• Korean Journal of Child Studies
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.41-62
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• 2012

This study explored the case of sandplay therapy for a 4th grade girl suffering from selective mutism. Her selective mutism apparently began following an extremely embarrassing experience in kindergarten. Her symptoms were a combination of symbiotic, reactive and passive- aggressive type behaviors. The goal of the therapy undertaken with this child was to enable her to express her repression and suppression, within a free and protective space during sandplay therapy. There were a total of 60 sessions of sandplay therapy. The client described the situations she had experienced in the first sandtray, by placing babies absent caring adults and food on the sandbox. She also placed baby fish away from their mother. In the mid-point of the sessions, she repeated her regressive behaviors by babbling like a baby and fought with snakes and monsters. In the final sessions, she showed integration and adaptation by engaging in snow play, expressing the union of opposites, placing blue and red mig and making a cross on the sand. This study showed the effectiveness of sandplay therapy since her selective mutism was lessened.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.25 no.8
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• pp.122-131
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• 2011

In this paper, the design and analysis of a reconfigurable modular structure, which reforms itself according to the change of the environment and realize appropriate forms and motions, are dealt with. This modular is a free structure from the restrictions with constraints about fixed environment and has various forms and motions by combining units. The form of this unit has a shape of a square with 7 centimeters side each, and has a structure which can be combined in a chain-shape or a lattice-shape. Additionally, The structure has a mobility by being equipped with wheels so that it can be combined for itself. In this paper, all the wireless controllers, sensor system, and communicating method between modules according to module structures were suggested and transformation method to be transformed to shape of snakes, caterpillars were presented. Moreover, simulations for each method were performed to show the validity of the motions including motor torque analysis. All the motions suggested were realized and experimented, whereby the availability of the designed mechanism and algorithm was verified with the result of experiments.

• The KIPS Transactions:PartB
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• v.12B no.7 s.103
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• pp.767-774
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• 2005

In this paper, we present a snake-based scheme for tracking object contour using disparity information taken from a stereo image sequence with cluttered background. The proposed method is composed of two steps. First, 3-D motion of object is estimated and candidate snake points are selected in disparity space. Second, object contour is extracted by using a modified snake algorithm with disparity information. The proposed algorithm can successfully extract the concave contour of objects and track the object contour in complex image. Performance of the proposed algorithm has been verified by simulation.

• The Journal of Engineering Research
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.109-117
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• 2004

In this paper, we propose an object contour tracking algorithm using snakes in stereo image sequences. The proposed technique is composed of two steps. In the first step, the candidate Snake points are determined from the motion information in 3-D disparity space. In the second step, the energy of Snake function is calculated to check whether the candidate Snake points converge to the edges of the interested objects. The energy of Snake function is calculated from the candidate Snake points using the disparity information obtained by patch matching. The performance of the proposed technique is evaluated by applying it to various sample images. Results prove that the proposed technique can track the edges of objects of interest in the stereo image sequences even in the cases of complicated background images or additive components.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.187-189
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• 2002

A 29-year-old Korean woman visited the Department of Surgery in MizMedi Hospital with a palpable itching mass on the right breast that had existed for the past 7 months. She had no history to eat either frogs or snakes, but had the history of drinking impure water. Sonography revealed a serpiginous hypoechoic tubular structure associated with partial fat necrosis in breast parenchymal layer and subcutaneous fat layer. It also revealed oval cystic lesions. At operation, an ivory white opaque ribbon-like worm that measured 16.5 cm in length and 0.5 cm in width was extracted. Anti-sparganum specific serum IgG level in the patient's serum (absorbance ＝ 0.71), measured by ELISA, was found to be significantly higher than those of normal controls (cut off point ＝ 0.21) . Sonography and ELISA appear to be helpful to diagnose sparganosis. Breast sparganosis is rarely found throughout the world.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.177-180
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• 2002

Gangweon-do is known to be highly endemic area of sparganosis more than other provinces in Korea. A seroepidmiologic examination for the detection of anti-Spirometra erinacei plerocercoid IgG in serum was carried out in normal inhabitants in Hongcheon-gun, Gangweon-do. Sere were tested by enzyme-linked immunosrobent assay (ELISA) for the anti-sparganum antibodies. Positive rate for anti-sparganum antibody in 719 adults was 3.3%. Data of the questionnaire for 24 ELISA positive inhabitants revealed that 20 had a history of eating raw meat of snakes, 24 had a history of eating frogs, and 24 had a history of drinking stream water. Two positive cases had a past history of sparganosis. Two positive cases showed current symptoms of sparganosis. The data revealed that ELISA would be useful to find infected cases among normal inhabitants at sparganosis-endemic areas.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.57 no.2
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• pp.179-184
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• 2019

