• Dementia and Neurocognitive Disorders
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.59-70
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• 2022

Background and Purpose: Neurofilament light chain (NfL) has been considered as a biomarker for neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's disease (AD). We measured plasma NfL levels in older adults with cognitive complaints and evaluated their clinical usefulness in AD. Methods: Plasma levels of NfL, measured by using the single molecule array method, were acquired in a total of 113 subjects consisting of subjective cognitive decline (SCD; n=14), mild cognitive impairment (MCI; n=37), or dementia of Alzheimer type (DAT; n=62). Plasma NfL level was compared among three groups, and its association with cognitive and functional status was also analyzed. Results: After adjusting for age, plasma NfL level was higher in subjects with DAT (65.98±84.96 pg/mL), compared to in subjects with SCD (16.90±2.54 pg/mL) or MCI (25.53±10.42 pg/mL, p=0.004). NfL levels were correlated with scores of the mini-mental state examination (r=-0.242, p=0.021), clinical dementia rating (CDR) (r=0.291, p=0.005), or CDR-sum of boxes (r=0.276, p=0.008). Just for participants who performed amyloid positron emission tomography (PET), the levels were different between subjects with PET (-) (n=17, 25.95±13.25 pg/mL) and PET (+) (n=16, 63.65±81.90 pg/mL, p=0.010). Additionally, plasma NfL levels were different between vascular dementia and vascular MCI, and between Parkinson's disease- dementia and no dementia. Conclusions: This pilot study shows that in subjects with DAT, plasma NfL levels increase. Plasma NfL level correlated with cognitive and functional status. Further longitudinal studies may help to apply the plasma NfL levels to AD, as a potential biomarker for the diagnosis and predicting progression.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.2443-2446
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• 2013

Published data have shown that the levels of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and soluble VEGF receptor-1 (sVEGFR-1) in plasma and pleural effusion might be usefulness for lung cancer diagnosis. Here, we performed a prospective study to investigate the utility of VEGF and sVEGFR-1 in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) for differential diagnosis of primary lung cancer. A total of 56 patients with solitary pulmonary massed by chest radiograph or CT screening were enrolled in this study. BALF and plasma samples were obtained from all patients and analyzed for VEGF and sVEGFR-1 using a commercially available sandwich ELISA kit. The results showed that the levels of VEGF in BALF were significantly higher in patients with a malignant pulmonary mass compared with patients with a benign mass (P < 0.001). However, no significant difference of sVEGFR-1 in BALF was found between malignant and non-malignant groups (P = 0.43). With a cut-off value of 214 pg/ml, VEGF showed a sensitivity and specificity of 81.8% and 84.2%, respectively, in predicting the malignant nature of a solitary pulmonary mass. Our study suggests that VEGF is significantly increased in BALF among patients with lung cancer than in benign diseases. Measurement of VEGF in BALF might be helpful for differential diagnosis of primary lung cancer.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.13 no.6
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• pp.2577-2581
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• 2012

Objective: To conduct a meta-analysis to investigate the value of EBV DNA in diagnosis of nasopharyngeal cancer (NPC) in Asian populations, and provide important evidence for screening. Methods: Prospective or respective case-control or cohort studies regarding the detection role of EBV DNA for NPC were included in our study. We conducted a comprehensive literature search in PubMed, EMBASE, and the Chinese Biomedical Database (CBM database between January 1980 and March 2012. Results: A total of 18 studies with 1492 NPC cases and 2641 health controls were included. Almost of the included studies were conducted in China, and only one other conducted in Thailand. The overall results demonstrated that the pooled sensitivity, specificity, positive likelihood (+LR) and negative likelihood (-LR) were 0.73 (0.71-0.75), 0.89 (0.88-0.90), 8.84 (5.65-13.84) and 0.19(0.11-0.32), respectively. The overall EBV DNA detection showed the largest area of 0.932 under the summary receiver operator curve (SROC). The accuracy of detection by plasma for NPC (0.86) was higher than in serum (0.81), with largest areas under the SROC of 0.97 and 0.91, respectively. Conclusion: Our results demonstrated the EBV DNA detection in plasma or serum has high sensitivity and specificity in diagnosis of NPC, especially in Chinese populations with a high risk of cancer.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.10 no.6
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• pp.603-608
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• 1997

To improve animal production, a simple and accurate pregnancy diagnosis plays a very important role. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to develop an on-farm blood progesterone enzyme immunoassay (EIA) system for monitoring the early pregnancy in sows. Star tubes coated with mouse monoclonal anti-progesterone antibody were used for this proposed EIA system which was tested in field trials. The results could be obtained within 30 minutes either by spectrophotometry or the naked eye. Heparinized fresh blood samples collected from the ear vein of sows 17-22 days after breeding (day 0) were tested qualitatively to diagnose sows as pregnant or non-pregnant with high ( > 3 ng/ml) or low ($${{\leq_-}}3ng/ml$$) progesterone in the blood. To provided a double check data, plasma progesterone levels were also measured quantitatively by the same EIA system with some modification. Total agreement of diagnosis by the on-farm EIA kit and by farrowing or abortion from 128 tested sows was found to be 92.2% accuracy (93.1% on pregnant diagnosis and 83.3% on non-pregnant diagnosis). It was concluded that the on-farm EIA blood progesterone test is a very useful method for monitoring the early pregnancy status of sows.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.46 no.2
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• pp.161-164
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• 2009

