• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.17 no.12
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• pp.1736-1740
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• 2004

Since the application of relatively high levels of heavy metals in the compost poses a potential hazard to plants and animals, the content of heavy metals in the compost with animal manure is important to know if it is as a fertilizer. Measurement of heavy metals content in the compost by chemical methods usually requires numerous reagents, skilled labor and expensive analytical equipment. The objective of this study, therefore, was to explore the application of near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRS), a nondestructive, cost-effective and rapid method, for the prediction of heavy metals contents in compost. One hundred and seventy two diverse compost samples were collected from forty-seven compost facilities located along the Han river in Korea, and were analyzed for Cr, As, Cd, Cu, Zn and Pb levels using inductively coupled plasma spectrometry. The samples were scanned using a Foss NIRSystem Model 6500 scanning monochromator from 400 to 2,500 nm at 2 nm intervals. The modified partial least squares (MPLS), the partial least squares (PLS) and the principal component regression (PCR) analysis were applied to develop the most reliable calibration model, between the NIR spectral data and the sample sets for calibration. The best fit calibration model for measurement of heavy metals content in compost, MPLS, was used to validate calibration equations with a similar sample set (n=30). Coefficient of simple correlation (r) and standard error of prediction (SEP) were Cr (0.82, 3.13 ppm), As (0.71, 3.74 ppm), Cd (0.76, 0.26 ppm), Cu (0.88, 26.47 ppm), Zn (0.84, 52.84 ppm) and Pb (0.60, 2.85 ppm), respectively. This study showed that NIRS is a feasible analytical method for prediction of heavy metals contents in compost.

• Journal of Biosystems Engineering
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• v.39 no.2
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• pp.134-141
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• 2014

Purposes: This study was to validate the Robotic Smart Work System that can provides better working conditions and high productivity in unstructured environments like bio-industry, based on a tele-operation system for fruit harvesting with low cost 3-D positioning system on the laboratory level. Methods: For the Robotic Smart Work System for fruit harvesting and cultivation management in agriculture, a vision based tele-operating system and 3-D position information are key elements. This study proposed Robotic Smart Farming, an agricultural version of Robotic Smart Work System, and validated a 3-D position information system with a low cost omni camera and a laser marker system in the lab environment in order to get a vision based tele-operating system and 3-D position information. Results: The tasks like harvesting of the fixed target and cultivation management were accomplished even if there was a short time delay (30 ms ~ 100 ms). Although automatic conveyor works requiring accurate timing and positioning yield high productivity, the tele-operation with user's intuition will be more efficient in unstructured environments which require target selection and judgment. Conclusions: This system increased work efficiency and stability by considering ancillary intelligence as well as user's experience and knowhow. In addition, senior and female workers will operate the system easily because it can reduce labor and minimized user fatigue.

• Weed & Turfgrass Science
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.109-116
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• 2017

This study was carried out two surveys in 2015 to monitor weed occurrence and determine the most troublesome weeds in peach orchards of Korea. The first survey identified 56 taxa belonging to 23 families including 27 annuals, 11 biennials, and 18 perennials. Based on importance values, Conyza canadensis (5.12%), Plantago asiatica (4.17%), and Trifolium repens (3.86%) were the dominant weeds in the first survey (from April to June). Seventeen exotic weeds were identified in the first survey, including Conyza canadensis, Trifolium repens, and Chenopodium ficifolium. The second survey (from September to October) identified 42 weeds belonging to 19 families including 23 annuals, 5 biennials, and 14 perennials. According to importance values, Digitaria ciliaris (8.00%) was the most dominant weed, followed by Echinochloa utilis (6.61%) and Rorippa palustris (6.48%). There were 12 exotic weeds, including Taraxacum officinale, Rumex crispus, and Trifolium repens. Additionally, according to Braun-Blanquet's scale showed that the dominance value was level 1 (41.98% and 46.43%, respectively) in two surveys. Currently, 40% of the total surveyed peach orchards applied herbicides for weed control. These results could provide basic data to assist orchardists in selecting the most suitable weed management methods; thereby, reducing labor inputs and effectively lowering costs while improving fruit yields in peach orchards of Korea.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.50 no.1
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• pp.25-37
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• 2008

