• Plant Breeding and Biotechnology
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.183-191
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• 2017

Finger millet (Eleusine coracana L. Gaertn.) is an important cereal crop in eastern Africa and southern India with excellent grain storage capacity and the unique ability to thrive in extreme environmental conditions. In this study, we analyzed the genetic diversity and population structure of finger millet using 12 developed microsatellites. By sequencing 815 clones from an SSR-enriched genomic DNA library, we obtained 12 polymorphic SSR markers, which also revealed successful amplicons in finger millet accessions. Using the developed SSR markers, we estimated genetic diversity and population structure among 76 finger millet accessions in Asia, Africa, and unknown origins. The number of alleles ranged from 2 to 9, with an average of 3.3 alleles. The mean values of observed heterozygosity and expected heterozygosity were 0.27 and 0.35, respectively. The average polymorphism information content was 0.301 in all 76 finger millet accessions. AMOVA analysis showed that the percentage of molecular variance among the populations was 1%, that among individuals was 5%, and that within individuals was 94%. In STRUCTURE analysis, the 76 finger millet accessions were divided into two subpopulations which had an admixture of alleles. There was a correspondence among PCoA, AMOVA, and population structure. This study may form the basis for a finger millet breeding and improvement program.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.87 no.3
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• pp.261-281
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• 2024

Cardiovascular comorbidity is common in individuals with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). This factor interferes with pharmacological treatment. The use of β-blockers has been proposed for their known cardioprotective effects. However, due to their adverse reactions, and the risk of causing bronchospasm, there is reluctance to use them. To summarize existing evidence on the effects of β-blocker use in COPD associated with cardiovascular comorbidities in relation to disease severity, exacerbation, and mortality outcomes. EMBASE, Medline, Lilacs, Cochrane Library, and Science Direct databases were used. Observational studies that evaluated the effects of β-blockers on individuals with COPD and cardiovascular comorbidities, and related disease severity, exacerbations, or mortality outcomes were included. Studies that did not present important information about the sample and pharmacological treatment were excluded. Twenty studies were included. Relevance to patient care and clinical practice: The use of β-blockers in individuals with COPD and cardiovascular disease caused positive effects on mortality and exacerbations outcomes, compared with the results of individuals who did not use them. The severity of the disease caused a slight change in forced expiratory volume in 1 second. The odds ratio for mortality was 0.50 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.39 to 0.63; p<0.00001), and for exacerbations, 0.76 (95% CI, 0.62 to 0.92; p=0.005), being favorable to the group that used β-blockers. Further studies are needed to study the effect of using a specific β-blocker in COPD associated with a specific cardiovascular comorbidity.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.8
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• pp.3917-3921
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• 2016

Background: The association between calcium channel blockers (CCBs) and survival in cancer patients remains unclear and the results of related studies are conflicting. The objective of the study was to investigate the association between calcium channel blockers (CCBs) use and survival in cancer patients. Materials and Methods: We searched PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science and Cochrane Library for studies published before January 2016 with the terms related to CCBs and survival in cancer patients. The information was reviewed and extracted by two evaluators independently. Data of publications was extracted and calculated into hazard ratios (HRs) for overall survival (OS). Statistical analysis was performed by using Review Manager 5.3. Results: There were 11 studies included in our meta-analysis. Analysis of all studies showed that CCBs use was not associated with survival in cancer patients (HR=1.07; 95% CI: 0.91-1.25; P=0.42). No association between CCBs use and overall survival in cancer patients was existed whether in Asian (HR=1.18, 95% CI: 0.72-1.93; P=0.52) or Caucasian population (HR=1.03, 95% CI: 0.89-1.20; P=0.66). Conclusions: There is no evidence that CCBs use is associated with a better or worse outcome of survival in cancer patients.

