• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.10
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• pp.5589-5597
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• 2013

The aim of this review article was to evaluate the relationship and the possible etiological mechanisms between endometriosis, leiomyoma (LM) and adenomyosis and gynecological cancers, such as ovarian and endometrial cancer and leiomyosarcoma (LMS). MEDLINE was searched for all articles written in the English literature from July 1966 to May 2013. Reports were collected systematically and all the references were also reviewed. Malignant transformation of gynecologic benign diseases such as endometriosis, adenomyosis and LM to ovarian and endometrial cancer remains unclear. Hormonal factors, inflammation, familial predisposition, genetic alterations, growth factors, diet, altered immune system, environmental factors and oxidative stress may be causative factors in carcinogenesis. Early menarche, low parity, late menopause and infertility have also been implicated in the pathogenesis of these cancers. Ovarian cancers and endometriosis have been shown to have common genetic alterations such as loss of heterozygosity (LOH), PTEN, p53, ARID1A mutations. MicroRNAs have also been implicated in malignant transformation. Inflammation releases proinflammatory cytokines, and activates tumor associated macrophages (TAMS) and nuclear factor kappa b (NF-KB) signaling pathways that promote genetic mutations and carcinogenesis. MED12 mutations in LM and smooth muscle tumors of undetermined malignant potential (STUMP) may contribute to malignant transformation to LMS. A hyperestrogenic state may be shared in common with pathogenesis of adenomyosis, LM and endometrial cancer. However, the effect of these benign gynecologic diseases on endometrial cancer should be studied in detail. This review study indicates that endometriosis, LM, adenomyosis may be associated with increased risk of gynecological cancers such as endometrial and ovarian cancers. The patients who have these gynecological benign diseases should be counseled about the future risks of developing cancer. Further studies are needed to investigate the relationship between STUMPs, LMS and LM and characteristics and outcome endometrial carcinoma in adenomyotic patients.

• CRM연구
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.31-41
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• 2011

Supporting communications among users, Social Network has encouraged various information flows through relationships among them. This paper studies on mentality or attitude of Social Network Services (SNS for short) users, on the basis of Technology Acceptance Model (TAM for short) and then proposes so-called TAMS, Technology Acceptance Model for Social Network Services. SNS users make full use of SNS as channels in order to create, expand, and obtain some information related to personal concerns. We will research on how the benefits that users get by using SNS exert influence on user-perceived usability. The SNS-using benefits focus on relationship benefits that are formed by interactions among users. Provided that perceived usability affects mental or informational benefits according to involvement of SNS users, we will check how perceived usability or ease of use is connected to brand attitude.

• Journal of Korean Society of Transportation
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.109-117
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• 2008

The first phase of School Zone Improvement Project introduced to enhance the safety of school-routes were completed by 2007 and the second phase of the project will be continued from 2008 to 2012. Since a huge budget is required for the project, there is a need to evaluate how many child-related crashes were reduced through the project, prior to the implementation of the second phase. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the influence of the School Zone Improvement Project on reduction in child-related crashes with data collected from the database of the National Police Agency. This study employed a Before-and-After study with comparison group to assess how many crashes were reduced. The results showed that the number of child-related crashes were decreased by 10, which is about 39% reduction in crash frequencies. With respect to the land use characteristics of school zones, the number of reduced crashes in residential zone, commercial zone, and mixed zone were 2.41, 3.8, and 0.5, respectively. The results may provide a significant implication for the second phase of the project that there is a need to establish different plans for improvement project with respect to land use characteristics.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.28 no.8
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• pp.992-998
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• 2018

Cancer cells grow in an environment composed of various components that supports tumor growth. Major cell types in the tumor microenvironment are fibroblast, endothelial cells and immune cells. All of these cells communicate with cancer cells. Among infiltrating immune cells as an abundant component of solid tumors, macrophages are a major component of the tumor microenvironment and orchestrates various aspects of immunity. The complex balance between pro-tumoral and anti-tumoral effects of immune cell infiltration can create a chronic inflammatory microenvironment essential for tumor growth and progression. Macrophages express different functional programs in response to microenvironmental signals, defined as M1 and M2 polarization. Tumor-associated macrophages (TAM) secret many cytokines, chemokines and proteases, which also promote tumor angiogenesis, growth, metastasis and immunosuppression. TAM have multifaceted roles in the development of many tumor types. TAM also interact with cancer stem cells. This interaction leads to tumorigenesis, metastasis, and drug resistance. TAM obtain various immunosuppressive functions to maintain the tumor microenvironment. TAM are characterized by their heterogeneity and plasticity, as they can be functionally reprogrammed to polarized phenotypes by exposure to cancer-related factors, stromal factors, infections, or even drug interventions. Because TAMs produce tumor-specific chemokines by the stimulation of stromal factors, chemokines might serve as biomarkers that reflect disease activity. The evidence has shown that cancer tissues with high infiltration of TAM are associated with poor patient prognosis and resistance to therapies. Targeting of TAM in tumors is considered a promising therapeutic strategy for anti-cancer treatment.

