• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.308-314
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• 2011

It has been shown that circadian genes not only play an important role on circadian rhythms, but also participate in other physiological and pathological activities, such as drug dependence, cancer development and radiation injury. The Per2, an indispensable component of the circadian clock, not only modulates circadian oscillations, but also regulates organic function. In the present study, we applied mPER2-upregulated NIH3T3 cells to reveal the relationship of mPer2 and the cells damaged by ultraviolet C (UVC). NIH3T3 cells at the peak of the expression of mPer2 induced by phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate (PMA) demonstrated little damage by UVC evaluated by MTT assay, cell growth curves and cell colony-forming assay, compared with that at the nadir of the expression of mPer2. Overexpression of mPER2, accompanied p53 upregulated, also demonstrated protective effect on NIH3T3 cells damaged by UVC. These results suggest that mPer2 plays a protective effect on cells damaged by UVC, whose mechanism may be involved in upregulated p53.

• Sleep Medicine and Psychophysiology
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.77-83
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• 2016

Objectives: The present study investigated current practices of insomnia treatment among Korean doctors in clinical settings. Methods: A total of 100 doctors participated in the present study and filled out a series of survey questions regarding their treatment of insomnia patients. Results: The results revealed that the primary type of insomnia treatment was pharmacological and that the most popular medication was zolpidem. The majority of doctors reported that they also utilized non-pharmacological treatments such as sleep hygiene education and cognitive-behavioral therapy. However, these treatments tended to result in low satisfaction. In addition, the doctors perceived that patients largely preferred pharmacological treatments to non-pharmacological ones and did not have sufficient knowledge of non-pharmacological treatments. Conclusion: Many doctors believed that non-pharmacological treatments for insomnia were important, but reported that they were difficult to implement in practice. The results of this study suggest that improved medical conditions for non-pharmacological treatments and education of physicians are necessary to appropriately treat insomnia.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.35 no.5
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• pp.169-176
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• 2014

As body postures on bed affects various sleep related diseases, it is considered as important information when monitoring sleeping in daily life. Though there have already been a few approaches to monitor body postures on bed conventionally, the development for simple and unconstrained methods is still needed to realize the long-term daily monitoring. Focusing on the fact that ballistocardiogram changes depending on the body postures on bed, we developed a novel method to estimate body posturesusing extremely simple, film-type ballistocardiogram sensor which is based on polyvinylidene fluoride(PVDF) film. With 10 subjects, we performed two experiments. One was for an estimation test to show that body postures on bed can be estimated by ballistocardiogram, and the other was for a reproducibility test to present the feasibility of ballistocardiogram based body postures monitoring. To estimate body postures on bed, we made an individual template set of body postures by designating one ballistocardiogram (BCG) sample as a template in each postures. Then, we calculated Pearson's correlation coefficients between a sample and each templates and estimated the body posture of the sample by choosing a posture which corresponds to the most significant correlation coefficients. As a result, we estimated body postures on bed with 99.2% accuracy in average and found that the estimation using ballistocardiogram is reproducible.

• Sleep Medicine and Psychophysiology
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.51-55
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• 2020

In this paper, we reviewed domestic and foreign cases and evaluation methods for validation of sleep products for development of the domestic sleep industry. Foreign companies and organizations are trying to verify products relatively systematically for demonstration purposes, but they are using different methods depending on the institution, and standardized validation guidelines have not been established. In Korea, there has been little evaluation including objective verification for sleep products. Sleep-wake evaluation for validation of sleep products requires expert evaluation of the product and of the product effectiveness by users, and subjective and objective sleep-wake evaluations and circadian rhythm evaluation methods can be used. For more accurate verification, experimental designs such as randomization method, control product utilization method, and cross-experiment design can be used.

• Sleep Medicine and Psychophysiology
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.61-67
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• 2016

Objectives: We aimed to evaluate the effects of mattress type on both objective and subjective sleep quality in healthy good sleepers. Methods: Fifteen healthy good sleepers with a mean age of 30.8 years participated in this study. A randomized crossover trial was carried out using two different mattress types: a standard mattress and a contour coil mattress. After a night of adaptation, all participants were randomized to either a standard mattress or a contour coil mattress. Then, nocturnal polysomnography was conducted for two consecutive nights. Subjective evaluations were obtained using a self-report questionnaire before and after the polysomnographic recording sessions. Results: The polysomnographic showed no differences in total sleep time, sleep stage, or wake time after sleep onset between the two mattress conditions. Of the polysomnographic variables, only sleep onset latency was significantly reduced for the contour coil mattress. Additionally, participants reported better subjective sleep quality when sleeping on the contour coil mattress, according to the questionnaires. Conclusion: The type of mattress might affect not only subjective, but also objective sleep quality, including sleep onset latency.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.211-218
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• 2014

The objective of this research is to develop an automatic algorithm based on electrocardiogram (ECG) to estimate slow-wave sleep (SWS). An algorithm is based on 7 indices extracted from heart rate on ECG which simultaneously recorded with standard full night polysomnography from 31 subjects. Those 7 indices were then applied to independent component analysis to extract a feature that discriminates SWS and other sleep stages. Overall Cohen's kappa, accuracy, sensitivity and specificity of the algorithm to detect 30s epochs of SWS were 0.52, 0.87, 0.70 and 0.90, respectively. The automatic SWS detection algorithm could be useful combining with existing REM and wake estimation technique on unattended home-based sleep monitoring.

