• Proceedings of the KSEEG Conference
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• 2007.04a
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• pp.339-341
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• 2007

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• Proceedings of the KSEEG Conference
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• 2001.04a
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• pp.42-45
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• 2001

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2011

Although Nepal is naturally bestowed with ample water resources, not all of the population has access to safe and clean drinking water. Waste water treatment is almost nonexistent. In the recent days the flow of population in the urban areas has increased the existing challenges of providing safe water and promoting sanitation. The prevalence of water borne diseases is high. This paper presents overview of issues like water pollution, arsenic contamination of drinking water, waste water treatment and effects of water contamination on public health. Comparison between waste water treatment regulations in South Korea and Nepal has also been made. Implementation strategies to tackle the existing water related problem for promoting public health is also recommended.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.1647-1654
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• 2008

The characteristics of arsenic(As) contamination were investigated on soils of 3 abandoned metal mine sites in Gangwon-do, Korea. Total forty nine soils were sampled to conduct standard methods(extraction by 1HCl), sequential extraction and column leaching test. Concentration of As extracted by 1N HCl was ordered as follows: A mine > B mine > C mine, and the concentration of arsenic in the soils of A mine was significantly greater than that at any other cases and all samples of A mine were exceeded the national regulation of $6mg \;kg^{-1}$. In the results of sequential extraction, the potential contamination risk for groundwater and plants was ordered as follows: C mine > B mine > A mine because the C mine showed the relatively greater mobility and bioavailability of fraction than any other mines. And, in colume test, concentration of As was ordered as follows: C mine > B mine > A mine, and it was expected that these results were connected with fraction characteristics of the mine sites. Therefore adequate leaching investigations should be used to simulate the effect of natural leaching conditions, and to predict both the potential mobility of metals to groundwater and their bioavailability to plants under natural conditions.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.1-5
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• 2018

Arsenic (As) is one of the elements having most harmful impact on the human health. Arsenic is a known carcinogen and arsenic contamination of drinking water is affecting on humans in many regions of the world. Adsorption has been proved most preferable technique for the removal of arsenic. Many researchers have studied various types of solid materials as arsenic adsorbent, and iron oxide and its modified forms are considered as the most effective adsorbent in terms of adsorption capacity, recovery, and economics. However, most of all iron oxides have small surface area in comparing with common adsorbents in environmental application such as activated carbon but the activated carbon has weak sorption affinity for arsenic. We have used an activated carbon as base adsorbent and iron oxide coating on the activated carbon as high affinity sorption sites and giving magnetic attraction ability. In this study, adsorption properties of arsenic and magnetic separation efficiency of the magnetized activated carbon (MAC) were evaluated with variable iron oxide content. As the iron oxide content of the MAC increased, adsorption capacity has also gradually increased up to a point where clogging by iron oxide in the pore of activated carbon compensate the increased sorption capacity. The increase of iron oxide content of the MAC also affected magnetic properties, which resulted in greater magnetic separation efficiency. Current results show that magnetically modified common adsorbent can be an efficiency improved adsorbent and a feasible environmental process if it is combined with the magnetic separation.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.641-648
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• 2013

Arsenic (As) contamination in drinking water is severe problem for about 100 million people who live in Bangladesh, Cambodia, Nepal, India, Vietnam, Myanmar, Mongolia, and Ethiopia etc. Chronic doses cause skin cancer, blackfoot disease, and cardiac damage. Even though the biosand filter (BSF) is popular in many developing countries, it could not remove effectively hazardous ions as As. Adsorbent is effective and feasible to reduce As. In this study the improved biosand filter (iBSF) was embedded with adsorbent, was tested to evaluate As removal as well as organic removal. In 20 days removal of turbidity, bacteria, and $UV_{254}$ have shown 60-95 % removal. Arsenic was removed more than 99.9 % in the columns embedded with silica oxides of ferric manganese ($FM{\alpha}$) while 5.8 ~ 38.3 % in columns without $FM{\alpha}$. Isotherm test showed that average amount of the adsorbed arsenic on the oxides was 0.56 mg/G.

• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
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• v.51 no.1
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• pp.1-9
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• 2023

Arsenic (As), which is ubiquitous throughout the environment, represents a major environmental threat at higher concentration and poses a global public health concern in certain geographic areas. Most of the conventional arsenic remediation techniques that are currently in use have certain limitations. This situation necessitates a potential remediation strategy, and in this regard bioremediation technology is increasingly important. Being the oldest representativse of life on Earth, microbes have developed various strategies to cope with hostile environments containing different toxic metals or metalloids including As. Such conditions prompted the evolution of numerous genetic systems that have enabled many microbes to utilize this metalloid in their metabolic activities. Therefore, within a certain scope bacterial isolates could be helpful for sustainable management of As-contamination. Research interest in microbial As(III) oxidation has increased recently, as oxidation of As(III) to less hazardous As(V) is viewed as a strategy to ameliorate its adverse impact. In this review, the novelty of As(III) oxidation is highlighted and the implication of As(III)-oxidizing microbes in environmental management and their prospects are also discussed. Moreover, future exploitation of As(III)-oxidizing bacteria, as potential plant growth-promoting bacteria, may add agronomic importance to their widespread utilization in managing soil quality and yield output of major field crops, in addition to reducing As accumulation and toxicity in crops.

• Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.153-160
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• 1993

Health complaints among vinylhouse workers in Sungjoo county, Kyungpook province led to the investigation of heavy metal levels of air, soil and humans as well as physical conditions of the vinylhouse. The average temperature and humidity inside the vinylhouse were 8 higher and 10% point lower, respectively, as compared to the outside. While discomfort index(D. I.) outside was pleasant level(69.2), D. I. inside was 82 at which point 100% of people feels discomfort. Cadmium concentration of soils inside the vinylhouse(0.116 mg/kg) was 1.8 times higher than the soils outside. Arsenic concentration of soils inside the vinylhouse(4.882 mg/kg) was only slightly higher than the soils outside(4.182 ng/kg). However, both heavy metal concentrations detected in soils inside or outside the vinylhouse were within the normal range. Analysis of 10 air samples taken inside the vinylhouse showed that only one sample had a cadmium concentration above the detectable level and the rest of samples were below the detectable levels. While there were no difference of arsenic concentrations in urine between male and female, cadmium concentrations in urine samples of female (3.31 ug/l) was slightly higher than male(2.38 ug/l). Age-dependent increases of cadmium concentrations in urine samples were also observed. However, there was no concentration difference of these heavy metals in urine between vinylhouse workers and non-vinylhouse workers. Urine concentrations of cadmium and arsenic detected from vinylhouse workers or non-vinylhouse workers were within the normal range. The present study represents a first attempt to evaluate physical and environmental risk factors of the vinylhouse affecting the vinylhouse farmer's health. The study revealed that, while physical conditions of the vinylhouse such as temperature and humidity are the possible factors associated with the farmer's complaints, environmental contamination as judged from heavy metal levels in soil, air and humans is not a risk factor contributing to the vinylhouse farmer's health problem.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.245-251
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• 2013

BACKGROUND: The objectives of this study are to investigate the contamination levels of heavy metals in soil, ground water, and agricultural product near the abandoned Boeun and Sanggok mine areas in Korea and to assess the health risk for these local residents exposed to the toxic heavy metals based on analytical data. METHODS AND RESULTS: By the results of human health risk assessment for local residents around Boeun and Sanggok, human exposure to cadmium, copper, arsenic from soil and to lead, cadmium, and arsenic from rice grain were higher in Sanggok, but human exposure to zinc and arsenic from ground water was higher in Boeun. By the results of hazard index (HI) evaluation for arsenic, cadmium, copper, lead, and zinc, HI values in both areas were higher than 1.0. This result indicated that the toxicity hazard through the continuous exposure to lead, cadmium, arsenic from rice, ground water, and soil would be likely to occur to the residents in the areas. Cancer risk assessment for arsenic, risks from the rice were exposed to one to two out of 10,000 people in Boeun and one of 1,000 people in Sanggok. These results showed that the cancer risks of arsenic in both areas were 10~100 times greater than the acceptable cancer risk range of US EPA ($1{\times}10^{-6}{\sim}1{\times}10^{-5}$). CONCLUSION(S): Therefore, if these two local residents consume continuously with arsenic contaminated soil, ground water, and rice, the adverse health effects (carcinogenic potential) would be more increased.

• Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.54 no.4
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• pp.561-567
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• 2021

The edible sargasso seaweed hijiki Sargassum fusiforme is known to have high concentration of arsenic, which is a threat to human health, particularly due to inorganic arsenic. In this study, various methods were used to remove inorganic arsenic from steamed hijiki concentrate. The highest concentration of arsenate [As(V)] in both raw and processed hijiki during steamed hijiki manufacturing process was within the range of 8.213-14.356 mg/kg, and it is a potential source of inorganic arsenic, which can result in re-contamination and cause environmental pollution. The removal efficiencies of the various removal methods were within the range of 57.3-83.4%, and 19.0% reduction was achieved using activated carbon and alginate bead. Further, activated carbon showed the best adsorption effect of inorganic arsenic. Therefore, we suggest that activated carbon is a suitable efficient method for removing inorganic arsenic and has low operational costs in field applicability.