• Clean Technology
• /
• v.25 no.4
• /
• pp.316-323
• /
• 2019

In order to enhance combustion efficiency and reduce atmosphere pollutants, it is essential to measure carbon monoxide (CO) concentration precisely in combustion exhaust. CO is the important gas species regarding pollutant emission and incomplete combustion because it can trade off with NOx and increase rapidly when incomplete combustion occurs. In the case of a steel annealing system, CO is generated intentionally to maintain the deoxidation atmosphere. However, it is difficult to measure the CO concentration in a combustion environment in real-time, because of unsteady combustion reactions and harsh environment. Tunable Diode Laser Absorption Spectroscopy (TDLAS), which is an optical measurement method, is highly attractive for measuring the concentration of certain gas species, temperature, velocity, and pressure in a combustion environment. TDLAS has several advantages such as sensitive, non-invasive, and fast response, and in-situ measurement capability. In this study, a combustion system is designed to control the equivalence ratio. Also, the combustion exhaust gases are produced in a Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG)/air flame. Measurement of CO concentration according to the change of equivalence ratio is confirmed through TDLAS method and compared with the simulation based on Voigt function. In order to measure the CO concentration without interference from other combustion products, a near-infrared laser at 4300.6 cm^-1 was selected.

• Journal of Bio-Environment Control
• /
• v.20 no.2
• /
• pp.162-168
• /
• 2011

This study was carried out to investigate the plant growth of several Carex L. plants according to light intensity and soil depth planted on a green wall and roof, and to show basic data for the use of Carex L. plants in various forms. The temperature was dropt more in the green container compared to the normal especially during the genial weather from August to September. The plant growth of Carex testaceae, Carex oshimensis Evergold, and Carex ciliatomarginata Nakai was excellent at light intensity from 0 to $1799\;{\mu}M{\cdot}m^{-2}{\cdot}s^{-1}$, and that of Carex siderosticta Hance, Carex flagellifera Bronzita, Carex ornithopoda Variegata, and Carex morrowii Ice Dance were best in lower light intensity from 0 to $786\;{\mu}M{\cdot}m^{-2}{\cdot}s^{-1}$. The leaf color of the plants changed vividly as the light intensity grew lower and the visible value of the plants increased. There must be more considerations about the pattern changes in additory experiments. The water content in the soil depth of 10 cm was maintained higher than the other treatments because of no drainage layer. Most Carex L. plants grew excellent in the soil depth of 10 cm. However, Carex oshimensis Evergold, Carex siderosticta Hance, and Carex testaceae showed the best plant growth in soil depth 20 cm, and Carex morrowii Ice Dance and Carex ciliatomarginata Nakai in soil depth of 40 cm. Therefore, Carex L. plants could be recommended as materials for green roof because they also grew well in light soil depth of 10~20 cm.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
• /
• v.22 no.10
• /
• pp.1905-1919
• /
• 2000

The main motivation of this research is to develop an intelligent control strategy for Activated Sludge Process (ASP). ASP is a complex and nonlinear dynamic system because of the characteristic of wastewater, the change in influent flow rate, weather conditions, and etc. The mathematical model of ASP also includes uncertainties which are ignored or not considered by process engineer or controller designer. The ASP is generally controlled by a PID controller that consists of fixed proportional, integral, and derivative gain values. The PID gains are adjusted by the expert who has much experience in the ASP. The ASP model based on $Matlab^{(R)}5.3/Simulink^{(R)}3.0$ is developed in this paper. The performance of the model is tested by IWA(International Water Association) and COST(European Cooperation in the field of Scientific and Technical Research) data that include steady-state results during 14 days. The advantage of the developed model is that the user can easily modify or change the controller by the help of the graphical user interface. The ASP model as a typical nonlinear system can be used to simulate and test the proposed controller for an educational purpose. Various control methods are applied to the ASP model and the control results are compared to apply the proposed intelligent control strategy to a real ASP. Three control methods are designed and tested: conventional PID controller, fuzzy logic control approach to modify setpoints, and fuzzy-PID control method. The proposed setpoints changer based on the fuzzy logic shows a better performance and robustness under disturbances. The objective function can be defined and included in the proposed control strategy to improve the effluent water quality and to reduce the operating cost in a real ASP.

• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.21 no.7
• /
• pp.1032-1038
• /
• 2011

Recently identified Ciona intestinalis voltage sensor-containing phosphatase (Ci-VSP) consists of an ion channel-like transmembrane domain (VSD) and a phosphatase-like domain. Ci-VSP senses the change of membrane potential by its VSD and works as a phosphoinositide phosphatase by its phosphatase domain. In this study, we present the construction of His-tagged phosphatase-like domain of Ci-VSP, its recombinant expression and purification, and its enzymatic activity behavior in order to examine the biochemical behavior of phosphatase domain of Ci-VSP without interference. We found that Ci-VSP(248-576)-His can be eluted with an elution buffer containing 25 mM NaCl and 100 mM imidazole during His-tag purification. In addition, we found the proper measurement condition for kinetics study of Ci-VSP(248-576)-His against p-nitrophenyl phosphate (pNPP). We measured the kinetic constant of Ci-VSP(248-576)-His at $37^{\circ}C$, pH 5.0 or 5.5, under 30 min of reaction time, and less than $2.0\;{\mu}g$ of protein amount. With these conditions, we acquired that Ci-VSP(248-576)-His has $K_m$ of $354{\pm}0.143\;{\mu}M$, $V_{max}$ of $0.0607{\pm}0.0137\;{\mu}mol$/min/mg and $k_{cat}$ of $0.359{\pm}0.009751\;min^{-1}$ for pNPP dephosphorylation. Therefore, we produced a pure form of Ci-VSP(248-576)-His, and this showed a higher activity against pNPP. This purified protein will provide the road to a structural investigation on an interesting protein, Ci-VSP.

• Development and Reproduction
• /
• v.10 no.3
• /
• pp.159-168
• /
• 2006

Rodents and many other mammals have two chemosensory systems that mediate responses to pheromones, the main and accessory olfactory system, MOS and AOS, respectively. The chemosensory neurons associated with the MOS are located in the main olfactory epithelium, while those associated with the AOS are located in the vomeronasal organ(VNO). Pheromonal odorants access the lumen of the VNO via canals in the roof of the mouth, and are largely thought to be nonvolatile. The main pheromone receptor proteins consist of two superfamilies, V1Rs and V2Rs, that are structurally distinct and unrelated to the olfactory receptors expressed in the main olfactory epithelium. These two type of receptors are seven transmembrane domain G-protein coupled proteins(V1R with $G_{{\alpha}i2}$, V2R with $G_{0\;{\alpha}}$). V2Rs are co-expressed with nonclassical MHC Ib genes(M10 and other 8 M1 family proteins). Other important molecular component of VNO neuron is a TrpC2, a cation channel protein of transient receptor potential(TRP) family and thought to have a crucial role in signal transduction. There are four types of pheromones in mammalian chemical communication - primers, signalers, modulators and releasers. Responses to these chemosignals can vary substantially within and between individuals. This variability can stem from the modulating effects of steroid hormones and/or non-steroid factors such as neurotransmitters on olfactory processing. Such modulation frequently augments or facilitates the effects that prevailing social and environmental conditions have on the reproductive axis. The best example is the pregnancy block effect(Bruce effect), caused by testosterone-dependent major urinary proteins(MUPs) in male mouse urine. Intriguingly, mouse GnRH neurons receive pheromone signals from both odor and pheromone relays in the brain and may also receive common odor signals. Though it is quite controversial, recent studies reveal a complex interplay between reproduction and other functions in which GnRH neurons appear to integrate information from multiple sources and modulate a variety of brain functions.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
• /
• v.56 no.3
• /
• pp.301-310
• /
• 2023

