• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.47 no.5
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• pp.432-445
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• 2021

Background: The European Centre for Ecotoxicology and Toxicology of Chemicals' Targeted Risk Assessment (ECETOC TRA) tool has been recognized by EU REACH as a preferred approach for calculating worker health risks from chemicals. Objectives: The applicability of the ECETOC TRA to occupational exposure estimation from industrial uses of methanol was studied by inputting surveyed and varied parameters for TRA estimation as well as through comparison with measured data. Methods: Information on uses of methanol was collected from seven working environment monitoring reports along with the measured exposure data. Input parameters for TRA estimation such as operating conditions (OCs), risk management measures (RMMs) and process categories (PROCs) were surveyed. To compare with measured exposures, parameters from the surveyed conditions of ventilation but no use of respiratory protection were applied. Results: PROCs 4, 5, 8a, 10, and 15 were assigned to ten uses of methanol. The uses include as a solvent for manufacturing sun cream, surfactants, dyestuffs, films and adhesives. Methanol was also used as a component in a release agent, hardening media and mold wash for cast products as well as a component of hard-coating solution and a viscosity-controlling agent for manufacturing glass lenses. PROC 8a and PROC 10 of a cast product manufacturer without LEV (local exhaust ventilation) and general ventilation as well as no respiratory protection resulted in the highest exposure to methanol. Assuming the identical worst OCs and RMMs for all uses, exposures from PROC 5, 8a, and 10 were the same and the highest followed by PROC 4 and 15. The estimation resulted in higher exposures in nine uses except one use where measured exposure approximated exposures without RMMs. Conclusions: The role of ECETOC TRA as a conservative exposure assessment tool was confirmed by comparison with measured data. Moreover, it can guide which RMMs should be applied for the safe use of methanol.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.620-625
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• 2018

Pyropia yezoensis is one of the most extensively cultivated seaweeds used as food in Korea. However, the quality and yield of Pyropia farms are frequently affected by outbreaks of thallus discoloration. The objective of this study was to develop a simple and rapid method to evaluate P. yezoensis discoloration caused by nutrient deficiencies. A colorimeter was used to quantify the color of P. yezoensis in nutrient deficient media over 10 days. Quantitative values of lightness (L), redness (a), and yellowness (b) measured with a colorimeter were used as indicators of P. yezoensis discoloration. The vacuoles of P. yezoensis were observed at 4 days and swelled gradually from 6 days onward. The three colorimeter parameters L, a, and b values showed significantly different values with culture period. The lightness (L) value was darker initially, and continued to lighten over culture period. The yellowness (b) value increased, but the redness (a) value decreased throughout this study. The a/b ratio and redness (a) values from the colorimeter were important P. yezoensis color change indicators. The discoloration group of P. yezoensis had quantitative values for parameters of L above 70, a below 2.6, and b above 15.0. The results of this study showed that quantitative colorimetric measurements can be used as tools for simple and rapid detection of P. yezoensis discoloration.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.12 no.9
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• pp.13-20
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• 2011

There are many mountains in Korean Peninsula, and those used for the construction of roads and railways sectors are forming slopes. Slope collapse occurs with falling rocks and landslide because of the relaxation of the thawing rocks. The heavy rain in summer can also significantly contribute to the process, and abnormal climate change is much more influential than before. Therefore, rockfall-related accidents in rainy season are easily accessible in media every year. There has been a lot of research on application of strengthening compensation of the sections in order to minimize casualties and property damage. Rockfall Protection Net, however, has not been focused on much in the field yet. This study highlights the need of Rockfall Protection Net, since it can segregate the falling rocks inside the net relatively safely. Although there has been a little doubt about the effectiveness of rockfall protection facilities, it is obvious that relevant studies dealing with the solidity of the net are necessary for the rockfall protection net to be capable of supporting rockfall energies. As a result, Expanded metal strength is much more durable compared to the PVC coating net, and it is regarded as an excellent alternative material for the Rockfall Protection Net. In this study, the applicability of Expanded Metal as the alternative of Rockfall Protection Net is verified experimentally.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.469-497
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• 2020

More than one-third of the world's population still has no access to clean cooking facilities despite global interest and efforts to expand the accessibility of clean cooking fuels. They use traditional biomass, i.e., crops, animal dung and firewood, as their cooking fuel, and the health and economic damage from it is severe. As many studies have been conducted to understand the choice and transition of cooking fuel in developing countries, characteristics of household head have been addressed as one of the main fuel determinants. However, decision-making in households is not only made by household head and can vary depending on the relative characteristics of household members. Thus, this study analyses the determinants of cooking fuel choice through the samples of Cambodian couples(household head and his/her spouse) considering both characteristics of husbands and wives. As a result, it is confirmed that the effects of characteristics, such as employment, education levels, and frequency of media use, between husbands and wives on cooking fuel choice were different. This study is expected to contribute to the development of more sophisticated policies to increase clean fuel in Cambodia, given that it takes into account the characteristics of spouses who have not previously been dealt with in analyzing the determinants of cooking fuel choice and that it is difficult to find research on Cambodia.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.310-320
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• 2022

This study aimed to identify the change in the public perception of "bats" after the outbreak of the coronavirus (COVID-19) infection. Text mining and network analysis were conducted for blog posts, the largest social network in Korea. We collected 9,241 Naver blog posts from 2019 to 2020 just before the outbreak of COVID-19 in Korea. The data were analyzed with Python and NetMiner 4.3.2, and the public's perception of bats was examined through the relationship of keywords by period. Findings indicated that the frequency of bat keywords in 2020 increased more than 25 times compared to 2019, and the centrality value increased more than three times. The perception of bats changed before and after the outbreak of the pandemic. Prior to COVID-19, bats were highly recognized as a species of wildlife while in the first half of 2020, they were strongly considered as a threat to human society in relation to infectious diseases and health. In the second half of 2020, it was confirmed that the area of interest in bats expanded as the proportion of ecological and cultural types ofresearch increased. This study seeks to contribute to the expansion and direction of future research in bats by understanding the public's interest in the potential impact of the species as disease hosts post the COVID-19 pandemic.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.321-333
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• 2022

