• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.3293-3298
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• 2013

Background: The study investigated the influence of culturally-based health beliefs on engagement in healthy lifestyle behaviour. Specifically, the study compared levels of engagement between Western and Chinese youth in Australia and assessed the extent to which culture-specific attributions about the causes of illness, and health beliefs, predict engagement in healthy lifestyle behaviour. Materials and Methods: Ninety-four Western and 95 Chinese (N=189; Mean Age=20.8 years, SD=3 years) young adults completed an online questionnaire. Predictor variables were cultural health beliefs measured by the Chinese Cultural Views on Health and Illness scale (CCVH, Liang et al., 2008), and illness attributions beliefs measured by the Cause of Illness Questionnaire (CIQ, Armstrong and Swartzman, 1999). Outcomes variables were levels of engagement in healthy lifestyle behaviour. Results: Results indicated that Chinese participants have a significantly lower exercising rate and healthy dietary habits compared to the Western sample. Moreover, Chinese participants were found to believe more strongly than Westerners that cancer was associated with factors measured by the Traditional-Chinese-Model (TCM). Finally, the observed relationship between cultural health beliefs and physical inactivity was mediated by attributions of illness, in particular to the supernatural subscale, with the Sobel Test showing a significant mediation (z=-2.63, p=0.004). Conclusions: Mainstream approaches to encourage healthy lifestyles are unlikely to be effective when educating Chinese youth. Instead, health promotion programs should attempt to address the illness attribution beliefs and educate Chinese youth about the role of diet and exercise in prevention of diseases such as cancer.

• Advances in nano research
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.1-15
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• 2023

Driven by the scaling down of transistor node technology, graphene became of interest to many researchers following the success of its fabrication as graphene nanoribbons (GNRs). However, during the fabrication of GNRs, it is not uncommon to have defects within the GNR structures. Scaling down node technology also changes the modelling approach from the classical Boltzmann transport equation to the quantum transport theory because the quantum confinement effects become significant at sub-10 nanometer dimensions. The aim of this study is to examine the effect of Stone-Wales defects on the electronic properties of GNRs using a tight-binding model, based on Non-Equilibrium Green's Function (NEGF) via numeric computation methods using MATLAB. Armchair and zigzag edge defects are also implemented in the GNR structures to mimic the practical fabrication process. Electronic properties of pristine and defected GNRs of various lengths and widths were computed, including their band structure and density of states (DOS). The results show that Stone-Wales defects cause fluctuation in the band structure and increase the bandgap values for both armchair GNRs (AGNRs) and zigzag GNRs (ZGNRs) at every simulated width. In addition, Stone-Wales defects reduce the numerical computation DOS for both AGNRs and ZGNRs. However, when the lengths of the structures increase with fixed widths, the effect of the Stone-Wales defects become less significant.

• The Journal of Korean Academy of Prosthodontics
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.405-420
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• 2003

Purpose : The purpose of this study was to compare the fracture resistance of the IPS Empress ceramic crown with 1.0mm width rounded shoulder, which is usually recommended in all ceramic crown. and 0.5mm width chamfer finish lines on the maxillary central incisor. Material and method : After 15 metal dies were made for each group, the IPS Empress all ceramic crowns were fabricated and cemented with resin cement(Bistite resin cement, Tokuyama Soda Co. LTD., Japan) on the metal die. The cemented crowns were mounted on the positioning jig and the universal testing machine(Zwick Z020, Zwick Co. Germany)was used to measure the fracture strength with loading on the incisal edge. And also, three-dimensional finite element stress analysis was used to measure the stress distribution with the various types of the finish lines(1.0mm width rounded shoulder, 0.5mm width chamfer), the loading site(incisal edge, incisal $\frac{1}{3}$) and the type of loading(concentration loading, distribution loading). Results and conclusion : 1. In the fracture resistance experiment according to the finish line, the mean fracture strength of rounded shoulder(876N) and the mean fracture strength of chamfer(882N) did not skew any significant difference between each other(p>0.05). 2. The stress distribution of all ceramic crown in three dimensional finite element analysis showed concentration aspect at loading point and cervical area or labial surface. 3. In metal die, there were no differences in stress distribution between finish lines, but in natural teeth model, chamfer finish line showed higher stress than rounded shoulder finish line. 4. When force was loaded on the incisal edge the stress was concentrated on the incisal edge and the cervical area of labial surface. When force was loaded on the incisal $\frac{1}{3}$, the stress concentrated on the cervical area of labial surface and the cingulum area. 5. Generally, natural teeth model showed higher and various stress than the metal die.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Medical Physics Conference
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• 2002.09a
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• pp.53-60
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• 2002