Plasma cell granuloma is a tumor-like disease characterized by non-neoplastic polyclonal proliferation of plasma cells and other mononuclear cells. This disease occurs most frequently in the lung and upper respiratory tract, while the involvement of the central nervous system is very rare. A 44-year-old female patient presented with nausea and progressive visual disturbance. Brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) revealed the mass along the right tentorium with low signal intensity in the T2 weighted image (T2WI) and fluid-attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR) sequence, and an isosignal intensity in T1 weighted image (T1WI), the latter of which was enhanced after administration of gadolinium-diethylenetriamine penta-acetic acid (Gd-DTPA). The thickest portion of the tentorium was partially excised via the combined suboccipital and infratentorial approach. The histopathological examination indicated a diagnosis of plasma cell granuloma. Postoperative steroid therapy was administered for remnant tumor control. Although a follow up MRI scan taken 20 months after the operation showed a slight decrease in tumor size, the lesion had extended to the falx and left frontal convexity along with parenchymal edema at 32 months after the operation and the clinical status was aggravated. The mass was removed from the left frontal convexity. Radiation therapy was given, together with steroid administration.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.91-95
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• 2006

In whole world consciousness of environment maintenance have increased very quickly for the end of the 20th century. To use and disuse toxic substances have been controled at the field of industry. Also the field of lighting source belong to environmental control. And in the future the control will be strong. In radiational mechanism of fluorescence lamp mechanism is the worst environmental problem. In radiational mechanism of fluorescence lamp mercury is the worst environmental problem root. In the mercury free lighting source system the Xe gas lamp is one type. And the Ne:Xe mixing gas lamp improvements firing voltage of Xe gas lamp. Purpose and subject of this study are understand, efficiency, ideal of Ne:Xe plasma which mercury free lamp. Before ICP was designed, basic parameters of plasma, which are electron temperature and electron density, were measured and calculated by Langmuir probe data. Property of electron temperature and electron density were confirmed by changing ratio of Ne:Xe.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.12-17
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• 2000

Helicon waves were excited by a Nagoya type III antenna in magnetized plasma, and hydrogen and methane are fed through a Mass Flow Controller(MFC). We made a diagnosis of properties of helicon plasma by H$_2$gaseous discharge, and fabricated the diamond thin film. The maximum measured electron density was 1${\times}$10$\^$10/ cm$\^$-3/. Diamond films have been growo on (100) silicon substrate using the helicon plasma chemical vapor deposition. Diamond films were deposited at a pressure of 0.1 Torr, deposition time of 40~80 h, a substrate temperature of 700$^{\circ}C$ and methane concentrations of 0.5~2.5%. The growth characteristics were investigated by means of X-ray Photoelectron (XPS) and X-ray Diffraction(XRD), XRD and XPS analysis revealed that SiC was formed, and finally diamond particles were definitely deposited on it. With increasing deposition time, the thickness and crystallization of the daimond thin film increased, For this system the optimum condition of methane concentration was estimated to near to 1.5%.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.74-84
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• 2022

As the semiconductor industry develops, the difficulty of newly required process technology becomes difficult, and the importance of production yield and product reliability increases. As an effort to minimize yield loss in the manufacturing process, interests in the process defect process for facility diagnosis and defect identification are continuously increasing. This research observed the plasma condition changes in the multi oxide/nitride layer deposition (MOLD) process, which is one of the 3D-NAND manufacturing processes through optical emission spectroscopy (OES) and monitored the result of whether the change in plasma characteristics generated in repeated deposition of oxide film and nitride film could directly affect the film. Based on these results, it was confirmed that if a change over a certain period occurs, a change in the plasma characteristics was detected. The change may affect the quality of oxide film, such as the film thickness as well as the interfacial surface roughness when the oxide and nitride thin film deposited by plasma enhenced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) method.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers C
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• v.54 no.5
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• pp.213-217
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• 2005

In this paper, we introduced a LIF measurement method and summarized the theoretical side. When an altered wavelength of laser and electric power, lamp applied electric power, we measured the relative density of the metastable state in mercury after observing a laser induced fluorescence signal of 404.8nm and 546.2nm, and confirmed the horizontal distribution of plasma density in the discharge lamp. Due to this generation, the extinction of atoms in a metastable state occurred through collision, ionization, and excitation between plasma particles. The density and distribution of the metastable state depended on the energy and density of plasma particles, intensely This highlights the importance of measuring density distribution in plasma electric discharge mechanism study The results confirmed the resonance phenomenon regarding the energy level of atoms along a wavelength change, and also confirmed that the largest fluorescent signal in 436nm, and that the density of atoms in 546.2nm ($6^3S_1 {\to} 6^3P_2$ ) were larger than 404.8nm ($6^3S_1 {\to} 6^3P_1$). According to the increase of lamp applied electric power, plasma density increased, too. When increased with laser electric power, the LIF signal reached a saturation state in more than 2.6mJ. When partial plasma density distribution along a horizontal axis was measured using the laser induced fluorescence method, the density decreased by recombination away from the center.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Heat Treatment
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.150-155
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• 2010

Generally, plasma nitriding process has composed with a nitriding layer within glow discharge region occurred by energy exchange. The dissociations of nitrogen molecules are very difficult to make neutral atoms or ionic nitrogen species via glow discharge area. However, the captured electrons in which a double-folded screen with same potential cathode can stimulate and come out some single atoms or activated ionic species. It was showed an important thing that is called "hat is a dominant component in this nitriding process?" in plasma nitriding process and it can take an effective species for without compound layer. During a plasma nitriding process, it was able to estimate with analyzing and identification by optical emission spectroscopy (OES) study. And then we can make comparative studies on the nitrogen transfer with plasma nitriding and ATONA process using plasma diagnosis and metallurgical observation. From these observations, we can understand role of active species of nitrogen, like N, $N^+$, ${N_2}^+$, ${N_2}^*$ and $NH_x$-radical, in bulk plasma of each process. And the same time, during DC plasma nitriding and other processes, the species of FeN atom or any ionic nitride species were not detected by OES analyzing.