• The Korean Journal of Food And Nutrition
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.921-928
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• 2014

This study investigated the quality characteristics of cookies containing capsaicin, the main source of spicy taste in pepper, which is well known for its various functions such as anti-oxidant, anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory, and anti-obesity activities, as well as pain-relief effect. Cookie samples were made by adding the capsaicin powder at different levels, including 40 mg% (C1), 85 mg% (C2), and 150 mg% (C3). In this study, measurement of the moisture, pH, color, spread factor, hardness, anti-oxidant activity, and sensory evaluation of the cookies was carried out. The results showed that the anti-oxidant activity increased when more capsaicin powder was added to the cookies (p<0.001). The moisture also increased with increasing capsaicin powder content (p<0.05), while the pH did not show any significant changes. As for the colors, the L value and b value decreased as more capsaicin powder was added, while the a value increased. The spread factor also increased significantly with the increase of capsaicin powder (p<0.01). Although the hardness increased with capsaicin powder content, no statistically significant differences were observed among the various cookies. In the sensory evaluation, Cookies containing 40 mg of capsaicin obtained the highest score in color, while cookies containing 150 mg of capsaicin showed the highest score in taste, texture, and overall acceptability.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.387-397
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to suggest design characteristics of picture books for silver generation empirically through academic consideration of necessity and characteristics of picture books targeting silver generation. Through an analytical result of literature materials such as library and information science, pedagogy, and literature therapeutics, and aging phenomenon, picture books help mental and physical health of silver generation, but picture books for silver generation are insufficient in comparison with demand. Therefore, a theoretical basis of study and development of fairy tale books for silver generation is acutely needed. This study suggested that close attention for characteristics of silver generation is needed to solve a problem about dyslexia of silver generation in story, picture(expression, size, layout, structure, and color), and typography of characteristic factors of picture on designing fairy tale books for silver generation, suggesting needs to develop picture books reflecting characteristics such as visual organ, body function, and psychological factor of silver generation. In addition, design characteristics for composition of picture books for silver generation will be used as part of advanced data in a study on solid analytical data through an actual analysis on silver generation in the future.

• Journal of Gastric Cancer
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.256-261
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• 2015

Purpose: Gastric cancer is the third leading cause of cancer-related mortality, with the incidence and mortality being higher in men than in women. Various studies have shown that eating carrots may play a major role in the prevention of gastric cancer. We conducted a meta-analysis to determine the relationship between carrot consumption and gastric cancer. Materials and Methods: We searched multiple databases including PubMed, Cochrane Library, Scopus, ScienceDirect, and Persian databases like Scientific Information Database (SID) and IranMedx. The following search terms were used: stomach or gastric, neoplasm or cancer, carcinoma or tumor, and carrot. Statistical analyses were performed using Comprehensive Meta Analysis/2.0 software. Results: We retrieved 81 articles by searching the databases. After considering the inclusion and exclusion criteria, 5 articles were included in this study. The odds ratio (OR) obtained by fixed effects model showed that a 26% reduction in the risk of gastric cancer has been associated with the consumption of carrots) OR=0.74; 95% confidence interval=0.68~0.81; P<0.0001). According to funnel graph, the results showed that the possibility of a publication bias does not exist in this study. Conclusions: The findings of this study showed an inverse relationship between the consumption of carrots and the risk of gastric cancer.

• Imaging Science in Dentistry
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• v.50 no.2
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• pp.169-174
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• 2020

Purpose: Periodontal disease causes tooth loss and is associated with cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and rheumatoid arthritis. The present study proposes using a deep learning-based object detection method to identify periodontally compromised teeth on digital panoramic radiographs. A faster regional convolutional neural network (faster R-CNN) which is a state-of-the-art deep detection network, was adapted from the natural image domain using a small annotated clinical data- set. Materials and Methods: In total, 100 digital panoramic radiographs of periodontally compromised patients were retrospectively collected from our hospital's information system and augmented. The periodontally compromised teeth found in each image were annotated by experts in periodontology to obtain the ground truth. The Keras library, which is written in Python, was used to train and test the model on a single NVidia 1080Ti GPU. The faster R-CNN model used a pretrained ResNet architecture. Results: The average precision rate of 0.81 demonstrated that there was a significant region of overlap between the predicted regions and the ground truth. The average recall rate of 0.80 showed that the periodontally compromised teeth regions generated by the detection method excluded healthiest teeth areas. In addition, the model achieved a sensitivity of 0.84, a specificity of 0.88 and an F-measure of 0.81. Conclusion: The faster R-CNN trained on a limited amount of labeled imaging data performed satisfactorily in detecting periodontally compromised teeth. The application of a faster R-CNN to assist in the detection of periodontally compromised teeth may reduce diagnostic effort by saving assessment time and allowing automated screening documentation.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.20 no.8
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• pp.1258-1270
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• 2017

