fibrillation (Afb) and atrial flutter (Afl) with a SQUID magnetocardiograph (MCG) system. To detect AA is one of challenging topics in MCG. As the AA generally have irregular rhythm and atrio-ventricular conduction, the MCG signal cannot be improved by QRS averaging; therefore a SQUID MCG system having a high SNR is required to measure informative atrial excitation with a single scan. In the case of Afb, diminished f waves are much smaller than normal P waves because the sources are usually located on the posterior wall of the heart. In this study, we utilize an MCG system measuring tangential field components, which is known to be more sensitive to a deeper current source. The average noise spectral density of the whole system in a magnetic shielded room was $10\;fT/{\surd}Hz(a)\;1\;Hz\;and\;5\;fT/{\surd}Hz\;(a)\;100\;Hz$. We measured the MCG signals of patients with chronic Afb and Afl. Before the AA measurement, the comparison between the measurements in supine and prone positions for P waves has been conducted and the experiment gave a result that the supine position is more suitable to measure the atrial excitation. Therefore, the AA was measured in subject's supine position. Clinical potential of AA measurement in MCG is to find an aspect of a reentry circuit and to localize the abnormal stimulation noninvasively. To give useful information about the abnormal excitation, we have developed a method, separative synthetic aperture magnetometry (sSAM). The basic idea of sSAM is to visualize current source distribution corresponding to the atrial excitation, which are separated from the ventricular excitation and the Gaussian sensor noises. By using sSAM, we localized the source of an Afl successfully.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.1087-1093
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to survey the effectiveness of oriental medicine treatment on lumbar herniated intervertebral disc and spondylolisthesis. The clinical study was performed on 32 cases of patients with lumbar herniated intervertebral disc and spondylolisthesis as diagnosed by X-ray, Magnetic resonance imaging(MRI) exams amongst the patients who were admitted to Jaseng Hospital of Oriental Medicine from January 2010 to June 2010. 32 cases of patients were analyzed according to the distribution of sex, age, duration of disease, contributory factor, symptoms, admission period, disc herniation type and level of spondylolisthesis. The efficacy of treatment was evaluated respectively. The number of the female patients were larger than that of male with the ratio of 1:0.6. Most of the patients were in their fifties(43.8%), choronic phase(46.9%), those patients suffered from lower back pain and leg pain radiation(90.6%), reasons unknown(56.3%). Most of them also had mixed disc(37.5%), bulging disc(37.5%) and spondylolisthesis of LS on L5(50.0%). Most of them stayed in the hospital for 21-25days. After treatment, the percentage with good improvement was 62.5%, fair 18.8%, poor 12.5%, and excellent 6.3%, respectively. Oriental medicine treatment has on useful effect on the recovery of lumbar herniated intervertebral disc with spondylolisthesis.

• Advances in pediatric surgery
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.150-156
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• 2005

Failure of the urachus to regress completely results in anomalies that may be classified as patent urachus, urachal sinus, urachal cyst and bladder diverticula. The presenting symptoms of children with urachal anomalies are variable and uniform guidelines for diagnosis and treatment are lacking. The purpose of this study was to analyze our experience and develop conclusions regarding the presentation, diagnosis and treatment of urachal anomalies. We retrospectively analyzed the records of 32 patients who were admitted for urachal anomalies from March 1995 to February 2005. The age distribution of these patients at presentation ranged from 1 day to 14 years old (median age 1 month). There were 20 boys and 12 girls. The 32 cases comprised 13 cases of urachal sinus (40.6 %), 10 urachal cyst (31.3 %), and 9 patent urchus (28.1 %). In 30 patients ultrasonography was used for diagnosis and 2 patients with patent urachus were explored without using a diagnostic method. Twenty-three patients were confirmed by ultrasonography alone and 7 patients were examined using additional modalities, namely, computed tomography for 2 patients with an urachal cyst, magnetic resonance imaging for 1 patient with an urachal cyst, and fistulography for 3 patients with an urachal sinus. The presenting symptoms were umbilical discharge (14 patients), umbilical granuloma (8), abdominal pain and fever (3), fever (3), abdominal pain (2), and a low abdominal mass (2). Excision was performed in 29 patients, and 3 patients were conservatively managed. Urachal anomalies in children most frequently presented in neonates, and the most common complaint was umbilical discharge with infection. Urachal anomalies can be diagnosed by a physical examination and an appropriate radiographic test. Ultrasound was the most useful diagnostic method. Complete surgical excision of an urachal anomaly is recommended to avoid recurrence, and the rare development of carcinoma.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetics Society
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• v.6 no.6
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• pp.405-410
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• 1996

