• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.56 no.1
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• pp.207-215
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• 2024

This study focuses on measuring the levels of naturally occurring radioactivity in the soil of Swabi, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, as well as the associated health hazard. Thirty (30) soil samples were collected from various locations and analyzed for ²²⁶Ra, ²³²Th, and ⁴⁰K radioactivity levels using a High Purity Germanium detector (HPGe) gamma-ray spectrometer with a photo-peak efficiency of approximately 52.3%. The average values obtained for these radionuclides are 35.6 ± 5.7 Bqkg^-1, 47 ± 12.5 Bqkg^-1, and 877 ± 153 Bqkg^-1, respectively. The level of ²³²Th is slightly higher and ⁴⁰K is 2.2 times higher than the internationally recommended limit of 30 Bqkg^-1 and 400 Bqkg^-1, respectively. Various parameters were calculated based on the results obtained, including Radium Equivalent (Ra_eq), External Hazard (H_ex), Absorbed Dose Rate (D), Annual Gonadal Equivalent Dose (AGDE), Annual Effective Dose Rate, and Excess Lifetime Cancer Risk (ELCR), which are 170.3 ± 24 Bqkg^-1, 0.46 ± 0.06 Bqkg^-1, 81.4 ± 2.04 nGy h^-1, 582 ± 78.08 µSvy^-1, 99.8 ± 13.5 µSv Gy^-1, and 0.349 ± 0.04, respectively. These values are below the limits recommended by the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) in 2002. This study highlights the potential radiation threats associated with natural radioactivity levels in the soil of Swabi and provides valuable information for public health and safety.

• The Journal of Korean Society for Radiation Therapy
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.57-71
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• 2005

Purpose : To evaluate radiation dose and accuracy with TLD and diode detector when treat total skin with electron beam. Materials and Methods : Using Stanford Technique, we treated patient with Mycosis Fungoides. 6 MeV electron beam of LINAC was used and the SSD was 300 cm. Also, acrylic speller(0.8 cm) was used. The patient position was 6 types and the gantry angle was 64, 90 and $116^{\circ}$. The patient's skin dose and the output were detected 5 to 6 times with TLD and diode. Result : The deviations of dose detected with TLD from tumor dose were CA $+\;6\%$, thigh $+\;8\%$, umbilicus $+\;4\%$, calf $-\;8\%$, vertex $-\;74.4\%$, deep axillae $-\;10.2\%$, anus and testis $-\;87\%$, sole $-\;86\%$ and nails shielded with 4mm lead $+4\%$. The deviations of dose detected with diode were $-4.5\%{\sim}+5\%$ at the patient center and $-1.1\%{\sim}+1\%$ at the speller. Conclusion : The deviation of total skin dose was $+\;8\%{\sim}-\;8\%$ and that deviation was within the acceptable range(${\pm}\;10\%$). The boost dose was irradiated for the low dose areas(vertex, anus, sole). The electron beam output detected at the sootier was stable. It is thought that the deviation of dose at patient center detected with diode was induced by detection point and patient position.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.218-224
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• 2014

The small field dosimetry is very important in modern radiotherapy because it has been frequently used to treat the tumor with high dose hypo-fractionated radiotherapy or high dose single fraction stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) with small size target. But, the dosimetry of a small field (< $3{\times}3cm^2$) has been great challenges in radiotherapy. Small field dosimetry is difficult because of (a) a lack of lateral electronic equilibrium, (b) steep dose gradients, and (c) partial blocking of the source. The objectives of this study were to measure and verify with the various detectors the output factors in a small field (<3 cm) for the 6 MV photon beams. Output factors were measured using the CC13, CC01, EDGE detector, thermoluminescence dosimeters (TLDs), and Gafchromic EBT2 films at the sizes of field such as $0.5{\times}0.5$, $1{\times}1$, $2{\times}2$, $3{\times}3$, $5{\times}5$, and $10{\times}10cm^2$. The differences in the output factors with the various detectors increased with decreasing field size. Our study demonstrates that the dosimetry for a small photon beam (< $3{\times}3cm^2$) should use CC01 or EDGE detectors with a small active volume. And also, Output factors with the EDGE detectors in a small field (< $3{\times}3cm^2$) coincided well with the Gafchromic EBT2 films.

• Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging
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• v.41 no.3
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• pp.234-240
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• 2007

Purpose: In this study we propose a block-iterative method for reconstructing Compton scattered data. This study shows that the well-known expectation maximization (EM) approach along with its accelerated version based on the ordered subsets principle can be applied to the problem of image reconstruction for Compton camera. This study also compares several methods of constructing subsets for optimal performance of our algorithms. Materials and Methods: Three reconstruction algorithms were implemented; simple backprojection (SBP), EM, and ordered subset EM (OSEM). For OSEM, the projection data were grouped into subsets in a predefined order. Three different schemes for choosing nonoverlapping subsets were considered; scatter angle-based subsets, detector position-based subsets, and both scatter angle- and detector position-based subsets. EM and OSEM with 16 subsets were performed with 64 and 4 iterations, respectively. The performance of each algorithm was evaluated in terms of computation time and normalized mean-squared error. Results: Both EM and OSEM clearly outperformed SBP in all aspects of accuracy. The OSEM with 16 subsets and 4 iterations, which is equivalent to the standard EM with 64 iterations, was approximately 14 times faster in computation time than the standard EM. In OSEM, all of the three schemes for choosing subsets yielded similar results in computation time as well as normalized mean-squared error. Conclusion: Our results show that the OSEM algorithm, which have proven useful in emission tomography, can also be applied to the problem of image reconstruction for Compton camera. With properly chosen subset construction methods and moderate numbers of subsets, our OSEM algorithm significantly improves the computational efficiency while keeping the original quality of the standard EM reconstruction. The OSEM algorithm with scatter angle- and detector position-based subsets is most available.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.79-88
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• 2014

The dose distributions within the real volumes of tumor targets and critical organs during internal target volume-based intensity-modulated radiation therapy (ITV-IMRT) for liver cancer were recalculated by applying the effects of actual respiratory organ motion, and the dosimetric features were analyzed through comparison with gating IMRT (Gate-IMRT) plan results. The ITV was created using MIM software, and a moving phantom was used to simulate respiratory motion. The doses were recalculated with a 3 dose-volume histogram (3DVH) program based on the per-field data measured with a MapCHECK2 2-dimensional diode detector array. Although a sufficient prescription dose covered the PTV during ITV-IMRT delivery, the dose homogeneity in the PTV was inferior to that with the Gate-IMRT plan. We confirmed that there were higher doses to the organs-at-risk (OARs) with ITV-IMRT, as expected when using an enlarged field, but the increased dose to the spinal cord was not significant and the increased doses to the liver and kidney could be considered as minor when the reinforced constraints were applied during IMRT plan optimization. Because the Gate-IMRT method also has disadvantages such as unsuspected dosimetric variations when applying the gating system and an increased treatment time, it is better to perform a prior analysis of the patient's respiratory condition and the importance and fulfillment of the IMRT plan dose constraints in order to select an optimal IMRT method with which to correct the respiratory organ motional effect.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.33-41
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• 2012

For applying the quality assurance (QA) of volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT) introduced in Eulji Hospital, we classify it into three different QA steps, treatment planning QA, pretreatment delivering QA, and treatment verifying QA. These steps are based on the existing intensity modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) QA that is currently used in our hospital. In each QA step, the evaluated items that are from QA program are configured and documented. In this study, QA program is not only applied to actual patient treatment, but also evaluated to establish a reference of clinical acceptance in pretreatment delivering QA. As a result, the confidence limits (CLs) in the measurements for the high-dose and low-dose regions are similar to the conventional IMRT level, and the clinical acceptance references in our hospital are determined to be 3 to 5% for the high-dose and the low-dose regions, respectively. Due to the characteristics of VMAT, evaluation of the intensity map was carried out using an ArcCheck device that was able to measure the intensity map in all directions, $360^{\circ}$. With a couple of dosimetric devices, the gamma index was evaluated and analyzed. The results were similar to the result of individual intensity maps in IMRT. Mapcheck, which is a 2-dimensional (2D) array device, was used to display the isodose distributions and gave very excellent local CL results. Thus, in our hospital, the acceptance references used in practical clinical application for the intensity maps of $360^{\circ}$ directions and the coronal isodose distributions were determined to be 93% and 95%, respectively. To reduce arbitrary uncertainties and system errors, we had to evaluate the local CLs by using a phantom and to cooperate with multiple organizations to participate in this evaluation. In addition, we had to evaluate the local CLs by dividing them into different sections about the patient treatment points in practical clinics.

