• Journal of Nutrition and Health
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• v.49 no.4
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• pp.213-222
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• 2016

Purpose: Coffee is the most frequently consumed food item in South Korea after rice and cabbage. Coffee contains various substances, including caffeine, cafestol, kahweol, chlorogenic acid, and many other known and unknown ingredients with some health benefits. Especially, cumulative evidence has shown that regular coffee use is associated with lower risk of type 2 diabetes, although limited and inconsistent data are available regarding metabolic syndrome. Methods: This study reviewed all available scientific and epidemiologic evidence on coffee consumption, metabolic syndrome, and the association between them. Most epidemiologic research regarding this association was of a cross-sectional design, and a few case-control and cohort studies were available. We conducted meta-analysis with 11 observational studies investigated in Europe, America, and Asia. Summary odds ratios (OR) were calculated using a random-effects model. Results: The overall OR of metabolic syndrome was 0.90 (95% Confidence Interval (CI), 0.81-0.99) for the highest category of coffee intake compared with the lowest intake category. These associations were stronger in populations of US and Europe (OR 0.84, 95% CI 0.76-0.94), whereas no association was observed in the Asian population (OR 1.00, 95% CI 0.81-1.23). Conclusion: The review results indicate that frequent coffee consumption may be beneficial to metabolic syndrome, but the association between coffee consumption and metabolic syndrome may differ by nations or continents.

• Atmosphere
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.507-524
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• 2008

In this paper, future climate changes over East Asia($20^{\circ}{\sim}50^{\circ}N$, $100^{\circ}{\sim}150^{\circ}E$) are projected by anthropogenic forcing of greenhouse gases and aerosols using coupled atmosphere-ocean general circulation model (AOGCM) simulations based on Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) B1, A1B and A2 scenarios. Before projection future climate, model performance is assessed by the $20^{th}$ Century (20C3M) experiment with bias, root Mean Square Error (RMSE), ratio of standard deviation, Taylor diagram analysis. The result of examination of the seasonal uncertainty of T2m and PCP shows that cold bias, lowered than that of observation, of T2m and wet bias, larger than that of observation, of PCP are found over East Asia. The largest wet bias is found in winter and the largest cold bias is found in summer. The RMSE of temperature in the annual mean increases and this trend happens in winter, too. That is, higher resolution model shows generally better performances in simulation T2m and PCP. Based on IPCC SRES scenarios, East Asia will experience warmer and wetter climate in the coming $21^{st}$ century. It is predict the T2m increase in East Asia is larger than global mean temperature. As the latitude goes high, the warming over the continents of East Asia showed much more increase than that over the ocean. An enhanced land-sea contrast is proposed as a possible mechanism of the intensified Asian summer monsoon. But, the inter-model variability in PCP changes is large.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.343-355
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• 2005

Cloud/fog water was collected at Daegwallyeong, a typical clean environmental area, by using an active fog sampler during the foggy period in 2002, The pH ranged from 3,7 to 6,5 with a mean of 5,0, but the pH calculated from average concentrations of $H^+$ was 4.4. $SO_4^{2-},\;NO_3^-\;and\;NH_4^+$ were predominant ions with average concentrations of 473,3, 463,3 and $576,0\;{\mu}eq/L$, respectively, This showed that cloud/fog water was slightly acidified, but the concentrations of major pollutants were as high as those for polluted area, suggesting effect from long range transported pollutants, Samples were categorized into four groups (E, W, S, N) by applying 48-h back trajectory analysis using the Hybrid Single-Particle Largrangian Integrated Trajectory (HYSPLIT) model. Concentrations of seasalt $(Na^+\;and\;Cl^-)$ were the highest for group E, indicating large input of seasalts by air masses transported from the East Sea. The concentrations of $SO_4^{2-}$ were slightly higher in group W but the difference was not significant. However, the concentrations of $NO_3^-$ were significantly higher in group W than those in other three groups, The median values of cloud/fog water pH for group N and W were below 4,5, which is significantly lower than median values in group E and group S, This suggests that the acidifying pollutants were transported from the Asia continents and Seoul metropolitan area cause acidification of the cloud/fog water in Daegwallyeong.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.46 no.3
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• pp.319-331
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• 2013

