• The Korean Journal of Pain
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.175-181
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• 2000

Background: Pain is often measured using psychophysical scaling techniques. However, all of these methods found their limits, since they were based on the subjective sensations reported by the subjects. It is, therefore, desirable to validate psychophysical pain measures by simultaneously measuring some physiological correlate of nociception. We studied an objective method for measuring pain in human volunteer using R(III) nociceptive flexion reflex. Methods: Four different intensity of electrical stimuli between perception and 1.4 times the R(III) nociceptive flexion threshold were delivered to the sole of the feet in 8 normal volunteers. We measured the flexion reflex activity in the skin over the ipsilateral tibialis anterior muscle and subjects rated each stimulus on a visual analog scale (VAS) Results: Both R(III) nociceptive flexion reflex activity and VAS ratings showed a linear relationship with stimulus intensity and with each other in all volunteers. Conclusions: R(III) nociceptive flexion reflex elicited through electrical stimulation may used as an objective pain measurement, previsionary based on our study paradigm.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.14 no.12
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• pp.1223-1232
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• 2004

This study is directed toward determining the number and characteristics of psychologically meaningful perceptual dimensions required for assessing the sound quality with respect to vehicle noises, and toward identifying the acoustical and/or psychoacoustical bases underlying the preference and similarity judgments. For the purpose of analyzing the paired comparison data produced by subjective ratings we used nonmetric multidimensional scaling(MDS). The perceptual dimensions based upon preference ratings could explain 76.3 % of the variance by maximum dB(A) and sharpness acum. The correlation between objective and subjective positions of the stimuli is $R^2$=0.97(F(1,13)=195.45, p < .01), corrected $R^2$=0.93. The less the intensity of the stimulus the more becomes the subjective Position would be over-estimated relative to the objective one. The same is valid for the opposite case. The perceptual dimensions based upon similarity judgments could be accounted for 47.8 % and 23.5% of the variance, each of which might be a match for the maximum dB(A) and the sharpness acum, respectively. The correlation between objective and subjective positions of the stimuli is $R^2$=0.94(F(1,13)=92.38, p < .01), corrected $R^2$=0.87. The more the intensity of the stimulus the more becomes the subjective position would be over-estimated relative to the objective one. The same is valid for the opposite case. In other words, it is likely that the larger the amount of two stimuli which to compare would be judged similar. So far it should be further clarified that whether the relationship between preference ratings and psychological distances nay be optimized through which psycho-physical models.

• Journal of Yeungnam Medical Science
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.12-20
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• 2000

The memory of pain can be more damaging than its initial experience. Several factors arc related the directions of pain memory: current pain intensity, emotion, expectation of pain, and peak intensity of previous pain. The possible mechanisms behind the memory of pain are neuroplastic changes of nervous system via peripheral and central sensitization. Peripheral sensitization is induced by neurohumoral alterations at the site of injury and nearby. Biochemicals such as K+, prostaglandins, bradykinin, substance P, histamine and serotonin, increase transduction and produce continuous nociceptive input. Central sensitization takes place within the dorsal horn of spinal cord and amplifies the nociceptive input from the periphery. The mechanisms of central sensitization involve a variety of transmitters and postsynaptic mechanisms resulting from the activations of NMDA receptors by glutamate. and activation of NK-1 tachykinnin receptors by substance-P and neurokinnin. The clinical result of peripheral and central sensitization is hyperalgesia, allodynia, spontaneous pain, referred pain, or sympathetically maintained pain. These persistent sensory responses to noxious stimuli arc a form of memory. The hypothesis of preemptive analgesia is that analgesia administered before the painful stimulus will prevent or reduce subsequent pain and analgesic requirements in comparison to the identical analgesic intervention administered after the painful stimulus, by preventing or reducing the memory of pain in the nervous system. Conventionally, pain management was initiated following noxious stimuli such as surgery. More recently, however many have endorsed preemptive analgesia initiated before surgery. Treatments to control postsurgical pain are often best started before injury activates peripheral nociceptors and triggers central sensitization. Such preemption is not achieved solely by regional anesthesia and drug therapy but also requires behavioral interventions to decrease anxiety or stress. Although the benefit of preemptive analgesia may not be obvious in every circumstance, and in many cases may not sufficient to abolish central sensitization, it is an appropriate and human goal of clinical practice.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2004.08a
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• pp.171-175
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• 2004

