• Journal of Chest Surgery
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• v.50 no.2
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• pp.78-85
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• 2017

Background: Closure of a secundum atrial septal defect (ASD) is possible through surgical intervention or device placement. During surgical intervention, concomitant pathologies are corrected. The present study was conducted to investigate the outcomes of surgical ASD closure, to determine the risk factors of mortality, and establish the effects of concomitant disease correction. Methods: Between October 1989 and October 2009, 693 adults underwent surgery for secundum ASD. Their mean age was $40.9{\pm}13.1years$, and 199 (28.7%) were male. Preoperatively, atrial fibrillation was noted in 39 patients (5.6%) and significant tricuspid regurgitation (TR) in 137 patients (19.8%). The mean follow-up duration was $12.4{\pm}4.7years$. Results: There was no 30-day mortality. The 1-, 5-, 10-, and 20-year survival rates were 99.4%, 96.8%, 94.5%, and 81.6%, respectively. In multivariate analysis, significant preoperative TR (hazard ratio [HR], 1.95; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.09 to 3.16; p=0.023) and preoperative age (HR, 1.04; 95% CI, 1.01 to 1.06; p=0.001) were independent risk factors for late mortality. The TR grade significantly decreased after ASD closure with tricuspid repair. However, in patients with more than mild TR, repair was not associated with improved long-term survival (p=0.518). Conclusion: Surgical ASD closure is safe. Significant preoperative TR and age showed a strong negative correlation with survival. Our data showed that tricuspid valve repair improved the TR grade effectively. However, no effect on long-term survival was found. Therefore, early surgery before the development of significant TR mat be beneficial for improving postoperative survival.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.275-280
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• 2016

Background: A tobacco-free workplace policy is identified as an effective means to reduce tobacco use and protect people from second-hand smoke; however, the number of tobacco-free policies (TFP) remains very low in workplaces in Malaysia. This study explored the factors affecting support for a tobacco-free policy on two healthcare campuses in Malaysia, prior to the implementation of TFP. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted among 286 non-smokers from two healthcare training centres and two nearby colleges in Malaysia from January 2015 to April 2015. A standardized questionnaire was administered via staff and student emails. The questionnaire collected information on sociodemographic characteristics, support for a tobacco-free policy and perceived respiratory and sensory symptoms due to tobacco exposure. Bivariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses were performed to estimate the independent effects of supporting a tobacco-free campus. Results: The percentage of individuals supporting completely tobacco-free facilities was 83.2% (N=238), as opposed to 16.7% (N=48) in support of partially tobacco-free facilities. Compared to the supporters of partially tobacco-free facilities, non-smokers who supported completely tobacco-free health facilities were more likely to be female, have higher education levels, to be very concerned about the effects of other people smoking on their health and to perceive a tobacco-free policy as very important. In addition, they perceived that tobacco smoke bothered them at work by causing headaches and coughs and, in the past 4 weeks, had experienced difficulty breathing. In the multivariate model, after adjusting for sociodemographic characteristics and other factors, only experiencing coughs and headaches increased the odds of supporting a completely tobacco-free campus, up to 2.5- and 1.9-fold, respectively. Conclusions: Coughs and headaches due to other people smoking at work enhances support for a completely tobacco-free campus among non-smokers.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.90-102
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• 2017

In this study, various types of nutrient models were tested by using two tears's water quality data collected from the stormwater wetland in Korea. Based on results, most important factor influencing nitrogen removal was hydraulic loading rate, which indicates that surface area of wetland is more important than its volumetric capacity, and model proposed by WEF was found to give a least error between measured and calculated values. For the phosphorus, in case assuming a power relationship between rate constant and temperature, the best prediction result were obtained, but temperature was most sensitive parameter affecting phosphorus removal. In addition, denitrification was always a limiting step for the nitrogen removal in this particular wetland mostly due to the lack of carbon source and high dissolved oxygen concentration. In this paper, several alternatives to improve nitrogen removal, including proper arrangement and designation of wetland elements and use of floating plants or synthetic fiber mat to control oxygen level and to capture the algal particles were proposed and discussed.

