• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.138-150
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• 2022

Background: Epidemiology is a fundamental study of public health, including environmental health, since the features and causes of diseases discovered through epidemiology provide crucial information for developing successful disease prevention strategies. Objectives: This paper tried to define the role and function of epidemiologic research in the field of environmental health, summarize examples of epidemiological studies with regard to selected environmental health events in South Korea, and address important issues that should be considered when conducting epidemiological research in the future. Methods: Epidemiological studies of selected environmental health events were reviewed and summarized in terms of their contribution to environmental health in South Korea. Based on the information, important issues were suggested for future epidemiological studies in environmental health. Results: The role and function of epidemiologic research in the field of environmental health includes the systematic description of the health effects caused by environmental exposure, verification of the causal relationship between environmental exposure and health effects, and provision of background data for conducting prevention strategies and developing policies. A number of epidemiological studies have contributed to characterizing and assessing the environmental risks involved in a series of environmental health events in South Korea. Conclusions: Important issues for future epidemiological studies may include health effects from chronic low-level environmental exposure, application of analytical epidemiology to elucidate causal relationships, use of exposure/disease/susceptibility biomarkers, accurate reconstruction of past exposure status, cohort recruitment and long-term follow-up, and in-advance surveillance of diseases with environmental causes.

• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Health Society Conference
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• 2003.06a
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• pp.76-85
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• 2003

Mass and elemental dry deposition fluxes and ambient particle size distributions were measured using dry deposition plates and a cascade impactor, from March to November 1998 in Seoul, Korea. During the spring sampling period several yellow sand events characterized by long range transport from China and Mongolia impacted the area. During these events the mass fluxes were statistically the same as during springtime non-yellow-sand events. However, most elemental fluxes were higher. In general, the flux ratios of both crustal (Al, Ca, Mn) and anthropogenic elements (Ni, Pb) to total mass measured during the daytime yellow-sand events were substantially higher than those measured in spring daytime during non-yellow-sand time periods. During all seasons the average measured daytime fluxes were about two times higher than at nighttime. The flux of primarily anthropogenic metals (Cu, Ni, Pb, Zn) and Mn was on average one to two orders of magnitude lower than the flux of the crustal metals Al and Ca. As is typically found two modes, fine (0.1∼l.0 $\mu\textrm{m}$) and coarse (1.0∼10.0 $\mu\textrm{m}$) were present in the measured size distributions (<10 $\mu\textrm{m}$). The particles in the coarse mode constitute a major portion of the measured mass size distribution during the yellow-sand events possibly due to the long-range transport of those particles from China.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.43 no.6
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• pp.491-498
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• 2017

Objective: Bacterial abundance and community compositions have been examined in Asian dust events, clarifying their impacts on public health. This study aims to determine the bacterial community compositions and viable bacteria in Asian dust particles in the Asian dust or non-Asian dust event of March 2016. Methods: The dust samples were collected using the high volume air sampler or high volume cascade impactor, and bacterial 16S rRNA genes were amplified using PCR, followed by pyrosequencing. Bacterial diversity index, richness estimate and community composition in the particles were analyzed from the sequencing data using Mothur software. Results: The results showed that the diversity and richness during Asian dust events were higher than them in non-Asian dust events. The total bacterial community analysis showed that at the phylum Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria and Firmicutes were the most dominant of Asian dust events and non-Asian dust events. In addition, the bacterial colony counts were higher during Asian dust event, comparing with non-Asian dust event. Conclusions: This study showed that bacterial community and richness of Asian dust samples was more complex and higher than non-Asian dust samples in Gyeonggi-do, Korea, which could affect public health and environment. Thus, the continuous monitoring of Asian dust could be an alternative for managing airborne bacteria.

