• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.82-91
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• 2023

The children who are part of this study are compelled to wear masks at educational facilities for an extended period of time as they continue to be exposed to Asian dust, fine dust, and COVID-19. However, use of masks is currently causing them a lot of inconvenience. This study aimed to gather basic data for the development of a mask that is suitable and comfortable for children to wear. A total of 331 children aged 1 to 9 were investigated through their parents in terms of their lifestyle, mask wearing and purchasing status, mask preferences, mask inconvenience, and mask improvement. According to the survey on mask use, the proportion of children aged 1-3 years old and wearing ultra-small/XS masks, 4-6 year olds wearing small/S, and 7-9 year olds wearing small/S was the highest. More than 80% of children were wearing masks with a standard filter of KF80 or higher. The purchase criteria for children's masks were found to be excellent in terms of wearing comfort and meeting the filter standards. According to the survey on inconvenience of wearing masks, the majority of those surveyed expressed the need to develop children's masks of different sizes. Furthermore, they experienced various kinds of inconveniences from adult masks, such as the material quality and length of earring bands; it was deduced that these aspects need to be taken care of. The vertical folding type was the most popular in the mask design for children. Children have to wear masks for a prolonged period of time, but they are experiencing lot of inconvenience, which need to be addressed.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.265-269
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• 2020

Korea has failed to respond to the Middle East respiratory syndrome of 2015 and the early phase of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) of 2020. This is due to the structural problems of the Ministry of Health and Welfare that has been more increased manpower and budgets of the welfare part relative to those of the health part, and the ministers were appointed welfare experts, not health experts. In 21 (56.8%) of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries, the Ministry of Health operates independently, and these countries have been relatively well coping with COVID-19. The importance of the Korean health sector is increasing even further. Korea faces on the emerging infectious diseases, chronic infectious diseases such as tuberculosis that has been being a huge burden, and rapidly increasing non-communicable diseases, suicide and mental disorders, and some diseases due to fine dust and climate change. In addition, the rapid advancement of the aging society, the entry of an era of ultra-low fertility and low-economic growth, and the unification of the Korean peninsula are calling for a health policy reform. Therefore, the Ministry of Health should be established and systematically responsible for health policy, disease policy, medical policy, and medical security policy. Ministry of Health will be the control tower for K-Disease Control, K-Bio, and K-Health.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.545-564
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• 2016

Recently as fine and ultra fine particles become major environmental issues in Korea, it is very important to develop effective solutions to air pollution. Accordingly this study aims at detecting causes of air pollution by using models and examining if diesel price increases contribute to reduction of diesel consumption and air pollution. TSP, PM10, $NO_X$, $SO_X$, CO, and VOC are included as major air pollutants. As a result, we found invert U shape curve between pollution and income for all air pollutants except CO. Consumer price index, coal power capacity, diesel consumption, frequency of yellow dust, number of natural gas buses, number of transport business, annual average temperature, number of manufacturing businesses are also influential in explaining causes of air pollution. As diesel price increases by 1%, air pollutants decline between 0.07~0.12% in the short run. Simultaneously, the additional revenue from increases in diesel prices might be transferred to support expansion of biofuel market. Also, stronger policy should be developed to mitigate the current air pollution problem.

• Journal of the Architectural Institute of Korea Structure & Construction
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.61-68
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• 2018

Recently, concentration of fine and ultra-fine particulate matter(PM) has been increased in KOREA. The increase of PM in KOREA is due to increase of domestic industries and yellow dust from china. PM is known to cause diseases such as dyspnoea, asthma, arrhythmia. Since PM is harmful to human, KOREA Ministry of Environment(ME) warns people to stay indoors when the outdoor PM concentration is high. However, prior studies has shown that indoor PM concentration can be relatively high when outdoor PM concentration is high due to infiltration of PM into buildings though leakage areas. In this study, airtightness, indoor and outdoor pressure difference and PM 2.5 & 10 concentration were measured in an apartment complex to observe PM infiltrating into building. Field measurement was conducted in newly-built apartment buildings to avoid the influence of indoor PM which can be generated by residents. The airtightness test was conducted to identify the leakage areas of the apartment, such as electric outlets and supply/exhaust diffusers. The airtightness test result showed that the air leakage area of the building was dominant in buildings envelop. According to indoor and outdoor pressure difference measurement result and PM concentration measurement result, it can be concluded that outdoor PM can infiltrate into indoor by leakage areas when wind is blown toward the apartment. As a result, pressure difference formed by the external weather condition and architectural characteristics such as the airtightness in building can influence PM to infiltrate into buildings. In further studies, I/O ratio, stack-effect, infiltration and penetration factor will be considered.