• International Journal of Highway Engineering
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.79-87
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• 2015

PURPOSES: According to accident statistics for road built in 2004, the ratio of accidents on frozen roads to normal roads is 0.9%, whereas the fatality ratio is 2.7%. The risk of accidents on frozen roads is very high. Measures taken every year to prevent traffic accidents of frozen roads in the winter season are still insufficient. Additionally, measures have been established mainly on rural roads. Therefore, for urban roads, analyses and measures to prevent accidents are lacking. In this study, data on accidents on frozen roads was used to search for the causes behind these accidents and measures to reduce accidents have been recommended. METHODS: In this study, collected data from the TAMS (Traffic Accident Management System), which were collected by the Seoul National Police Agency was used. The data were divided into vehicle, people, and condition of road. The analytical model used here was the Logistic Regression Model, which is frequently used for traffic safety and accident analysis. This study uses the odds ratio analysis to search for variables related to frozen road traffic accidents in each category. A total of 18 out of 47 variables were found to be the causes of accidents. RESULTS: From the results of the comparative analysis of 18 variables, the category of the condition of the road was found to be the most critical. Contrary to expectations, more accidents occurred in clear weather than in other conditions. Accidents on bridges occurred frequently, and its odds ratio was the highest compared with other road types. When BPT is operated, the probability of accidents on frozen roads is lower than in general conditions, and accidents occurred frequently on roads with less than four lanes. CONCLUSIONS : Based on the results of this study, suggestions for reducing the risk of future domestic road accidents in freezing conditions are indicated as follows. First, it is necessary to perform a technical review of the urban road traffic accidents caused by frozen roads. Second, it is necessary to establish criteria for the study of the road environment based on the major causes of road accidents on frozen roads. Third, improvements in urban road environmental factors should be made.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.147-165
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• 2009

Virtual community(VC) will increasingly be organized as commercial enterprises, with the objective of earning an attractive financial return by providing members with valuable resources and environment. For example, Cyworld.com in Korea uses several community services to enable customers of Cyworld to take control of their own value as potential purchasers of products and services. Although initial adoption is important for online network service success, it does not necessarily result in the desired managerial performance unless the initial usage is continuously related to the continuous usage and purchase. Particularly, the customer who receives relevant online services and is well equipped with online network services, will trust the online service provider and perceive less risk and experience more activities such as continuous usage and purchase. Thus, how to promote continued online service usage or, alternatively, how to prevent discontinuance is a critical issue for VC service providers to consider. By aggregating a wide range of information and online environments for customers and providing trust to its members, the service providers of virtual communities help to reduce the perceived risk of continuous usage and purchase. Drill down, online service managers realize that achieving strong and sustained customers who continuously use online service and purchase on it is crucial. Therefore, the research into this online service continuance will identify the relationship between the initial usage and the continuous usage and purchase. The research of continuous usage or post adoption has recently emerged as an important issue in the IS literature. Individuals' information systems(IS) continuous usage decisions are congruent with consumers' repeat purchase decisions. The TAM(Technology Acceptance Model) paradigm has been strongly confirmed across a wide range from product purchase on EC to online service usage contexts. The analysis of IS usage based on TAM has proven to be successful across almost online service contexts. However, most of previous studies have focused on only an area (i.e., VC or EC). Just little research has tried to analyze the relationship between VC and EC. The effect of some factors on user intention, captured through several theories such as TAM, has been demonstrated. Yet, few studies have explored the salient relationships of VC users' EC acceptance. To fill this gap between VC and EC research, this paper attempts to develop a research model that extends the TAM perspective in view of the additional contributions of trust in the service provider and trust in members on some factors that affect EC and VC adoption. In this extension, we applied the TAM-to-TAM(T2T) model, and analyzed the transfer effect of trust between these two TAMs. The research model was empirically tested on the context of a social network service. The model was to extend TAM with the trust concept for the virtual community environment from the perspective of tasks. By building an extended model of TAM and examining the relationships between trust and the existing variables of TAM, it is aimed to explain a user's continuous intention to use VC and purchase on EC. The unit of analysis in this paper is an individual user of a virtual community. The population of interest is the individual with the experiences in virtual community. The data for this paper was made available via a Web survey of VC users. In total, 281 cases were gathered for about one week, but there were some missing values in the sample and there were some inappropriate cases. Thus, only 248 cases were finally analyzed. We chose the structural equation analysis to test the hypotheses and it is better suited for explaining complex relationships than the other methods. In this test, AMOS was used to test the Structural Equation Model (SEM). Noticeable results have been found in the T2T model regarding the factors affecting the intention to use of virtual community and loyalty. Our result showed that trust transfer plays a key role in forming the two adoption beliefs. Overall, this study preliminarily confirms the salience of trust transfer in online service.