• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.180-188
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• 2016

Acuros XB advanced dose calculation algorithm (AXB, Varian Medical Systems, Palo Alto, CA) has been released recently and provided the advantages of speed and accuracy for dose calculation. For clinical use, it is important to investigate the dosimetric performance of AXB compared to the calculation algorithm of the previous version, Anisotropic Analytical Algorithm (AAA, Varian Medical Systems, Palo Alto, CA). Ten volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT) plans for each of the following cases were included: head and neck (H&N), prostate, spine, and lung. The spine and lung cases were treated with stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) technique. For all cases, the dose distributions were calculated using AAA and two dose reporting modes in AXB (dose-to-water, $AXB_w$, and dose-to-medium, $AXB_m$) with same plan parameters. For dosimetric evaluation, the dose-volumetric parameters were calculated for each planning target volume (PTV) and interested normal organs. The differences between AAA and AXB were statistically calculated with paired t-test. As a general trend, $AXB_w$ and $AXB_m$ showed dose underestimation as compared with AAA, which did not exceed within -3.5% and -4.5%, respectively. The maximum dose of PTV calculated by $AXB_w$ and $AXB_m$ was tended to be overestimated with the relative dose difference ranged from 1.6% to 4.6% for all cases. The absolute mean values of the relative dose differences were $1.1{\pm}1.2%$ and $2.0{\pm}1.2%$ when comparing between AAA and $AXB_w$, and AAA and $AXB_m$, respectively. For almost dose-volumetric parameters of PTV, the relative dose differences are statistically significant while there are no statistical significance for normal tissues. Both $AXB_w$ and $AXB_m$ was tended to underestimate dose for PTV and normal tissues compared to AAA. For analyzing two dose reporting modes in AXB, the dose distribution calculated by $AXB_w$ was similar to those of AAA when comparing the dose distributions between AAA and $AXB_m$.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.11 no.9
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• pp.1296-1301
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• 2008

Ultrasonography constructs pictures of areas inside the body needs in diagnosis by bouncing high-enorgy sound waves(ultrasound) off internal tissues or organs. In constructing an ultrasonographic image, the weakness of bounding signals induces noises and detailed differences of brightness, so that having a difficulty in detecting and diagnosing with the naked eyes in the analysis of ultrasonogram. Especially, the difficulty is extended when diagnosing muscle areas by using ultrasonographic images in the musculoskeletal test. In this paper, we propose a novel image processing method that computationally extracts a muscle area from an ultrasonographic image to assist in diagnosis. An ultrasonographic image consists of areas corresponding to various tissues and internal organs. The proposed method, based on features of intensity distribution, morphology and size of each area, extracts areas of the fascia, the subcutaneous fat and other internal organs, and then extracts a muscle area enclosed by areas of the fascia. In the extraction of areas of the fascia, a series of image processing methods such as histogram stretching, multiple operation, binarization and area connection by labeling is applied. A muscle area is extracted by using features on relative position and morphology of areas for the fascia and muscle areas. The performance evaluation using real ultrasonographic images and specialists' analysis show that the proposed method is able to extract target areas being approximate to real muscle areas.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.41 no.10
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• pp.788-795
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• 2013

A magnesium bipolar plate whose surface was protected by thinly deposited silver layer was investigated as an alternative to existing graphite bipolar plate of PEM fuel cells. Thin silver layer of $3{\mu}m$ was deposited on a magnesium alloy substrate by physical vapor deposition (PVD) method in an environment of $180^{\circ}C$. A number of tests were conducted on the fabricated magnesium based bipolar plates to determine their suitability for use in PEM fuel cell stacks. The test on corrosion resistance in the same pH condition as in a PEM operation demonstrated the layer protected the magnesium alloy substrate, while unprotected substrate suffered from severe corrosion. The contact resistance of the fabricated bipolar plate was less than $20m{\Omega}-cm^2$ which was superior to the conventional bipolar plates. A single cell was constructed using the fabricated bipolar plates and power output was measured. Due to the enhanced conductivity caused by low contact resistance, slight increase was observed in current density and output voltage. With low density of the magnesium substrate and ease on machining, the weight reduction of the stack of 30~40 % is possible to produce the same power output.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
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• v.35 no.2C
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• pp.246-253
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• 2010

