• Journal of Food Hygiene and Safety
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.535-543
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• 2020

In addition to the ubiquitous roles of cellular RNA in genetic regulations, gene expression and phenotypic variations in response to environmental cues and chemotactic signals, the regulatory roles of a new type of RNA called extracellular RNAs (exRNAs) are an up-and-coming area of research interest. exRNA is transported outside the cell through membrane blebs known as membrane vesicles or extracellular vesicles (EVs). EV formation is predominant and conserved among all microbial forms, including prokaryotes, eukaryotes, and archaea. This review will focus on the three major topics concerning bacterially derived exRNAs, i.e., 1) the discovery of exRNA and influence of extraneous RNA over bacterial gene regulations, 2) the known secretion mechanism for the release of exRNA, and 3) the possible applications that can be devised with these exRNA secreted by different gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria. Further, this review will also provide an opinion on exRNA- and EV-derived applications such as the species-specific exRNA markers for diagnostics and the possible roles of exRNA in probiotics and the epigenetic regulations of the gut microbiome.

• Journal of Korea Port Economic Association
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.69-86
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• 2022

This study analyses the necessity of the large-size shipyard and explores competitiveness factors of it. Furthermore, the competitiveness is evaluated and the economic feasibility of building and operation of shipyard is examined. As a result of AHP analysis of the determining factors of the competitiveness of the repairing shipyard, the importance of the factors was found in the order of arrival and departure safety, repair technology, dock and wharf facilities, repair cost, repair period (on time delivery), and repair parts supply. Moving distance, repair service quality, repair parts supply, arrival and departure safety, repair technology, dock and quay wall facilities, and repair period (on time delivery) were identified as key factors in the AHP analysis for competitiveness of the Busan Port repair shipyard to be built in the future. As a result of the analysing economic feasibility, the net present value of the Busan Port repair shipyard construction and operation investment project was KRW 435.6 billion, and the internal rate of return was 9.8%, higher than the social discount rate (4.5%), and the cost-benefit ratio (B/C) was high at 1.167. As a result of the study, the necessity and economic feasibility of the Busan Port repair shipyard are sufficiently ensured, and the competitiveness assessment was highly positive.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.19 no.11
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• pp.255-266
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• 2021

Investment demand for factory facilities has increased due to the balloon effect caused by housing price regulation. This study investigated the impact of the real estate market and macroeconomic factors on the bid price ratio of apartment auctions and factory auctions, focusing on the metropolitan area. To this end, we reviewed theories and previous studies on real estate auctions, and examined how macroeconomic variables affect bid price ratio of apartments and factories using the panel vector autoregressive model. It was found that the increase in the apartment bid price ratio increases as the participation in apartment auctions increases. However, as the factory bid price ratio increases, the factory bid price ratio does not increase, it was confirmed that the positive (+) relationship between the successful bid price ratio and the bid price ratioe does not exist, unlike previous studies. Based on the analysis results, it is suggested that the real estate market and macroeconomic factors should be considered for the stable operation of the related relevant auction system. This study has limitations in that it is limited to the metropolitan area. In the future, research that expands the scope of research to the whole country and provinces should be conducted.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Marine Environment & Safety
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• v.27 no.7
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• pp.1074-1081
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• 2021

Nitrous oxide (N₂O) is one of the six major greenhouse gases and is known to produce a greenhouse ef ect by absorbing infrared radiation in the atmosphere. In particular, its global warming potential (GWP) is 310 times higher than that of CO₂, making N₂O a global concern. Accordingly, strong environmental regulations are being proposed. N₂O reduction technology can be classified into concentration recovery, catalytic decomposition, and pyrolysis according to physical methods. This study intends to provide information on temperature conditions and reaction time required to reduce nitrogen oxides with cost. The high-temperature ranges selected for pyrolysis conditions were calculated at intervals of 100 K from 1073 K to 1373 K. Under temperatures of 1073 K and 1173 K, the N₂O reduction rate and nitrogen monoxide concentration were observed to be proportional to the residence time, and for 1273 K, the N₂O reduction rate decreased due to generation of the reverse reaction as the residence time increased. Particularly for 1373 K, the positive and reverse reactions for all residence times reached chemical equilibrium, resulting in a rather reduced reaction progression to N₂O reduction.

