• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.32 no.8
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• pp.1003-1010
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• 2022

The purpose of this study was to examine the phytochemical compounds and antibacterial activity of Coffea robusta leaf extract (RLE). The results indicated that chlorogenic acid (CGA) is a major component of RLE. The minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of RLE against Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli, and Salmonella Typhimurium were 6.25, 12.5, 12.5, and 12.5 mg/ml, respectively. RLE effectively damages the bacterial cell membrane integrity, as indicated by the high amounts of proteins and nucleic acids released from the bacteria, and disrupts bacterial cell membrane potential and permeability, as revealed via fluorescence analysis. Cytotoxicity testing showed that RLE is slightly toxic toward HepG2 cells at high concentration but exhibited no toxicity toward Caco2 cells. The results from the present study suggest that RLE has excellent potential applicability as an antimicrobial in the food industry.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.53-63
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• 2023

Purpose: This study aims to determine the effect of Customer Experience Management (CEM) on the distribution of Marketing Performance mediated by Digital Business Innovation (DBI), Digital Operational Excellence (DOE), and Digital Value Co-Creation (DVC) in Indonesia Information & Technology (IT) industry. Research design, data, and methodology: This research was conducted in two stages, namely exploratory and explanatory on IT companies in Indonesia. The authors took 132 samples using proportionate random sampling method in three groups of companies. Results: The results showed that CEM had no significant positive effect on the distribution of Marketing Performance. CEM has no direct effect on the distribution of Marketing Performance through the mediation of DBI. CEM has direct effect on the distribution of Marketing Performance through the mediation of DOE and DVC. DBI has no significant effect in increasing the distribution of Marketing Performance. However, DOE and DVC have a significant effect in increasing the distribution of Marketing Performance. Conclusion: The distribution of Marketing Performance can be indicated better through CEM through mediation.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Navigation and Port Research Conference
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• v.2
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• pp.153-155
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• 2006

A major advantage of the area in and around Braunschweig is its concentration of major research institutes and small to large enterprises dealing with different modes of transportation. For many years, aviation has been a particular focus. The research institutes have aircraft and helicopters equipped especially for research projects, as well as other laboratory equipment, allowing simulation and testing of air traffic application both virtually and on real aircraft. In addition, with the Luftfahrtbundesamt (equivalent organization to FAA) and the Bundesstelle $f{\"{u}}r$ Flugunfalluntersuchung (equivalent to NTSB) both located at the Research Airport, it enables direct contact with two key air-traffic safety authorities. The institutes of DLR and the Technical University of Braunschweig are very active in rail transportation applications. Cooperation with the market leader in rail automation - Siemens Rail Automation, also located in Braunschweig - and with other companies in the Braunschweig region means that safety-critical road applications and mobility research is available due to the activities of a number of institutes. Cooperation with Volkswagen (VW) and other companies in the region ensure access to the market leaders' know-how in this sector. Current European activities within framework of the Galileo project offer particularly good opportunities for the Research Airport to leverage its expertise and position itself internationally as a specialist in safety-critical transport applications - the centre is an initiative of Niedersachsen and the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Labour and Transport Location and navigation plays a central role in all modes of transport - air, road and rail. The market is being revolutionized by the increasing integration of GNSS. The realization of the Galileo system will provide additional opportunities for the Research Airport: Galileo as a civil operated system offers service guarantees especially in the area of safety-critical applications in transportation. Notably standards, processes and authorizations related to the certification of safety-critical applications in the areas of air, road and rail transportation are still to be determined. GAUSS, located at the Research Airport Braunschweig, as an European centre of excellence for simulation, testing and certification of safety-critical applications can offer its expertise to validate the services guaranteed by the Galileo concessionaire.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.118-123
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• 2023

Background: Chronic exposure to silica is related with the provocation of an inflammatory response and oxidative stress mechanism. Vitamin D has multiple benefits in biological activities particularly respiratory system disease. Method: In this research, 20 male Wistar rats were randomly allocated into four groups (5 rats /group) as follow: Group1 received saline as (negative control) group. The group 2 received a single IT instillation of silica (positive control) group; the group 3 was co-administrated with single IT silica and Vitamin D (20 mg/kg/day) daily for a period of 90 days. The rats of group 4 received Vitamin D daily for a period of 90 days. Results: Silica significantly increased serum and lung total Oxidant Status (TOS). Meanwhile, silica reduced serum and lung total antioxidant capacity (TAC), GSH and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-a). Vitamin D treatment meaningfully reversed oxidative stress, antioxidants status and inflammatory response. Also, Vitamin D improved histopathological changes caused by silica. Conclusion: These findings indicate that Vitamin D exerts protective effects against silica-induced lung injury. It seems that Vitamin D has potential use as a therapeutic object for silica induced lung injure.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.307-316
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• 2016