In this paper, a method of removing the space skew and cross-talk cancellation is proposed where the self-generated signals from the subject are used to obtain the subject's location. In the proposed method, the good spatial sound image is maintained even when the listener moves from the sweet spot. Two major parts of the proposed method are as follows: listener position tracking using the stimuli from the subject and removal of the space skew and cross-talk signals. Listener position tracking is achieved by estimation of the time difference of arrival (TDoA). The position of the listener is then computed using the Talyer-series estimation method. The head-related transfer functions (HRTF) are used to remove the space skew and cross-talk signals, where the direction of the HRTF is given by the one estimated from the listener position tracking. The performance evaluation is carried out on the signals from the 100 subjects that are composed of the 50 female and 50 male subjects. The positioning accuracy is achieved by 70%~90%, under the condition that the mean squared positioning error is less than $0.07m^2$. The subjective listening test is also conducted where the 27 out of the 30 subjects are participated. According to the results, 70% of the subjects indicates that the overall quality of the reproduced sound from the proposed method are improved, regardless of the subject's position.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Agricultural Machinery Conference
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• 2000.11b
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• pp.472-479
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• 2000

A persimmon harvesting vehicle that can be operated in hilly orchards as well as a manipulator that can be used to harvest persimmons located in remote positions in the trees were designed and developed. The vehicle could be operated with keeping balanced position in an inclined field and its working platform could be moved up and down easy to approach fruits in a remote region with the aids of a hydraulic and a electrical and electronics systems. The weight of the vehicle was 927 kg and the center of gravity was located at 427 mm to the inner side from the center of a right driving caterpillar, 607 mm to a rear axle from the center of a front axle, and 562 mm to upward from ground. The automatic level control sensor for leveling the working platform was activated within 14.5 ∼ 16.5 degrees of slope variation. The total length of the manipulator was 1.39 m and weight is 975 g. It was powered by a 12 V geared motor to detach persimmon fruits with a rotational force. The gripper was made of plastic and rubber to increase a frictional force. In a performance evaluation test, static tipping angle, dynamic tipping angle toward front side when the vehicle was moving downward, climbing angle, driving speed of the vehicle were measured or calculated. In persimmon harvesting tests 24.9% of yield was increased by hand picking with the aid of the vehicle and additional 7% of yield were increased when the manipulator was used. Therefore, 99010 of total possible yield was achievable when both of the vehicle and the manipulator were used for the manual persimmon harvesting. Increase in 22.5% of total yield was achieved with the manipulator only.

• Archives of Plastic Surgery
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.380-384
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• 2009

Purpose: Autologous vessels remain the gold standard for vascular grafts in microanastomoses. However, they are sometimes unavailable and have a limited long - term patency. Synthetic vessels have high success rates in large - diameter reconstructions but failed when used as small - diameter grafts due to graft occlusion. It has been proved that endothelial cell seeding improves prosthesis performance and long - term patency. Among polyurethane, PET and ePTFE, polyurethane has the best affinity to endothelial cells and mechanical properties closest to human vessels. We examined the ability of endothelial cells to attach to a polyurethane graft manufactured by the electrospinning method. Methods: Endothelial cells, which were cultured from porcine internal jugular veins, were attached to polyurethane grafts with an internal diameter of 3 mm. The same cells were attached to allogeneic decellularized porcine internal carotid artery grafts as controls. Both of the 10 mm - long grafts were exposed to endothelial cells in a well for 1 hour. Each well contained $2{\times}10^5$ endothelial cells. The graft materials were rotated through 90 degrees every 15 minutes in order to minimize the effect of gravity. The extent of cell attachment was examined with the MTT assay. Results: The MTT assay showed good incorporation of endothelial cells into both grafts. For the evaluation of affinity, the number of attached cells was counted at 10 fields of microscopic examination with ${\times}40$ magnification. Endothelial cells adhered more to polyurethane grafts (mean, $127.4{\pm}6.2cells$) compared to porcine artery grafts (mean $45.8{\pm}5.1cells$)(p<0.05,Mann - Whitney test). Conclusion: In this study, we attached porcine endothelial cells to polyurethane grafts, manufactured by electrospinning. The grafts exhibited a better affinity to endothelial cells than allogeneic decellularized porcine internal carotid artery grafts. It is suggested that the time required for endothelial cells to attach to decellulized artery grafts may be longer than that which is required for attachment to polyurethane grafts.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.38 no.9
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• pp.739-745
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• 2014