Recent climate change, which is mostly ascribed to anthropogenic activities, is believed to be a major factor leading to biodiversity decreases and ecosystem service deteriorations. I have reviewed recent studies on climate change effects for many ecological processes involved with plants, in order to improve our understanding of the nature of ecological complexity. Plants in general have better growth and productivity under high levels of $CO_2$, although the long term effects of such $CO_2$ fertilizers are still controversial. Over the last 30 years, the Earth has been greening, particularly at higher latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, perhaps due to a relaxation of climatic constraints. Human appropriation of net primary productivity (NPP), which corresponds up to 1/3 of global NPP, is ultimately responsible for climate change and biodiversity decreases. Climate change causes phenological variations in plants, especially in regards to spring flowering and fall leaf coloring. Many plants migrate polewards and towards higher altitudes to seek more appropriate climates. On the other hand, tree mortality and population declines have recently been reported in many continents. Landscape disturbance not only hinders the plant migration, but also makes it difficult to predict the plants' potential habitats. Plant and animal population declines, as well as local extinctions, are largely due to the disruption of species interactions through temporal mismatching. Temperature and $CO_2$ increase rates in Korea are higher than global means. The degree of landscape disturbances is also relatively high. Furthermore, long-term data on individual species responses and species interactions are lacking or quite limited in Korea. This review emphasizes the complex nature of species responses to climate change at both global and local scales. In order to keep pace with the direction and speed of climate change, it is urgently necessary to observe and analyze the patterns of phenology, migration, and trophic interactions of plants and animals in Korea's landscape.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.53 no.5
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• pp.307-310
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• 2020

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has placed unprecedented pressure on healthcare systems, even in advanced economies. While the number of cases of SARS-CoV-2 in Africa compared to other continents has so far been low, there are concerns about under-reporting, inadequate diagnostic tools, and insufficient treatment facilities. Moreover, proactiveness on the part of African governments has been under scrutiny. For instance, issues have emerged regarding the responsiveness of African countries in closing international borders to limit trans-continental transmission of the virus. Overdependence on imported products and outsourced services could have contributed to African governments' hesitation to shut down international air and seaports. In this era of emerging and re-emerging pathogens, we recommend that African nations should consider self-sufficiency in the health sector as an urgent priority, as this will not be the last outbreak to occur. In addition to the Regional Disease Surveillance Systems Enhancement fund (US$600 million) provided by the World Bank for strengthening health systems and disease surveillance, each country should further establish an epidemic emergency fund for epidemic preparedness and response. We also recommend that epidemic surveillance units should create a secure database of previous and ongoing pandemics in terms of aetiology, spread, and treatment, as well as financial management records. Strategic collection and analysis of data should also be a central focus of these units to facilitate studies of disease trends and to estimate the scale of requirements in preparation and response to any future pandemic or epidemic.

• Korean Journal of Veterinary Research
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.86-93
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• 2000

Paratuberculosis (Johne's disease), a chronic enteritis produced by Mycobacterium paratuberculosis, affects a large proportion of ruminants in all continents and causes important economic losses. The identification of well-characterized and species-specific components of M paratuberculosis would provide the means to improve the specificity and sensitivity of immunodiagnostic assays for Johne's disease. The aims of this study were to express the recombinant C-terminal of 34kDa protein (rC34P) of M paratuberculosis in E coli and to investigate the effectiveness of this protein in detecting antibodies to the native protein in sera from paratuberculosis infected cattle. The C-terminal of the gene encoding the 34kDa protein was amplified by polymerase chain reaction from the chromosomal DNA of M paratuberculosis (ATCC 19698) and cloned into vector pGEX-4T-2. Then, cloned plasmid was transformed into E coli DH5${\alpha}$ and the rC34P was overexpressed. The rC34P was purified by affinity chromatography and gel filtration. The rC34P was examined antigenicity by Western blot. The rC34P was reactive with culture positive bovine serum and hyperimmune rabbit anti-M paratuberculosis serum but was not reactive with culture negative bovine serum and tuberculin positive bovine serum in Western blot. In conclusion, the rC34P produced in this study is expected as a useful candidate for antigen in serological diagnosis of Johne's disease.