A tactile stimulator array using stacked PZT is fabricated and evaluated in this paper. The purpose of this research is the development of a tactile stimulator to represent the obstacle information for the visually disabled. As a first step of this research, we investigate the physiological characteristics of tactile stimuli and design a tactile stimulator based on the investigated results. Also we evaluated a fabricated tactile stimulator. The prototype of tactile stimulator which has 2x2 tactor elements with 3mm spacing is fabricated using stacked PZT actuator. In order to evaluate the characteristics of this tactile stimulator, physiological experiments are carried out. In the experiment, the threshold of tactile stimulus intensity within a frequency range of 5-500Hz and at various stimulus amplitudes are investigated. According to the obtained experimental result, the input signal of tactile stimulator for the transfer of obstacle information is determined. Also physiological experiments of multi-stimuli recognition such as shift and rotation are carried out.

• Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.67-75
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• 2006

HVIMs consists of simulated driver models implemented with series of mathematical functions and computerized vehicle dynamic models. To effectively model the perception process, as a part of driver models, psychophysical nonlinearity should be considered not only for the single-modal stimulus but for the stimulus of multiple modalities and interactions among them. A series of human factors experiments were conducted using the primary sensory of visual and auditory modalities to find out the effects of auditory cues in visual velocity estimation tasks. The variations of auditory cues were found to enhance/reduce the perceived intensity of velocity as the level changed. These results indicate that the conventional psychophysical power functions could not applied for the perception process of the HVIMs with multi-modal stimuli. 'Ruled surfaces' in a 3-D coordinate system(with the intensities of both kinds of stimuli and the ratio of enhancement, respectively for each coordinate) were suggested to model the realistic perception process of multi-modal HVIMs.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.2644-2651
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to investigate difference between grip strength, upper limb dexterity, and hand function according to touch and heat sensory stimulus. Forty healthy men were recruited. After obtaining subjects characteristics, examined grip strength, upper limb dexterity, and hand function, then we made touch sensory input using soft brush and tried the test again. Next day, we made thermal input using hot pack and did retest, too. The result showed significant differences appeared on every variable in grip strength and upper limb dexterity test (p<.001), and significant differences appeared on every variable except lifting small objects in hand function (p<.01). In conclusion, sensory input is to increase grip strength, upper limb dexterity, and hand function. The thermal sensory input has a tendency to increase grip strength, upper limb dexterity, and hand function than that of touch sensory input in effect of stimulus classification. The application of proper stimulus helps to facilitate upper limb and hand function in rehabilitation and in industrial field. So it is necessary to try more tests of frequency and intensity of stimulus.

• Journal of the Korean Magnetics Society
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.92-97
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• 2017

It is widely known that pulsed magnetic field (PMF) is very useful tool to manipulate chemical and physiological processes in human body. The purpose of our study is to observe dynamics of rouleaux patterns of red blood cells (RBC) under PMF. The aggregation of RBCs or rouleaux formation is caused by fibrinogen in blood plasma. The maximum magnetic field intensity is 0.27 T and pulse time of 0.102 msec and pulse repetition rate was 1 Hz. PMF stimulus was applied to the palm of left hand for 5, 10, 15 and 20 min. Live blood analysis was used in vitro in order to quantitatively estimate the velocity of RBC exposed to PMF stimulus. The velocity of stacked-RBC of 10 minute PMF stimulus was increased up to $8{\times}10^{-4}m/sec$, but it decreased rapidly as the time passed. The results of present study have adduced that PMF stimulus on hand provide the improvement of RBC rouleaux formation, increase of RBC's moving velocity as well as low blood viscosity.

