• Journal of Ginseng Research
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.111-131
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• 2002

Korean ginseng (Panax ginseng C.A. Meyer) received a great deal of attention from the Orient and West as a tonic agent, health food and/or alternative herbal therapeutic agent. However, controversy with respect to scientific evidence on pharmacological effects especially, evaluation of clinical efficacy and the methodological approach still remains to be solved. Author reviewed those articles published since 1980 when pharmacodynamic studies on ginseng have intensively started. Special concern was paid on metabolic disorders including diabetes mellitus, circulatory disorders, malignant tumor, sexual dysfunction, and physical and mental performance to give clear information to those who are interested in pharmacological study of ginseng and to promote its clinical use. With respect to chronic diseases such as diabetes mellitus, atherosclerosis, high blood pressure, malignant disorders, and sexual disorders, it seems that ginseng plays preventive and restorative role rather than therapeutics. Particularly, ginseng plays a significant role in ameliorating subjective symptoms and preventing quality of life from deteriorating by long term exposure of chemical therapeutic agents. Also it seems that the potency of ginseng is mild, therefore it could be more effective when used concomitantly with conventional therapy. Clinical studies on the tonic effect of ginseng on work performance demonstrated that physical and mental dysfunction induced by various stresses are improved by increasing adaptability of physical condition. However, the results obtained from clinical studies cannot be mentioned in the indication, which are variable upon the scientist who performed those studies. In this respect, standardized ginseng product and providing planning of the systematic clinical research in double-blind randomized controlled trials are needed to assess the real efficacy for proposing ginseng indication. Pharmacological mode of action of ginseng has not yet been fully elucidated. Pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic researches reveal that the role of ginseng not seem to be confined to a given single organ. It has been known that ginseng plays a beneficial role in such general organs as central nervous, endocrine, metabolic, immune systems, which means ginseng improves general physical and mental conditons. Such multivalent effect of ginseng can be attributed to the main active component of ginseng,ginsenosides or non-saponin compounds which are also recently suggested to be another active ingredients. As is generally the similar case with other herbal medicines, effects of ginseng cannot be attributed as a given single compound or group of components. Diversified ingredients play synergistic or antagonistic role each other and act in harmonized manner. A few cases of adverse effect in clinical uses are reported, however, it is not observed when standardized ginseng products are used and recommended dose was administered. Unfavorable interaction with other drugs has also been suggested, which the information on the products and administered dosage are not available. However, efficacy, safety, interaction or contraindication with other medicines has to be more intensively investigated in order to promote clinical application of ginseng. For example, daily recommended doses per day are not agreement as 1-2g in the West and 3-6 g in the Orient. Duration of administration also seems variable according to the purpose. Two to three months are generally recommended to feel the benefit but time- and dose-dependent effects of ginseng still need to be solved from now on. Furthermore, the effect of ginsenosides transformed by the intestinal microflora, and differential effect associated with ginsenosides content and its composition also should be clinically evaluated in the future. In conclusion, the more wide-spread use of ginseng as a herbal medicine or nutraceutical supplement warrants the more rigorous investigations to assess its effacy and safety. In addition, a careful quality control of ginseng preparations should be done to ensure an acceptable standardization of commercial products.

• Information Systems Review
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.193-218
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• 2015

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of closed-type SNS use (i.e., Naver Band) on the perception and behavior of the Korean Army soldiers. In contrast to open-type SNS (e.g., Facebook or Twitter), Naver Band is an online communication service system mostly based on confined offline social network. Therefore, it increases communication between acquaintances who have previously formed relationships. Although the Korean Army recently began to use Naver Band as a method of communication between soldiers, their parents/acquaintance, and Army commanders (or leaders), little research has been done about how this use directly affects army soldiers. Hence, applying the motivation opportunity ability theory of behavior, this study examines how enjoyment (Motivational factor), social ties (Opportunity factor), and social intelligence (Ability factor) affect soldiers' belongingness to their organization and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). We also hypothesize that army soldiers' belongingness and OCB may enhance their individual performance. Survey results show that enjoyment, social ties, and social intelligence increase army soldiers' belongingness, which leads to OCB. Also, enhanced OCB increases individual performance. However, the effect of enjoyment and social ties on soldiers' OCB is non-significant and soldiers' belongingness does not have influence on individual performance. Theoretical and practical implications are presented.

