• Journal of Dental Anesthesia and Pain Medicine
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• 제21권2호
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• pp.139-153
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• 2021

Background: In anesthetic techniques, touching bones can cause needle bending. Theoretically, a needle should support such deflection without fracturing. However, it is possible that a needle may fracture depending on the quality and type of needle used. This study evaluated the physical, chemical, and micromorphological characteristics of long and short dental anesthetic needles, as well as the mechanical properties of flexural load and bending resistance when needles are subjected to different bending angles. Methods: Long and short needles (30G, Jets, Misawa, Selekto, Terumo, Unoject and 27G, Dencojet, Injex, Jets, Misawa, Procare, Setoject XL, Terumo) were evaluated. Scanning electron microscopy was used to evaluate the needle bevels and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy was used for the chemical analysis of needle compositions. Flexural loading and bending strength assessments were performed using a universal testing machine by bending the needles (n = 5) to angles of 30°, 60°, or 90°, or until fracture occurred. Results: The Injex 27G, Jets 27G, and Septoject XL 27G needles were all less than 30 mm in length. There were small percentage variations in the chemical compositions of the needles. Superior smoothness was observed for the Unoject 30G needle, which exhibited the highest fracture resistance at 60°. The Jets 30G needle exhibited greater resistance to fractures at 90°. The Procare 27G needle exhibited the highest load resistance to bending, followed by the Septoject XL 27G needle, and both needles were tied for the lowest fracture resistance. No needle fractured when bent to 30° or at less than three bends to 60° or 90°. Conclusions: Greater needle resistance to bending increases the probability of early fracturing. Thinner and shorter needles are more resistant than longer and thicker needles. Performing a single bend does not result in any significant risk of fracture or obliterate the lumen, allowing for the continued passage of anesthetic liquid.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• 제8권1호
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• pp.573-585
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• 2021

The banking sector is one of the most important sectors in Pakistan's struggling economy. Recent studies have recommended that suitable methods can be applied to predict bankruptcy. In this context, this work analyzes Pakistan's banking sector's financial status through the five-factor Altman Z-score model, which determines the probability of bankruptcy for an organization. Banking data has been collected through the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) in the period 2013-2017. The Z-score assessment criteria is defined as: Z> 2.99 - "safe" zone; Z> 1.8 Z>2.98- "grey" zone; and Z <1.8 - "distress" zone. Results show good predictions for the local banking industry, while most foreign Pakistani banks were found bankrupt with the Z-score below 1.1. One of the financial risks investors face when investing in any company is the risk of bankruptcy. One of the most used models for predicting financial distress for any company is Altman's Z-score model. On the other hand, the Z-score analysis suggests that all banking establishments are not bankrupt because they have sufficient ability to control bankruptcy. At the same time, foreign banks failed financially and would not be able to be sustained in the future because they do not have the ability to pay the short-term and long-term debt.

• 한국농공학회논문집
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• 제63권2호
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• pp.75-84
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• 2021

As the weather changes become frequent, weather disasters are increasing, causing more damage to plastic greenhouses. Among the damage caused by various disasters, damage by snow to the greenhouse takes a relatively long time, so if an alarm system is properly prepared, the damage can be reduced. Existing greenhouse design standards and snow warning systems are based on snow depth. However, even in the same depth, the load on the greenhouse varies depending on meteorological characteristics and snow density. Therefore, this study aims to secure the structural safety of greenhouses by developing sensors that can directly measure snow loads, and analysing the warning criteria for load using a stochastic model. Markov chain was applied to estimate the failure probability of various types of greenhouses in various regions, which let users actively cope with heavy snowfall by selecting an appropriate time to respond. Although it was hard to predict the precise snow depth or amounts, it could successfully assess the risk of structures by directly detecting the snow load using the developed sensor.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• 제13권1호
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• pp.59-65
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• 2022

Background: Healthcare workers' attitudes toward vaccination have been widely described in the literature, but a restricted amount of studies assessed healthcare students' knowledge, attitudes, and opinions on this issue. This study aimed to estimate the influence of a degree course on knowledge and immunization behavior among healthcare students and to compare medical students with students from other health profession degree programs to identify possible differences. Methods: A multicenter, cross-sectional study was performed in 2018 in 14 Italian Universities (3,131 students were interviewed). A validated questionnaire was used to assess knowledge, attitudes, and opinions toward vaccinations, with a specific focus on influenza vaccine and attitudes toward mandatory vaccination policies. Statistical software STATA® 14 was used. Results: Significant differences were recorded between medical students and other healthcare students. The intention to get vaccinated against influenza during the next season and having been vaccinated in the previous season was higher in the medical group (p < 0.001). In the group of students of other health professions, we registered a lower probability of identifying themselves as a high-risk group for contracting infectious diseases as a consequence of their profession and health status (aOR 0.49; CI95%: 0.40-0.60) and an increased likelihood of defining their level of knowledge on vaccine-preventable diseases and related vaccinations as "insufficient/sufficient/fair" (aOR 1.31; CI95%: 1.11-1.56). Conclusions: Results show several differences between medical students and students of other health professions when it comes to vaccination knowledge, attitudes, and perceptions, as well as a general low tendency to be vaccinated against influenza.