Motion of lung tumors from respiration has been reported in the literature to be as large as of 1-2 cm. This motion requires an additional margin between the Clinical Target Volume (CTV) and the Planning Target Volume (PTV). While such a margin is necessary, it may not be sufficient to ensure proper delivery of Intensity Modulated Radiotherapy (IMRT) to the CTV during the simultaneous movement of the DMLC. Gated treatment has been proposed to improve normal tissues sparing as well as to ensure accurate dose coverage of the tumor volume. The following questions have not been addressed in the literature: a) what is the dose error to a target volume without gated IMRT treatment\ulcorner b) what is an acceptable gating window for such treatment. In this study, we address these questions by proposing a novel technique for calculating the 3D dose error that would result if a lung IMRT plan were delivered without gating. The method is also generalized for gated treatment with an arbitrary triggering window. IMRT plans for three patients with lung tumor were studied. The treatment plans were generated with HELIOS for delivery with 6 MV on a CL2100 Varian linear accelerator with a 26 pair MLC. A CTV to PTV margin of 1 cm was used. An IMRT planning system searches for an optimized fluence map ${\Phi}$ (x,y) for each port, which is then converted into a dynamic MLC file (DMLC). The DMLC file contains information about MLC subfield shapes and the fractional Monitor Units (MUs) to be delivered for each subfield. With a lung tumor, a CTV that executes a quasi periodic motion z(t) does not receive ${\Phi}$ (x,y), but rather an Effective Incident Fluence EIF(x,y). We numerically evaluate the EIF(x,y) from a given DMLC file by a coordinate transformation to the Target's Eye View (TEV). In the TEV coordinate system, the CTV itself is stationary, and the MLC is seen to execute a motion -z(t) that is superimposed on the DMLC motion. The resulting EIF(x,y)is inputted back into the dose calculation engine to estimate the 3D dose to a moving CTV. In this study, we model respiratory motion as a sinusoidal function with an amplitude of 10 mm in the superior-inferior direction, a period of 5 seconds, and an initial phase of zero.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.21 no.6
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• pp.637-645
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• 2011

Production of recombinant proteins by excretory expression has many advantages over intracellular expression in Escherichia coli. Hyperexpression of a secretory exoglucanase, Exg, of Cellulomonas fimi was previously shown to saturate the SecYEG pathway and result in dramatic cell death of E. coli. In this study, we demonstrated that overexpression of the PspA in the JM101(pM1VegGcexL-pspA) strain enhanced excretion of Exg to 1.65 U/ml using shake-flask cultivation, which was 80% higher than the highest yield previously obtained from the optimized JM101(pM1VegGcexL) strain. A much higher excreted Exg activity of 4.5 U/ml was further achieved with high cell density cultivation using rich media. Furthermore, we showed that the PspA overexpression strain enjoyed an elevated critical value (CV), which was defined as the largest quotient between the intracellular unprocessed precursor and its secreted mature counterpart that was still tolerable by the host cells prior to the onset of cell death, improving from the previously determined CV of 20/80 to the currently achieved CV of 45/55 for Exg. The results suggested that the PspA overexpression strain might tolerate a higher level of precursor Exg making use of the SecYEG pathway for secretion. The reduced lethal effect might be attributable to the overexpressed PspA, which was postulated to be able to reduce membrane depolarization and damage. Our findings introduce a novel strategy of the combined application of metabolic engineering and construct optimization to the attainment of the best possible E. coli producers for secretory/excretory production of recombinant proteins, using Exg as the model protein.

• The Journal of Korean Academy of Prosthodontics
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• v.53 no.4
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• pp.318-324
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• 2015

Purpose: This study compared shear bond strengths of five self-adhesive cements with phosphate monomer to zirconium oxide ceramic with and without airborn particle abrasion. Materials and methods: One hundred zirconia samples were air-abraded ($50{\mu}mAl_2O_3$). One hundred composite resin cylinders were fabricated. Composite cylinders were bonded to the zirconia samples with either Permacem 2.0 (P), $Clearfil^{TM}$ SA Luting (C), $Multilink^{(R)}$ Speed (M), $RelyX^{TM}$ U200 Automix (R), G-Cem $LinkAce^{TM}$ (G). All bonded specimens were stored in distilled water ($37^{\circ}C$) for 24 h and half of them were additionally aged by thermocycling ($5^{\circ}C$, $55^{\circ}C$, 5,000 times). The bonded specimens were loaded in shear force until fracture (1 mm/min) by using Universal Testing Machine (Model 4201, Instron Co, Canton, MA, USA). The failure sites were inspected under field-emission scanning electron microscopy. The data was analyzed with ANOVA, Tukey HSD post-hoc test and paired samples t-test ($\alpha$=.05). Results: Before and after thermocycling, $Multilink^{(R)}$ Speed (M) revealed higher shear-bond strength than the other cements. G-Cem $LinkAce^{TM}$ (G) showed significantly lower bond strengths after thermocycling than before treatment (P<.05), but the other groups were not significantly different (P>.05). Conclusion: Most self-adhesive cements with phosphate monomer showed high shear bond strength with zirconia ceramic and weren't influenced by thermocycling, so they seem to valuable to zirconia ceramic bonding.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.21 no.7
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• pp.928-935
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• 2008

The myostatin gene of seven important meat (Beltex (Australia), Beltex$\times$Huyang (F1), Meat and Multi-Prolific Chinese Merino Fine Wool, Meat Chinese Merino Fine Wool and Dorper (South Africa)) and non-meat (Huyang and Kazak) sheep breeds was analyzed to study the genetic basis of muscular hypertrophy (double muscling) phenotype in sheep. SNPs, four in regulatory regions and several in the introns in the myostatin gene, were identified, and the former four SNPs were used for further studies. Twelve haplotypes were predicted by PHASE program, of which four main haplotypes (1, 3, 7, 9) were present in 90% of the 364 sheep in the study. Haplotypes 1-4 were mainly present in meat breeds while haplotypes 7 and 9 dominated the non-meat breeds. The association between haplotypes and average daily gain (ADG) was analyzed among 116 sheep with production data, Haplo2 (CGAA) and Haplo8 (TGAA) were identified to have significant (p<0.05) effect on ADG by the model (JMP5.1 software) taking into account the effects of breed, family background, haplotype, birth weight and sex. ADG of these haplotype groups also correlated well (r = 0.82) with hypertrophic phenotype scores. In conclusion, the mutations -956 (T$\rightarrow$C), -41 (C$\rightarrow$A) and 6223 (G$\rightarrow$A) involved in Haplo2 and 8 may be associated with the double-muscling trait by influencing myostatin function and be suitable markers in selecting meat sheep.