• The Korean Journal of Mycology
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• v.26 no.4 s.87
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• pp.450-457
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• 1998

The cryparin of Cryphonectria parasitica belongs to a cell wall associated fungal hydrophobin. The cryparin, though it is encoded by a single copy gene, is known for the high expression during the liquid culture of C. parasitica, and it turns out that 22% of total mRNA was transcribed for cryparin at 48hr after the liquid culture. In addition, it is also known as one of down-regulated fungal proteins by the presence of double stranded RNA virus, Cryphonectria hypovirus 1. In previous studies (Kim et al., 1999), we have constructed a cryparin-null mutant by replacing the cryparin gene with hygromycin B resistance gene due to site directed homologous recombination. In order for the promoter analysis of cryparin which seems to be very strong as well as mycoviral specific, it is preferable to have a strain with only a target promoter replaced and a discernable target site for incoming vectors. However, the cryparin-null mutant revealed the presence of an additional copy of transforming vector except the one which replaced the cryparin gene. In addition, the cryparin-null mutant did not contain any markers for targeted integration of incoming vectors. This prompts us to design an experiment to obtain a strain for promoter analysis of cryparin gene. A different mating type strain EP6(Mata, $met^-$) was mated with the cryparin-null mutant ${\triangle}$Crp194-7(MatA, Crp${\triangle}$::hph) to make the progenies with only a single replacement vector and $met^-$ characteristic remained. Nutritional assay as well as Southern blot analysis revealed that the progeny, ${\triangle}$Crp194-a6, was the methionine auxotroph with a single replacing vector in genome. Northern blot analysis and PAGE showed that there was no cryparin produced in this bred strain either.

• Journal of Music and Human Behavior
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.67-85
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• 2005

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of music listening, autogenic training, and music-assisted autogenic training on the quality of life, physiological and psychological relaxation responses, and daily living in a population of migraine patients. Forty migraine patients, ranging 20 to 60 years, were referred to the researcher by their physicians and participated in the study. A convenience control-group pretest-posttest design was employed. The participants were randomly assigned to one of four groups: music listening (ML), autogenic training (AT), music-assisted autogenic training (MAT), or a control group participants, with n = 10 participants per group. The participants in experimental groups received four 30-minute sessions with an assigned treatment, once a week during a 4-week experiment period. The participants in the control group continued their regular medical treatment as prescribed by the doctor without receiving any other relaxation treatment. However, they were still aware of the research and their responsibilities for the study. The Migraine Assessment (MIDAS) and Migraine-Specific Quality of Life (MSQOL) questionnaire were used to investigate a migraine patients' quality of life collected before and after the 4-week experiment for all subjects. The physiological and psychological relaxation responses of migraine patients were measured by relaxation levels and forehead temperature recorded before and after each treatment session for the participants in three treatment conditions. The effect of the relaxation treatments on daily living of migraine patients was examined through the frequency and intensity of migraine headaches, and the amount of medication taken for migraine headaches during the 4-week experiment as recorded in participants' diary for all participants. The results found significant differences from pre- to posttest on the MIDAS, MSQOL, and relaxation levels while no significant was found among the groups. The analysis of forehead temperature showed no significant difference from pre- to posttest and among the groups. A one-way ANOVA was performed on the frequency, intensity, and amount of medication taken for migraine headaches during the 4-week experiment period. While results yielded no significant difference among the groups, the data indicate that the participants in the three treatment groups reported fewer migraine headaches, lower degrees of headache intensity, and less medication taken for migraine headaches than participants in the control group. A conclusion drawn from this study is that music listening itself as a relaxation treatment, or as an adjunct to other relaxation techniques can be effective in the treatment of migraine headaches.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.127-138
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• 2014

As increasing concerns about potential risks and hazards in children's products, the laws and regulations for heavy metals and phthalate retardants contained in the children's products have been reinforced in many countries. Especially, in Korea, environment and health laws and regulations for children's products was declared in 2009. This study was researched in terms of contents and migration of phthalates and heavy metals in 124 children's products sold in the Korean market. The results for contents of heavy metals showed that 123 products contained different 14 heavy metals depending on kinds of products. As the results of migration by sucking, the heavy metals in the products such as black, plastic dolls, wood toys, and bottom mat for swimming were transferred into extraction solution. Ba, Cu, Zn, and Sn were transferred from most of these products into the extraction solution and Co, Ni and Pb were additionally transferred into several products. As the results of migration through a skin, while Ba, Cu, and Zn were transferred from most products containing the heavy metals, as for accessories, Cr, Ba, Ni, Zn, and Cu were migrated. The results of contents of phthalates presented that 21 products contained DBP, DEHP and DINP. Only 2 products showed the migration of DEHP by sucking. DEHP in most products were transferred and DBP for 2 products and DINP for 7 products were migrated.

