• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 2020

Objectives: This study intends to evaluate the ecological risk of lead (Pb), arsenic (As), and their compounds according to the 2010 action plan on inventory and management for national priority chemicals and provide calculations of risks to the environment. By doing so, we aim to inform risk management measures for the target chemicals. Methods: We conducted species sensitivity distribution (SSD) analysis using the collected ecotoxicity data and obtained predicted no effect concentrations (PNECs) for the in-water environment using a hazardous concentration of 5% (HC5) protective of most species (95%) in the environment. Based on the calculated PNECs for aquatic organisms, PNEC values for soil and sediment were calculated using the partition coefficient. We also calculated predicted exposure concentration (PEC) from nation-wide environmental monitoring data and then the hazard quotient (HQ) was calculated using PNEC for environmental media. Results: Ecological toxicity data was categorized into five groups and five species for Pb and four groups and four species for As. Based on the HC5 values from SSD analysis, the PNEC value for aquatic organisms was calculated as 0.40 ㎍/L for Pb and 0.13 ㎍/L for As. PNEC values for soil and sediment calculated using a partition coefficient were 77.36 and 350.50 mg/kg for Pb and 24.20 and 112.75 mg/kg for As. The analysis of national environmental monitoring data showed that PEC values in water were 0.284 ㎍/L for Pb and 0.024 ㎍/L for As, while those in soil and sediment were respectively 45.9 and 44 mg/kg for Pb, and 11.40 and 19.80 mg/kg for As. Conclusions: HQs of Pb and As were 0.70 and 0.18 in water, while those in soil and sediment were 0.59 and 0.13 for Pb and 0.47 and 0.18 for As. With HQs <1 of lead and arsenic in the environment, their ecological risk levels are found to be low.

• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Health Society Conference
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• 2004.06a
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• pp.173-177
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• 2004

The acute toxicities of two major anti-pathogenic veterinary medicines, i.e., ciprofloxacin and enrofloxacin, and six benzimidazole anthelmintics, i.e., albendazole, thiabendazole, flubendazole, febantel, fenbendazole, and oxfendazole, were evaluated with a marine bacterium, Vibrio fischeri, and invertebrate Daphnia magna. These veterinary medical products have been widely used for farm animals, but their impact on aquatic fauna has seldom been investigated. In general, daphnids responded as much as 3 orders of magnitude more sensitively to the tested pharmaceuticals than the microbes. For Daphnia, the most toxic product among the tested anthelmintics was fenbendazole, followed by flubendazole > albendazole ${\approx}$ febantel > thiabendazole > oxfendazole. Daphnids' EC50 values obtained from 48 to 96 hrs of fenbendazole exposure ranged from 2.7 to 6.3 ug/L. The mixture toxicity of the test pharmaceuticals was generally additive in nature and was well predicted by a concentration addition model. Using the predicted no effect concentrations (PNECs) of the benzimidazole derivatives estimated from this study, and predicted environmental concentrations (PECs) of these pharmaceuticals, the risk quotients of each anthelmintics were calculated. Most of the test anthelmintic compounds resulted in risk quotients greater than 1. Especially, risk quotient for fenbendazole was 2,791, which strongly indicates this compound might cause severe ecological consequences, should no future action be taken. This study is the first report on the aquatic toxicities and potential ecological risk of major anthelmintic and antimicrobial veterinary products in Korea. The result of this study provides information necessary for conducting more detailed ecological risk assessment of pharmaceutical products in ambient water and guiding proper management decision.

• Advances in environmental research
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.41-54
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• 2020

Industrialization and urbanization are modern need and trends. Such trends affect the natural ecosystem of rivers. Indian rivers face such problems in a high ratio. The aim of this study is to investigate the cause and amount of pollution in a tributary river Krishni. Pre-monsoon sampling of Krishni river water was performed as per APHA standard. Water samples were collected from different sites of Krishni river. Physiochemical parameters as well as trace elements concentrations have been analysed and results were compared with BIS-2012, WHO-2017 and EPA-2001 recommendations. The presence of high BOD, COD, TDS and others physiochemical parameters along with heavy metals reveals that tributary is highly polluted owing to industrial and domestic discharge either directly or through drains. High values of these parameters are harmful for the ecological health of the river because it makes survival of aquatic flora and fauna at risk. On the basis of the results obtained by the present study, it was concluded that level of the pollution in river Krishni is at alarming phase, where if strong action for the rejuvenation of river not takes place, river becomes a dead pool.