When livestock facilities in Korea have been changed larger and denser, rearing conditions have been getting worse and the productivity of animal production have been decreased. Especially in the cold season, the minimized ventilation has generally been operated to save energy cost in Korea resulting in very poor environmental condition and high mortality. While the stability, suitability, and uniformity of the rearing condition are the most important for high productivity, the ventilation configuration is the most important to improve the rearing condition seasonally. But, it is so difficult to analyze the internal air flow and the environmental factors by conducting only field experiment because the weather condition is very unpredictable and unstable as well as the structural specification can not be easily changed by the researchers considering cost and labor. Accordingly, an aerodynamic computer simulation was adopted to this study to overcome the weakness of conducting field experiment and study the aerodynamic itself. It has been supposed that the airflow is the main mechanism of heat, mass, and momentum transfers. To make the simulation model accurately and actually, simplified pig models were also developed. The accuracy of the CFD simulation model was enhanced by 4.4 % of errors compared with the data collected from field experiments. In this paper, using the verified CFD model, the CFD computed internal rearing condition of the mechanically ventilated pig house were analyzed quantitatively as well as qualitatively. Later, this developed model will be computed time-dependently to effectively analyze the seasonal ventilation efficiency more practically and extensively with tracer gas decay theory.

• Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.160-165
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• 1998

Current discriminating technique of rice variety is known to be not objective till this time because of depending on naked eye of well trained inspector. DNA finger print method based on genetic character of rice has been indicated inappropriate for on-site application, because the method need much labor and skilled expert. The purpose of this study was to develops the identification technique of polished rice varieties using CCD camera images. To minimize the noise of the captured image, thresholding and median filtering were carried out, and edge was extracted from the image data. Image data after pretreatment of normalize and FFT(fast fourier transform) were used for library model and feedforward backpropagation neural network model. Image processing technique using CCD camera could discriminate the variety of rice with high accuracy in case of quite different rice of shape, but the accuracy was reached at 85% in the similar shape of rice.

• Archives of design research
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.93-102
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• 2003

This thesis is a study for the standardization of the design of ginseng cultivating facility (also known as the sun off facility) for the improvement of farming environment. The core background of this study is to propose a basic study for introducing, for the first time, the modern ginseng cultivating facility that matches the position of korea as a main nation cultivating ginseng and to secure the production and quality value of Koryo Ginseng, which is a special world-level agricultural product of Korea, under the present WTO agricultural product open system. Right now, wood, rice straw, or vinyls, which are non-standardized or are for one-time use only are used. Therefore, as a concept of the design, 1 tried to revise the fact that these materials are being used to set up the facility repeatedly every year which is creating environmental pollution and wasting of our countries labor and resource. Concrete factors to be improved are as follows: First, standardization of the form and structure of mass production system; Second, introduction of new materials such as semi-permanent resin etc., for standardization of materials; 1 tried to make the above two factors into a shape based on a Korean image. As for the design, designed a standard unit model of the ginseng cultivation facility especially keeping in mind to design it so the facility can be freely connected and assembled according to the size and shape of the cultivation area.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.373-379
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• 2019

Smart-farm has been spreading across Korea to improve the labor efficiency and productivity of greenhouse crops. Although notable improvements have been made in the monitoring technologies and environmental-controlling systems in greenhouses, only a few simple decision-support systems are available for predicting the optimum environmental conditions for crop growth. In this study, a tomato growth model (GreenTom), which was developed by Seoul National University in 1997, was calibrated and validated to examine if the model can be used as a decision-supporting system. The original GreenTom model was not able to simulate artificial defoliation, which resulted in overestimation of the leaf area index in the late growth. Thus, an algorithm for simulating the artificial defoliation was developed and added to the original model. The node development, leaf growth, stem growth, fruit growth, and leaf area index were generally well simulated by the modified model indicating that the model could be used effectively in the decision-making of smart greenhouse.

• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.613-630
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• 2013

This study attempts to analyze the spatial characteristics of organic agriculture in Korea during the period of 2000~2010, focusing on women's labor contribution to agricultural operations. Spatial distribution and concentration of organic farming have been investigated using Location Quotient(LQ) and Local Indicator of Spatial Association(LISA), it was found that the specialized organic farmland in the Seoul Metropolitan area has decreased significantly over the past decade, while in Chungnam and Kyungpook province it has been rapid growth in the same period. Multilinear regression analysis was also carried out to find out whether the spatial clusters in organic farming depends on women farmers. Results describing the correlation between organic farming and women farmers within identified clusters suggest that the possibility of the transition towards sustainable agriculture and farmland restructuring in Korea, by women.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Rural Architecture
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.21-28
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• 2011

This paper was able to indicate to the results the following thing that attempted a required potential development demand, through the contents and cost analysis in Rural Community Development Project. Nowadays, Rural Areas comparatively have a lot of development demands related to improvements environmental of residence life and construction of Urban-Rural Exchange Facility, on the other and, there is comparatively a few facilities demands regarding agriculture production. Demand is cold storage facilities and agricultural products direct sale facilities expansion to be able to raise value added of agricultural products as facilities related comparatively a little agriculture production, and an improvement of residence life comparatively has a lot of repair environmental uninhabited house repair, river-front and the roadside, rest shelter creation demands. However, that should be forecasted so that aging of rural, population decrease and development demand is caused by a lot of issues such as maintenances operation of many Urban-Rural Exchange Facilities and a similar program and content has a lot of them in bilateral adjacent zones. Therefore, in the future plan shall attempt efficiency operating facilities and a program through characterization and network of zone so that facilities and program can have complementary relation in the adjacent zones. And item development and an investor are necessary regarding new labor force supply for continuous value maintenance of space and returning to the farm that there were the reverse agriculture production and Amenity which are an rural village. Furthermore, developmental plan of rural village is necessary through the demand analyses that a citizen wishing for things.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural Science
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.147-161
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• 2001

Efficiency and competitive power in agribusiness management has became important issue due to the rapid changes in farming environment under new WTO agreement. To increase competitive power, small-sized petty farm should be restructured to be specialized large-scaled farming system. Trust farming corporation(TFC) has been introduced to increase farm productivity and competitive power through large scale farming system and refined management skills. Eventually, TFCs are expected to revitalize rural economy. TFCs are increasing in numbers, but they are unsatisfactory in quality often with insolvent operations. The typical problems with TFCs are internal conflicts among members, lack of management abilities and incentives, inefficiency in machinery use, and insolvent operations. The self effort by members and legal-institutional assistance can alleviate the negative factors against the rational for cooperative management and sustain TFCs. This study identifies the management problems of TFCs. To provide the methods for increasing management efficiency, improving rational management skills, and hence to help revitalizing the rural economy with competitive power, 20 TFCs in Nonsan County is surveyed. The major findings are as follows; 1) According to the survey result of 20 trust farming corporations, investments on the accumulation of knowledges and information, accounting management, machinery management are required due to the present lack of management/accounting ability. There also exist problems associated with revenue sources, labor uses, and public recognition. To increase management efficiency under current situation, corporations should import active business plans with expanding farming execution and off-farm season business. 2) Based on the result of corporations' business analysis, more than 50% of the corporations were not able to provide profit dividends to the members. It suggests that trust farming corporations need appropriate and stable revenue sources to sustain business. It is also required that corporations should reduce their excessive expenditure on fixed assets. 3) Theoretical amounts of consignment fees for tillage operation, planting, and harvesting were found to be 338,874 won, 216,596 won, and 332,318 won, respectively. Although actual levels of fee are 110%~120% of these theoretical levels of consignment fee, corporations' expected fee levels could not be acheived because of competency of consignment market.