• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.38 no.6
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• pp.472-481
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• 2012

Objectives: This study aims to investigate the AD (allergic diseases: asthma, allergic rhinitis and atopic dermatitis) prevalence among elementary schoolchildren in an industrial city, Ulsan, and identify major environmental risk factors associated with AD prevalence. Methods: Data on the physician-diagnosed prevalence over the past 12 months and potential risk factors of AD were collected through a questionnaire from a 2009-2010 survey of 4,067 schoolchildren living in different urban environments. The logistic regression analysis was performed to assess differences in AD prevalence among the areas and to determine which environmental factors impacted AD. Results: Our survey results showed that the AD prevalence rate ranged between 26.2% and 35.9%. Children living in polluted areas (near industrial and central urban areas) had about a 10% higher prevalence of AD than did those living in coastal or suburban residences. The Chi-Square test demonstrated that this local difference was statistically significant before and after adjustment of major confounders such as parental AD history and parental education. The results of the logistic regression analysis showed a statistically significant association between several environmental factors (ventilation in winter, odor conditions and exposure to traffic smoke, and outdoor $PM_{10}/O_3$ pollution) and the prevalence of AD found by multivariate model after adjusting confounders. Conclusion: These results suggest that local differences in AD prevalence are significantly associated with outdoor environmental factors. Although there are likely to be other risk factors for AD, living in a polluted area and exposure to high levels of air pollutants can contribute to an increased risk of childhood AD.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.45-51
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• 1973

Bacterial cultures of the transfer forceps, 4"$\times$4"mesh gauze and polluted air of nursing units of general surgery, internal medicine, gynecology and pediatrics of S.N.U.H. were carried on for S consecutive days (from 17th to 21s1 August, 1972) to investigate the degree of contamination of such instruments which were used in dressing the patients. 1. The average hospitalized patients for each nursing unit were 24 persons. 2. The frequency of dressing, and using forceps and gauze in surgical nursing unit were 25,316 and 66 times respectively. Actually the forceps were used most frequently. There was no dressing in the nursing unit of internal median. 3. Most of dressing were carried on from 11 : 00 to 13 : 59 o′clock. 4. Averagely 121.5 persons passed through each nursing unit. 549 visitors dropped in the nursing unit of gynecology in maximum, and 219 visitors in the nursing of internal medicine in minimum. The visitors rushed in from 11 : 00 to 13 : 59 o′clock to he 142.5 persons for each nursing unit in average. 5. Colony counts after the bacterial cultures of the forceps and gauze disclosed 1098.44 and 704.51 per plate respectively. 6. The degree of contamination was parallel to the duration and frequency of dressings. 7. The degree of contamination of the instruments was severest in the nursing unit of internal medicine, and !east in the nursing unit of gynecology. On the matter of gauze, the contamination was most extreme in the pediatric nursing unit. 8. There was no significant daily differences in terms of contamination throughout the week. 9. It was disclosed that empty forceps jars were less contaminated than the jars with solution of any kind. 10. Bacterial cultures of the polluted air in corridor showed 73,88 colony counts per plate.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.197-202
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• 2007

Formaldehyde is a typical indoor air pollutant that has numerous adverse health problems in modern living conditions. Phytoremediation that use plants to remove contaminants from polluted media can be applied to improve indoor air quality. Two sets of experiments; 1) two rooms in newly built auditorium and 2) a bed room in 2-year-old apartment; were performed to investigate plant effects on indoor formaldehyde concentration. It was observed from the experiments that plant can help decontaminating formaldehyde at low concentration level (0.1 ppm) but the effects decreased considerably at hish concentration (1ppm). The purification effects of indoor plant also showed the periodic pattern due to its physiological activity. More purification was observed as increasing plant density in the bed room but the formaldehyde concentration returned the original concentration level in two days after removing plants. It was suggested from the results that air purification using plants is an effective means of reduction on indoor formaldehyde level, though, reduction of source is highly desirable when the concentration level is high. The results also suggest that introducing supplementary purifying aids and/or efficient ventilation could be considered due to periodic removal pattern of plant.

• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Sciences Society Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.5-10
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• 2003

This paper explores not only emerging scientific problems but also the difficulties communicating air quality issues into an increasingly sensitive the public and policy arena. The public understanding and trust in air pollution information and indices may be very different to the notions of validity or accuracy that are important for a scientist. We operate in a world where openness requires us to reveal both the difficulties and disagreements in our understanding of the polluted atmosphere. Yet this can be confusing and increase complexity in situations where clear political and social decisions are required. I am going to examine these issues, starting with questions of what substances we regard as pollutants and the difficulties of getting the correct balance of concern given the broadening the base of chemicals emitted to the environment. There are also questions of exposure particularly in terms of vulnerable populations, who may spend large amounts of time indoors, where air is rarely monitored. In contemporary society there are pollution problems that extend far beyond urban areas and we have to consider regional issues such as windblown dusts, smoke from forest fires along with issues of the emission of green house gases and ozone depleting substances. Finally I will discuss the issues of communicating with a concerned public and sceptical politicians and the troubling interface between technological and sociological control. Such complexity is often missed in a maze of seemingly stronger political and social needs.