• Journal of Navigation and Port Research
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.199-207
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• 2015

In ports of Korea, the marine traffic flow is congested due to a large number of vessels coming in and going out. In order to improve the safety and efficiency of these vessels, South Korea is operating with a Vessel Traffic Service System, which is monitoring its waters for 24 hours. However despite these efforts of the VTS (Vessel Traffic Service) officers, collisions are occurring continuously, the risk situation is analyzed that occurs once in about 20 minutes, the risk may be greater. It investigated to reduce these accidents by providing a safety standard for collision danger in a timely manner. Thus, this study has developed a risk prediction module to predict risk in advance. This module can avoid collision risk to adjust the speed and course of ship using a risk evaluation model based on ship operator's risk perspective. Using this module, the ship operators and VTS officers can easily be identified risks in complex traffic situations, so they can take an appropriate action against danger in near future including course and speed change. To verify the effectiveness of this module, this paper predicted the risk of each encounter situation and confirmed to be capable of identifying a risk changes in specific course and speed changes at Busan coastal water.

• International Journal of Quality Innovation
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.22-40
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• 2008

Unnatural working postures usually cause musculoskeletal problems for workers in work field, especially in traditional industry. Many analysis and survey methodologies have been developed to identify unnatural postures and disorder risks in workplaces. The Ovako Working Posture Analyzing System (OWAS) and Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire (NMQ) are the representative methods and applied widely. This study applied the both tools to investigate the work field of a manufacturing factory of the water heater's case. We divided the manufacturing process into nine workshops, took the pictures of working motions by DV camera and analyzed the postures on OWAS. From the OW AS results, we could identify the risks level of musculoskeletal symptoms as four Action Categories (AC). And from the comparison of OWAS and NMQ results, we could provide the suggestions to improve the working methods and environment. From the results of OWAS, we found that the operators' head/neck and back were above AC3 in some workshops. If the situation continued in long period, the operators might have the risk to get musculoskeletal symptoms. From the investigation of NMQ, we also found that the percentage of aches on neck, shoulders and lower back were higher than other parts of body. The correlation between aches and jobs was more than 75%. So we provided some suggestions to improve: work rotation and adjustment of work surface/height to fit in with Ergonomics. Then the risks of musculoskeletal symptoms would be reduced.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.823-829
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• 2002

The thrombosis importantly came to the front as the risk factor of these circulation system's disease. SilsoSanGami(SSG) was used for investigating the inhibitory effect on platelet-activating factor-induced platelet aggregation about drugs that used to improvement various symptoms created by the thrombosis in oriental medicine. In this study, the water-extracted SSG was investigated for its possible antithrombotic action on platelets. The antithrombotic activity of water-extracted SSG was deduced from its ability to suppress platelet aggregation, ATP-exocytosis, and the generation of prostaglandin E₂ and thromboxane A₂ by human platelets, stimulated with arachidonic acid. Water-extracted SSG dose-dependently suppressed the aggregation of human platelets, the release of endogenous ATP, and the formation of PGE₂ and TXB₂, both the latter usually detected to estimate the activity of COX and TXS, respectively. Since the IC/sub 50/ values necessary to inhibit COX (115 ㎍/㎖ SSG) and TXS(74 ㎍/㎖ SSG) were in the same range, inhibition of COX is suggested to be the primary target of water-extracted SSG, thus suppressing the formation of PGE₂ which is metabolized by TXS to TXA₂. We considerated that SSG has practical applicational value of clinical trial in the thrombosis caused by platelet aggregation.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.295-306
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• 2009