In this study, the concentration and distribution characteristics of BTEX (benzene toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylene) emitted from Daesan Petrochemical Industrial Complex were examined to determine their potential hazards to local residents. Residents living nearby the complex areas may be exposed to the chemicals through various media (air, water, and soil), especially by air. This study evaluated human health risks by inhalation using both deterministic and probabilistic risk assessment approaches. As a result of the deterministic risk assessment, the non-cancer risk was much lower than the regulation limit of hazard index (HI 1.0) for all the points. However, in case of cancer risk evaluation, it was found that the risk of excess cancer for benzene at point A located in the industrial complex was 2.28×10^-6, which slightly exceeded the standard regulatory limit of 1.0×10^-6. In addition, the probabilistic risk assessment revealed that the percentile exceeding the standard of 1.0×10^-6was found to be 45.3%. The sensitivity analysis showed that exposure time (ET) had the greatest impact on the results. Based on the risk assessment study, it implied that ethylbenzene, toluene, and xylene had little adverse effects on potential human exposure, but benzene often exceeded the cancer risk standard (1.0×10^-6). Further studies on extensive VOCs monitoring are needed to evaluate the potential risks of industrial complex areas.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.55 no.1
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• pp.111-125
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• 2022

Since landslide can cause huge damages to many facilities, close characterization of slopes is needed for appropriate reinforcements for the unstable ones in order to prevent the damages. Geophysical surveys, which can characterize a large area at a relatively low cost without disturbing slopes, have been widely employed for the assessment of slope stability in other countries. However, only conventional direct investigation methods are mainly used in Korea. In this paper, we analyzed various cases, which evaluated slope stabilities by characterizing slopes using geophysical exploration. First, we introduced changes in geophysical properties due to unstable media of slope like fracture location, fracture connectivity and distribution of groundwater level, and subsequently discussed the applicability of geophysical methods to the detection of the changes; the methods include electrical resistivity survey, seismic survey, self-potential survey, induced polarization survey and ground penetrating radar. Based on this description, we analyzed how geophysical surveys were performed on various slopes.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
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• v.42 no.4
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• pp.259-268
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• 2023

Rhodococcus sp. 3-2 strain has been reported to degrade benzimidazole-based pesticides, such as benomyl and carbendazim. Therefore, this study aimed to optimize culture medium composition and culture conditions to achieve cost-effective and efficient large-scale production of the Rhodococcus sp. 3-2 strain. The study identified that the optimal media composition for mass culture comprised 0.5% glucose, 0.5% yeast extract, 0.15% NaCl, 0.5% K₂HPO₄, 0.5% sodium succinate, and 0.1% MgSO₄. Additionally, a microbial agent was developed using a 1.5-ton fermenter, with skim milk (20%), monosodium glutamate (15%), and vitamin C (2%) as key components. The storage stability of the microbial agent has been confirmed, with advantages of low temperature conservation, which helps to sustain efficacy for at least six months. We also assessed the benomyl degradation activity of the microbial agent within field soil. The results revealed an over 90% degradation rate when the concentration of viable cells exceeded 2.65 × 10⁶ CFU/g after a minimum of five weeks had elapsed. Based on these findings, Rhodococcus sp. 3-2 strain can be considered a cost-effective microbial agent with diverse agricultural applications.

• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.156-163
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• 2008

Luminescent bacterial toxicity test was first introduced in the early 1980s, registered as international standard method in 1998 and now widely used as a common toxicity test method. This toxicity test uses luminescent bacterium, Vibrio fischeri, originated from marine environment as a test organism. The degree of toxicity can be evaluated from the comparison of luminescent emission intensity between control and treatment groups to toxicants and materials from various environmental matrix for 30 min. This test can be carried out by using commercial products and its results are sensitive and precise. This research is on the feasibility of adopting luminescent bacterial test as a domestic standard test protocol. Using commercial products, a series of experiments were conducted to identify the precision and accuracy of injection volume and light emission, and to evaluate concentration-response relationship between chemical concentrations and light emissions. Also, the feasibility of the application to environmental media and quality assurance/quality control were checked. The results of serial toxicity tests revealed that the preliminary luminescent bacterial toxicity test was robust and suitable as a standard method.

• Journal of Science Education
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• v.47 no.3
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• pp.251-262
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• 2023

In this study, we examine other factors that may contribute to the decline in students' academic performance and educational attainment. Many media reports, as well as previous studies, have suggested that virtual learning is the main reason for the decline in students' academic performance. However, the 2020 National Student Achievement Survey, which was conducted in conjunction with the COVID-19 Distance Learning Environment Student Survey, showed that students were highly satisfied with distance learning (70-80%), and the analysis of the National Assessment of Educational Achievement showed that students' academic performance had already been declining year by year since 2017, with a general downward curve. For further confirmation, we analyzed the performance of high school students on mock exams and found that their performance was not normally distributed, but rather a right-skewed U-shaped distribution with a shrinking number of medians and severe polarization. We found that this phenomenon is not simply because of the mode or quality of the virtual classroom, but to a variety of factors, including environmental influences such as care and management at home, changes in investment in private education, increased time spent on online devices while taking virtual classes at the bottom, and increased time spent watching online content, games, and videos that are not related to learning.