Background: Resilience engineering (RE) is a new paradigm that can control incidents and reduce their consequences. Integrated RE includes four new factors-self-organization, teamwork, redundancy, and fault-tolerance-in addition to conventional RE factors. This study aimed to evaluate the impacts of these four factors on RE and determine the most efficient factor in an uncertain environment. Methods: The required data were collected through a questionnaire in a petrochemical plant in June 2013. The questionnaire was completed by 115 respondents including 37 managers and 78 operators. Fuzzy data envelopment analysis was used in different ${\alpha}$-cuts in order to calculate the impact of each factor. Analysis of variance was employed to compare the efficiency score means of the four abovementioned factors. Results: The results showed that as ${\alpha}$ approached 0 and the system became fuzzier (${\alpha}=0.3$ and ${\alpha}=0.1$), teamwork played a significant role and had the highest impact on the resilient system. In contrast, as ${\alpha}$ approached 1 and the fuzzy system went toward a certain mode (${\alpha}=0.9$ and ${\alpha}=1$), redundancy had a vital role in the selected resilient system. Therefore, redundancy and teamwork were the most efficient factors. Conclusion: The approach developed in this study could be used for identifying the most important factors in such environments. The results of this study may help managers to have better understanding of weak and strong points in such industries.

• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.854-872
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• 2016

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect that Chinese tourists' perceptions of beauty products and their friendliness toward Korean culture have on beauty tourism, particularly on Chinese tourists' intent to purchase, re-purchase, and recommend beauty products. Between the 10th and 21st of June, 2016, a total of 277 questionnaires were distributed in Seoul, Busan, and Daegu using SPSS 21.0. Cronbach's ${\alpha}$ was undertaken to test the reliability of the questions and an analysis of the frequency, factors, t-test, and Sobel test used in the study. Korean beauty was derived from two factors: "product favorability" and "product excellence and credibility." Product favorability had a significant effect on the intent to purchase, as did participants' friendliness toward Korean culture. Re-purchases and the intent to recommend beauty products were also significantly affected. In the relationship between the perception of beauty products and the intent to purchase, the study revealed partial mediation effects of the participants' friendliness toward Korean culture on product favorability and complete mediation effects on product excellence and credibility. Friendliness toward Korean culture had partially mediated the effect that product favorability had on the intent to re-purchase and recommend. Tourists' friendliness toward Korean culture had complete mediation on the effect that product excellence and credibility had on the intent to re-purchase and recommend. According to the Gender Equality and Family Act, the difference between buying and selling beauty depends on the difference between purchase and intentions. Friendliness toward Korean culture has become an important variable thanks to product superiority and reliability.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.13
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• pp.5515-5519
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• 2015

The single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) ss469415590 in the interferon lambda-4 (IFNL4) gene has recently been reported to have an association with treatment response in chronic hepatitis C. However, any importance of the SNP in association with response to pegylated interferon (PEG-IFN) therapy in patients with chronic hepatitis B (CHB) is unclear. We retrospectively analyzed data for Thai patients with CHB treated with PEG-IFN for 48 weeks. Virological response (VR) for HBeAg-positive CHB was defined as HBeAg seroconversion plus HBV DNA level <2,000 IU/mL at 24 weeks post-treatment. VR for HBeAg-negative CHB was defined as an HBV DNA level <2,000 IU/mL at 48 weeks. The SNP was identified by real time PCR using the TaqMan genotyping assay with MGB probes. A total 254 patients (107 HBeAg-positive and 147 HBeAg-negative) were enrolled in the study. The distribution of TT/TT, ${\Delta}G/TT$ and ${\Delta}G/{\Delta}G$ genotypes was 221 (87.0%), 32 (12.6%) and 1 (0.4%), respectively. Patients with non-TT/TT genotypes had significantly higher baseline HBV DNA levels than patients with the TT/TT genotype. In HBeAg-positive CHB, 41.2% of patients with TT/TT genotype versus 50.0% with non-TT/TT genotype achieved VR (P=0.593). In HBeAg-negative CHB, the corresponding figures were 40.3% and 43.5%, respectively (P=0.777). There was no significant correlation between the SNP genotypes and HBsAg clearance in both groups of patients. In summary, ss469415590 genotypes were not associated with response to PEG-IFN in Thai patients with HBeAg-positive and HBeAg-negative CHB.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.2865-2869
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• 2013

