• Journal of the Korean Child Neurology Society
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.227-232
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• 2018

Purpose: Febrile seizure (FS) is the most common type of seizure in children between 6 months to 5 years of age. A family history of febrile seizures can increase the risk a child will have a FS. Yet, prevalence of FS regarding external environment has not been clearly proved. This study attempts to determine the association between prevalence of FS and weather. Methods: This study included medical records from the Korea National Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service. Data were collected from 29,240 children, born after 2004, diagnosed with FS who were admitted to one of the hospitals in Seoul, Korea, between January 2009 and December 2013. During the corresponding time period, data from the Korea Meteorological Administration on daily monitoring of four meteorological factors (sea-level pressure, amount of precipitation, humidity and temperature) were collected. The relationships of FS prevalence and each meteorological factor will be designed using Poisson generalized additive model (GAM). Also, the contributory effect of viral infections on FS prevalence and weather will be discussed. Results: The amount of precipitation was divided into two groups for comparison: one with less than 5 mm and the other with equal to or more than 5 mm. As a result of Poisson GAM, higher prevalence of FS showed a correlation with smaller amount of precipitation. Smoothing function was used to classify the relationships between three variables (sea-level pressure, humidity, and temperature) and prevalence of FS. FS prevalence was correlated with lower sea-level pressure and lower humidity. FS prevalence was high in two temperature ranges (-7 to $-1^{\circ}C$ and $18-21^{\circ}C$). Conclusion: Low sea-level pressure, small amount of precipitation, and low relative air humidity may increase FS prevalence risk.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.32 no.6
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• pp.575-582
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• 2016

Seoul city has high population density as well as high traffic congestion, which are vulnerable to exposure of environmental pollutions caused by car traffic. However, recent studies are only on local regions about road traffic and air pollution or health effect of road traffic on residents. Thus, comprehensive study data are needed in terms of overall Seoul regions. In this study utilized the nitrogen dioxide concentration through the national air pollution monitoring network data, 2012 to 2013. It also divided regions into high and low exposure districts via the Origin destination data developed by the Korea transport institute to quantify and evaluate the effect of transport policies and analyzed a correlation of asthma symptoms with high and low exposure districts through raw data of community health survey from the Korea centers for disease control and prevention. Based on the collected data, the pearson's correlation analysis was conducted between air pollution substance concentration and high exposure district and multiple logistic regression analysis was conducted to determine the effect of traffic environment and factors on asthma symptoms of residents. Accordingly, the following results were derived. First, the high exposure district was higher concentrations of nitrogen dioxide ($NO_2$) as per time compared to those of the low exposure district (p<0.01). Second, analysis on correlation between average daily environmental concentration in the air pollution monitoring network and road traffic showed that nitrogen dioxide had a significant positive correlation (p<0.01) with car traffic and total traffic as well as with truck traffic (p<0.05) statistically. Third, an adjusted odds ratio about asthma doctor's diagnosis in the high and low exposure districts was analyzed through the logistic regression analysis. With regard to an adjusted model 2 (adjusted gender, age, health behavior characteristics, and demographic characteristics) odds ratio of asthma doctor's diagnosis in the high exposure district was 1.624 (95% CI: 1.269~2.077) compared to that of the low exposure district, which was significant statistically (p<0.001).

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.73-86
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• 2015

The use of complimentary indicators, other than radiation dose and risk, to assess the safety of radioactive waste disposal has been discussed in a number of publications for providing the reasonable assurance of disposal safety and convincing the public audience. In this study, the radionuclide flux was selected as performance indicator to appraise the performance of engineered barriers and natural barrier in the Wolsong low- and intermediate-level waste disposal facility. Radionuclide flux showing the retention capability by each compartment of the disposal system is independent of assumptions in biosphere model and exposure pathways. The scenario considered as the normal scenario of disposal facility has been divided into intact or degraded silo concrete conditions. In the intact silo concrete, the radionuclide flux has been assessed with respect to the radionuclide retardation performance of each engineered barrier. In the degraded silo concrete, the radionuclide flux has been explored based on the performance degradation of engineered barriers and the relative significance of natural barrier quantitatively. The results can be used to optimally design the near-surface disposal facility being planned as the second project phase. In the future, additional complimentary indicators will be employed for strengthening the safety case for improving the public acceptance of low- and intermediate-level waste disposal facility.