• Knowledge Management Research
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.161-183
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• 2023

Social Q&A sites, where individuals freely ask and answer each other online, play an important role as a public knowledge repository. For their sustainable growth, social Q&A sites constantly need new askers and new answerers. However, previous studies have focused only on answerers, with little attention to new users or askers. This study examines the factors encouraging new users to continue using social Q&A sites based on motivational affordance theory and self-determination theory, and also investigates whether the factors differ depending on the types of users (i.e., new asker vs. new answerer). In addition, the moderating effect of prior experience with a member Q&A site was examined. Using logistic regression and XGBoost, we analyzed online activity data from 25,000 users in the Stack Exchange Network and found that design elements with motivational affordances had significant impacts on new users' continuance behavior. The experience of a member Q&A site negatively moderated the influence of the antecedents of continuance behavior. Interestingly, the influence of editing was not significant in the analysis of new users as a whole, but was significant in the separate analyses of askers (significantly negative) and answerers (significantly positive).

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.57-89
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• 2009

This study aims to shed light on the new insights on the cross-buying intentions in the banking industry and suggests an integrated model of the cross-buying intentions. Recently with globalization in the financial sector, financial companies are trying to retain current customers and attract new one by developing various financial products. In South Korea, this trend is especially apparent in the banking sector. Cross-selling of various financial products such as beneficiary certificates, bankasurance and etc. is becoming more important in retaining competitive advantage in Korean banking industry. However, there are few studies which are trying to find out the factors affecting cross-buying intentions and explain their interrelationships comprehensively. Based upon the previous studies, this study finds out the factors affecting cross-buying intentions and classifies them into two dimensions: affective and instrumental. Affective dimension includes trust, satisfaction and commitment. Instrumental dimension includes the factors such as geological convenience, one-stop convenience, professionality, and direct mail. The results from this study are as follow. All the factors in the affective dimension(trust, satisfaction and commitment) have significant impacts on cross-buying intentions. Also all the factors in the instrumental dimension(geological convenience, one-stop convenience, professionality, and DM) significantly affect cross-buying intentions. Some implications of this dissertation are as follow; First, this study identifies the antecedents of cross-buying intentions comprehensively. Second, this paper provides practical guidelines for the banks attempting to intensify cross-selling activities. Third, banks need to develop sophisticated plans which can consolidate the emotional ties with customers through positive service experiences as the affective dimension is important in influencing cross-buying intentions. Finally, regarding the instrumental dimesnion, the implications are: 1) Developing various new financial products in addition to traditional product such as deposits and installment savings for improving customer convenience, 2) Enhancing the professionality of employees by strengthening education programs on numbers of financial products, 3) Increasing cross-buying intentions through the DM.

• Information Systems Review
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.165-187
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• 2023

The continuous increase in life expectancy and high interest in health has brought about significant changes in the use of health information by the public according to the development of information technology represented by the Internet and smartphones. As the medical market expands to the mobile health environment, many health-related apps have been created and distributed, but the acceptance rate is slow as it has become challenging to provide services due to various regulations. In this study, perceived value, perceived risk factors (psychological risk, risk of time-loss, legal risk), and perceived benefits (usefulness, interaction, autonomy) were derived and verified as factors that affect the acceptance resistance of personal health record apps based on the privacy calculation model. In addition, by analyzing the moderating effect of trust in the manufacturer, how the perceived risk and perceived benefit affect the perceived value was verified. A survey was conducted on Korean college students who recognized the personal health record apps but did not use them, and 127 samples were analyzed using structural equations. As a result of hypothesis verification, perceived value has a negative effect on acceptance resistance, perceived risk (risk of time-loss) has a negative effect on perceived value, and perceived benefits (usefulness, interaction, autonomy) were found to have a positive effect on perceived value. Trust in manufacturers has weakened the impact of perceived risks (legal risk) on perceived values. This study is expected to play an important role in maintaining a competitive advantage in the personal health record app market environment by identifying and proposing detailed criteria for reducing the acceptance resistance of personal health record apps.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.71-79
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• 2024

ChatGPT, an interactive artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot developed by Open AI in the U.S., gaining popularity with great repercussions around the world. Some academia are concerned that ChatGPT can be used by students for plagiarism, but ChatGPT is also widely used in a positive direction, such as being used to write marketing phrases or website phrases. There is also an opinion that ChatGPT could be a new future for "search," and some analysts say that the focus should be on fostering rather than excessive regulation. This study analyzed consciousness about ChatGPT for college students through a survey of their perception of ChatGPT. And, plagiarism inspection systems were prepared to establish an education support model using ChatGPT and ChatGPT. Based on this, a university education support model using ChatGPT was constructed. The education model using ChatGPT established an education model based on text, digital, and art, and then composed of detailed strategies necessary for the era of the 4th industrial revolution below it. In addition, it was configured to guide students to use ChatGPT within the permitted range by using the ChatGPT detection function provided by the plagiarism inspection system, after the instructor of the class determined the allowable range of content generated by ChatGPT according to the learning goal. By linking and utilizing ChatGPT and the plagiarism inspection system in this way, it is expected to prevent situations in which ChatGPT's excellent ability is abused in education.