• 대한통합의학회지
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• 제9권3호
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• pp.47-58
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• 2021

Purpose : This study aimed to investigate the association between asthma and oral health and factors influencing asthma in adults. We also investigated whether asthma is related to mental health and physiological factors of blood. Methods : Data from 12,639 adults was taken from the 7th period (2016~2018) Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and analyzed using with SPSS 22.0 statistical program. Statistical analysis of data included frequency analysis, cross-analysis, and logistic regression analysis. For continuous data, an independent sample t-test was performed. The statistical significance level was defined as 0.05. Results : The probability of asthma occurrence was statistically different within general characteristics (gender, age, school grade, income, and drinking). By independent variables in a logistic regression analysis, the asthma diagnosis group had more people with speech discomfort (OR=1.37), chewing discomfort (OR=1.29), and oral pain (OR=.73). We found that people with asthma had a more unfavorable perception of their health (OR=1.73), suffered more depression (OR=.45), stress (OR=.66), and limited activity (OR=2.38). Moreover, the white blood cell count (OR=1.10) and high sensitivity C-reactive protein test (OR=1.06) also showed higher values than the control group. Conclusion : Our study showed that oral health and mental health were associated with the asthma, and influencing factors were oral health and behavior and mental health-related characteristics. Therefore, it is necessary to understand asthma-related risk factors for oral health and recognize the importance of systematic oral care education and regular dental visits for patients receiving asthma treatment. Thus, this study provides valuable insights on appropriate oral health management and prevention of asthma in patients.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• 제22권2호
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• pp.169-184
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• 2022

The importance of seismicity in developing countries and the strengthening of buildings is a topic of major importance. Therefore, the study of several solutions with the development of new technologies is of great importance to investigate the damage on retrofitted structures by using probabilistic methods. The Federal Emergency Management Agency considers three types of performance levels by considering different scenarios, intensity and duration. The selection and scaling of ground motions mainly depends on the aim of the study. Intensity-based assessments are the most common and compute the response of buildings for a specified seismic intensity. Assessments based on scenarios estimate the response of buildings to different earthquake scenarios. A risk-based assessment is considered as one of the most effective. This research represents a practical method for developing countries where exists many active faults, tall buildings and lack of good implementable approaches. Therefore, to achieve the main goal, two high-rise steel buildings have been modeled and assessed. The contribution of buckling-restrained braces in the elastic design of both buildings is firstly verified. In the nonlinear static range, both buildings presented repairable damage at the central top part and some life safety hinges at the bottom. The nonlinear incremental dynamic analysis was applied by 15 representative/scaled accelerograms to obtain levels of performance and fragility curves. The results shown that by using probabilistic methods, it is possible to estimate the probability of collapse of retrofitted buildings by buckling-restrained braces and tuned mass dampers, which are practical retrofitting options to protect existing structures against earthquakes.

• Journal of Information Technology Applications and Management
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• 제28권6호
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• pp.97-116
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• 2021

Due to the decrease in the school-age population and government regulations, universities have made great efforts to secure their own competitiveness. In particular, the selection of universities with financial support based on the recent evaluation of the Ministry of Education has become a major concern enough to affect the existence of the university itself. This paper extracts three-year data from 124 major private universities nationwide, and quantitatively analyzes the variables of major universities selected as self-improvement universities, competency reinforcement universities, and universities with limited financial support. As a result of estimating the selection of self-powered universities using the ordered logit model by hierarchically inputting 12 variables, student competitiveness in the metropolitan area (1.318^**), Educational Restitution Rate (4.078^***), University operation expenditure index rate (1.088^***) values were found. Significant positive coefficient values were found in the admission enrollment rate (45.98^***) and the enrollment rate (13.25^***). As a result of analyzing the marginal effects, the increase in the rate of reduction of education costs has always been positive in the selection of self-powered universities, but it was observed that the rate of increase decreases in areas of increase of 150% or more. On the contrary, the probability of becoming a Em-powered university was negative in all sectors, but on the contrary, it was analyzed that marginal effects increased at the same time point. On the other hand, the employment rate of graduates was not able to find direct significance with the result of the selection of Self powered universities. Through this paper, it is expected that each university will analyze the possibility and shortcomings of the selection of Self powered universities in policy making, and in particular, the risk of dropout of selection for the vulnerable field can be predicted using marginal effects. It can be used as major research data for both university evaluators, university officials and students.