Valence band photoemission spectroscopy (PES) measurements have been performed for $Co_{x}Pd_{100-x}$ alloy films using synchrotron radiation (x = 0, 25, 40, 65). Then the partial spectral weight distributions (PSW's) of Co 3d and Pd 4d electrons have been determined. The Co 3d PSW's exhibit some structures which are quite different from those of the Co film for x < 25 %, whereas they become very similar to those of the Co film for x > 40 %. For x < 25 %, the peak near the Fermi level ($E_F$) and a shoulder around 2 eV binding energy in the Co 3d PSW reflect large hybridization between Pd 4d and Co 3d electrons, suggesting that the hybridization might play an inportant role in determining perpendicualr magnetic anisotropy. The Pd 4d PSW's in Co-Pd alloy films are found to have larger FWHM's (full widths at half maximum), larger binding energies of the main peaks, and larger spectral intensities at $E_F$ than the PES spectrum of the Pd film. The FWHM of the Pd 4d PSW increases with decreasing Pd concentration, which are considered to reflect the disordering effect in the alloy formation or the change in the Pd 4d electronic structure due to hybridization between Co 3d and Pd 4d electrons.

• The Korean Journal of Pain
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.22-27
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• 2012

Background: The common causes of lower back pain with or without leg pain includes disk disease and spinal stenosis. A definitive diagnosis is usually made by means of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), but treatment is often difficult because the MRI findings are not consistent with the symptoms of the patient in many cases. The objective of this study was to observe the correlation between the patterns of epidurography performed in patients having lower back pain with or without leg pain and the position or severity of the pain as subjectively described by the patients. Methods: The subjects of this study were 69 outpatients with lower back pain with or without leg pain who visited our clinic and complained of predominant pain on one side. We performed caudal epidural block using an image intensifier. A mixture of the therapeutic drug and the contrast agent (10 ml) was injected to observe the contrast flow pattern. The patients who complained of predominant pain on one side were divided into the left side group and the right side group. A judgment of inconsistency was made if the contrast agent flowed to the side of the pain, while a judgment of consistency was made if the contrast agent flowed to the opposite side of the pain. The degree of the drug distribution was evaluated by counting the number of cells to which the contrast agent's flowed for evaluating the correlation between the contrasted cell and the severity of pain (one group ${\leq}$ VAS 7, the other group ${\geq}$ VAS 8) the degree of the contrast agent's contrast was evaluated by dividing and counting an image into 15 cells (the left, right, and middle sections at each level of L4, L5, S1, S2, and S3). Results: Thirty out of the 69 patients who had laterality in pain, that is, those who complained of predominant pain on one side, showed that the laterality of the pain and the contrast agent flow was consistent, while 39 patients showed that the laterality was inconsistent (P: 0.137). The evaluation of the correlation between the pain and the contrast agent flow showed that the mean number of contrasted cells was $9.0{\pm}2.2$ for the 46 patients in the group with a VAS of 7 or lower and $6.5{\pm}2.0$ for the 23 patients in the group with a VAS of 8 or higher, indicating that the former group showed a significantly greater number of contrasted cells (P < 0.001). Conclusions: This study, conducted with patients having lower back pain with or without leg pain, showed that the contrast flow pattern of caudal epidurography had a significant correlation with the severity of the pain but not with the laterality of the pain.