'Semantic gap' has been a year-old problem in automatic video summarization, which refers to the gap between semantics implied in video summarization algorithms and what people actually infer from watching videos. Using the external EEG bio-feedback obtained from video watchers as a solution of this semantic gap problem has several another issues: First, how to define and measure noises against ERP waveforms as signals. Second, whether individual differences among subjects in terms of noise and SNR for conventional ERP studies using still images captured from videos are the same with those differently conceptualized and measured from videos. Third, whether individual differences of subjects by noise and SNR levels help to detect topic-irrelevant shots as signals which are not matched with subject's own semantic topical expectations (mis-match negativity at around 400m after stimulus on-sets). The result of repeated measures ANOVA test clearly shows a 2-way interaction effect between topic-relevance and noise level, implying that subjects of low noise level for video watching session are sensitive to topic-irrelevant visual shots, while showing another 3-way interaction among topic-relevance, noise and SNR levels, implying that subjects of high noise level are sensitive to topic-irrelevant visual shots only if they are of low SNR level.

• The Journal of Korean Obstetrics and Gynecology
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.80-94
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• 2020

Objectives: The purpose of this review is to analyze the domestic study trends of clinical use of Digital Infrared Thermal Imaging (DITI) as a diagnosis instrument on obstetrics and gynecological diseases in Korean literature. Methods: We searched for clinical studies using DITI in the journal of Korean obstetrics & gynecology, National Digital Science Library, Research Information Sharing Service, Korean Medical Database up to May 2020. After searching studies, we selected studies and analyzed according to disease. Results: 18 clinical studies were published in two kinds of academic journals. There were 4 studies about dysmenorrhea and menopausal symptoms, 2 studies about postpartum disease and hypercryalgesia, 1 study about amenorrhea, premenstrual syndrome, leukorrhea, infertility, polycystic ovary syndrome and hot flush. Conception vessel was frequently used for DITI measurement, followed by stomach meridian. The temperatures of abdomen (CV4, CV12), face (HN3), upper and lower limb (PC8, LU4, LR3, ST32) were commonly measured. Conclusions: This study shows that DITI could be one of effective diagnosis instrument for obstetrics and gynecological diseases. More well-designed clinical studies using DITI will be needed.

• Korean Journal of Acupuncture
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.191-208
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• 2017

Objectives : The purpose of this study was to analyze the trend of pharmacopuncture in Korean patent in order to establish database for patent technology. Methods : Electronic literature searches for Korean patents related to pharmacopuncture were performed in two electronic databases (Korea Intellectual Property Right Information Service and National Digital Science Library) to June 2017. Patents that were not Korean ones, did not use medicinal herb, only described method of manufacture, or had nothing to do with pharmacopuncture were excluded in this study. The status and application date of patents, Medicinal herb, target diseases, International Patent Classification (IPC), model of experiment and extracting methods were analyzed. Results : A total of 379 patents were retrieved. Based on our inclusion/exclusion criteria, 297 patents were excluded. Of 82 included patents, 27 patents did not include experiments using pharmacopuncture, and 9 patents were invented for treating animals such as pig or calf. In IPC analysis, Bee Venom, Panax (ginseng), Angelica, and Paeoniaceae were used frequently. Musculoskeletal diseases were the most targeted diseases followed by nervous diseases. For extracting, hot water extraction, distillation extraction, and solvent extraction using alcohol, ethanol, or methanol for solvent were commonly used. Conclusions : These data are useful for inventing new patent and extending range of pharmacopuncture in clinical use, however, more systematically analyzed patent studies and pharmacopuncture-related studies for new application on various diseases are needed in further studies.