The risk assessment of groundwater and soil in Sasang industrial complex in Busan Metropolitan City was carried out in order to estimate risks to human health and the environment. The carcinogenic risk (CR) of receptors to soil and air was not identified. However, the CRs for TCE and PCE were 6.7E-6 and 1.0E-5, respectively. Hazard quotient (HQ) and hazard index (HI) did not appear through air exposure pathways. Yet the HQ and HI of soil were 3.4E-5 and 5E-5, respectively, and lower than the critical value (1.0). On the contrary, HQ and HI with respect to groundwater were calculated as 0.7 (not hazardous) and 1.4 (hazardous). The constituent reduction factor (CRF) for TCE in the study area was determined as 2.5, and thus remediation work is demanded. As a result of sensitivity analysis for 18 exposure factors, eight exposure factors (life time of carcinogens, age, body weight, exposure duration, exposure frequency, dermal exposure frequency, water ingestion rate, and soil ingestion rate) varied with the variation of risk.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.136-143
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• 2018

In this study, we conducted a pilot study on the multiple spurious operations (MSO) analysis in the fire probabilistic safety assessment (PSA) of domestic nuclear power plant (NPP) to identify the degree of influence of the operator actions used in the MSO mitigation strategies. The MSO scenario of the domestic reference NPP selected for this study is refueling water tank (RWT) drain down event. It could be caused by spurious operations of the containment spray system (CSS) of the reference NPP. The RWT drain down event can be stopped by the main control room (MCR) operator actions for stopping the operation of CSS pump or closing the CSS motor operated valve if the containment spray actuation signal (CSAS) is spuriously actuated. Outside the MCR, it can be stopped by operator actions for closing the CSS manual valves or motor operated valve or stopping the operation of CSS pump. The quantification result of a fire PSA model that takes into account all recovery actions for the RWT drain down event lead to risk reduction by about 95%, compared with quantification result of fire PSA model without considering them. Among the various operator actions, the recovery action for the spurious CSAS operations and the operator action for the manual valve are identified as the most important operator actions. This study quantitatively showed the extent to which the operator actions used as MSO countermeasures have affected the fire PSA quantification results. In addition, we can see the rank of importance among the operator recovery actions in quantitative terms.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.121-126
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• 2007

Obesity is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease. In our case study using animal models for disease states such as obesity or hypertension, we found that, Isaria sinclairii remarkably reduced body weight and ameliorated metabolic abnormalities in Zucker and SHR rats. Genetically obese (fa/fa) Zucker rats were one animal model chosen for this study. Four groups of rats received a standard diet and were treated orally with the following test samples daily for 8 weeks: saline (negative control), ethanol extracts of I. sinclairii, hot water extract of I. sinclairii, or $Xenical^{(R)}$ (30 mg/kg, positive control). Mild reductions (6.3%) in body weight gain were observed in the groups treated with the hot water extract of I. sinclairii compared to the control after 8 weeks. Interestingly, organ weight was greatly reduced by this Dongchunghacho (I. sinclairii), in parallel with the mild reductions in body weight gain and reductions in abdominal fat (adipose tissue). Also observed was a 4.1 % decrease in the ratio of heart weight/body weight compared to the control group. As a hypertensive animal model, SHR (spontaneously hypertensive rat) and WKY (Wistar Kyoto) rats were also administered these extracts for one month. Treatment with the hot water extract of I. sinclairii caused greater reductions in body weight gain for the SHR group (10.9%) compared to the WKY group's (5.2%). Based on these results, I. sinclairii extracts contain selective action for anti-obesity activity, naturally occurring candidate for regulation of body weight increase, as demonstrated in the present study.

• Advances in Traditional Medicine
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.8-17
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• 2003

Water extract (kwath) of six different widely used Ayurvedic medicinal plants were tested in mice for possible neuropharmacological efficacy. In the present experiments it was observed that a number of plant tested causes a significant level of Central Nervous System (CNS) depression, in that it significantly decreased the spontaneous Motor activity, and also lowered the exploratory behavior of the treated animals. Terminalia chebula (HAA), Terminalia bellerica (BHA), Emblica officinalis (AA), Piper longum 1. (PP). exhibited depressant action of on the CNS. Apart from them a mild to moderate degree of depression was evident as a consequence of administration of Zingiber officinale Rosc (SUT), Piper nigrum L. (MRC). However, none of the plant tested did not exhibit significant effects on pentobarbital induced narcosis, and this indicated that the sedating effects of the drug was not associated with the risk of fatal consequences on overdose.