Sparganosis is a parasitic infestation caused by sparganum, a plerocercoid tapeworm larva of the genus Spirometra. Since the first case of human sparganosis reported in 1908, sparganosis has been a global disease, and is common in China, Japan, and Southeast Asian countries. Consumption of raw snakes, frogs, fish, or drinking contaminated beverages are sources of human infections. Human sparganosis usually manifests in subcutaneous fat in areas such as the abdomen, genitourinary tract, and limbs. Breast sparganosis cases are rare, representing less than 2% of total cases of human infections. Complete surgical extraction of the sparganum is the treatment of choice. Because of the rarity of the disease, clinical suspicion is vital to reach the diagnosis of breast sparganosis. Here we report 2 rare cases of breast sparganosis presenting with a painless breast lump, both treated with surgical excision and sparganum extraction.

• Natural Product Sciences
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.259-267
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• 2020

Snakebite is a severe medical, economic, and social problem across the world, mostly in the tropical and subtropical area. These regions of the globe have typical of the world's venomous snakes present where access to prompt treatment is limited or not available. Snake venom is a complex mixture of toxin proteins like neurotoxin and cardiotoxin, and other enzymes like phospholipase A2 (PLA2), haemorrhaging, transaminase, hyaluronidase, phosphodiesterase, acetylcholinesterase, cytolytic and necrotic toxins. Snake venom shows a wide range of biological effects like anticoagulation or platelet aggregation, hemolysis, hypotension and edema. Phospholipase A2 is the principal constituent of snake venom; it catalyzes the hydrolysis of the sn-2 position of membrane glycerophospholipids to liberate arachidonic acid, which is the precursor of eicosanoids including prostaglandins and leukotrienes. The information regarding the structure and function of the phospholipase A2 enzyme may help in treating the snakebite victims. This review article constitutes a brief description of the structure, types, mechanism occurrence, and tests of phospholipase A2 and role of components of medicinal plants used to inhibit phospholipase A2.

• Journal of Information Processing Systems
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.688-700
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• 2022

A composite bionic soft gripper integrated with electromagnets and magneto-active elastomers is designed by combining the structure of the human hand and the snake's behavior of enhancing friction by actively adjusting the scales. A silicon-based polymer containing magnetized hard magnetic particles is proposed as a soft finger, and it can be reversibly bent by adjusting the magnetic field. Experiments show that the length, width, and height of rectangular soft fingers and the volume ratio of neodymium-iron-boron have different effects on bending angle. The flexible fingers with 20 vol% are the most efficient, which can bend to 90° when the magnetic field is 22 mT. The flexible gripper with four fingers can pick up 10.51 g of objects at the magnetic field of 105 mT. In addition, this composite bionic soft gripper has excellent magnetron performance, and it can change surface like snakes and operate like human hands. This research may help develop soft devices for magnetic field control and try to provide new solutions for soft grasping.

• Journal of Veterinary Science
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.81.1-81.10
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• 2022

Background: Snakebites remain a devastating and life-threatening environmental hazard. While the management of snakebites has been well described in humans, few clinical data and guidelines exist for dogs, especially in Korea. Objectives: This retrospective study evaluated the clinical features of 70 dogs with snakebite wounds in Korea. Methods: The medical records of 72 dogs that presented to three animal hospitals from June 2008 to July 2021 were reviewed; among these, 70 dogs that met the inclusion criteria were enrolled. Their signalment, history, clinical signs, physical examination, blood analysis, treatment, and prognosis were also evaluated. Results: Of 70 dog owners, 35 (50%) witnessed the bite, with a mean time between bite and hospital presentation of 9.7 ± 4.1 h in 58 dogs. Blood smears were evaluated in 45 dogs, of which 28 (62%) showed echinocytosis. Anemia and acute kidney injury were found in 21 (29%) and 2 dogs (3%), respectively. A total of 37 dogs (53%) were hospitalized, 5 (7%) of which died. Conclusions: The most significant finding was the high prevalence of echinocytosis. The data from this retrospective study could inform the management of dogs bitten by snakes in Korea.