• Journal of Information Science Theory and Practice
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• 제10권spc호
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• pp.56-65
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• 2022

Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (KISTI) is a Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG) Tier-1 center mandated to preserve raw data produced from A Large Ion Collider Experiment (ALICE) experiment using the world's largest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN). Physical medium used widely for long-term data preservation is tape, thanks to its reliability and least price per capacity compared to other media such as optical disk, hard disk, and solid-state disk. However, decreasing numbers of manufacturers for both tape drives and cartridges, and patent disputes among them escalated risk of market. As alternative to tape-based data preservation strategy, we proposed disk-only erasure-coded archival storage system, Custodial Disk Storage (CDS), powered by Exascale Open Storage (EOS), an open-source storage management software developed by CERN. CDS system consists of 18 high density Just-Bunch-Of-Disks (JBOD) enclosures attached to 9 servers through 12 Gbps Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) Host Bus Adapter (HBA) interfaces via multiple paths for redundancy and multiplexing. For data protection, we introduced Reed-Solomon (RS) (16, 4) Erasure Coding (EC) layout, where the number of data and parity blocks are 12 and 4 respectively, which gives the annual data loss probability equivalent to 5×10^-14. In this paper, we discuss CDS system design based on JBOD products, performance limitations, and data protection strategy accommodating EOS EC implementation. We present CDS operations for ALICE experiment and long-term power consumption measurement.

• Structural Monitoring and Maintenance
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• 제10권1호
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• pp.87-105
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• 2023

Seismic regulations have been updated from time to time to accommodate an increase in seismic hazards. Comparison of seismic fragility of the existing bridges in Indonesia from different historical periods since the era before 1990 will be the basis for seismic assessment of the bridge stock in Indonesia, most of which are located in earthquake-prone areas, especially those built many years ago with outdated regulations. In this study, seismic fragility curves were developed using incremental non-linear time history analysis and more holistically according to the actual strength of concrete and steel material in Indonesia to determine the uncertainty factor of structural capacity, βc. From the research that has been carried out, based on the current seismic load in SNI 2833:2016/Seismic Map 2017 (7% probability of exceedance in 75 years), the performance level of the bridge in the era before SNI 2833:2016 was Operational-Life Safety whereas the performance level of the bridge designed with SNI 2833:2016 was Elastic - Operational. The potential for more severe damage occurs in greater earthquake intensity. Collapse condition occurs at As = F_PGA x PGA value of bridge Era I = 0.93 g; Era II = 1.03 g; Era III = 1.22 g; Era IV = 1.54 g. Furthermore, the fragility analysis was also developed with geometric variations in the same bridge class to see the effect of these variations on the fragility, which is the basis for making bridge risk maps in Indonesia.

• 대한토목학회논문집
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• 제29권3A호
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• pp.181-188
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• 2009

본 연구에서는 현수교의 합리적인 시공방안 결정 및 구조안전성 평가에 대한 기초자료를 제시하였다. 기 연구된 현수교의 해석모델 및 신뢰성이론을 바탕으로 초기형상해석, 자유진동해석, 시공변수를 고려한 시공단계해석 및 신뢰성해석 등을 수행 할 수 있는 수치해석프로그램을 개발하였다. 현수교의 시공방안은 보강형의 시공순서, 시공방향 및 주경간과 측경간의 동시 시공성 등의 다양한 시공변수를 고려하여 설정하였다. 시공방안에 따른 동적시공단계해석은 작성된 해석프로그램에 의해 수행하였으며 주요부재의 응답특성을 검토하여 각각의 시공방안에 대한 장 단점을 제시하였다. 시공단계별 구조신뢰성해석은 자연적 불확실성을 고려하여 신뢰성지수 및 파괴확률을 산정함으로써, 설정된 시공방안에 따른 현수교의 안전성을 정량적으로 평가하였다. 아울러, 인위적 불확실성을 고려하여 산정된 해석결과에 대해 재평가하였으며, 시공단계 위험성의 주요 퍼센트 분포를 빈도수 히스토그램을 이용하여 제시하였다.