Ferrihydrite is an iron oxide mineral that is easily found in the natural environment, including acid mine drainage, and has a low crystallinity and high specific surface area, resulting in high reactivity with other ions, and can remove environmentally hazardous substances. However, because ferrihydrite is a metastable mineral, there is a possibility of releasing adsorbed ions by phase transformation to other minerals having low surface area and high crystallinity. In this study, the adsorption characteristics of arsenate, chromate, and selenate on ferrihydrite and the oxyanion removal efficiency of ferrihydrite were studied considering mineral phase transformation. At both pH 4 and 8, the adsorption of oxyanions used in the study were in good agreement with both Langmuir and Freundlich adsorption models except for selenate at pH 8. Due to the difference in surface charge according to pH, at pH 4 a higher amount of ions were adsorbed than at pH 8. The adsorption amount were in the order of arsenate, chromate, and selenate. These different adsorption models and adsorption amounts were due to different adsorption mechanisms for each oxyanions on the surface of ferrihydrite. These adsorption characteristics were closely related to changes in the mineral phase. At pH 4, a phase transformation to goethite or hematite was observed, but only a phase transformation to hematite was observed at pH 8. Among the oxyanion species on ferrihydrite, arsenate showed the highest adsorption capacity and hardly caused phase transformation during the experimental period after adsorption. Contrary to this, chromate and selenate showed faster mineral phase transformation than arsenate, and selenate had the lowest retardation effect among the three oxyanions. Ferrihydrite can effectively remove arsenate due to its high adsorption capacity and low phase transformation rate. However, the removal efficiency for other two oxyanions were low by the low adsorption amount and additional mineral phase transformation. For chromate, the efficient removal is expected only at low concentrations in low pH environments.

• Korea Trade Review
• /
• v.48 no.3
• /
• pp.217-242
• /
• 2023

This study aims to analyze the factors influencing the logistics demand of inland ports along the Yangtze River and predict future port logistics demand based on these factors. The logistics demand prediction using system dynamics techniques was conducted for a total of six ports, including Chongqing and Yibin ports in the upper reaches, Jingzhou and Wuhan ports in the middle reaches, and Nanjing and Suzhou ports in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River. The logistics demand for all ports showed an increasing trend in the mid-term prediction until 2026. The logistics demand of Chongqing port was mainly influenced by the scale of the hinterland economy, while Yibin port appeared to heavily rely on the level of port automation. In the case of the upper and middle reach ports, logistics demand increased as the energy consumption of the hinterland increased and the air pollution situation worsened. The logistics demand of the middle reach ports was greatly influenced by the hinterland infrastructure, while the lower reach ports were sensitive to changes in the urban construction area. According to the sensitivity analysis, the logistics demand of ports relying on large cities was relatively stable against the increase and decrease of influential factors, while ports with smaller hinterland city scales reacted sensitively to changes in influential factors. Therefore, a strategy should be established to strengthen policy support for Chongqing port as the core port of the upper Yangtze River and have surrounding ports play a supporting role for Chongqing port. The upper reach ports need to play a supporting role for Chongqing port and consider measures to enhance connections with middle and lower reach ports and promote the port industry. The development strategy for inland ports along the Yangtze River suggests the establishment of direct routes and expansion of the transportation network for South Korean ports and stakeholders. It can suggest expanding the hinterland network and building an efficient transportation system linked with the logistics hub. Through cooperation, logistics efficiency can be enhanced in both regions, which will contribute to strengthening the international position and competitiveness of each port.

• Journal of Advanced Marine Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.40 no.1
• /
• pp.28-33
• /
• 2016

