• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.11
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• pp.6293-6299
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• 2013

Background: A number of clinicopathologic factors have been found to be associated with pathological lymph node metastasis (pLNM) in rectal cancer; however, most of them can only be identified by expensive high resolution imaging or obtained after surgical treatment. Just like the Child-Turcotte-Pugh (CTP) and the model for end-stage liver disease (MELD) scores which have been widely used in clinical practice, our study was designed to assess the pre-operative factors which could be obtained easily to predict intra-operative pLNM in rectal cancer. Methods: A cohort of 469 patients who were treated at our hospital in the period from January 2003 to June 2011, and with a pathologically hospital discharge diagnosis of rectal cancer, were included. Clinical, laboratory and pathologic parameters were analyzed. A multivariate unconditional logistic regression model, areas under the curve (AUC), the Kaplan-Meier method (log-rank test) and the Cox regression model were used. Results: Of the 469 patients, 231 were diagnosed with pLNM (49.3%). Four variables were associated with pLNM by multivariate logistic analysis, age<60 yr (OR=1.819; 95% CI, 1.231-2.687; P=0.003), presence of abdominal pain or discomfort (OR=1.637; 95% CI, 1.052-2.547; P=0.029), absence of allergic history (OR=1.879; 95% CI, 1.041-3.392; P=0.036), and direct $bilirubin{\geq}2.60{\mu}mol/L$ (OR=1.540; 95% CI, 1.054-2.250; P=0.026). The combination of all 4 variables had the highest sensitivity (98.7%) for diagnostic performance. In addition, age<60 yr and direct $bilirubin{\geq}2.60{\mu}mol/L$ were found to be associated with prognosis. Conclusion: Age, abdominal pain or discomfort, allergic history and direct bilirubin were associated with pLNM, which may be helpful for preoperative selection.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.40 no.6
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• pp.492-501
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• 2014

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to assess the validity of self-reported cigarette smoking status and investigate factors associated with the accuracy self-reported and measured urinary cotinine in Korean adults. Methods: We used data from the $1^{st}$ Korean National Environmental Health Survey (2009-2011) among adults aged ${\geq}19$ years (N=6,246). The survey examined self-reported smoking status, and urinary cotinine was regarded as the biomarker of exposure to tobacco smoke. Urinary cotinine was analyzed using a gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS) and data analysis was conducted using IBM SPSS version 20.0, which uses the sample weight and calculates variance estimates to adjust for the unequal probability of selection into the survey. Results: We calculated a cut-off point (53.3 ug/L) by using a ROC (Receiver Operating Characteristic) curve. The smoking prevalence was 24.6% based on self-reported data and 28.2% based on urinary cotinine concentrations. When we assessed the agreement between self-reported and urinary cotinine, we found an average agreement of 97.7% among self-reported smokers and 94.5% among self-reported non-smokers. Among self-reported smokers, factors affected the discrepancy were age, household economic status and average number of cigarettes smoked per day. On the other hand, gender, former smoking experience, and exposure to SHS (second hand smoke) were associated with discrepancies among self-reported non-smokers. Conclusion: These results suggest that self-reported data on smoking status provide a valid estimate of actual smoking status. In future research, we will conduct a continuous monitoring study for reliability verification of the data to reduce potential interpretation errors.

• Journal of Korean Ophthalmic Optics Society
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.37-42
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• 2008

