• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.17-34
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• 2023

Camera trapping has been used as a non-invasive survey method that minimizes anthropogenic disturbance to ecosystems. Nevertheless, it is labor-intensive and time-consuming, requiring researchers to quantify species and populations. In this study, we aimed to improve the preprocessing of camera trapping data by utilizing an object detection algorithm. Wildlife monitoring using unmanned sensor cameras was conducted in a forested urban forest and a green space on a university campus in Cheonan City, Chungcheongnam-do, Korea. The collected camera trapping data were classified by a researcher to identify the occurrence of species. The data was then used to test the performance of the YOLO-X object detection algorithm for wildlife detection. The camera trapping resulted in 10,500 images of the urban forest and 51,974 images of green spaces on campus. Out of the total 62,474 images, 52,993 images (84.82%) were found to be false positives, while 9,481 images (15.18%) were found to contain wildlife. As a result of wildlife monitoring, 19 species of birds, 5 species of mammals, and 1 species of reptile were observed within the study area. In addition, there were statistically significant differences in the frequency of occurrence of the following species according to the type of urban greenery: Parus varius(t = -3.035, p < 0.01), Parus major(t = 2.112, p < 0.05), Passer montanus(t = 2.112, p < 0.05), Paradoxornis webbianus(t = 2.112, p < 0.05), Turdus hortulorum(t = -4.026, p < 0.001), and Sitta europaea(t = -2.189, p < 0.05). The detection performance of the YOLO-X model for wildlife occurrence was analyzed, and it successfully classified 94.2% of the camera trapping data. In particular, the number of true positive predictions was 7,809 images and the number of false negative predictions was 51,044 images. In this study, the object detection algorithm YOLO-X model was used to detect the presence of wildlife in the camera trapping data. In this study, the YOLO-X model was used with a filter activated to detect 10 specific animal taxa out of the 80 classes trained on the COCO dataset, without any additional training. In future studies, it is necessary to create and apply training data for key occurrence species to make the model suitable for wildlife monitoring.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.55 no.1
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• pp.10-18
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• 2022

This study analyzed the relationship between the community structure of benthic macroinvertebrates and habitat changes in open estuaries among the sites included in the national estuary monitoring program. The estuary survey was conducted under the "Guidelines for Investigation and Evaluation of Biometric Networks" and classified by sea area, 80 places in the East Sea, 102 places in the South Sea, and 19 places in the West Sea were investigated. In a total of 201 open estuaries, benthic macroinvertebrates were identified with 4 phyla, 9 classes, 41 orders, 139 families, 269 species and 196 species in the East Sea, 182 species in the South Sea, and 90 species in the West Sea. The highest population densities were Insecta in the East Sea, the Malacostraca in the South Sea, and the Annelida in the West Sea. Through SIMPER analysis, species contributing to the similarity of benthic macroinvertebrates communities in each sea area were identified. Some species greatly influenced the similarity of clusters. The benthic community in the East Sea was affected by the salinity, so the contribution rate of freshwater species was high. On the other hand, the benthic communities of the South and West Seas showed species compositions are influenced by the substrate composition. As results, the benthic macroinvertebrate community in Korean estuaries was impacted by salinity and substrate simultaneously, and the close relationship with geographical distance was not observed. The result of this study is expected to be used to respond to environmental changes by identifying and predicting changes in the diversity and distribution of benthic macroinvertebrates in Korea estuaries.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.549-556
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• 2017

Rivers continuously transport terrestrial organic carbon matter to the estuary and the ocean, and they play a critical role in productivity and biodiversity in the marine ecosystem as well as the global carbon cycle. The amount of terrestrial organic carbon transporting from the rivers to ocean is an essential piece of information, not only for the marine ecosystem management but also the carbon budget within catchment. However, this phenomenon is still not well understood. Most large rivers in Korea have a well-established national monitoring system of the river flow and the TOC (Total Organic Carbon) concentration from the mountain to the river mouth, which are fundamental for estimating the amount of the TOC flux. We estimated the flux of the total terrestrial organic carbon of five large rivers which flow out to the Yellow Sea, using the data of the national monitoring system (the monthly mean TOC concentration and the monthly runoff of river flow). We quantified the annual TOC flux of the five rivers, showing their results in the following order: the Han River ($18.0{\times}10^9gC\;yr^{-1}$)>>Geum River ($5.9{\times}10^9gC\;yr^{-1}$)>Yeongsan River ($2.6{\times}10^9gC\;yr^{-1}$)>Sumjin River ($2.0{\times}10^9gC\;yr^{-1}$)>>Tamjin River ($0.2{\times}10^9gC\;yr^{-1}$). The amount of the Han River, which is the highest in the Korean rivers, corresponds to be 4% of the annual total TOC flux of in the Yellow River, and moreover, to be 0.6% of Yangtze River.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.221-231
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• 2023