• Radiation Oncology Journal
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.181-189
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• 2001

Purpose : Changes in the balance between MMP and TIMP can have a profound effect on the composition in the extracellular matrix (ECM) and affect various cellular functions including adhesion, migration, differentiation of cells, and fibrosis and invasion and metastasis of cancer cells. Radiation therapy is a popular treatment modality for benign and malignant tumor, but the study for radiation effect on MMP and TIMP is scarce. In the current study, we have examined the expression of TIMP in fibrosis-prone (C57BL/6) mice after radiation. Methods and Materials : Adult female mice of $10\~12$ weeks were used. The whole body were irradiated using a Varian CL-4/100 with 2 and 10 Gy. Immunohistochemical staining was peformed according to Avidin Biotin complex method and evaluated by observing high power field. For TIMP-1, TIMP-2 antibodies, reactivity was assessed in the parenchymal cell and in the stromal cell. The scale of staining was assessed by combining the quantitative and qualiative intensity of staining. Results : TIMP-1 immunoreactivity did not change in lung. But, in liver, TIMP-1 immunoreactivity was localized in cytoplasm of hepatocyte and Kupffer cell. in kidney, TIMP-1 immunoreactivity was localized in cytoplasm of some tubular cell. Temporal variations were not seen. Dose-response relationship was not seen except kidney. TIMP-2 immunoreactivity in lung was a score (++) at 0 Gy and elevated to a score (+++) at 2 Gy. TIMP-2 immunoreactivity was a score (++) in liver at 0 Gy. TIMP-2 immunoreactivity was localized in cytoplasm of hepatocyte and Kupffer cell as same as patterns of TIMP-1 immunoreactivity. The TIMP-2 immunoreactivity in liver was elevated to (+++) at 2 Gy. Immunoreactivity to TIMP-2 in kidney was a score (+++) at 0 Gy and was not changed at 10 Gy. The score of TIMP-2 immunoreactivity was reduced to (++) at 2 Gy. TIMP-2 immunoreactivity was confined to tubules in kidney. Temporal variation of TIMP-2 immunoreactivity was irregular. Dose-response relationship of TIMP-2 immunoreactivity was not seen. Conclusions : Differences between intensity of expression of TIMP-1 and TIMP-2 in each organ was present. Expression of TIMP was localized to specific cell in each organ. Irradiation increased TIMP-1 immunoreactivity in the liver and the kidney. Irradiation increased TIMP-2 immunoreactivity in the lung. But, in the liver and the kidney, TIMP-2 expression to radiation was irregular. Temporal variation of TIMP-2 immunoreactivity was irregular. Dose-response relationship of TIHP-2 immunoreactivity was not seen. In the future, we expect that the study of immunohistochemical staining of longer period of postirradiation and quantitative analysis using western blotting and northern blotting could define the role of TIMP in the radiation induced tissue fibrosis.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.45-70
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• 2009

This article investigates which types of the strategies announced by the listed firms contribute to enhancing the long-term performance of the companies. Since 2002, Korean Exchange adopted the "faire disclosure policy" which mandates that all publicly traded companies must disclose material information to all investors at the same time. Thanks to the policy, Korean investors can, now, easily access the board's decision on management strategies on the same day the decision is made. If the companies trustfully carry out their announced strategies, we can decide which types of strategies actually enhance or deteriorate the long-term performance, simply by comparing the announced strategies and the firm's performance. The sample companies are confined to 60 firms that became listed in the KOSDAQ market through back-door listing from 2003 to 2005. Using only the newly listed companies, we can avoid the interference on the long-term performance of the strategies pursued before the event date. This often holds true, for many companies radically modify their strategies after the listing. Furthermore, the back-door listing companies serve our purpose better than IPO companies do, because the former tend to have a variety of announcement within a given period of time beginning the listing date. Using these sample companies, this article analyzes the effect on one year buy-and-hold returns and abnormal buy-and-hold returns after the listing of the various types of strategies announced during the same period of time. The results show that those evidences of restructuring such as 'reduction of capital' and 'resignation of incumbent board members', actually contribute to the increase in adjusted long-term stock returns. Those strategies which can be view as evidence of new investment such as 'increase in tangible assets', 'acquisition of other companies', do also helps the stockholders better off. On the contrary, 'increase in bank loans', 'changes of CEO' and 'merger' deteriorate the equity value. The last findings let us to presume that the back-door listing companies appear to use the bank loans for value-reducing activities; the change in CEO is not a sign of restructuring, but rather a sign of failure of the restructuring; another merger carried out after back-door listing itself is also value-reducing activity. This article's findings on reduction of capital, merger and bank loans oppose the results of the former empirical studies which analyze only the short-term effect on stock price. Therefore, more long-term performance studies on public disclosures are in order.