• International Journal of Fuzzy Logic and Intelligent Systems
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.246-253
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• 2016

Infrared (IR) imaging has been researched for various applications such as surveillance. IR radiation has the capability to detect thermal characteristics of objects under low-light conditions. However, automatic segmentation for finding the object of interest would be challenging since the IR detector often provides the low spatial and contrast resolution image without color and texture information. Another hindrance is that the image can be degraded by noise and clutters. This paper proposes multi-level segmentation for extracting regions of interest (ROIs) and objects of interest (OOIs) in the IR scene. Each level of the multi-level segmentation is composed of a k-means clustering algorithm, an expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm, and a decision process. The k-means clustering initializes the parameters of the Gaussian mixture model (GMM), and the EM algorithm estimates those parameters iteratively. During the multi-level segmentation, the area extracted at one level becomes the input to the next level segmentation. Thus, the segmentation is consecutively performed narrowing the area to be processed. The foreground objects are individually extracted from the final ROI windows. In the experiments, the effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated using several IR images, in which human subjects are captured at a long distance. The average probability of error is shown to be lower than that obtained from other conventional methods such as Gonzalez, Otsu, k-means, and EM methods.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.46-52
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• 2018

Interest in fire prevention/fighting has been increased by large fire. It is important to install/manage the detector, alarm, firefighting facility, evacuation route and so on to minimize the damage from fire. Chemical plant is generally constructed by steel structure. So fireproofing is significantly required to chemical plant because steel structure should endure during fire. Currently, fireproofing should be applied up to 6m from ground by local regulation. But chemical plant can handle the large amount of flammable materials or only non-flammable materials. Required of fireproofing height by fire magnitude is studied in this thesis.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Dyers and Finishers Conference
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• 2011.03a
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• pp.63-63
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• 2011

The donor-${\pi}$-acceptor (D-${\pi}$-A) chromophoric dye system has received great attention in variety fields such as electroluminescent materials, sensors and optoelectronic devices. There are many research activities focused on the development for abovementioned application materials with the high-performance properties. In the previous work, we are reported that novel D-${\pi}$-A dye, 2-[4-(9H-carbazol-9-yl)benzylidene]-2,3-dihydroinden-1-one, is successfully attained and exhibited a positive fluorescence solvatochromism. In this work, the molecular structure and packing geometry of 2-[4-(9H-carbazol-9-yl)benzylidene]-2,3-dihydroinden-1-one was discussed by their conformational structure. Their single yellow prism crystal having approximate dimensions of $0.30{\times}0.10{\times}0.10$ mm was carried out with a Rigaku RAXIS RAPID imaging plate area detector with graphite monochromated $CuK_{\alpha}$ radiation. Their crystal structure were solved by using the CrystalStructure crystallographic software package.

• Journal of the Korean Applied Science and Technology
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.11-20
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• 1998

The propagation of light radiation in a turbid medium is an important problem that confronts dosimetry of therapeutic laser delivery and the development of diagnostic spectroscopy. Scattered light is measured as a function of the position(distance r, depth z) between the axis of the incident beam and the detection spot. Turbid sample yields a very forward-directed scattering pattern at short range of position from source to detector, whereas the thicker samples greatly attenuated the on-axis intensity at long range of position. The portions of scattered light reflected from or transmitted throughphantom depend upon internal reflectance and absorption properties of the phantom. Monte Carlo simulation method for modelling light transport in tissue is applied. It uses the photon is moved a distance where it may be scattered, absorbed, propagated, internally reflected, or transmitted out of tissue. The photon is repeatedly moved until it either escape from or is absorbed by the phantom. In order to obtain an optimum therapeutic ratio in phantom material, optimum control the light energy fluence rate is essential. This study is to discuss the physical mechanisms determining the actual light dose in phantom. Permitting a qualitative understanding of the measurements. It may also aid in designing the best model for laser medicine and application of medical engineering.