• Korean Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.45-55
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• 2024

This study analyzed the efficiency determinants of specialty construction companies by industry using the DEA model and the Tobit model. The analysis targets are 394 specialty construction companies as of 2022. As a result of analysis of efficiency determinants using 12 company characteristics as independent variables, the biggest problem for specialty construction companies was overall efficiency reduction due to rising labor costs. In addition, in a situation where construction companies' loan regulations are severe, the debt ratio was found to have a positive effect on efficiency. Company size had a different impact by industry, and the number of businesses held, credit score, and total capital turnover had an effect only on some industries. This study presents results that are an advance on existing research in that it strategically analyzes factors for improving the efficiency of specialty construction companies. However, it has limitations such as limiting the analysis to only specialty construction companies subject to external audit, insufficient number of companies subject to analysis by industry, and analyzing relative efficiency in the same category for each industry.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.49-71
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• 2010

Franchise businesses in South Korea have contributed to economic growth and job creation, and its growth potential remains very high. However, despite such virtues, domestic franchise businesses face many problems such as the instability of franchisor's business structure and weak financial conditions. To solve these problems, the government enacted legislation and strengthened franchise related laws. However, the strengthening of laws regulating franchisors had many side effects that interrupted the development of the franchise business. For example, legal regulations regarding franchisors have had the effect of suppressing the franchisor's leadership activities (e.g. activities such as the ability to advocate the franchisor's policies and strategies to the franchisees, in order to facilitate change and innovation). One of the main goals of the franchise business is to build cooperation between the franchisor and the franchisee for their combined success. However, franchisees can refuse to follow the franchisor's strategies because of the current state of franchise-related law and government policy. The purpose of this study to explore the effects of franchisor's leadership style on franchisee's commitment in a franchise system. We classified leadership styles according to the path-goal theory (House & Mitchell, 1974), and it was hypothesized and tested that the four leadership styles proposed by the path-goal theory (i.e. directive, supportive, participative and achievement-oriented leadership) have different effects on franchisee's commitment. Another purpose of this study to explore the how the level of franchisee's self-efficacy influences both the franchisor's leadership style and franchisee's commitment in a franchise system. Results of the present study are expected to provide important theoretical and practical implications as to the role of franchisor's leadership style, as restricted by government regulations and the franchisee's self-efficacy, which could be needed to improve the quality of the long-term relationship between the franchisor and franchisee. Quoted by Northouse(2007), one problem regarding the investigation of leadership is that there are almost as many different definitions of leadership as there are people who have tried to define it. But despite the multitude of ways in which leadership has been conceptualized, the following components can be identified as central to the phenomenon: (a) leadership is a process, (b) leadership involves influence, (c) leadership occurs in a group context, and (d) leadership involves goal attainment. Based on these components, in this study leadership is defined as a process whereby franchisor's influences a group of franchisee' to achieve a common goal. Focusing on this definition, the path-goal theory is about how leaders motivate subordinates to accomplish designated goals. Drawing heavily from research on what motivates employees, path-goal theory first appeared in the leadership literature in the early 1970s in the works of Evans (1970), House (1971), House and Dessler (1974), and House and Mitchell (1974). The stated goal of this leadership theory is to enhance employee performance and employee satisfaction by focusing on employee motivation. In brief, path-goal theory is designed to explain how leaders can help subordinates along the path to their goals by selecting specific behaviors that are best suited to subordinates' needs and to the situation in which subordinates are working (Northouse, 2007). House & Mitchell(1974) predicted that although many different leadership behaviors could have been selected to be a part of path-goal theory, this approach has so far examined directive, supportive, participative, and achievement-oriented leadership behaviors. And they suggested that leaders may exhibit any or all of these four styles with various subordinates and in different situations. However, due to restrictive government regulations, franchisors are not in a position to change their leadership style to suit their circumstances. In addition, quoted by Northouse(2007), ssubordinate characteristics determine how a leader's behavior is interpreted by subordinates in a given work context. Many researchers have focused on subordinates' needs for