Great tit (Parus major) is a bioindicator species that can measure environmental changes in urban ecosystems and plays an important role in maintaining health as a representative insectivorous bird. Researchers have utilized artificial nest box surveys to understand the reproductive ecology of the Paridae family of birds, including the Great tits, but it is difficult to conduct a macroscopic study due to spatial and temporal limitations. This study designed and applied a citizen-participatory monitoring of artificial nest boxes project to transcend the limitations of expert-centered monitoring methods. The Suwon Front Yard Bird Monitoring Team installed artificial nest boxes in green spaces in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province and observed the reproductive ecology of the Paridae family through the participation of voluntary citizen surveyors. Participants were recruited through an online survey from February 9 to February 22, 2021, and they directly performed from installation to observation of artificial next boxes from February 23 to August 31, 2021. Online education was provided to the volunteers for the entire monitoring process to lower the entry barrier for non-expert citizen surveyors and collect consistent data, and observation records were collected through a mobile app. A total of 98 citizen surveyors participated in the citizen-participatory monitoring of artificial nest boxes project, and 175 (84.95%) of the 256 distributed artificial nest boxes were installed in green spaces in Suwon City. Among the installed artificial nest boxes, the results of the citizen science project were confirmed for 173 (83.98%), excluding two boxes with position coordinate generation errors. A total of 987 artificial nest box observation records were collected from citizen surveyors, with a minimum of one time, a maximum of 26 times, and an average of 5.71±4.37 times. The number of observations of artificial birdhouses per month was 70 times (7.09%) in February, 444 times (44.98%) in March, 284 times (28.77%) in April, 133 times (13.48%) in May, 46 times (4.66%) in June, 6 times (0.61%) in July, and 4 times (0.41%) in August. Birds using the artificial nest boxes were observed in 57 (32.95%) of the 173 installed artificial nest boxes, and they included Great tit (Parus major) using 12 boxes (21.05%), Varied Tit (Parus varius) using 7 boxes (12.28%), and unidentified birds using 38 boxes (66.67%). This study is the first to consider citizen participation in the monitoring of artificial nest boxes, a survey method for the reproductive ecology of the Paridae family, including Great tits, and it can be utilized as basic data for the design of ecological monitoring combined with citizen science in the future.

• Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.155-163
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• 2003

Fluoranthene, a common polycyclicaromatic hydrocarbon (PAH), exhibits phototoxicity which may affect aquatic organisms. The eventual goal of this study is to develop a biomarker of Japanese medaka (Oryzias latipes) used in monitoring hazardous chemicals in the ecosystem. In this study we investigated neural toxicity of fluoranthene in Japanese medaka (Oryzias latipes) along with comparative analysis of corresponding behavioral response. The untreated individuals shooed normal behavioral characteristics (i. e., smooth and linear movements). The treated fish, however, showed stopping and abrupt change of orientation (100 ppb), and severely reduced locomotive activity and enhanced surfacing activity (1,000 ppb). Treatment of the medaka fish with fluoranthene caused a significant suppresson of acetycholine esterase (AChE) activities in the body portion but not in the head portion. When fish were exposed to 1,000 ppb of fluoranthene for 24 hr, the body AChE activities decreased from 126.${\pm}$31.89 (nmoles substrate hydrolyzed per min per mg protein) to 49.51${\pm}$11.99. Expressions of tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) protein in the different organs from both head and body portions were comparatively analyzed using an immunohistochemical technique. Five organs of the medaka fish showing a strong TH protein expression were the olfactory bulb, hypothalamus, optic lobe, pons and myelencephalon regions. This study provides molecular and neurobehavioral bases of a biomonitoring system for toxic chemicals using fish as a model organism.

