• Journal of the Korean Geosynthetics Society
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.53-62
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• 2024

Recently, development of non-traditional energy such as oil sands has been actively conducted in the cold region such as Canada. Frozen soil has different thermal and mechanical characteristics from general soil due to its high organic contents. This study evaluated the impact of organic matter content on the thermal and mechanical behavior of frozen soil samples collected from Alberta, Canada, and Gangwon Province, South Korea. As the organic content increases, the maximum dry unit weight decreases and the optimum moisture content increases in compaction tests. In uniaxial compression tests under frozen conditions, the strength of the frozen specimens increased as the temperature decreased. The strength of Canada soil sample increased with higher organic matter content at low temperatures. However, the strength of frozen soil was not significantly affected by organic matter content due to the complex behavior and unfrozen water content. Thermal conductivity tests showed higher thermal conductivity in frozen conditions compared to unfrozen conditions, due to the higher thermal conductivity of ice compared to water. These findings provide essential data for geotechnical design and construction in large-scale projects such as oil sands development in cold regions. Further research is needed to explore the impact of organic matter content on different types of frozen soils.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.434-441
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• 2024

Mammary gland tumors are the most common tumors detected in non-spayed female dogs and pose a significant clinical challenge. Due to the strong similarity between canine mammary tumors (CMT) and human breast cancer (HBC), biomarkers identified in HBC can also be detected in CMT. These biomarkers have been shown to offer valuable insights into early diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment strategies. The purpose of this article is to provide a concise overview of CMT biomarkers based on the current literature. Traditional treatments for CMT in dogs typically begin with surgery, followed by chemotherapy, radiotherapy, or hormonal therapy. However, these treatments alone are not always fully effective. A diagnostic biomarker can detect the presence of a disease or the characteristics of a disease and classify an individual's status. Prognostic biomarkers focus on predicting the expected progression, recurrence, or survival of the disease in patients. By utilizing advances in understanding the mechanism of canine-specific mammary gland tumors, the estimation of biomarkers offers hope for improved outcomes in cancer patients. Novel technologies, such as single-cell RNA sequencing analysis, could provide a valuable resource for deciphering intra- and inter-tumoral heterogeneity. This review paper explores current research on CMT biomarkers and suggests directions for their development.

• Journal of Korean Medicine Rehabilitation
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.29-49
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• 2024

Objectives The purpose of this study is to systemically review the recent studies in the Korean medicine treatments for torticollis. Methods We search the clinical studies from January 1, 2018 to December 31, 2023. The studies were searched through 10 databases (Oriental Medicine Advanced Searching Integrated System, Korean studies Information Service System, Research Information Sharing Service, Korean Medical Database, ScienceON, PubMed, Cochrane Library, Embase, Wanfang Data, China National Knowledge Infrastructure). Results A total of 19 studies were included in the study. 12 studies were case report studies, 5 studies were randomized controlled trials, 2 studies were non-randomized controlled trials. Of the 19 interventions, Chuna was the most used in this study and of the 28 evaluation tools, Sternocleidomastoid thickness was the most used in this study except efficiency rate. All 19 studies had improvements after treatment, and 8 studies had statistically significant improvements. As a result of the study, we found that Chuna, GB, GB20, BL10, Glycyrrhiza uralensis were commonly used Korean medicine treatments for torticollis. Conclusions We analyzed the Korean medicine treatments for torticollis. Through this study, we found that the Korean medicine was effective for torticollis. However, more research is needed to confirm the more detailed effect.

• Korean Journal of Radiology
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.395-405
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• 2023