Purpose: The objective of the study: At present, the spectacles, with its use as a medical aids or a fashion trimming, are recognized as one of the living necessities which can't be separated from human body. One of the features of spectacles is that it must be worn on any part of human body. Such a feature has to be satisfied under the condition an user keeps feeling comfortable with the rim of spectacles worn. In order to ensure meeting this condition, a criterion has to be arranged for the design of the rim of spectacles. In order to manufacture a rim of spectacles which allows an user to secure a comfortable range of vision as well as enhancing the feeling when to be worn, a manufacturing standard has to be established based on optical science. No precise rim of spectacles could be made from the manufacturing method depending on the manufacturer's sensibility. When the rim of spectacles was manufactured according to the incorrect standards, it may cause an user such a fatal result as myopia, hyperopia or astigmatism. Methods: This study focuses on providing a detailed explanation about the design of rim, which is the most important element during designing a rim of spectacles, making use of the optical elements of spectacles, and helping the manufacturers and the people who work in the spectacles-related business understand and recognize what is correct and exact and then leading them to establish a standard in respect to the manufacture and selection of spectacles. Results, Conclusions: Considering the fact there happen many errors in relation with the names of rim stipulated in the provisions of International Standards Organization (ISO), due to wrong interpretation by some of the rim manufacturers, the right interpretation should be given about the bridge which is directly connected to rim, so that the rims of spectacles manufactured in Korea could keep a favorable position in competing with the foreign products of same kinds.

• Nutrition Research and Practice
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.20-24
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• 2020

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Malnutrition has multiple impacts on surgical success, postoperative complications, duration of hospital stay, and costs, particularly for cancer patients. There are various nutrition risk screening tools available for clinical use. Herein, we aim to determine the most appropriate nutritional risk screening system for esophageal cancer (EC) patients in China. SUBJECTS/METHODS: In total, 138 EC patients were enrolled in this study and evaluated by experienced nurses using three different nutritional screening tools, the Nutrition Risk Screening 2002 tool (NRS2002), the Patient-generated Subjective Globe Assessment (PG-SGA), and the Nutrition Risk Index (NRI).We compared sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative likelihood ratios, and Youden index generated by each of the three screening tools. Finally, cut-off points for all three tools were re-defined to optimize and validate the best nutritional risk screening tool for assessing EC patients. RESULTS: Our data suggested that all three screening tools were 100% sensitive for EC patients, while the specificities were 44.4%, 2.96%, and 59.26% for NRS 2002, PG-SGA, and NRI, respectively. NRI had a higher positive likelihood ratio as well as a higher area under the receiver operating characteristic curve compared to those of NRS 2002 and PG-SGA; although, all three tools had null negative likelihood ratios. After adjusting the cut-off points, the specificity and accuracy for all tools were significantly improved, however, the NRI remained the most appropriate nutritional risk screening system for EC patients. CONCLUSIONS: The NRI is the most suitable (highest sensitivity and accuracy) nutritional risk screening tool for EC patients. The performance of the NRI can be significantly improved if the cut-off point is modified according to the results obtained using MedCalc software.

• International Journal of Highway Engineering
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.49-58
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• 2015

PURPOSES : The use of environmentally friendly construction methods has been recently encouraged to reduce fuel consumption and the effects of global warming. For this purpose, the roller compacted concrete pavement (RCCP) construction method has been developed. RCCP is more environmentally friendly and economically efficient than general concrete by reducing the amount of CO2 generated through the application of a smaller amount of cement. RCCP has a number of advantages such as an easy construction method, low cost, high structural hydration performance, and aggregate interlocking. However, mix design standards and construction guidelines of RCCP are required for domestic application. In addition, a study on aggregate selection, which has an effect on the characteristics of RCCP, is necessary owing to a limited number of researches. Thus, the aggregate effect on the performance of RCCP in securing the required strength and workability was evaluated in consideration of domestic construction. METHODS : Sand and coarse aggregates of both 19mm and 13mm in maximum size were used in this study. Four types of aggregate gradations (s/a = 30%, 58%, and 70% for the sand and coarse aggregate of 19mm in maximum size, and s/a = 50% for a combination of the three types of aggregates) were set up to investigate the effects of the PCA band on the RCC characteristics. The conditions of s/a = 30% and 70% were evaluated to check the gradation effect outside of the recommended band. The conditions of s/a = 58% and 50% were used because they are the optimum combination of the two and three types of aggregates, respectively. RCCP gradation band was suggested gradation with a proper construction method of RCCP by synthetically comparing and analyzing the correlation of optimum water content, maximum dry density, and strength of requirements through its consistency and compaction test. RESULTS : The lower and upper limit lines are insufficient to secure a relatively strong development and workability compared to an aggregate gradation in the RCCP gradation band region. On the other hand, the line in the RCCP gradation band and the 0.45 power curve in the RCCP gradation band region were satisfactory, ensuring the required strength and workability. CONCLUSIONS : The suitable aggregate gradation on RCCP process should meet the RCCP gradation band area; however, fine particles passing through a #60 sieve do not need to be within the recommended gradation band because the influence of this region on such fine particles is small.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Fisheries and Ocean Technology
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• v.46 no.4
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• pp.281-291
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• 2010