• Korean Journal of Biological Psychiatry
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.108-115
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• 1997

The alcoholic neuropathies developed in approximately 34% of chronic alcoholics and the sexual dysfunction had been experienced in 8-54% of male alcoholics(Schiavi 1990). The aims of this study were to identify the prevalence of subclinical polyneuropathies and sexual disorders in alcohol dependence, and to evaluate the association between them. The nerve conduction velocity(NCV), electromyography(EMG), and pudendal somatosensory evoked potentials(SEPs) were tested for the male alcoholics(N=34) and controls(N=17 for NCV & EMG, N=25 for pudendal SEPs). The pudendal SEPs were measured by the following procedures, in which we stimulated the dorsal nerve of penis attached by the ring electrode(stimulus intensity, three times of threshold : stimulus rate, 1-4.7Hz : stimulus duration, 0.1 or 0.2msec), and recorded at the scalp(active electrode, 2cm behind Cz : reference electrode, Fz). The NCV and EMG detected signs of peripheral neuropathies in 79.4% of alcoholics. Among the alcoholics, 64.7% were abnormal on the pudendal SEPs. Among the alcoholics who revealed abnormality on EMG and NCV, 81.4% were abnormal on the pudendal SEPs, in which 51.9% were not responded. The P1 latencies of pudendal SEPs on neuropathic alcoholics were significantly delayed(p<0.05) than non-neuropathic alcoholics. There was a relative correlation between peripheral neuropathies and sexual disorders in the alcoholics. The prevalence of subclinical neuropathies and sexual disorders seemed to be much higher in alcohol dependence than expectation, and these two problems were relatively correlated, and our results suggested that the peripheral polyneuropathies were one of the prerequisites of sexual disorders.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.210-216
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• 2010

This study is vestibular electric stimulation applied between the mastoids during quiet standing elicits postural sway. The aim of this study was to characterize the postural sway response to continuous sinusoidal vestibular electric stimulation across various stimulus frequencies and amplitudes. Binaural bipolar sinusoidal vestibular electric stimulation was applied to the skin overlying the mastoid processes of 10 subjects while they stood on a force plate. The position of the center of pressure(COP) and signals at the feet are obtained on an force plate, while the head and whole body center of mass(COM) was measured with motion analysis system. The stimulus conditions included eight frequencies (1/64, 1/32, 1/16, 1/8, 1/4, 1/2, 1, and 2Hz) and six peak amplitudes (0.1, 0.25, 0.5, 0.7, 1 and 2mA). Each subject experienced one trial at each amplitude-frequency pair. The stimuli elicited sway in lateral plane in all subjects, as evidenced by changes in the stimulus frequency. Our results demonstrate that the vestibular system is sensitive to vestibular electric stimulation intensity changes and responds by altering the magnitude of the response accordingly.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.42 no.5
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• pp.412-421
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• 2023

Ultrasound brain stimulation is spot-lighted by its capability of inducing brain cell activation in a localized deep brain region and ultimately treating impaired brain function while the efficiency and directivity of neural modulation are highly dependent on types of stimulus waveforms. Therefore, to optimize the types of stimulation parameters, we propose a cell-cultivable ultrasonic transducer having a series stack of a spin-coated polymer piezoelectric element (Poly-vinylidene fluoride-trifluorethylene, PVDF-TrFE) and a parylene insulating layer enhancing output acoustic pressure on a glass-coverslip which is commonly used in culturing cells. Due to the uniformity and high accuracy of stimulus waveform, tens of neuronal cell responses located on the transducer surface can be recorded simultaneously with fluorescence microscopy. By averaging the cell response traces from tens of cells, small changes to the low intensity ultrasound stimulations can be identified. In addition, the reduction of stimulus distortions made by standing wave generated from reflections between the transducers and other strong reflectors can be achieved by placing acoustic absorbers. Through the proposed ultrasound transducer, we could successfully observe the calcium responses induced by low-intensity ultrasound stimulation of 6 MHz, 0.2 MPa in astrocytes cultured on the transducer surface.