Objective: This study aimed to develop and validate models using radiomics features on a native T1 map from cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) to predict left ventricular reverse remodeling (LVRR) in patients with nonischemic dilated cardiomyopathy (NIDCM). Materials and Methods: Data from 274 patients with NIDCM who underwent CMR imaging with T1 mapping at Severance Hospital between April 2012 and December 2018 were retrospectively reviewed. Radiomic features were extracted from the native T1 maps. LVRR was determined using echocardiography performed ≥ 180 days after the CMR. The radiomics score was generated using the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator logistic regression models. Clinical, clinical + late gadolinium enhancement (LGE), clinical + radiomics, and clinical + LGE + radiomics models were built using a logistic regression method to predict LVRR. For internal validation of the result, bootstrap validation with 1000 resampling iterations was performed, and the optimism-corrected area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) with 95% confidence interval (CI) was computed. Model performance was compared using AUC with the DeLong test and bootstrap. Results: Among 274 patients, 123 (44.9%) were classified as LVRR-positive and 151 (55.1%) as LVRR-negative. The optimism-corrected AUC of the radiomics model in internal validation with bootstrapping was 0.753 (95% CI, 0.698-0.813). The clinical + radiomics model revealed a higher optimism-corrected AUC than that of the clinical + LGE model (0.794 vs. 0.716; difference, 0.078 [99% CI, 0.003-0.151]). The clinical + LGE + radiomics model significantly improved the prediction of LVRR compared with the clinical + LGE model (optimism-corrected AUC of 0.811 vs. 0.716; difference, 0.095 [99% CI, 0.022-0.139]). Conclusion: The radiomic characteristics extracted from a non-enhanced T1 map may improve the prediction of LVRR and offer added value over traditional LGE in patients with NIDCM. Additional external validation research is required.

• Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.47 no.4
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• pp.272-281
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• 2023

Ecosystem observatories are burgeoning globally in an endeavour to detect national and global scale trends in the state of biodiversity and ecosystems in an era of rapid environmental change. In this paper we highlight the additional importance of regional scale outcomes of such infrastructure, through an introduction to the Great Western Woodlands TERN (Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network) SuperSite, and key findings from three gradient plot networks that are part of this infrastructure. The SuperSite was established in 2012 in the 160,000 km² Great Western Woodlands region, in a collaboration involving 12 organisations. This region is globally significant for its largely intact, diverse landscapes, including the world's largest Mediterranean-climate woodlands and highly diverse sandplain shrublands. The dominant woodland eucalypts are fire-sensitive, requiring hundreds of years to regrow after fire. Old-growth woodlands are highly valued by Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities, and managing impacts of climate change and the increasing extent of intense fires are key regional management challenges. Like other TERN SuperSites, the Great Western Woodlands TERN SuperSite includes a core eddy-covariance flux tower measuring exchanges of carbon, water and energy between the vegetation and atmosphere, along with additional environmental and biodiversity monitoring around the tower. The broader SuperSite incorporates three gradient plot networks. Two of these represent aridity gradients, in sandplains and woodlands, informing regional climate adaptation and biodiversity management by characterising biodiversity turnover along spatial climate gradients and acting as sentinels for ecosystem change over time. For example, the sandplains transect has demonstrated extremely high spatial turnover rates in plant species, that challenge traditional approaches to biodiversity conservation. The third gradient plot network represents a 400-year fire-age gradient in Eucalyptus salubris woodlands. It has enabled characterisation of post-fire recovery of vegetation, birds and invertebrates over multi-century timeframes, and provided tools that are directly informing management to reduce stand-replacing fires in eucalypt woodlands. By building regional partnerships and applying globally or nationally consistent methodologies to regional scale questions, ecological observatories have the power not only to detect national and global scale trends in biodiversity and ecosystems, but to directly inform environmental decisions that are critical at regional scales.

• Journal of Korean Society for Quality Management
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• v.51 no.4
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• pp.531-550
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• 2023