To estimate the mesh selectivity of monofilament and multifilament gill net for Marbled sole, Pleuronectes yokohamae, the field testes were carried out 12 times with five different mesh sizes (86.6, 101.0, 121.2, 137.7, 151.5mm) in the western sea of Korea, 2007-2009. The master curve of selectivity was estimated by the extended Kitahara's method. In the field testes, the total number of species and catch were 26 and 987, respectively. The catch number of marbled sole was 728 and occupied 73.8% in total catch. The optimum values of l/m for 1.0 of retention probability in monofilament and multifilament gill net were estimated 0.288 and 0.307, respectively and l/m was estimated to be 0.189, 0.203, 0.213, 0.222 and 0.230 in case of monofilament gill net and 0.171, 0.191, 0.205, 0.216 and 0.227 in case of multifilament gill net when the retention probability were 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4 and 0.5, respectively. The 0.5 selection range of multifilament gill net was wider about 1.5 times than that of monofilament gill net according as multifilament gill net was 0.216 and monofilament gill net was 0.148. So the multifilament gill net has a low selectivity than that of the monofilament gill net. To estimate the optimum mesh size on first maturity length 19.5cm of marbled sole, the retention probability value of 0.1 was adopted in consideration of using the gill net for marbled sole at present. The optimum mesh size were estimated to be 103.2mm and 114.0mm in monofilament gill net and multifilament gill net, respectively, on first maturity length 19.5cm of marbled sole.

• Journal of Pharmaceutical Investigation
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.191-199
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• 2000

Genomics is providing targets faster than we can validate them and combinatorial chemistry is providing new chemical entities faster than we can screen them. Historically, the drug discovery cascade has been established as a sequential process initiated with a potency screening against a selected biological target. In this sequential process, pharmacokinetics was often regarded as a low-throughput activity. Typically, limited pharmacokinetics studies would be conducted prior to acceptance of a compound for safety evaluation and, as a result, compounds often failed to reach a clinical testing due to unfavorable pharmacokinetic characteristics. A new paradigm in drug discovery has emerged in which the entire sample collection is rapidly screened using robotized high-throughput assays at the outset of the program. Higher-throughput pharmacokinetics (HTPK) is being achieved through introduction of new techniques, including automation for sample preparation and new experimental approaches. A number of in vitro and in vivo methods are being developed for the HTPK. In vitro studies, in which many cell lines are used to screen absorption and metabolism, are generally faster than in vivo screening, and, in this sense, in vitro screening is often considered as a real HTPK. Despite the elegance of the in vitro models, however, in vivo screenings are always essential for the final confirmation. Among these in vivo methods, cassette dosing technique, is believed the methods that is applicable in the screening of pharmacokinetics of many compounds at a time. The widespread use of liquid chromatography (LC) interfaced to mass spectrometry (MS) or tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) allowed the feasibility of the cassette dosing technique. Another approach to increase the throughput of in vivo screening of pharmacokinetics is to reduce the number of sample analysis. Two common approaches are used for this purpose. First, samples from identical study designs but that contain different drug candidate can be pooled to produce single set of samples, thus, reducing sample to be analyzed. Second, for a single test compound, serial plasma samples can be pooled to produce a single composite sample for analysis. In this review, we validated the issue whether the second method can be applied to practical screening of in vivo pharmacokinetics using data from seven of our previous bioequivalence studies. For a given drug, equally spaced serial plasma samples were pooled to achieve a 'Pooled Concentration' for the drug. An area under the plasma drug concentration-time curve (AUC) was then calculated theoretically using the pooled concentration and the predicted AUC value was statistically compared with the traditionally calculated AUC value. The comparison revealed that the sample pooling method generated reasonably accurate AUC values when compared with those obtained by the traditional approach. It is especially noteworthy that the accuracy was obtained by the analysis of only one sample instead of analyses of a number of samples that necessitates a significant man-power and time. Thus, we propose the sample pooling method as an alternative to in vivo pharmacokinetic approach in the selection potential lead(s) from combinatorial libraries.