Batteries are used for main power engine in the fields such as mobiles, electric vehicles and unmanned submarines, for starter and lamp driver in general automotive, for emergency electric source in ship. These days, lead-acid and the lithium ion batteries are increasingly used in the fields of the secondary battery, and the lead-acid battery has a low price and safety comparatively, The lithium ion battery has a high energy density, excellent output characteristics and long life, whereas it has the risk of explosion by reacting with moisture in the air. But Recently, due to the development of waterproof, fireproof, dustproof technology, lithium batteries are widely used, particularly, because their usages are getting wider enough to be used as a power source for hybrid ship and electric propulsion ship, it is necessary to manage more strictly. Hybrid ship has power supply units connected to the packets to produce more than 500kWh large power source, and therefore, A number of the communication modules and wires need to implement the wire inspection and monitor system(WIIMS) that allows monitoring server to transmit detecting voltage, current and temperature data, which is required for the management of the batteries. This paper implements a low price type wireless inspection and monitoring system(WILIMS) of the lithium ion battery for hybrid vessels using BLE wireless communication modules and power line modem( PLM), which have the advantages of low price, no electric lines compared to serial communication inspection systems(SCIS). There are state of charge(SOC), state of health(SOH) in inspection parts of batteries, and proposed system will be able to prevent safety accidents because it allows us to predict life time and make a preventive maintenance by checking them at regular intervals.

• Progress in Medical Physics
• /
• v.23 no.1
• /
• pp.26-32
• /
• 2012

The magnification technique has recently become popular in bone radiography, mammography and other diagnostic examination. However, because of the finite size of X-ray focal spot, the magnification influences various imaging properties with resolution, noise and contrast. The purpose of study is to investigate the influence of magnification and focal spot size on digital imaging system using eDQE (effective detective quantum efficiency). Effective DQE is a metric reflecting overall system response including focal spot blur, magnification, scatter and grid response. The adult chest phantom employed in the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was used to derive eDQE from eMTF (effective modulation transfer function), eNPS (effective noise power spectrum), scatter fraction and transmission fraction. According to results, spatial frequencies that eMTF is 10% with the magnification factor of 1.2, 1.4, 1.6, 1.8 and 2.0 are 2.76, 2.21, 1.78, 1.49 and 1.26 lp/mm respectively using small focal spot. The spatial frequencies that eMTF is 10% with the magnification factor of 1.2, 1.4, 1.6, 1.8 and 2.0 are 2.21, 1.66, 1.25, 0.93 and 0.73 lp/mm respectively using large focal spot. The eMTFs and eDQEs decreases with increasing magnification factor. Although there are no significant differences with focal spot size on eDQE (0), the eDQEs drops more sharply with large focal spot than small focal spot. The magnification imaging can enlarge the small size lesion and improve the contrast due to decrease of effective noise and scatter with air-gap effect. The enlargement of the image size can be helpful for visual detection of small image. However, focal spot blurring caused by finite size of focal spot shows more significant impact on spatial resolution than the improvement of other metrics resulted by magnification effect. Based on these results, appropriate magnification factor and focal spot size should be established to perform magnification imaging with digital radiography system.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
• /
• v.23 no.4
• /
• pp.113-117
• /
• 2016

Recently, hydrogen is regarded as important energy in the future, because it is clean and renewable. The photoelectrochemical (PEC) system, which produce hydrogen using water splitting by solar energy, is one of the most promising energy systems because it has abundant energy sources and good theoretical efficiency. GaN has recently been regarded as suitable photoelectrode that could be used to split water to generate hydrogen without extra bias because its band edge position include water redox potential ($V_{redox}=1.23$ vs. SHE). GaN also shows considerable corrosion resistance in aqueous solutions and it is possible to control its properties, such as structure, band gap, and catalyst characteristics, in order to improve solar energy conversion efficiency. But, even if the band edge position of GaN make PEC reaction facilitate without bias, the overpotential of oxygen evolution reaction could reduce the efficiency of system. One of the ways to decrease overpotential is introduction of co-catalyst on photoelectrode. In this paper, we will investigate the effect of manganese dioxide ($MnO_2$) as a co-catalyst. $MnO_2$ particles were dispersed on GaN photoelectrode by spincoater and analyzed properties of the PEC system using potentiostat (PARSTAT4000). After coating $MnO_2$, the flat-band potential ($V_{fb}$) and the onset voltage ($V_{onset}$) were moved negatively by 0.195 V and 0.116 V, respectively. The photocurrent density increased on $MnO_2$ coated sample and time dependence was also improved. These results showed $MnO_2$ has an effect as a co-catalyst and it would enhance the efficiency of overall PEC system.