• Molecular & Cellular Toxicology
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.267-272
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• 2007

Environmental and anthropogenic changes affect the health and stability of marine ecosystem. In this study we aimed to identify molecular biomarkers for ecotoxicological pollutants risk assessment in the rockfish (Sebastes schlegeli). We designed primers based on conserved sequences by multiple alignments of target genes from related species, and cloned the partial cDNAs of cytochrome P450 (CYP1A1), glutathione S-transferase (GST), metallothionein (MT), superoxide dismutase (SOD), ubiquitin (UB), vitellogenin (VTG) and $\beta$-actin by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) from S. schlegeli. Northern blot results indicated that these six genes expressions were significantly induced by benzo[a]pyrene (BaP, 1 ${\mu}M$) and that the level of each of their transcripts increased in BaP-exposed rockfish in a time-dependent manner. This study suggests that transcriptional changes in these six genes may be used for monitoring environmental exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs).

• Journal of Soil and Groundwater Environment
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.8-18
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• 2015

Pollutants such as heavy metals and explosives originating from the military operational ranges can be migrated to adjacent surface water body or offsite soil, and can affect to local residents and aquatic ecosystem. Therefore, Korea Ministry of the National Defense has established various guidelines for environmental management including the installation of pollutant migration prevention facilities (PMPFs) and monitoring methodologies for heavy metals in the operational range soil and effluent and sediment of PMPFs. However, current guidelines neither address the explosive compounds such as 2, 4, 6-trinitrotoluene (TNT) and hexahydro-1,3,5-trinitro-1,3,5-triazine (RDX) nor suggest detailed environmental investigation protocol. This paper introduces the new “Environmental Management Manual for Military Firing Ranges”, which includes the environmental criteria for explosives as well as the detailed investigation protocol for the affected environmental media including soil, effluent and sediment of PMPFs.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.247-259
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• 2008

The utilization of a variety of hazard chemicals bears risks to human health and ecosystem. The increasing usage of various chemicals indicates the greater emission of those chemicals to water system, and the subsequent deterioration of water quality. Water system is vulnerable to many pollutants, however, there are limitations of managing a range of hazard chemicals based on insufficient legal foundations. Therefore it is needed to select hazard chemicals that can be potentially discharged into water system, and subsequently to classify a wide range of existing chemicals for better management of those chemicals. In this study, the 259 candidate chemicals of concern were selected from the lists of the toxic released inventory chemicals (148), hazard concern candidate chemicals (106), and wastewater effluent standard candidate chemicals (116). We suggested the category 1, 2, 3 and 4 of hazard chemicals potentially discharged into water system. The assessment factors considered for the classification were hazard potential, persistence and emission to water body. This work was conducted as a part of the project entitled 'Development of integrated methodology for evaluation of water environment', and the results were used to develop the monitoring lists of hazard chemicals in four major rivers in Korea.

• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.43-51
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• 2020

The present study was designed to characterize the bioaccumulation of organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) in marine organisms (zooplankton, oyster, crab, and goby) on different trophic level. In the present study, sedentary bivalve (oyster) showed strong correlations in OCPs levels with surface sediment in the study area. This indicates the two compartments can be used as alternative for pollution monitoring of OCPs even in narrow scale in space. Bioaccumulation and trophic transfer of OCPs was strongly associated with their hydrophobicity (i.e., K_OW). HCHs with log K_OW < 5 did not show any enrichment through food-chain. However, log BAF values of OCPs with log K_OW > 5 positioned over the 1:1 lines of log BAF and log K_OW of the top predator, indicating the greater fugacities in the higher trophic level and thus the occurrence of biomagnification via ingestion. Based on trophic transfer factors (TTF), more hydrophobic OCPs with log K_OW > 5 were enriched by several to several ten times in the highest trophic level relative to the lowest trophic level. This finding can be used in the establishment of marine environmental water quality criteria by considering biomagnification factors (TTF in this study) of OCPs.

• Spatial Information Research
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.509-518
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• 2003

Impervious surface affects urban climate, flood, and water pollution. With a higher paved rate, expanded heat containing capacity of buildings and roads raises atmospheric temperature, and increased quantity of the outflowed water brings flood during a heavy downpour. Moreover, increased non-point source pollutant load is accountable for water pollution. In this regard, it is definitely important to research and keep monitoring the current situation of paved surface, which influences urban ecosystem, disaster and pollution. In fact, collecting information on urban paved surface, which requires the time and expense, is very difficult due to its complicate structure. In order to solve the problem, this study suggested a method to utilize satellite image data for efficient survey on the current condition of paved surface. It analyzed the paved surface condition of Anyang-si by using IKONOS image and discussed the usefulness and limitation of this method.