• Journal of Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.59 no.4
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• pp.323-330
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• 2016

Pinellia ternata Breitenbach, the natural medicinal plant of the Araceae family, is a perennial plant originated from the East Asia, but also widely distributed in Europe and North America. Its tuber is used as traditional medicine for treatment of various diseases such as vomiting, inflammation, and traumatic injury. Pharmacological studies revealed that P. ternata possesses anticonvulsant, anti-tumor, insecticidal, and cytotoxic activities. Despite being well-known as the useful medicinal plant, there is no reliable, standardized method for origin discrimination. Ultra performance liquid chromatography-photodiode array detector and quadrupole time of flight-mass spectrometry based metabolite-profiling was applied to explore significant metabolite for origin discrimination between Korean and Chinese P. ternata. One compound was isolated from Korean P. ternata using repeated ODS column chromatography by bioactivity guided fractionation, and determined as [6]-gingerol according to the results of spectroscopic data including nuclear magnetic resonance and MS. This compound was selected as cosmeceutical biomarker by fingerprints, and it was associated to melanin inhibitory effect determining its origin authenticity. Furthermore, the calibration curve of biomarker was prepared using validated method for the comparison of content between Korean and Chinese P. ternata. This is the report to address the selection and successful validation of the discriminant metabolite for confirmation of Korean P. ternata.

• Imaging Science in Dentistry
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.113-119
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• 2003

Purpose : To evaluate the relationship between morphometric analysis of bone microstructure from digital radiographic image and trabecular bone strength. Materials and Methods : One hundred eleven bone specimens with 5 mm thickness were obtained from the mandibles of 5 pigs. Digital images of specimens were taken using a direct digital intraoral radiographic system. After selection of ROI (100 × 100 pixel) within the trabecular bone, mean gray level and standard deviation were obtained. Fractal dimension and the variants of morphometric analysis (trabecular area, periphery, length of skeletonized trabeculae, number of terminal point, number of branch point) were obtained from ROI. Punch sheer strength analysis was performed using Instron (model 4465, Instron Corp., USA). The loading force (loading speed 1 mm/min) was applied to ROI of bone specimen by a 2 mm diameter punch. Stress-deformation curve was obtained from the punch sheer strength analysis and maximum stress, yield stress, Young's modulus were measured. Results: Maximum stress had a negative linear correlation with mean gray level and fractal dimension significantly (p<0.05). Yield stress had a negative linear correlation with mean gray level, periphery, fractal dimension and the length of skeletonized trabeculae significantly (p < 0.05). Young's modulus had a negative linear correlation with mean gray level and fractal dimension significantly (p < 0.05). Conclusions : The strength of cancellous bone exhibited a significantly linear relationship between mean gray level, fractal dimension and morphometric analysis. The methods described above can be easily used to evaluate bone quality clinically.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.50-57
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• 2016

Pipeline is one of the most abundant components in petrochemical plant. It plays a critical role in transporting fluids. Some pipelines are thermally insulated by wrapping them with insulating materials to prevent the loss of energy. However, when corrosion begins under insulation, it cannot be easily seen without unwrapping the cover, and thus corrossion should be detected using a non-destructive ways such as ultrasound guided wave. In this paper, the piping where the CUI (Corrosion Under Insulation) which occurs in the insulation parts guided waves effectively the optimum condition which is theoretical for selected guided waves phase velocity dispersion curve and wave-structure. The results of this study are expected to be directly utilized for onsite inspection of pipeline's CUI in many petrochemical plants.