affiliation, preferences for structure, desires for control, and self-perceived level of task ability. In this study, we have focused on the self-perceived level of task ability, namely, the franchisee's self-efficacy. According to Bandura (1977), self-efficacy is chiefly defined as the personal attitude of one's ability to accomplish concrete tasks. Therefore, it is not an indicator of one's actual abilities, but an opinion of the extent of how one can use that ability. Thus, the judgment of maintain franchisee's commitment depends on the situation (e.g., government regulation and policy and leadership style of franchisor) and how it affects one's ability to mobilize resources to deal with the task, so even if people possess the same ability, there may be differences in self-efficacy. Figure 1 illustrates the model investigated in this study. In this model, it was hypothesized that leadership styles would affect the franchisee's commitment, and self-efficacy would moderate the relationship between leadership style and franchisee's commitment. Theoretically, quoted by Northouse(2007), the path-goal approach suggests that leaders need to choose a leadership style that best fits the needs of subordinates and the work they are doing. According to House & Mitchell (1974), the theory predicts that a directive style of leadership is best in situations in which subordinates are dogmatic and authoritarian, the task demands are ambiguous, and the organizational rule and procedures are unclear. In these situations, franchisor's directive leadership complements the work by providing guidance and psychological structure for franchisees. For work that is structured, unsatisfying, or frustrating, path-goal theory suggests that leaders should use a supportive style. Franchisor's Supportive leadership offers a sense of human touch for franchisees engaged in mundane, mechanized activity. Franchisor's participative leadership is considered best when a task is ambiguous because participation gives greater clarity to how certain paths lead to certain goals; it helps subordinates learn what actions leads to what outcome. Furthermore, House & Mitchell(1974) predicts that achievement-oriented leadership is most effective in settings in which subordinates are required to perform ambiguous tasks. Marsh and O'Neill (1984) tested the idea that organizational members' anger and decline in performance is caused by deficiencies in their level of effort and found that self-efficacy promotes accomplishment, decreases stress and negative consequences like depression and emotional instability. Based on the extant empirical findings and theoretical reasoning, we posit positive and strong relationships between the franchisor's leadership styles and the franchisee's commitment. Furthermore, the level of franchisee's self-efficacy was thought to maintain their commitment. The questionnaires sent to participants consisted of the following measures; leadership style was assessed using a 20 item 7-point likert scale developed by Indvik (1985), self-efficacy was assessed using a 24 item 6-point likert scale developed by Bandura (1977), and commitment was assessed using a 6 item 5-point likert scale developed by Morgan & Hunt (1994). Questionnaires were distributed to Korean optical franchisees in Seoul. It took about 20 days to complete the data collection. A total number of 140 questionnaires were returned and complete data were available from 137 respondents. Results of multiple regression analyses testing the relationships between the each of the four styles of leadership shown by the franchisor as independent variables and franchisee's commitment as the dependent variable showed that the relationship between supportive leadership style and commitment ($\beta$=.13, p<.001),and the relationship between participative leadership style and commitment ($\beta$=.07, p<.001)were significant. However, when participants divided into high and low self-efficacy groups, results of multiple regression analyses showed that only the relationship between achievement-oriented leadership style and commitment ($\beta$=.14, p<.001) was significant in the high self-efficacy group. In the low self-efficacy group, the relationship between supportive leadership style and commitment ($\beta$=.17, p<.001),and the relationship between participative leadership style and commitment ($\beta$=.10, p<.001) were significant. The study focused on the franchisee's self-efficacy in order to explore the possibility that regulation, originally intended to protect the franchisee, may not be the most effective method to maintain the relationships in a franchise business. The key results of the data analysis regarding the moderating role of self-efficacy between leadership behavior style as proposed by path-goal and commitment theory were as follows. First, this study proposed that franchisor should apply the appropriate type of leadership behavior to strengthen the franchisees commitment because the results demonstrated that supportive and participative leadership styles by the franchisors have a positive influence on the franchisee's level of commitment. Second, it is desirable for franchisor to validate the franchisee's efforts, since the franchisee's characteristics such as self-efficacy had a substantial, positive effect on the franchisee's commitment as well as being a meaningful moderator between leadership and commitment. Third, the results as a whole imply that the government should provide institutional support, namely to put the franchisor in a position to clearly identify the characteristics of their franchisees and provide reasonable means to administer the franchisees to achieve the company's goal.