• Horticultural Science & Technology
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.605-617
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• 2015

The ultimate goal of this research is to develop a botanical biofiltration system that combines a green interior, biofiltering, and automatic irrigation to purify indoor air pollutants according to indoor space and the size of biofilter. This study was performed to compare the stability of air flow characteristics and removal efficiency (RE) of fine dust within a wall-typed (vertical) botanical biofilter depending on humidifying cycle and to investigate RE of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) by the biofilter. The biofilter used in this experiment was designed as an integral form of water metering pump, water tank, blower, humidifier, and multi-level planting space in order to be suitable for indoor space utilization. As a result, relative humidity, air temperature, and soil moisture content (SMC) within the biofilter showed stable values regardless of three different humidifying cycles operated by the metering pump. In particular, SMCs were consistently maintained in the range of 27.1-29.7% during all humidifying cycles; moreover, a humidifying cycle of operating for 15 min and pausing for 45 min showed the best horizontal linear regression (y = 0.0008x + 29.09) on SMC ($29.0{\pm}0.2%$) during 120 hour. REs for number of fine dust (PM10) and ultra-fine dust (PM2.5) particles passed through the biofilter were in the range of 82.7-89.7% and 65.4-73.0%, respectively. RE for weight of PM10 passed through the biofilter was in the range of 58.1-78.9%, depending on humidifying cycle. REs of xylene, ethyl benzene, total VOCs (TVOCs), and toluene passed through the biofilter were in the range of 71.3-75.5%, while REs of benzene and formaldehyde (HCHO) passed through the biofilter were 39.7% and 44.9%, respectively. Hence, it was confirmed that the wall-typed botanical biofilter suitable for indoor plants was very effective for indoor air purification.

• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.47-57
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• 2015

The size fractionated atmospheric aerosols have been collected at Gosan site of Jeju Island during 2010~2011, and then their characteristics of acidification and neutralization have been investigated. The anthropogenic $NH_4{^+}$ and nss-$SO_4{^{2-}}$ showed high concentrations mostly at ultra-fine particle mode of $0.7{\sim}1.1{\mu}m$, but they also had a bimodal distribution showing high concentrations at coarse particle mode of $4.7{\sim}5.8{\mu}m$ during Asian Dust periods. The concentrations of nss-$Ca^{2+}$ and $NO_3{^-}$ were relatively high at coarse particle mode of $3.3{\sim}4.7{\mu}m$, especially $NO_3{^-}$ showed high concentrations with a bimodal pattern at both fine and coarse particle modes. The acidification of atmospheric aerosols at Gosan area was contributed mostly by inorganic sulfuric and nitric acids, while the contribution by organic formic and acetic acids was only 1.6~6.4%. Furthermore, the neutralization of acidic species among atmospheric aerosols was performed mostly by $NH_3$, $CaCO_3$ and $MgCO_3$, especially the neutralization by $NH_3$ was high in fine particle mode, while that by $CaCO_3$ was relatively high in coarse particle mode.

• The Journal of the Institute of Internet, Broadcasting and Communication
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.181-187
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• 2021

Recently, various air pollution factors have been measured and analyzed to reduce damages caused by it. In this process, many missing values occur due to various causes. To compensate for this, basically a vast amount of training data is required. This paper proposes a statistical techniques that effectively compensates for missing values generated in the process of measuring ozone, carbon dioxide, and ultra-fine dust using a small amount of learning data. The proposed algorithm first extracts a group of meteorological data that is expected to have positive effects on the correction of missing values through statistical information analysis such as the correlation between meteorological data and air pollution level factors, p-value, etc. It is a technique that efficiently and effectively compensates for missing values by analyzing them. In order to confirm the performance of the proposed algorithm, we analyze its characteristics through various experiments and compare the performance of the well-known representative algorithms with ours.