• Clinical and Experimental Pediatrics
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• v.48 no.10
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• pp.1076-1081
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• 2005

Purpose : Insulin resistance is the most important risk factor linked to the development of impaired glucose tolerance(IGT), diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular diseases in childhood and adolescent obesity, The purpose of this study was to see whether insulin resistance of obese adolescent is higher than that of obese children. and to analyze gender difference and affecting factors of insulin resistance. Methods : Of the 9,837 school children from 5 to 16 tears old, 92 obese children and 187 adolescent, underwent a two-hour oral glucose tolerance test and plasma glucose, insulin, lipid profiles, leptin and high sensitive C-reactive protein(hs-CRP) were measure. Results : Plasma insulin levels of female were higher compared to those of males during oral glucose tolerance test(P<0.05). Four(4.3%) in obese children and twenty five(13.3%) in obese adolescents met the criteria of IGT. Female, leptin, adiponectin and triglyceride concentrations were strongly correlated with homeostatic model assessment insulin-resistance(HOMA-IR) by multiple linear regression analysis(P<0.05). Conclusion : Obese adolescents might have higher insulin concentrations compared to obese children and obese girls higher insulin concentrations than obese boys. Obese boys and children with impaired glucose tolerance have higher insulin concentrations than those with normal glucose tolerance. HOMA-IR was significantly correlated with female, plasma leptin, adiponectin and triglyceride concentrations.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.1739-1750
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• 2012

This study was to develop the assessment of medical service outcome using administration data through compared with hospital standardized mortality ratios(HSMR) in various hospitals. This study analyzed 63,664 cases of Hospital Discharge Injury Data of 2007 and 2008, provided by Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. We used data mining technique and compared decision tree and logistic regression for developing risk-adjustment model of in-hospital mortality. Our Analysis shows that gender, length of stay, Elixhauser comorbidity index, hospitalization path, and primary diagnosis are main variables which influence mortality ratio. By comparing hospital standardized mortality ratios(HSMR) with standardized variables, we found concrete differences (55.6-201.6) of hospital standardized mortality ratios(HSMR) among hospitals. This proves that there are quality-gaps of medical service among hospitals. This study outcome should be utilized more to achieve the improvement of the quality of medical service.

• Journal of Navigation and Port Research
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• v.35 no.10
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• pp.823-827
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• 2011

The present Common Structural Rules for double hull oil tanker is not included the residual strength, which is one of the functional requirements in design part of Goal-based new ship construction standards (GBS). The GBS will be enforced after July 1, 2016. The requirement related residual strength has the goal to build safe ship even if she has the specified damages due to marine accidents including collision and grounding. In order to assess the residual strength based on risk for structural damages according to GBS, tons of nonlinear FE analysis work taking into account various types of damage will be needed. The Smith's method, a kind of simplified method for the strength analysis is very useful for this purpose. In this paper, the residual strength assessments based on ultimate strength using Smith's method were carried out. The objected ship is VLCC with stranding damage in bottom structures. Also, the results were compared with that of nonlinear FE analysis using three cargo hold model.

• Toxicological Research
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.261-266
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• 2010