• Journal of Legislation Research
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• no.44
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• pp.343-386
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• 2013

"Financial ADR" system in South Korea can be represented by so-called "Financial Dispute Resolution System", in which Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) and Financial Dispute Resolution Committee are the principal actors in operation of the system, and this is discussed as an "Administrative Financial ADR System". The system has over 10-year history since it was introduced in around 1999. Nonetheless, it was not until when financial consumer protection began to be highlighted after the 2008 financial crisis that Financial ADR system actually started to draw attention in Korea. This was because interest has been rising in "Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR)" as an institutional measure to protect financial consumers damaged via financial transactions. However, the current discussion on the domestic Financial ADR system shows an aspect that it is confined to who is to be a principal actor for the operation of Financial ADR institution with main regards to reorganization of supervisory system. This article aims to embody these facts in an institutional model by recognizing them as a problem and analyzing the features of the Financial ADR system, thereby clarifying problems of the system and presenting the direction of improvement. The Korean Financial ADR system can be judged as "administrative model integrated model consensual model quasi-judicial model non-prepositive Internal Dispute Resolution (IDR) model". However, at the same time, it is confronted with a task to overcome the two problems; the system is not equipped with institutional basis for securing its validity in spite of the adopted quasi-judicial effect model; and a burden of operating an integrated ADR system is considerable. From this perspective, the article suggests improvement plans for security of validity in the current system and for expansion of industry-control ADR system, in particular, a system of prepositive IDR model. Amongst them, it suggests further plans for securing the validity of the system as follows; promotion to expand the number of internal persons and to differentiate mediation procedures and effect; a plan to keep a financial institution from filing a lawsuit before an agreement recommendation or a mediation proposal is advised; and a plan to grant suspension of extinctive prescription as well as that of procedures of the lawsuit.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.157-176
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• 2012

Brand switching data frequently used in market structure analysis is adequate to analyze non- durable goods, because it can capture competition between specific two brands. But brand switching data sometimes can not be used to analyze goods like automobiles having long term duration because one of main assumptions that consumer preference toward brand attributes is not changed against time can be violated. Therefore a new type of data which can precisely capture competition among durable goods is needed. Another problem of using brand switching data collected from actual purchase behavior is short of explanation why consumers consider different set of brands. Considering above problems, main purpose of this study is to analyze market structure for durable goods with consideration set. The author uses exploratory approach and latent class clustering to identify market structure based on heterogeneous consideration set among consumers. Then the relationship between some factors and consideration set formation is analyzed. Some benefits and two demographic variables - age and income - are selected as factors based on consumer behavior theory. The author analyzed USA automotive market with top 11 brands using exploratory approach and latent class clustering. 2,500 respondents are randomly selected from the total sample and used for analysis. Six models concerning market structure are established to test. Model 1 means non-structured market and model 6 means market structure composed of six sub-markets. It is exploratory approach because any hypothetical market structure is not defined. The result showed that model 1 is insufficient to fit data. It implies that USA automotive market is a structured market. Model 3 with three market structures is significant and identified as the optimal market structure in USA automotive market. Three sub markets are named as USA brands, Asian Brands, and European Brands. And it implies that country of origin effect may exist in USA automotive market. Comparison between modal classification by derived market structures and probabilistic classification by research model was conducted to test how model 3 can correctly classify respondents. The model classify 97% of respondents exactly. The result of this study is different from those of previous research. Previous research used confirmatory approach. Car type and price were chosen as criteria for market structuring and car type-price structure was revealed as the optimal structure for USA automotive market. But this research used exploratory approach without hypothetical market structures. It is not concluded yet which approach is superior. For confirmatory approach, hypothetical market structures should be established exhaustively, because the optimal market structure is selected among hypothetical structures. On the other hand, exploratory approach has a potential problem that validity for derived optimal market structure is somewhat difficult to verify. There also exist market boundary difference between this research and previous research. While previous research analyzed seven car brands, this research analyzed eleven car brands. Both researches seemed to represent entire car market, because cumulative market shares for analyzed brands exceeds 50%. But market boundary difference might affect the different results. Though both researches showed different results, it is obvious that country of origin effect among brands should be considered as important criteria to analyze USA automotive market structure. This research tried to explain heterogeneity of consideration sets among consumers using benefits and two demographic factors, sex and income. Benefit works as a key variable for consumer decision process, and also works as an important criterion in market segmentation. Three factors - trust/safety, image/fun to drive, and economy - are identified among nine benefit related measure. Then the relationship between market structures and independent variables is analyzed using multinomial regression. Independent variables are three benefit factors and two demographic factors. The result showed that all independent variables can be used to explain why there exist different market structures in USA automotive market. For example, a male consumer who perceives all benefits important and has lower income tends to consider domestic brands more than European brands. And the result also showed benefits, sex, and income have an effect to consideration set formation. Though it is generally perceived that a consumer who has higher income is likely to purchase a high priced car, it is notable that American consumers perceived benefits of domestic brands much positive regardless of income. Male consumers especially showed higher loyalty for domestic brands. Managerial implications of this research are as follow. Though implication may be confined to the USA automotive market, the effect of sex on automotive buying behavior should be analyzed. The automotive market is traditionally conceived as male consumers oriented market. But the proportion of female consumers has grown over the years in the automotive market. It is natural outcome that Volvo and Hyundai motors recently developed new cars which are targeted for women market. Secondly, the model used in this research can be applied easier than that of previous researches. Exploratory approach has many advantages except difficulty to apply for practice, because it tends to accompany with complicated model and to require various types of data. The data needed for the model in this research are a few items such as purchased brands, consideration set, some benefits, and some demographic factors and easy to collect from consumers.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.31-54
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• 2007