• Journal of environmental and Sanitary engineering
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.36-40
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• 2002

The purpose of study was to suggest an investigation of citizen's attitude on harmful insects in house. This study was consisted of four parts, such as basic investigation (housing shape, housing material, the period of house constructed, a cleaning condition), condition of kitchen, condition of living room condition of bathroom. The environmental pollution was increased by the development of industry and urbanization in modern. And also the clean of house has related with air quality such as pollutants and harmful insects etc. Because dwelling shape of urban come to be crowded, shut tightly and high buildings, the air quality of indoor was gradually polluted by several irregular cause. In one of housing pollution, the harmful insects was important any other than indoor air pollution. The problems of kitchen were the odor of food waste, discharge system of sewage and harmful insects. The important issues of living room were mold and construction materials, then important them of bathroom were easing nature and discharge system of sewage. A kind of the harmful insects in house investigated cockroach> mosquito> ant>fly. Finally, it appeared that the control of harmful insects can be applied to the improvement of indoor air pollutant which are difficult to be controlled in house.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.19 no.E2
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• pp.51-61
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• 2003

The material exposure tests have been carried out since 1993 to evaluate the relationship between air pollution and material corrosion with the cooperation of the researchers in Japan, China, and Korea. The test pieces such as bronze, copper, marble, and carbon steel have been exposed under both unsheltered and rain-sheltered outdoor condition separately at 18 sampling sites in East Asia. At the same time, the concentration of SO$_2$ and NO$_2$ has been measured simultaneously with passive sampler. The meteorological data were collected from the AWS (Auto-mated weather station) In each country and chemical compositions of wet deposition were also analyzed by the bulk sampling of rainfall every month. As the results, it was found that the corrosion rates of test pieces in the ambient air were appeared to be in the order of carbon steel > marble > bronze copper. The corrosion rates of test pieces in the unsheltered outdoor condition were 2.34 to 5.88 times larger than those in rain-sheltered condition. It was also found that the corrosion rate in the heavy polluted area in China was the highest, and the corrosion rates of the metal pieces were generally proportional to SO$_2$ concentration. Between two sites in Korea, the test pieces at Daegu site showed higher corrosion rates that would be due to the higher SO$_2$ concentration.

• Proceedings of the Korea Concrete Institute Conference
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• 2006.05b
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• pp.509-512
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• 2006

We have many environmental problems by the polluted materials as a results of mechanical development these days. So people want to use building products made from natural things and take a good effect for people from those bio products. We can instance electron wave shelding, far infrared ray and anion emission, and anti-bacterial property as the latest trend of the bio building material. So we had a experiment to investigate how much bio materials affect concrete when we use in the concrete with cement substitution. We tested slump, 7days compressive strength, and air contents for physical properties of bio concrete. The result is that bio concretes with four bio ingredients have proper values comparing with target values for slump and air content but lower compressive strength than plain concrete.

• Proceedings of the KSR Conference
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• 2001.10a
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• pp.139.1-146
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• 2001

Contact lines are necessary to supply electric locomotives with electric power. As most railways are gradually electrified with modernized electric cars, the demand for catenary wires and their facilities are also increased. Catenary wires made by metallic materials are generally used in the open air. They are exposed to the marine area with air-borne salt or severely polluted industrial area with much corrosive emission gases depending on the railway locations. In urban area, acid rain may cause a degradation of catenary wire system. Corrosion of catenary wires can make their actual lifetime shorter than that originally designed. Thus, the messenger wires, a kind of catenary wire system, were investigated with respect to corrosion, which include new and the used one collected at the field. They are also vibrated with some amplitude everytime the train passes through the railway. The frequent cyclic load on the wire any result in a fatigue damage, Surface damage by corrosion can make fatigue crack initiate with ease. In the present study, the fatigue life of the used wire was measured 40 to 50% shorter than that of new one in average.

• Proceedings of the SAREK Conference
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• 2008.06a
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• pp.714-719
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• 2008

In a domestic construction field, after floor is constructed, protector for construction surface is set up to prevent the surface of the floor being scratched and polluted. However, the problem is that contaminants discharged with the removal of the protector for construction surface exert a bad influence for the indoor air quality. In the research, it tested to the contaminant reduction performance of the adsorption protector for construction surface using powder of charcoal by the alternative proposal of such protectors for construction surface

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers P
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• v.52 no.4
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• pp.167-171
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• 2003

Due to advancement of industrialization, the flue gas from the combustion of industrial factories and various means of transportation have polluted air. Therefore, it is necessary to develop new techniques of air purification. In order to produce a more effective reactor, simulation were conducted using the Flux-II D program. The condition of the simulation were as follows: The height of the plate electrode was 0 mm or 2 mm higher than that of the wire electrode. The distance between the electrodes was 12 mm, and the diameter of the wire electrode was 0.5 mm or 1.0 mm. The results of the electric potential and electric field simulations show that pollutants will be more effectively removed due to the dielectric strength between wire electrode and plate electrode which was strong, and wire electrodes which were concentrated in a high electric field.