• Proceedings of the Korean Environmental Health Society Conference
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• 2004.06a
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• pp.92-106
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• 2004

Elemental dry deposition fluxes were measured using dry deposition plates from March to June 1998 in Seoul, Korea. During this spring sampling period several yellow sand events characterized by long-range transport from China and Mongolia impacted the area. Understanding the impact of yellow-sand events on atmospheric dry deposition is critical to managing the heavy metal levels in the environment in Korea. In this study, the measured flux of a primarily crustal metal, Al and an anthropogenic metal, Pb was used with two hybrid receptor models, potential source contribution function (PSCF) and residence time weighted concentration (RTWC) for locating sources of heavy metals associated with atmospheric dry deposition fluxes during the yellow-sand events in Seoul, Korea. The PSCF using a criterion value of the 75th percentile of the measured dry deposition fluxes and RTWC results using the measured elemental dry deposition fluxes agreed well and consistently showed that there were large potential source areas in the Gobi Desert in China and Mongolia and industrial areas near Tianjin, Tangshan, and Shenyang in China. Major industrial areas of Shenyang, Fushun, and Anshan, the Central China loess plateau, the Gobi Desert, and the Alaskan semi-desert in China were identified to be major source areas for the measured Pb flux in Seoul, Korea. For Al, the main industrial areas of Tangshan, Tianjin and Beijing, the Gobi Desert, the Alashan semi-desert, and the Central China loess plateau were found to be the major source areas. These results indicate that both anthropogenic sources such as industrial areas and natural sources such as deserts contribute to the high dry deposition fluxes of both Pb and Al in Seoul, Korea during yellow-sand events. RTWC resolved several high potential source areas. Modeling results indicated that the long-range transport of Al and Pb from China during yellow-sand events as well as non yellow-sand spring daytimes increased atmospheric dry deposition of heavy metals in Korea.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.926-933
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• 2010

Runoff from a parking lot can be highly contaminated nonpoint source due to the impermeability of rainwater. This study presented runoff characteristics of heavy metals especially Zn and Pb from a parking lot during total 17 rain events. Monitoring results showed the first flush phenomenon within 30 min was observed in all rain events, but the event mean concentration (EMC) did not clearly show the characteristics of runoff. The ranges of Pb and Zn was $4{\sim}201{\mu}g/L$ and $131{\sim}672{\mu}g/L$, respectively, and the runoff mass of Zn and Pb was highly to related with the flow rate, and runoff coefficient of rain. The runoff mass of Zn was greater than that of Pb in all events. The runoff mass of Pb was highly correlated with the amount of TSS, and TSS and DOC were was related with the mass of Zn. This result implies that Pb and Zn are mainly existed in the particulate form. The results can be used to as meaningful data in the management of nonpoint source, and in the management in the runoff catchment in the parking lot.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Toxicology Conference
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• 2001.05a
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• pp.22-40
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• 2001

Apoptosis is characterized by DNA fragmentation, chromatin condensation and plasma membrane blebbing. These apoptotic processes have been mainly associated with genetic mechanisms. Recently, these processes have been also associated with mitochondrial events that include the release of cytochrome c and Diablo/SMAC by modulation of mitochondrial membrane permeability.(omitted)

• Journal of environmental and Sanitary engineering
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• v.4 no.2 s.7
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• pp.61-90
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• 1989

The purpose of this study was to identify and name clusters of school health program, and to describe some of the characteristics of administrative supports. The literature, materials and public documents were analysed by the chronological events from 1945 to 1989. The result of this study is as follows : 1. A brief summary of the history of school health program was included as an introduction to the analysis of the current programs of school health. Five current school health-program clusters were identified from findings of a study of programs ; 1) Physical assessment, laboratory examination and health services for the students, 2) health insturction 3) healthful living condition(environmental health), 4) health clinic management 5) administrative supports. 2. The earliest school-based efforts focused on communicable disease prevention by the ministry of health and social affairs. Annual medical inspection(health assessment) for school children for eyes, ears, nose, and throat were mandated nation-wide in 1951 by physical Assessment Act. 3. In 1979, the health instruction of schools to improve the health status of students was improved by health department in the Ministry of Education. 4. Experiences in healthful environment were basic components of the school health program. However, without careful planning and supervision these experiences were not contributed to the goal of school health. The formal program of school health environment were initiated in 1979. 5. In 1980, the guidelines of school health clinic management were prepared by Ministry of Education such as guidance of essential degrees and facilities in school health clinic. 6. Two patterns of administration of school health programs existed in Korea. In one the school health department operated its own health program and in the other the physical education department operated the health program within the school system. The school health department was established in Ministry of Education from 1979 to 1982. Improved school health programs will be a key element in the comprehensive national child health policy whic I will ask the Ministry of Education to develop for the Department.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.20 no.E2
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• pp.77-85
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• 2004

