• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.52 no.3
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• pp.365-374
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• 2016

In high-latitude regions, temperature has risen ($0.6^{\circ}C$ per decade) and this leads to the increase in microbial degradability against soil organic carbon (SOC). Furthermore, the decomposed SOC is converted into green-house gases ($CO_2$ and $CH_4$) and their release could further increase the rate of climate change. Thus, understanding the microbial diversity and their functions linked with SOC degradation in soil-thawing model is necessary. In this study, we divided tundra soil from Council, Alaska into two depth regions (30-40 cm and 50-60 cm of depth, designated as SPF and PF, respectively) and incubated that for 108 days at $0^{\circ}C$. A total of 111,804 reads were obtained through a pyrosequencing-based metagenomic study during the microcosm experiments, and 574-1,128 of bacterial operational taxonomic units (OTUs) and 30-57 of archaeal OTUs were observed. Taxonomic analysis showed that the distribution of bacterial taxa was significantly different between two samples. In detail, the relative abundance of phyla Actinobacteria and Firmicutes largely increased in SPF and PF soil, respectively, while phyla Crenarchaeota was increased in both soil samples. Weight measurement and gel permeation chromatography of the SOC extracts demonstrated that polymerization of humic acids, main component of SOC, occurred during the microcosm experiments. Taken together our results indicate that these bacterial and archaeal phyla could play a key function in SOC degradation and utilization in cold tundra soil.

• Particle and aerosol research
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.141-150
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• 2017

Using the NASA's Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2) reanalysis for aerosol optical depth (AOD) and satellite-observed carbon monoxide (CO) data, we examined the basic pattern of AOD variations over the three polar stations of Korea: Jangbogo and King Sejong stations in the Antarctica, and Dasan station in the Arctic area. AOD values at King Sejong and Dasan station show the maximum peaks in spring, which looks associated with the high amount of atmospheric CO emitted from the natural burning and the biomass burning. Jangbogo station shows the much less AOD compared to other two stations, and seems not strongly affected by the transport of airborne particles generated from mid-latitude regions. All three polar stations show the AOD increasing trend in general, indicating that the polar background air quality becomes polluted.

• Current Optics and Photonics
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.157-162
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• 2017

In large liquid crystal displays, the image quality in an oblique viewing direction is a crucial issue. From this perspective, 8-domain polymer-stabilized vertical alignment (PS-VA) mode has been developed to suppress the color shift in oblique viewing directions, compared to that in 4-domain PS-VA mode. To realize the 8-domain PS-VA, the four domains in a pixel are each divided into two regions, such that applying different electric potentials result in different tilt angles in these two regions, while keeping four azimuthal directions in each domain. However, applying different voltages in a pixel causes drawbacks, such as requiring additional processes to construct a capacitor and a transistor, which will further reduce the aperture ratio. Here we propose a different approach to form the 8-domain, by controlling surface polar anchoring energy and the width of patterned electrodes in two regions of a pixel. As a result, the gamma-distortion index (GDI), measured at an azimuthal angle of $0^{\circ}$, is reduced by about 23% and 8%, compared to that of a conventional 4-domain at polar angles of $30^{\circ}$ and $60^{\circ}$ respectively.

• Proceedings of the KSRS Conference
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• 2005.10a
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• pp.575-578
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• 2005

Topographical images, in case of aerial or satellite images, are usually similar in colors and textures, and complex in shapes. Thus we have to use shape features of images for efficiently retrieving a query image from topographical image databases. In this paper, we propose a shape feature extraction method which is suitable for topographical images. This method, which improves the existing projection in the Cartesian coordinates, performs the projection operation in the polar coordinates. This method extracts three attributes, namely the number of region pixels, the boundary pixel length of the region from the centroid, the number of alternations between region and background, along each angular direction of the polar coordinates. It extracts the features of complex shape objects which may have holes and disconnected regions. An advantage of our method is that it is invariant to rotation/scale/translation of images. Finally we show the advantages of our method through experiments by comparing it with CSS which is one of the most successful methods in the area of shape feature extraction

• Journal of Microbiology
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• v.42 no.4
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• pp.305-314
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• 2004

An exopolysaccharide-producing microalgal dinoflagellate was isolated from a red-tide bloom and des­ignated strain KG03. A bacteria-free culture of strain KG03 was achieved using a modified wash with phototaxis and antibiotic treatment. Combined treatment with neomycin and cephalosporin was the most effective for eliminating the bacteria associated with the microalgae. Strain KG03 was identified as Gyrodinium impudicum by analyzing the ITS regions of the 5.8S rDNA, 18S rDNA, morphological phenotype and fatty acid composition. The exopolysaccharide production and cell growth in a 300-ml photobioreactor were increased 2.7- and 2.4-fold, respectively, compared with that in a flask culture at the first isolation step.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.50.1-50.1
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• 2016

We have found cool homopause temperatures (Kim et al. 2016) of 180 - 250 K for the 8-micron North Polar Hot Spot (8NPHS) of Jupiter, which has been observed to be stationary at 180 deg (SysIII) longitude since the early 1980s. The 3-micron spectro-images of Jupiter that we analyzed were obtained with GNIRS, Gemini Near-Infrared Spectrograph at Gemini North on January 13, 2013(UT), and at $8{\mu}m$ on Feburary 6, 2013(UT) with TEXES, the Texas Echelon Cross Echelle Spectrograph at the NASA IRTF. The cool homopause was unexpected, and a possible implication of the relatively cool 8NPHS homopause compared with those of other auroral regions will be presented.