In the workplace, the arsenic is used in the semiconductor production and the manufacturing of pigments, glass, pesticides and fungicides. Therefore, workers may be exposed to airborne arsenic during its use in manufacturing. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the potential toxicity of particulate matters (PMs) doped with arsenic (PMs-Arsenic) using a rodent model and to compare the genotoxicity in various concentrations and to examine the role of PMs-Arsenic in the induction of signaling pathway in the lung. Mice were exposed to PMs $124.4{\pm}24.5\;{\mu}g/m^3$ (low concentration), $220.2{\pm}34.5\;{\mu}g/m^3$ (middle concentration), $426.4{\pm}40.3\;{\mu}g/m^3$ (high concentration) doped with arsenic $1.4\;{\mu}g/m^3$ (Low concentration), $2.5\;{\mu}g/m^3$ (middle concentration), $5.7\;{\mu}g/m^3$ (high concentration) for 4 wks (6 h/d, 5 d/wk), respectively in the whole-body inhalation exposure chambers. To determine the level of genotoxicity, Chromosomal aberration (CA) assay in splenic lymphocytes and Supravital micronucleus (SMN) assay were performed. Then, signal pathway in the lung was analyzed. In the genotoxicity experiments, the increases of aberrant cells were concentration-dependent. Also, PMs-arsenic caused peripheral blood micronucleus frequency at high concentration. The inhalation of PMs-Arsenic increased an expression of phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt: protein kinase B) and phpsphorylated mammalian target of rapamycin (p-mTOR) at high concentration group. Taken together, inhaled PMs-Arsenic caused genotoxicity and altered Akt signaling pathway in the lung. Therefore, the inhalation of PMs-Arsenic needs for a careful risk assessment in the workplace.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.1-11
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• 2011

A chronic drought stress has been imposed during non-rainy season(from winter to spring) since 1990s. We faced the most significant water crisis in 2001, and the drought was characterized by sultry weather and severe drought on a national scale. It has been widely acknowledged that the drought related damage is 2-3 times serious than floods. In the list of the world's largest natural disaster compiled by NOAA, 4 of the top 5 disasters are droughts. And according to the analysis from the NDMC report, the drought has the highest annual average damage among all the disasters. There was a very serious impact on the economic such as rising consumer price during the 2001 spring drought in Korea. There has been flood prevention measures implemented at national-level but for mitigation of droughts, there are only plans aimed at emergency (short-term) restoration rather than the comprehensive preventive measures. In addition, there is a lack of a clear set of indicators to express drought situation objectively, and therefore it is important and urgent to begin a systematic study. In this study, a nonstationary downscaling model using RCM based climate change scenario was first applied to simulate precipitation, and the simulated precipitation data was used to derive Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI). The SPI under climate change was used to evaluate the spatio-temporal variability of drought through principal component analysis at three different time scales which are 2015, 2045 and 2075. It was found that spatio-temporal variability is likely to modulate with climate change.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.51 no.10
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• pp.929-939
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• 2018

In North Korea, hydropower which occupies about 63% of power generation is a major electric power source, and North Korea has many advantages in the geographical for developing hydroelectric power. In this study, Information on the basin and dam capacity for 33 potential development site of hydroelectric dam was analyzed using DEM, and potential annual power generation was estimated by applying results of long-term runoff simulation with MWSWAT model for recent 30-year. The potential annual power generation at 33 dam was estimated to be about 28% of the current hydroelectric power in North Korea. In addition, a priority of dam development in each province was assessed by estimating the scale of an industry and prospecting the population change in the future. And a priority for dam development within the province was estimated based on the dam capacity and the potential annual power generation. The priority of each province was ranked in order of Pyeongannamdo, Hamgyungnamdo, Hamgyungbukdo, Hwanghaebukdo, Pyeonganbukdo, Jagangdo, Ryanggangdo, Hwanghaenamdo, and Gangwondo. The results of this study can be used as an initial review data for advancing to hydropower development project in North Korea.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.105-114
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• 2013

Recently, Due to Climate change, extreme rainfall occurs frequently. In many preceding studies, Because of extreme hydrological events changes, it is expected that peak flood Magnitude and frequency of drainage infrastructures changes. However, at present, probability rainfall in the drainage facilities design is assumed to Stationary which are not effected from climate change and long-term fluctuation. In the future, flood control safety standard should be reconsidered about the valid viewpoint. In this paper, in order to assess impact of climate change on drainage system, Future climate change information has been extracted from RCP 8.5 Climate Change Scenario for IPCC AR5, then estimated the design rainfall for various durations at return periods. Finally, the design flood estimated through the HEC-HMS Model which is being widely used in the practices, estimated the effect of climate change on the Design Flood of Mihochen basin. The results suggested that the Design Flood increase by climate change. Due to this, the Flood risk of Mihochen basin can be identified to increase comparing the present status.