Although medication is given to heart disease patients, conventional medication alone is not sufficient to treat heart disease. However, it has been reported that left ventricular assist device (LVAD) transplantation is an effective bridge to heart transplantation by assisting cardiac function. This study used long-term animal testing and emergency situations with a bovine model (Holstein) and canine model (Labrador-retriever) to evaluate the biocompatibility of LibraHeart-I (LH-1), which is a bent-tube type of LVAD that was developed in a previous study. In the long-term animal testing with the bovine model, the subjects survived for 49 days with no irregularities observed in their complete blood cell counts or the vital sign tests that were carried out during the test period. In short-term animal testing with the canine model, it was observed that blood did not remain inside the LH-I even without power support from an external drive source. In this study, the biocompatibility of the LH-I that was developed in a previous study was verified by the ejection performance during long-term animal testing and emergency situations.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Surveying, Geodesy, Photogrammetry and Cartography
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.27-40
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• 1998

This paper addresses the suitability of GPS positioning technology to monitoring deformation and movement of structures. The first part of the study is an empirical quantitative study of the repeatability of GPS observations and the second part is a performance evaluation of kinematic GPS, which requires only a few minutes per a point, for monitoring deformation of an engineering structure. On the test network for monitoring of a earth am, four observations have been conducted repeatedly on different seasons and water levels. The reference network was observed in static mode, and monitoring points were observed respectively in rapid-static mode as well as in kinematic mode in each epoch and then the results were compared with those obtained by conventional surveying techniques. The repeatability of baseline vectors to better than average 7 mm in three dimensions was achieved in base line observations between reference points and also the unclosure of reference networks showed the range of 4 ppm to 27 ppm. Compared with conventional surveying techniques, the kinematic approach showed the differences of 3∼4 m in slope distances which were observed from reference points to monitoring points, and showed the differences of 4∼8 m in height. It was ascertained that the kinematic GPS technology provides an efficient alternative to deformation monitoring by conventional means which are capable of detecting movements in the order of 5 mm.

• International Journal of Highway Engineering
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• v.7 no.3 s.25
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• pp.1-10
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• 2005

In this study, accelerated pavement tester(APT) was performed on long-life asphalt pavements that can save maintenance and user costs by increasing the design life twice longer than conventional asphalt pavements. Basic material testings are first conducted on a high modulus base(HMB) mixture developed in this study. Four different pavement sections including thin and thick conventional and thin and thick HMB courses are constructed to compare the load-carrying capacities and to investigate the fatigue and rutting performances using an accelerated pavement tester. Tensile strain values at the bottom of base courses under the various loading levels are measured. The tensile strain values of the HMB sections are lower than those of the conventional sections. It is observed from the APT performed on the thin pavement sections that no significant cracks are developed up to the 180,000 cycles of a wheel load. In terms of rutting, only 3mm of rutting is developed in the thick HMB section while 5.3mm of rutting is developed in the thick conventional section at the 90,000 cycles of the wheel load. The HMB material developed in this study can be successfully used in the long-life asphalt pavements because of its excellent fatigue and rutting performances. It is estimated from a series of structural analysis that the use of the HMB material instead of the conventional base materials may reduce the asphalt thickness at least 5cm because of its better load-carrying capacity.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.62 no.5
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• pp.39-46
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• 2020

This study evaluated the nitrogen oxide (NO_x) removal efficiency by air purification concrete blocks with titanium dioxide (TiO₂). The concrete in the mixtures had a 30% water:cement ratio, to which TiO₂ was added at 0%, 5%, and 10% of cement weight. The compressive strength reduction rate and removal efficiency of NO_x were investigated. The result of the compressive strength test in the study indicated that addition rate of TiO₂ did not lead to signifcant effect. In terms of the average removal efficiency of NO_x, mix No. 1 using a TiO₂ mixing ratio of 0% had a removal efficiency of 0.57% on average; thus, the removal effect w as not significant. For the other samples prepared by mixing, the average removal efficiencies for mix No. 2 (5% TiO₂) were 58.86% and 62.05% for normal and washing surface treatments, respectively, and those of sample No. 3 (10% TiO₂) were 59.94% and 67.61%. mixs No. 4 (5%) and No. 5 (10%), in which TiO₂ diluted with distilled water was sprayed onto the block surface, had an average NO_x removal efficiency of 61.72% and 68.48%, respectively. In terms of NOx removal efficiency, Mixs No. 3 and No. 5 with 10% TiO₂ were better than Mixs No. 2 and No. 4 with 5% TiO₂. In addition, analyzing the NO_x removal efficiency results from the fixing method, it was capable to apply mixing (washing) and the diluted spray methods. Therefore, it was found that the diluted spray method applied in this study can be employed in any manufacture of air purification concrete blocks.