• Sleep Medicine and Psychophysiology
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.70-77
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• 2021

Objectives: Our study aims to investigate the clinical and polysomnographic variables associated with subjective sleep perception. Methods: Among the patients who underwent nocturnal polysomnography (PSG) at the Center for Sleep and Chronobiology of Seoul National University Hospital from May 2018 to July 2019, 109 diagnosed with insomnia disorder based on DSM-5 were recruited for the study, and their medical records were retrospectively analyzed. Self-report questionnaires about clinical characteristics including Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI), Beck depression inventory (BDI), and Epworth sleepiness scale (ESS) were completed. Subjective sleep quality was measured using variables of subjective total sleep time (subjective TST), subjective sleep onset latency (subjective SOL), subjective number of awakenings, morning feeling after awakening, and sleep discrepancy (subjective TST-objective TST) the morning after PSG. Pearson and Spearman correlation analyses were used to determine the factors associated with subjective sleep perception. Results: In patients with insomnia, subjective TST was negatively correlated with Wake After Sleep Onset (WASO) (p = 0.001) and N1 sleep (p = 0.039) parameters on polysomnography. Also, it was negatively correlated with PSQI (p < 0.001) and BDI (p = 0.014) scores. Sleep discrepancy was negatively correlated with PSQI score (p = 0.018). Morning feeling was negatively correlated with PSQI (p = 0.019) and BDI (p < 0.001) scores. Conclusion: Our results demonstrated that subjective sleep perception is associated with PSG variables (WASO and N1 sleep) and with PSQI and BDI scores. In clinical practice, it is helpful to assess and manage insomnia patients in consideration of objective sleep variables, subjective sleep quality, and depressed mood, which can influence subjective sleep perception.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.36 no.5
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• pp.204-210
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• 2015

Although many studies have analyzed the relationship between electrodermal activity (EDA) and sleep stages, a practical method for detecting sleep stage using EDA has not been suggested. The aim of this study was to develop an algorithm for real-time automatic detection of deep sleep using the EDA signal. Simultaneously with overnight polysomnography (PSG), continuous measurement of skin conductance on the fingers was performed for ten subjects. The morphometric characteristics in the fluctuations of EDA signal were employed to establish the quantitative criteria for determining deep sleep. The 30-sec epoch-by-epoch comparison between the deep sleep detected by our method and that reported from PSG exhibited an average sensitivity of 74.6%, an average specificity of 98.0%, and an average accuracy of 96.1%. This study may address the growing need for a reliable and simple measure for identifying sleep stage without a PSG.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.544-549
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• 2012

To examine the neuroprotective effects of ginsenoside R0, we investigated the effects of ginsenoside R0 in PC12 cells under an anoxic or oxidative environment with Edaravone as a control. PC12 neuroendocrine cells were used as a model target. Anoxic damage or oxidative damage in PC12 cells were induced by adding sodium dithionite or hydrogen peroxide respectively in cultured medium. Survival ratios of different groups were detected by an AlamarBlue assay. At the same time, the apoptosis of PC12 cells were determined with flow cytometry. The putative neuroprotective effects of ginsenoside R0 is thought to be exerted through enhancing the activity of antioxidant enzymes Superoxide dismutases (SOD). The activity of SOD and the level of malondialdehyde (MDA) and intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS), were measured to evaluate the protective and therapeutic effects of ginsenoside R0. Ginsenoside R0 treated cells had a higher SOD activity, lower MDA level and lower ROS, and their survival ratio was higher with a lower apoptosis rate. It is suggested that ginsenoside R0 has a protective effect in the cultured PC12 cells, and the protection efficiency is higher than Edaravone. The protective mechanisms of these two are different. The prevent ability of ginsenoside R0 is higher than its repair ability in neuroprotection in vitro.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.55-61
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• 2014

In sleep monitoring system, polysomnography (PSG) is the gold-standard but previous studies revealed that attaching numerous amount of sensors disturb sleep during the test which is the fundamental disadvantage of PSG. We suggest an unconstrained rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep monitoring method measured with polyvinylidene (PVDF) film-based sensor for the normal and the obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) patients. Nine normal subjects and seventeen OSA patients have participated in the study. During REM sleep, rate and variability of respiration are known to be greater than in other sleep stages. Based on this phenomena, respiratory signals of participants were unconstrainedly measured using the PVDF-based sensor with the PSG and REM sleep were extracted from the average rate and variability of respiration. In epoch-by-epoch REM sleep detection, proposed method classified REM sleep with an average sensitivity of 72.3%, specificity of 92.5%, accuracy of 88.9%, and kappa statistic of 0.60 compared to the results of PSG. Student's t-test showed no significant difference between the results of normal and OSA group. This method is potentially applicable to REM sleep detection in homing environment or ambulatory monitoring.