Purpose: The unique nature of life-and-death healthcare services sets them apart from other service industries. While many studies exist on the relationship between healthcare services and customer satisfaction, most of them focus on mildly ill patients, ignoring the differences between critically ill and non-seriously ill patients. This study discusses the actual quality of healthcare services for patients who are facing life-threatening illnesses and are on life support, as well as their right to protection and dignity. Methods: The survey conducted to 149 patients with the four major illnesses: cancer, heart disease, brain disease and rare and incurable disease, those who have experiences with senior general hospitals. Results: The basic statistics of this study are adequate to represent the four major critical illnesses, and the reliability and validity of this study's hypotheses, which were measured by multiple items, were analyzed, and the internal consistency was judged to be high. In addition, it was found that the convergent validity was good and the discriminant validity was also secured. When examining the goodness of fit of the hypotheses, the SRMR, which is the standardized root mean square of residuals that measures the difference between the covariance matrix of the data variables and the theoretical covariance matrix structure of the model, met the optimal criteria. Conclusion: The academic implications of this study are differentiated from other studies by moving away from evaluating the quality of healthcare services for mildly ill patients and focusing on the rights and dignity of patients with life-threatening illnesses in four senior general hospitals. In terms of academic implications, this study enriches the depth of related studies by demonstrating the right to protection and dignity as a factor of patient-centeredness based on physical environment quality, interaction quality, and outcome quality, which are presented as sub-factors of healthcare quality. We found that the three quality factors classified by Brady and Cronin (2001) are optimized for healthcare quality assessment and management, and that the results of patients' interaction quality assessment can be used to provide a comprehensive quality rating for hospitals. Health and human rights are inextricably linked, so assessing the degree to which rights and dignity are protected can be a superior and more comprehensive measurement tool than traditional health level measures for healthcare organizations. Practical implications: Improving the quality of the physical environment and the quality of outcomes is an important challenge for hospital managers who attract patients with life and death conditions, but given the scale and economics of time, money, and human inputs, improving the quality of interactions and defining them as performance indicators in hospital quality management is an efficient way to create maximum value in the short term.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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• v.24 no.9
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• pp.111-118
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• 2024

The concept of social stratification and hierarchy among human dates back to the origin of human race. Presently, the growing reputation of social networks has given us with an opportunity to analyze these well-studied phenomena over different networks at different scales. Generally, a social network could be defined as a collection of actors and their interactions. In this work, we concern ourselves with a particular type of social networks, known as trust networks. In this type of networks, there is an explicit show of trust (positive interaction) or distrust (negative interaction) among the actors. In other words, an actor can designate others as friends or foes. Trust networks are typically modeled as signed networks. A signed network is a directed graph in which the edges carry an edge weight of +1 (indicating trust) or -1 (indicating distrust). Examples of signed networks include the Slashdot Zoo network, the Epinions network and the Wikipedia adminship election network. In a social network, actors tend to connect with each other on the basis of their perceived social hierarchy. The emergence of such a hierarchy within a social community shows the manner in which authority manifests in the community. In the case of signed networks, the concept of social hierarchy can be interpreted as the emergence of a tree-like structure comprising of actors in a top-down fashion in the order of their ranks, describing a specific parent-child relationship, viz. child trusts parent. However, owing to the presence of positive as well as negative interactions in signed networks, deriving such "trust hierarchies" is a non-trivial challenge. We argue that traditional notions (of unsigned networks) are insufficient to derive hierarchies that are latent within signed networks In order to build hierarchies in signed networks, we look at two interpretations of trust namely presence of trust (or "good") and lack of distrust (or "not bad"). In order to develop a hierarchy signifying both trust and distrust effectively, the above interpretations are combined together for calculating the overall trustworthiness (termed as deserve) of actors. The actors are then arranged in a hierarchical fashion based on these aggregate deserve values, according to the following hypothesis: actor v is assigned as a child of actor u if: (i) v trusts u, and (ii) u has a higher deserve value than v. We describe this hypothesis with additional qualifiers in this thesis.

• Journal of Korean Society of Rural Planning
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.19-28
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• 2024