• Atmosphere
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.155-167
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• 2020

In order to produce more detailed and accurate information of river discharge and freshwater discharge, global high-resolution hydrodynamic model (CaMa-Flood) is applied to an operational land surface model of global seasonal forecast system. In addition, bias correction to grid runoff for the hydrodynamic model is attempted. CaMa-Flood is a river routing model that distributes runoff forcing from a land surface model to oceans or inland seas along continentalscale rivers, which can represent flood stage and river discharge explicitly. The runoff data generated by the land surface model are bias-corrected by using composite runoff data from UNH-GRDC. The impact of bias-correction on the runoff, which is spatially resolved on 0.5° grid, has been evaluated for 1991~2010. It is shown that bias-correction increases runoff by 30% on average over all continents, which is closer to UNH-GRDC. Two experiments with coupled CaMa-Flood are carried out to produce river discharge: one using this bias correction and the other not using. It is found that the experiment adapting bias correction exhibits significant increase of both river discharge over major rivers around the world and continental freshwater discharge into oceans (40% globally), which is closer to GRDC. These preliminary results indicate that the application of CaMa-Flood as well as bias-corrected runoff to the operational global seasonal forecast system is feasible to attain information of surface water cycle from a coupled suite of atmospheric, land surface, and hydrodynamic model.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.377-394
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• 1998

The magnetic record of loess deposits may be one of the most detailed and useful records of Quatermary climate change on the continents. Stratigraphic variations of magnetic parameters define alternating zones of high and low concentrations of magnetic minerals. All the concentration-sensitive magnetic parameters show an increase within the interstadial Gilman Canyon Formation and interglacial Brady soil and a systematic decrease within the Wisconsinan Peoria loess. The influence of climate change on magnetic records is confirmed by a high correlation between the magnetic parameters and biological proxies. Rock magnetic data appear to be better correlated with temperature-sensitive biological proxies than does a precipitation-sensitive index such as the aridity index derived from opal phytoliths. Simultaneous, higher resolution sampling of magnetic and biological proxies proved to be a better sampling tactic, and enhanced the feasibility of rock magnetic parameters as independent climate proxies.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.71-75
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• 2006

We analyzed the phylogenic relationships of 23 partial 18S rDNA sequences of 22 species (1 species has 2 strains) belonging to Sarcorptiforms include 4 new sequences, using several tools. Although geographic distributions are quite far from, sequence similarity of two strains of Dermatophygoides pteronyssinus isolated from Japan and New Zealand were very high. This result suggests that mite migration by animals including human occurred in the two continents. We investigated the Endeostigmata taxonomic relationship between the Prostigmata and Oribatida subgroups using small fragments (340-400 bp) of their 185 rDNA sequences. But Endeostigmata was not grouped with Oribatida or Prostigmata. In conclusion, it is first reported phylogenic relationship for classified mites included in Sarcoptiformes using 185 rDNA sequence analysis and its system is a very powerful tool for classification of mites.

• Journal of Information Technology Services
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.73-83
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• 2016

Pedestrian safety was recently highlighted with a yellow carpet, a yellow-colored pavement material prepared for children waiting for signals for pedestrian crossing, without validation of its efficiency in practice. It was a promising device likely to assist highway safety by stimulating pedestrian to step on the yellow-colored area; it was generally called nudge effects. This paper delivers a study conducted to check the effectiveness of yellow carpet in three different aspects in vehicle driver's perspective by applying the newly introduced information technology (IT) service: Visual Attention Software (VAS). It was assumed that VAS developed by 3M in the United States should be able explain the Korean drivers' visual reaction behaviors since technology embedded in VAS was developed based on and proved by other various international countries and continents in the world. A set of pictures was taken at thirteen different field sites in seven school zone areas in the Seoul metropolitan area before and after the installation of a yellow carpet, respectively. Sets of those pictures were analyzed with VAS, and the results were compared based on the selective safety measures: the likely focusing on standing pedestrians (waiting for a pedestrian's green signal time) affected by its background (yellow-colored pavement) contrasting him or her. The test results from a set of before-and-after comparison analyses showed that the placement of yellow carpet would (1) increase 71% of driver's visual attention on pedestrian crossing areas and (2) change the sequential order of visual attention on that area 2.4 steps ahead. The findings would enhance deployment of such promising efficiency and thus increase children safety in pedestrian crossing. The result was promising to highlight the way to support the changes in conservative traffic safety engineering field by applying the advanced IT services, while much robust research was recommended to overcome the limitation of simplification of this study.