• Proceedings of the KSEEG Conference
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• 2000.04b
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• pp.308-310
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• 2000

Sampling rates become inconsistent when spatial data in spherical coordinate are re-sampled with respect latitudinal or longitudinal degree for mathematical processes such as Fourier Transfrom, and this results in the distrtions of the processed data in the wavenmber domain. This distortions are more evident in the polar regions. An example is presented to show such distortions during the recovery process of free-air gravity anomalies from ERSI radar atimeter data in Russian Arctic Barents Sea, and a method is present to minimize the distortion using Lambect Conformal Conic map projection.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.43 no.3
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• pp.209-223
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• 2023

This study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of a polar literacy education program for elementary and middle school students, and to derive implications for new education to respond to climate change. We developed modular education programs based on the seven principles of polar literacy established by the Polar-ICE team. We divided them into two courses, one emphasizing science concepts and another emphasizing humanities and sociological issues. We then selected and structured detailed programs suitable for the two courses. These two courses were applied to 26 elementary and middle school students for approximately 69 hours in a Saturday science class hosted by the Department of Science Education at a university in Seoul. The 26 students were divided into three groups. Two groups completed the science education program for polar literacy and a humanities and social studies education program for polar literacy, respectively. The third group, the control group, received general science education unrelated to polar literacy. Before and after running the programs, all three groups responded to a polar literacy test and questionnaires that used vocabulary and presented scenes associated with polar regions. The test results were expressed using Wilcoxon signed ranks, which is a non-parametric test method, and improvements made upon completion of the program were analyzed. From a cognitive aspect, all three groups showed improvement after completing the program in the knowledge area; however, the experimental groups showed a greater degree of improvement than the control group, and there was a clear difference in the contents or materials explicitly covered. From an affective aspect, the difference between before and after the program was minor, but the group that focused on humanities and social issues showed a statistically significant improvement. Regarding changes in polar imagery, the two experimental groups tended to diverge from monotonous images to more diverse images compared to the control group. Based on the above results, we suggested methods to increase the effectiveness of polar literacy education programs, the importance of polar literacy as appropriate material for scientific thinking and earth system education, measures to improve attitudes related to the polar region, and the need to link to school curriculums.

• Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.47 no.5
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• pp.611-621
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• 2014

A nationwide survey was conducted to study the rate of Kudoa septempunctata parasitization in cultured olive flounder, Paralichthys olivaceus, in Korea in 2013. Of 1107 olive flounder sampled randomly from 89 culture farms in five different regions in Korea, K. septempunctata was detected only in Jeju, where 10 of 318 fish (3.14%) were PCR positive, with genomic concentrations of $4.67{\times}10^5$ to $1.48{\times}10^{11}$ rDNA copies/g by real-time PCR. Of the ten Kudoapositive fish, K. septempunctata spores with 5-7 polar capsules were detected only in four fish. No samples of K. septempunctata were detected in olive flounder from the other regions surveyed. Furthermore, K. septempunctata was not detected in 326 samples of olive flounder seeds sampled from 39 hatcheries in seven different regions in Korea. Therefore, the parasite infection is restricted to Jeju and K. septempunctata infection is not spread from hatcheries.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.351-353
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• 2013

Until recently, Pacific equatorial tropical island states were subject of only very limited interest by scientists, government officials, industry and policy makers of Korea. And, comprehensive information and data on these island regions is not very detailed to help better understand their social backgrounds as well as their natural environment. However, these island regions are now in the middle of diplomatic tug-of-war among super powers as well as becoming nucleus of various science-based ocean issues including marine biodiversity, shifting ecosystem, global environmental change including sea level rise and ocean acidification, fisheries, etc. Therefore, rising political and scientific importance of these areas call for better understanding of these regions, in social aspects as well as natural scientific knowledge of the region. To be provocatively prepared to more actively role in these regions, "A study on Establishing Research Infrastructures in the Tropical Pacific" has been supported during 2012-2013 as a mission-oriented in-house project of the KIOST. This project aims to provide various research infrastructure for Pacific island states, to reinforce cooperation with these nations, and to enhance Korea's national prestige. This special issue contains 10 research articles based on the studies conducted in 2012~2013.