This study investigated and analyzed the landscape conservation activity promotion process targeting the 'Alassiasdeuli Community Farming Association Corporation', which is carrying out continuous rural landscape conservation activities led by local residents in the area of Yeohang Mountain, Yeohang-myeon, Haman-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do. Through this, the factors necessary to promote rural landscape conservation activities led by residents were identified, and implications necessary for rural landscape conservation activities led by residents were derived. The first factor that allowed Alassiasdeuli to pursue resident-led rural landscape conservation activities was the fact that an economically stable foundation was established before pursuing conservation activities. Rural landscape conservation activities are carried out based on continuous agricultural activities, and agriculture is closely related to the economic aspect. Accordingly, Alassiasdeuli had a small but regular income from the package business, and was able to carry out various rural landscape conservation activities based on this. Second, within the community, a sense of purpose for rural landscape conservation was shared as a common value. It started with common values that were in line with rural landscape conservation, such as an economic community based on agriculture, indigenous seed conservation, and eco-friendly agriculture, and later, awareness of traditional agriculture and rural landscape conservation was gradually established through members' continued empowerment and related experiences. It has been done. Third, various connections and cooperative relationships were established with residents, related organizations, and administration. We established cooperative relationships by recruiting local organizations and residents as active participants beyond program participation, and exchanged information and expanded the scope of activities by establishing networks with organizations such as the 'Gyeongnam Darang-Non Network'. In addition, through connection with administration, we experienced various projects and ensured the sustainability of activities through support. Fourth, there was a keyman who could organize activities and control the scale of support projects, taking into account the awareness and capabilities of members. In particular, it is thought that this was possible because the Secretary General was based on building a relationship of trust with residents before Alassiasdeuli was formed. Therefore, in order for resident-led rural landscape conservation activities to be continuously carried out, an organization must be formed centered on farmers, and the economic sustainability of the organization, sharing of common values, and trust relationships among members are the basis, and the Sustainable activities can be promoted through various cooperative relationships between residents, organizations, and administration.

• Journal of Society of Preventive Korean Medicine
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.131-150
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• 2024

Objectives : The aim of this study was to perform network analysis and analysis using the K-HERB database on inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), to verify the similarity between the derived networks and existing prescriptions, and to explore the possibility of developing new IBD prescriptions preliminarily. Methods : We conducted a comprehensive literature search on July 6, 2024, utilizing databases such as ScienceON, RISS, and OASIS. Clinical studies assessing the efficacy of herbal medicine in treating Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis were identified and compiled into a structured database. This dataset, which included related prescriptions and herbal formulations, was subsequently analyzed using NetMiner 4 for centrality and Louvain clustering analyses. We then compared the networks derived from the K-HERB database with existing therapeutic prescriptions to assess their similarity. Results : A total of 24 prescriptions and 66 herbs were identified across the surveyed studies on IBD. Paeoniae Radix Alba(白芍藥) emerged as the most frequently utilized herb for both Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis. Prominent herb combinations included Paeoniae Radix Alba-Angelicae Sinensis Radix (白芍藥-當歸), Angelicae Sinensis Radix-Coptidis Rhizoma (當歸-黃連), and Coptidis Rhizoma-Scutellariae Radix (黃連-黃芩) for ulcerative colitis. Centrality analysis revealed that Poria cocos (茯苓) and Paeoniae Radix Alba (白芍藥) had high centrality in the Crohn's disease, while Angelicae Sinensis Radix (當歸) and Paeoniae Radix Alba (白芍藥) had high centrality in the ulcerative colitis, indicating their prominent roles within the networks. Cohesion analysis resulted in 7 networks for Crohn's disease and 16 networks for ulcerative colitis. After excluding networks with a single herb, three networks related to Crohn's disease and two related to ulcerative colitis were examined using the K-HERB database. Among the 14 derived prescriptions for Crohn's disease and seven for ulcerative colitis, all except Oryeong-san (五苓散) were non-traditional in the context of IBD treatment. Conclusion : This preliminary study may provide a basis for the understanding and application of herbal prescriptions for IBD based on network analysis and the K-HERB database.

• Journal of Korean Library and Information Science Society
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• v.55 no.3
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• pp.285-312
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• 2024

This study aims to secure basic data for the development of locally customized reading culture programs by closely examining and analyzing the reading practices of local library users, their evaluation and improvement of existing reading culture programs, and the types and directions of reading culture programs they would like to see in the future. To this end, a survey was conducted among users of public libraries in the Busan area and the results were analyzed. The survey was conducted online and offline, with 609 respondents. Based on the results of this study, the following implications can be drawn: First, the definition of reading activities is expanding beyond traditional paper books to various digital media, and it is necessary to reflect this change in future program development. Second, as lack of time and lack of information were identified as the main reasons for non-participation in reading activities, libraries and related organizations should offer programs at more flexible times and expand participation opportunities through effective promotion strategies. Third, the continuity and diversity of library reading culture programs should be strengthened, and fourth, they should be differentiated in terms of topics, time, size, and type by age group. Finally, programs should be improved through continuous user surveys. The results of this study can be used as a basis for improving and developing library reading culture programs in the future.