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection can become chronic and if left untreated can progress to hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).Thailand is endemic for HBV and HCC is one of the top five cancers, causing deaths among Thai HBV-infected males. A single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) at the KIF1B gene locus, rs17401966, has been shown to be strongly associated with the development of HBV-related HCC. However, there are no Thai data on genotypic distribution and allele frequencies of rs17401966. Thai HBV patients seropositive for HBsAg (n=398) were therefore divided into two groups: a case group (chronic HBV with HCC; n=202) and a control group (HBV carriers without HCC; n=196). rs17401966 was amplified by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and analyzed by direct nucleotide sequencing. The genotypic distribution of rs174019660 for homozygous major genotype (AA), heterozygous minor genotype (AG) and homozygous minor genotype (GG) in the case group was 49.5% (n=100), 40.1% (n=81) and 10.4% (n=21), respectively, and in controls was 49.5% (n=97), 42.3% (n=83) and 8.2% (n=16). Binary logistic regression showed that rs17401966 was not statistically associated with the risk of HCC development in Thai chronic HBV patients (p-value=0.998, OR=1.00 and 95% CI=0.68-1.48). In conclusion, the KIF1B gene SNP (rs174019660) investigated in this study showed no significant association with HBV-related HCC in Thai patients infected with HBV, indicating that there must be other mechanisms or pathways involved in the development of HCC.

• Journal of Information Technology Services
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.49-67
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• 2020

On-Demand services have emerged as one of the core business strategies for delivering new experiential values by providing customized services in different user-needs nowadays. Based on the Stimulus-Organism-Response (S-O-R) framework, this paper focuses on the factors of environmental stimulation and emotional states of the demand-side that induce continuous intention of use from the On-Demand services. The study defines 'Informativeness', 'Fulfillment', 'Trust', and 'Convenience' as the properties of the On-Demand services and considers 'Playfulness', 'Customer Return on Investment (CROI)', and 'Service Excellence' as the aspects of the experiential values. The research shows that 'Fulfillment', 'Trust' and 'Convenience' affected the experiential value in 'Kakao Taxi (On-Demand transportation service)' while 'Informativeness', 'Fulfillment', 'Trust of platform', and 'Convenience' are represented as the related factors to the experiential value in 'Baedal Minjok (On-Demand food delivery service)'. The experiential value factors, 'CROI' and 'Service Excellence', are shown directly related to the continuous intention of use in both services. A partial mediation relationship is, furthermore, observed between the aspects of 'CROI' and 'Service Excellence' in Kakao Taxi and its 'Convenience' and 'Continuous intention of use.' In Baedal Minjok, a partial mediation relationship is found between the 'CROI' with its aspects of 'Trust of the platform', 'Convenience', and 'Continuous intention of use' as well. The results of this study may contribute a comprehensive understanding of the purpose of On-Demand services and its needs from the demand-side thus can be helpful for the supply-side.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.51 no.3
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• pp.335-341
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• 2013

Balamuthia mandrillaris is one of the 4 amebas in fresh water and soil that cause diseases in humans. Granulomatous amebic encephalitis (GAE), caused by B. mandrillaris, is a rare but life-threatening condition. A 4-year-old, previously healthy, Thai girl presented with progressive headache and ataxia for over a month. Neuroimaging studies showed an infiltrative mass at the right cerebellar hemisphere mimicking a malignant cerebellar tumor. The pathological finding after total mass removal revealed severe necrotizing inflammation, with presence of scattered amebic trophozoites. Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) obtained from lumbar puncture showed evidence of non-specific inflammation without identifiable organisms. A combination of pentamidine, sulfasalazine, fluconazole, and clarithromycin had been initiated promptly before PCR confirmed the diagnosis of Balamuthia amebic encephalitis (BAE). The patient showed initial improvement after the surgery and combined medical treatment, but gradually deteriorated and died of multiple organ failure within 46 days upon admission despite early diagnosis and treatment. In addition to the case, 10 survivors of BAE reported in the PubMed database were briefly reviewed in an attempt to identify the possible factors leading to survival of the patients diagnosed with this rare disease.