• 한국지구물리탐사학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2001.09a
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• pp.122-140
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• 2001

We have applied the geophysical survey, mainly electric and electromagnetic (EM) methods, to a test site contaminated by hydrocarbon waste disposal and local spill. The multi-frequency, moving source & receiver EM survey along with ground penetrating radar (GPR) showed a fairly good performance in detection of buried metal pipes and objects. Magnetic survey measuring vertical and horizontal gradients were so sensitive to the small metallic objects spread over the surface that it's hard to discriminate the buried pipe. We chose electrical resistivity, EM and GPR survey to examine the soil contamination. Depth slices of resistivity distribution as the results of the inversion of resistivity and EM data coincided each other and closely matched the contaminated area determined by chemical analysis of the soil samples. GPR images did not show the reflection events related with contamination plume since there are no distinct spill in this site. We inferred the contamination using the penetration depth of the GPR energy, which could be used as auxiliary information to the resistivity and EM results. We summarized the applicability of each survey methods based on this results and proposed a desirable survey scheme for the determination of hydrocarbon contaminated site.

• Sleep Medicine and Psychophysiology
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.82-91
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• 2018

Objectives: Synchronous electroencephalogram (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has been used to explore sleep stage dependent functional brain networks. Despite a growing number of sleep studies using EEG-fMRI, few studies have conducted network analysis on whole night sleep due to difficulty in data acquisition, artifacts, and sleep management within the MRI scanner. Methods: In order to perform network analysis for whole night sleep, we proposed experimental procedures and data processing techniques for EEG-fMRI. We acquired 6-7 hours of EEG-fMRI data per participant and conducted signal processing to reduce artifacts in both EEG and fMRI. We then generated a functional brain atlas with 68 brain regions using independent component analysis of sleep fMRI data. Using this functional atlas, we constructed sleep level dependent functional brain networks. Results: When we evaluated functional connectivity distribution, sleep showed significantly reduced functional connectivity for the whole brain compared to that during wakefulness. REM sleep showed statistically different connectivity patterns compared to non-REM sleep in sleep-related subcortical brain circuits. Conclusion: This study suggests the feasibility of exploring functional brain networks using sleep EEG-fMRI for whole night sleep via appropriate experimental procedures and signal processing techniques for fMRI and EEG.

• Advances in nano research
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.325-340
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• 2024

There are several novel uses for dispersing many nanoparticles into a conventional fluid, including dynamic sealing, damping, heat dissipation, microfluidics, and more. Therefore, melting heat and mass transfer characteristics of a 3-D MHD Hybrid Nanofluid flow over a rotating disc with presenting dufour and soret effects are assessed numerically in this study. In this instance, we investigated both ferric sulfate and molybdenum disulfide as nanoparticles suspended within base fluid water. The governing partial differential equations are transformed into linked higher-order non-linear ordinary differential equations by the local similarity transformation. The collection of these deduced equations is then resolved using a Chebyshev spectral collocation-based algorithm built into the Mathematica software. To demonstrate how different instances of hybrid/ nanofluid are impacted by changes in temperature, velocity, and the distribution of nanoparticle concentration, examples of graphical and numerical data are given. For many values of the material parameters, the computational findings are shown. Simulations conducted for different physical parameters in the model show that adding hybrid nanoparticle to the fluid mixture increases heat transfer in comparison to simple nanofluids. It has been identified that hybrid nanoparticles, as opposed to single-type nanoparticles, need to be taken into consideration to create an effective thermal system. Furthermore, porosity lowers the velocities of simple and hybrid nanofluids in both cases. Additionally, results show that the drag force from skin friction causes the nanoparticle fluid to travel more slowly than the hybrid nanoparticle fluid. The findings also demonstrate that suction factors like magnetic and porosity parameters, as well as nanoparticles, raise the skin friction coefficient. Furthermore, It indicates that the outcomes from different flow scenarios correlate and are in strong agreement with the findings from the published literature. Bar chart depictions are altered by changes in flow rates. Moreover, the results confirm doctors' views to prescribe hybrid nanoparticle and particle nanoparticle contents for achalasia patients and also those who suffer from esophageal stricture and tumors. The results of this study can also be applied to the energy generated by the melting disc surface, which has a variety of industrial uses. These include, but are not limited to, the preparation of semiconductor materials, the solidification of magma, the melting of permafrost, and the refreezing of frozen land.