• Current Research on Agriculture and Life Sciences
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• v.19
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• pp.23-29
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• 2001

This study was carried out to develop a seedling raising method without nursery soils in automatic raising facility of rice seedlings for machine transplanting. Pre-germinated seeds were sowed on the seed trays with three different seats such as paper seat, corrugated board, and polyethylene film instead of nursery soils. The growth characteristics of the seedlings for 20 days after sowing were compared with that of a conventional standard raising method with nursery soils. There was no difference in plant height of 10-day old seedlings among the different nursery methods, but the plant height of seedlings grown for 15 days after sowing in the trays with fivefold newspaper and nursery soils was significantly taller than those on other nursery conditions. Dry weight of seedlings grown in the tray with fivefold newspaper bottom was heavier than those in nursery trays with a corrugated board and a piece of polyethylene film. The seedlings grown in a nursery tray with fivefold newspaper showed better seedling quality and root-mat formation compared with the other nursery trays. This result suggests that the healthy seedlings for machine transplanting can be raised in the paper-sheet tray without nursery soils. The labour hours and cost required for the soil-free method using paper was reduced by about 49.3% and 26.6%, respectively, compared with the semi-adult seedling on nursery soils.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.56-59
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• 2017

During growing season of 2011 to 2013, Sclerotinia rot symptoms consistently have been observed on basil in Yesan-gun, Chungcheongnam-do in Korea. The typical symptom formed initially brownish spot on leaf and stem, and then advancing margins, wilting the whole plant and blighting, eventually died. On the surface of diseased lesions was observed cottony, white, dense mat of mycelial growth, and sclerotia ($30-100{\mu}m$ diameter) formed on stem and leaf. Morphological and cultural characteristic on potato dextrose agar, color of colony was white and colorless chocolate, sclerotium of irregular shape of the oval was black and $5-50{\mu}m$ diameter in size. In pathogenicity test, necrosis and wilt of the inoculated stem were observed in all plants and the pathogen was reisolated from stems. On the basis of mycological characteristics, pathogenicity, and internal transcribed spacer rDNA sequence analysis, this fungus was identified as Sclerotinia sclerotiorum. This is the first report of Sclerotinia rot on basil caused by S. sclerotiorum in Korea.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.475-481
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• 2010

Lots of pollutants typically originating from urban transportation are accumulating on the paved surfaces during dry periods and are washed-off directly to the river during a storm. Also, paved surfaces are contributing to increase in peak flows and volume of stormwater flows. These are the main reasons why the water quality of rivers and lakes remain polluted and still below standards. Currently, several management practices are being applied in developed countries but the design standards are still lacking. This research was conducted to develop a treatment technology that can be useful to address the problems concerning runoff quality and quantity. A lab scale infiltration device consisting of a pretreatment tank and media zone was designed and tested for various flow regimes characterizing the low, average and high intensity rainfall. Based on the experiments, the high intensity flow resulted to increase in outflow event mean concentration (EMC) of pollutants, about twice as much as the average outflow EMC. However, 78 to 88% of the total suspended solids were captured and retained in the pretreatment tank because of sedimentation. The removal of heavy metals such as zinc and lead was greatly affected by the vertical placement of woodchip layer prior to the media zone. It was observed that the high carbon content (almost 50%) in the woodchip provided opportunity for enhancing its uptake of metal by adsorption. The findings implied that the reduction of pollutants can be greatly achieved by means of proper pretreatment to allow for settling of particles with a combination of using high carbon source media like woodchip and a geotextile mat to reduce the flow before filtering into the media zone and finally discharging to the drainage system.

• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
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• v.43 no.1
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• pp.82-90
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• 2016

Most Araliaceae plant species distributed in Korea are economically important because of their high medicinal values. This study was conducted to develop barcode markers from sequence analysis of chloroplast DNA in 14 taxa of Araliaceae species grown in South Korea. Sequencing of seven chloroplast DNA regions was performed to establish the DNA barcode markers, as suggested by the Consortium for the Barcode of Life (CBOL). From the sequence analysis of chloroplast DNA, we identified specific sequences and nucleotides that allowed us to discriminate among each other 14 Korean Araliaceae species. The sequence in the region of psbA-trnH revealed the most frequent DNA indels and substitutions of all 7 regions studied. This psbA-trnH marker alone can discriminate among all 14 species. There are no differences between Korean and Chinese Panax ginseng in all seven sequenced chloroplast DNA regions. A phylogenetic tree constructed using the seven chloroplast DNA regions revealed that Tetrapanax papyriferus should be classified as an independent clade. The Aralia and Panax genera showed a close phylogenetic relationship. Five species in the Eleutherococcus genus were more closely related to Kalopanax septemlobus than to any Panax species.