• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.177-182
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• 1999

Objectives: To reexamine the association between air pollution and daily mortality in Seoul, Korea using a method of meta-analysis with the data filed for 1991 through 1995. Methods: A separate Poisson regression analysis on each district within the metropolitan area of Seoul was conducted to regress daily death counts on levels of each ambient air pollutant, such as total suspended particulates (TSP), sulfur dioxide $(SO_2)$, and ozone $(O_3)$, controlling for variability in the weather condition. We calculated a weighted mean as a meta-analysis summary of the estimates and its standard error. Results: We found that the p value from each pollutant model to test the homogeneity assumption was small (p<0.01) because of the large disparity among district-specific estimates. Therefore, all results reported here were estimated from the random effect model. Using the weighted mean that we calculated, the mortality at a $100{\mu}g/m^3$ increment in a 3-day moving average of TSP levels was 1.034 (95% Cl 1.009-1.059). The mortality was estimated to increase 6% (95% Cl 3-10%) and 3% (95% Cl 0-6%) with each 50 ppb increase for 9-day moving average of SO2 and 1-hr maximum O3, respectively. Conclusions: Like most of air pollution epidemiologic studies, this meta-analysis cannot avoid fleeing from measurement misclassification since no personal measurement was taken. However, we can expect that a measurement bias be reduced in a district-specific estimate since a monitoring station is hefter representative cf air quality of the matched district. The similar results to those from the previous studios indicated existence of health effect of air pollution at current levels in many industrialized countries, including Korea.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.34 no.7
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• pp.693-710
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• 2013

This study investigates the distribution of suspended particulates during the Asian dust period in Busan, Korea in the spring of 2009. Weather map and automatic weather system (AWS) data were used to analyze the synoptic weather conditions during the period. Particulate matter 10, laser particle counter data, satellite images and a backward trajectories model were used to analyze the aerosol particles distribution and their origins. In Case 1 (20 February 2009), when the $PM_{10}$ concentration increased, the aerosol volume distribution of small ($0.3-1.0{\mu}m$) particles decreased, while the concentration of large ($1.0-10.0{\mu}m$) particles increased. When the $PM_{10}$ concentration decreased, the aerosol volume distribution was observed to decrease as well. The prevailing winds changed from weak northerly winds to strong southwesterly winds when the concentration of the large particles increased. The correlation coefficient between the $PM_{10}$ concentration and aerosol volume distribution of large particles showed a high positive value of over 0.9. The results from the trajectory model show that the Asian dust originated in the Gobi desert and the Nei Mongol plateau. In Case 2 (25 April 2009), when the $PM_{10}$ concentration increased, the aerosol volume concentration of small ($0.3-0.5{\mu}m$) particles decreased, but the concentration of large ($0.5-10.0{\mu}m$) particles increased. The opposite was observed when the $PM_{10}$ concentration decreased. The prevailing winds changed from northeasterly winds to southwesterly and northeasterly winds. The correlation coefficient between the $PM_{10}$ concentration and aerosol volume distribution of large particles ($1.0-10.0{\mu}m$) showed a high positive value of about 0.9. The results from the trajectory model show that the Asian dust originated in Manchuria and the eastern coast of China.