The exchange between buyers and sellers in the industrial market is changing from short-term to long-term relationships. Long-term relationships are governed mainly by formal contracts or informal agreements, but many scholars are now asserting that controlling relationship by using formal contracts under environmental dynamism is inappropriate. In this case, partners will depend on each other's flexibility or interdependence. The former, flexibility, provides a general frame of reference, order, and standards against which to guide and assess appropriate behavior in dynamic and ambiguous situations, thus motivating the value-oriented performance goals shared between partners. It is based on social sacrifices, which can potentially minimize any opportunistic behaviors. The later, interdependence, means that each firm possesses a high level of dependence in an dynamic channel relationship. When interdependence is high in magnitude and symmetric, each firm enjoys a high level of power and the bonds between the firms should be reasonably strong. Strong shared power is likely to promote commitment because of the common interests, attention, and support found in such channel relationships. This study deals with environmental dynamism in high-tech industry. Firms in the high-tech industry regard it as a key success factor to successfully cope with environmental changes. However, due to the lack of studies dealing with environmental dynamism and supply chain commitment in the high-tech industry, it is very difficult to find effective strategies to cope with them. This paper presents the results of an empirical study on the relationship between environmental dynamism and supply chain commitment in the high-tech industry. We examined the effects of consumer, competitor, and technological dynamism on supply chain commitment. Additionally, we examined the moderating effects of flexibility and dependence of supply chains. This study was confined to the type of high-tech industry which has the characteristics of rapid technology change and short product lifecycle. Flexibility among the firms of this industry, having the characteristic of hard and fast growth, is more important here than among any other industry. Thus, a variety of environmental dynamism can affect a supply chain relationship. The industries targeted industries were electronic parts, metal product, computer, electric machine, automobile, and medical precision manufacturing industries. Data was collected as follows. During the survey, the researchers managed to obtain the list of parts suppliers of 2 companies, N and L, with an international competitiveness in the mobile phone manufacturing industry; and of the suppliers in a business relationship with S company, a semiconductor manufacturing company. They were asked to respond to the survey via telephone and e-mail. During the two month period of February-April 2006, we were able to collect data from 44 companies. The respondents were restricted to direct dealing authorities and subcontractor company (the supplier) staff with at least three months of dealing experience with a manufacture (an industrial material buyer). The measurement validation procedures included scale reliability; discriminant and convergent validity were used to validate measures. Also, the reliability measurements traditionally employed, such as the Cronbach's alpha, were used. All the reliabilities were greater than.70. A series of exploratory factor analyses was conducted. We conducted confirmatory factor analyses to assess the validity of our measurements. A series of chi-square difference tests were conducted so that the discriminant validity could be ensured. For each pair, we estimated two models-an unconstrained model and a constrained model-and compared the two model fits. All these tests supported discriminant validity. Also, all items loaded significantly on their respective constructs, providing support for convergent validity. We then examined composite reliability and average variance extracted (AVE). The composite reliability of each construct was greater than.70. The AVE of each construct was greater than.50. According to the multiple regression analysis, customer dynamism had a negative effect and competitor dynamism had a positive effect on a supplier's commitment. In addition, flexibility and dependence had significant moderating effects on customer and competitor dynamism. On the other hand, all hypotheses about technological dynamism had no significant effects on commitment. In other words, technological dynamism had no direct effect on supplier's commitment and was not moderated by the flexibility and dependence of the supply chain. This study makes its contribution in the point of view that this is a rare study on environmental dynamism and supply chain commitment in the field of high-tech industry. Especially, this study verified the effects of three sectors of environmental dynamism on supplier's commitment. Also, it empirically tested how the effects were moderated by flexibility and dependence. The results showed that flexibility and interdependence had a role to strengthen supplier's commitment under environmental dynamism in high-tech industry. Thus relationship managers in high-tech industry should make supply chain relationship flexible and interdependent. The limitations of the study are as follows; First, about the research setting, the study was conducted with high-tech industry, in which the direction of the change in the power balance of supply chain dyads is usually determined by manufacturers. So we have a difficulty with generalization. We need to control the power structure between partners in a future study. Secondly, about flexibility, we treated it throughout the paper as positive, but it can also be negative, i.e. violating an agreement or moving, but in the wrong direction, etc. Therefore we need to investigate the multi-dimensionality of flexibility in future research.