• Korean Journal of Radiology
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• v.23 no.12
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• pp.1269-1280
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• 2022

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the usefulness of quantitative indices obtained from deep learning analysis of gadoxetic acid-enhanced hepatobiliary phase (HBP) MRI and their longitudinal changes in predicting decompensation and death in patients with advanced chronic liver disease (ACLD). Materials and Methods: We included patients who underwent baseline and 1-year follow-up MRI from a prospective cohort that underwent gadoxetic acid-enhanced MRI for hepatocellular carcinoma surveillance between November 2011 and August 2012 at a tertiary medical center. Baseline liver condition was categorized as non-ACLD, compensated ACLD, and decompensated ACLD. The liver-to-spleen signal intensity ratio (LS-SIR) and liver-to-spleen volume ratio (LS-VR) were automatically measured on the HBP images using a deep learning algorithm, and their percentage changes at the 1-year follow-up (ΔLS-SIR and ΔLS-VR) were calculated. The associations of the MRI indices with hepatic decompensation and a composite endpoint of liver-related death or transplantation were evaluated using a competing risk analysis with multivariable Fine and Gray regression models, including baseline parameters alone and both baseline and follow-up parameters. Results: Our study included 280 patients (153 male; mean age ± standard deviation, 57 ± 7.95 years) with non-ACLD, compensated ACLD, and decompensated ACLD in 32, 186, and 62 patients, respectively. Patients were followed for 11-117 months (median, 104 months). In patients with compensated ACLD, baseline LS-SIR (sub-distribution hazard ratio [sHR], 0.81; p = 0.034) and LS-VR (sHR, 0.71; p = 0.01) were independently associated with hepatic decompensation. The ΔLS-VR (sHR, 0.54; p = 0.002) was predictive of hepatic decompensation after adjusting for baseline variables. ΔLS-VR was an independent predictor of liver-related death or transplantation in patients with compensated ACLD (sHR, 0.46; p = 0.026) and decompensated ACLD (sHR, 0.61; p = 0.023). Conclusion: MRI indices automatically derived from the deep learning analysis of gadoxetic acid-enhanced HBP MRI can be used as prognostic markers in patients with ACLD.

• Radiation Oncology Journal
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.238-244
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• 2003

Purpose: The Planning of High-Dose-Rate (HDR) brachytherapy treatments are becoming individualized and more dependent on the treatment planning system. Therefore, computer software has been developed to perform independent point dose calculations with the integration of an isodose distribution curve display into the patient anatomy images. Meterials and Methods: As primary input data, the program takes patients'planning data including the source dwell positions, dwell times and the doses at reference points, computed by an HDR treatment planning system (TPS). Dosimetric calculations were peformed in a $10\times12\times10\;Cm^3$ grid space using the Interstitial Collaborative Working Group (ICWG) formalism and an anisotropy table for the HDR Iridium-192 source. The computed doses at the reference points were automatically compared with the relevant results of the TPS. The MR and simulation film images were then imported and the isodose distributions on the axial, sagittal and coronal planes intersecting the point selected by a user were superimposed on the imported images and then displayed. The accuracy of the software was tested in three benchmark plans peformed by Gamma-Med 12i TPS (MDS Nordion, Germany). Nine patients'plans generated by Plato (Nucletron Corporation, The Netherlands) were verified by the developed software. Results: The absolute doses computed by the developed software agreed with the commercial TPS results within an accuracy of $2.8\%$ in the benchmark plans. The isodose distribution plots showed excellent agreements with the exception of the tip legion of the source's longitudinal axis where a slight deviation was observed. In clinical plans, the secondary dose calculations had, on average, about a $3.4\%$ deviation from the TPS plans. Conclusion: The accurate validation of complicate treatment plans is possible with the developed software and the qualify of the HDR treatment plan can be improved with the isodose display integrated into the patient anatomy information.