In order to investigate the scavenging property of airborne carbonaceous particles by precipitations, rainwater, snow sample, and total suspended particulate matter (TSP) were collected at a heavily industrialized urban site. Elemental carbon (EC) contents of both rainwater and snow water were deter-mined using elemental analysis system. EC concentrations in rain samples varied from 33.6 to 166.6 $\mu\textrm{g}$ L$^{-1}$ with an average 47.2 $\mu\textrm{g}$ L$^{-1}$ . On the other hand, those of snow samples in three times snow events were ranged from 122.4 to 293.3 $\mu\textrm{g}$ L$^{-1}$ . As might be expected, EC showed the significantly high scavenging rate at the initial rainfall. The average total carbon (TC) scavenging rate by washout mechanisms was 57.6% for five rainfall events. The scavenging rate of EC gradually increased in proportion to the increasing rainfall intensity and rainfall amount.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.56 no.1
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• pp.65-73
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• 2023

As one of the most vulnerable countries to floods, there should be an increased necessity for accurate and reliable flood forecasting in Indonesia. Therefore, a new prediction model using a machine learning algorithm is proposed to provide daily flood prediction in Indonesia. Data crawling was conducted to obtain daily rainfall, streamflow, land cover, and flood data from 2008 to 2021. The model was built using a Random Forest (RF) algorithm for classification to predict future floods by inputting three days of rainfall rate, forest ratio, and stream flow. The accuracy, specificity, precision, recall, and F1-score on the test dataset using the RF algorithm are approximately 94.93%, 68.24%, 94.34%, 99.97%, and 97.08%, respectively. Moreover, the AUC (Area Under the Curve) of the ROC (Receiver Operating Characteristics) curve results in 71%. The objective of this research is providing a model that predicts flood events accurately in Indonesian regions 3 months prior the day of flood. As a trial, we used the month of June 2022 and the model predicted the flood events accurately. The result of prediction is then published to the website as a warning system as a form of flood mitigation.

• Journal of Korean Society for Atmospheric Environment
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.435-447
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• 2016

Anthropogenic emissions of $PM_{2.5}$ in Chuncheon are considered to be low according to the national emissions inventory; however, the atmospheric $PM_{2.5}$ concentrations have been reported to be higher than or at least similar to those measured in metropolitan (e.g. Seoul) and/or in industrial cities (e.g. Incheon, Ulsan). In this study, the concentrations of $PM_{2.5}$ and its ionic and carbonaceous compounds were measured from Jan. 2013 to Dec. 2014 in Chuncheon, Korea to identify the characteristics of high $PM_{2.5}$ concentration event. Average $PM_{2.5}$ concentration was $34.6{\mu}g/m^3$, exceeding the annual air quality standard ($25{\mu}g/m^3$). The most abundant compound was organic carbon (OC), comprising 26% of $PM_{2.5}$ mass, followed by $SO_4{^{2-}}$. Among 14 high concentration events, three events showed clearly enhanced contributions of OC, $SO_4{^{2-}}$, $NO_3{^-}$ and $NH_4{^+}$ to $PM_{2.5}$ under the fog events. One event observed in summer showed high concentration of $SO_4{^{2-}}$ while the high wind speeds and the low $PM_{2.5}/PM_{10}$ ratios were observed for the two high concentration events. These results indicate that the secondary aerosol formation under the fog events and high atmospheric temperature as well as the regional and/or the long-range transport were important on enhancing $PM_{2.5}$ concentration in Chuncheon. Cluster analysis based on back trajectories also suggested the significant impacts of regional transport from China and metropolitan areas of Korea on $PM_{2.5}$ in Chuncheon.