• Journal of Animal Environmental Science
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.153-160
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• 2005

This study was conducted to determine the effect of floor type of finishing building and increasing market weight of finishing Pigs on Performance, carcass traits and pork quality. Four hundred and forty-four finishing pigs were confined and administered with different floor type(concrete slat and bedded with sawdust) and increasing market weight(110kg to 130kg) of finishing building. The result obtained from this study were summarized as follows; 1. There was no significant difference between the floor type of finishing building in the body weight gain, feed intake and gain per feed. And also increasing market weight of finishing pigs was not affected the performance of finishing pigs. 2. Increasing market weight of finishing pigs affect the carcass yield. The market weight at 130kg showed more amount of each cut of carcass, especially the belly portion was higher, but backfat thickness was not different. 3. Carcass traits did not show any significant difference due to the difference of market weight of finishing pig and floor type of finishing building. 4. There was no significant difference in the chemical compositions and meat color of pork loin between the floor type of finishing building and increasing market weight of finishing pigs.

• Journal of Chest Surgery
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• v.40 no.12
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• pp.825-830
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• 2007

Background: Minimally invasive cardiac surgery appears to offer certain advantages such as earlier postoperative recovery and a greater cosmetic effect than that achieved through conventional sternotomy. However, this approach has not yet been widely adopted in Korea to replace complex open heart surgery such as mitral valve reconstruction. This study compared the results of robot assisted minimally invasive mitral valve repair with those results of conventional sternotomy. Material and Method: From December 1993 to December 2005, 520 consecutive patients underwent mitral valve reconstruction for mitral regurgitation in our institution. These patients were subdivided according to those whose surgery used the conventional sternotomy approach (Group S, n=432) and those who underwent minimally invasive right anterior thoracotomy (Group M, n=88); we then compared the clinical results of both groups. When we performed minimally invasive right thoracotomy, we used a robot (AESOP 3000) and made an incision less than 5 cm. Result: Our study patients in both groups were similar for their age, gender and preoperative ejection fraction. There were two hospital mortalities in group S. but there was no mortality in the group M patients. Significant reductions in the ICU stay and the postoperative hospital stay were observed in the group M patients compared with the group S patients. However, both the bypass time and the aortic cross-clamp time were significantly longer in the group M patients. In spite of the confined incision in the group M patients, there were no limitations on the mitral valve repair techniques. There was a similar frequency of postoperative significant residual mitral regurgitation in both groups. Conclusion: In this study, the minimally invasive mitral valve repair showed comparable early results with the conventional sternotomy patients. We will now need long-term follow-up of these patients who underwent minimally invasive mitral valve repair, but we anticipate that based on the results of this study, we will begin to routinely perform minimally invasive cardiac surgery as out primary approach for mitral valve reconstruction.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.326-335
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• 2007

This study was conducted to assess the environmental risks of anthracnose resistant transgenic chili peppers with the PepEST gene on non-target organisms in the agroecosystem environments during the chili pepper growing seasons in 2006. We quantitatively collected arthropods assemblages living on leaves and flowers of chili peppers on June 20, July 25, and August 25 by using an insect vacuum collector to compare the patterns of arthropod community structures between non-transgenic chili peppers (nTR, WT512) and anthracnose resistant transgenic chili peppers (TR, line 68). We found the seasonal difference with the highest species richness and Shannon's diversity in July's sampling among the growing seasons (P<0.05) and each sampling season showed the different arthropod community composition. We also found there was no statistical difference between the two types of crops, nTR and TR, at each sampling time (P>0.05). The significance level of arthropod community showed that there were lots of seasonal difference of functional groups as well as taxa but only the herbivore group in the functional groups was significantly different for the types of plants (P<0.05). So, we further examined the herbivore groups to find any potential damage and identified the possibility of herbivorous damage from some herbivores, grasshoppers, aphids and thrips. Although we couldn't find any adverse effects from the environmental risk assessment between the arthropod community structures on two types of plants from our results, we should keep working for the environmental risk assessment because of the herbivorous potential risk possibility.