• Journal of the Society of Cosmetic Scientists of Korea
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• v.47 no.3
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• pp.237-245
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• 2021

Particulate matter and ultra-particle matters generally refer to very small floating dust, such as 1/6 to 1/7 and 1/20 to 1/30, respectively, compared to the thickness of human hair, and contain various types of heavy metal ions. In addition to breathing, particle matters (PM) that flows in through the gaps in the pores of the skin can induce health problems in the body's tissues and skin, so it must be removed by blocking the inflow or by washing. Through this study, we confirmed the possibility that heavy metal ions can be adsorbed and removed by using Oryza sativa (Rice) bran oil (OSBO). In addition, the cell viability is much higher than that of grain-derived components through cytotoxicity experiments, and the cytoprotective effect of an external stimulus source can be expected. It was confirmed that the expression amount of COL1A1 mRNA increased, and accordingly, it was believed that wrinkles that might be caused by moisture lost by heavy metal ions in fine dust could be alleviated. Based on the results of these experiments, we tried to present a cosmetics containing OSBO, which is a wash-off formulation, in order to finally remove heavy metals.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.301-311
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• 2015

Objectives: Operators of overhead traveling crane in a ship assembly factory perform work to transmit large vessel blocks to an appropriate working process. Hazardous matters such as metal dusts, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, ozone, loud noise and fine particles are generated by variable working activities in the factory. The operators could be exposed to the hazardous matters during the work. In particular, welding fumes comprised of ultra fine particles and heavy metals is extremely hazardous for humans when exposing a pulmonary through respiratory pathway. Occupational lung diseases related to welding fumes are increasingly on an upward tendency. Therefore, the objective of this study is to assess properly unknown occupational exposure to the welding fumes among the operators. Methods: This study intended to clearly determine an equivalence check whether or not chemical constituents and composition of the dusts, which existed in the driver's cab, matched up with generally known welding fumes. Furthermore, computational fluid dynamics program(CFD) was used to identify a ventilation assessment in respect of a contamination distribution of welding fumes in the air. The operators were investigated to assess personal exposure levels of welding fumes and respirable particulate. Results: The dust in an operation room were the same constituents and composition as welding fumes. Welding fumes, which caused by the welding in a floor of the factory, arose with an ascending air current up to a roof and then stayed for a long time. They were considered to be exposed to the welding fumes in the operation room. The personal exposure levels of welding fumes and respirable particulate were 0.159(n=8, range=0.073-0.410) $mg/m^3$ and 0.138(n=8, range=0.087-0.178) $mg/m^3$, respectively. They were lower than a threshold limit value level($5mg/m^3$) of welding fumes. Conclusions: These findings indicate that an occupational exposure to welding fumes can exist among the operators. Consequently, we need to be keeping the operators under a constant assessment in the operator process of overhead traveling crane.

• Journal of the Korean Association of Geographic Information Studies
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.1-17
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• 2022

This study analyzed the PM_2.5 pattern by using data measured for one year from June 2020 to May 2021 by 21 low-cost sensors installed near the Changwon National Industrial Complex in Changwon, Gyeongsangnam-do. For the PM_2.5 pattern, the land use types around the measuring points and meteorological factors such as air temperature and wind speed were considered. The PM_2.5 concentration was high from November to March in winter, and from 1 to 9 in the morning and early in the morning by time zone. The concentration of PM_2.5 was higher as it got closer to the industrial area, but the concentration was lower in the residential area and public facility area. In terms of meteorological factors, the higher the air temperature and wind speed, the lower the concentration of PM_2.5. As a result of this study, it was possible to identify the PM_2.5 patter near Changwon National Industrial Complex. This result will be useful data that can be used in urban and environmental planning to improve air quality including PM_2.5 in urban area in the future.