• Title/Summary/Keyword: Light environments

Search Result 569, Processing Time 0.025 seconds

A Unique Prokaryotic Assemblage of Wall Biofilm of a Volcanic Cave (Daesubee) in Jeju (제주도 용암동굴 대섭이굴 미생물 막의 독특한 원핵미생물 군집)

  • Moon, Jong-Geun;Jung, Man-Young;Kim, Jong-Geol;Park, Soo-Je;Kim, Dae-Shin;Kim, Jong-Shik;Rhee, Sung-Keun
    • Korean Journal of Microbiology
    • /
    • v.49 no.2
    • /
    • pp.184-190
    • /
    • 2013
  • Cave environment provides special ecosystems for evolution of lives distant from surface environments. We investigated bacterial and archaeal communities of wall biofilm obtained from of a volcanic cave (Daesubee) in Jeju, Republic of Korea. Bacterial and archaeal 16S rRNA genes were PCR-amplified and sequenced using pyrosequencing technologies. Unique prokaryotic communities with low diversities were observed. The main bacterial sequences (ca. 83% of total reads) were affiliated with Pseudonocardia mongoliensis of phylum Actinobacteria and clustered with clones obtained from various caves. Reflection of light on the wall surface of cave might be caused by formation of beads of water caused by hydrophobic filaments of actinobacterial colonies. Main archaeal sequences (ca. 65.7% of total reads) were related with those of I.1a-Associated group of phylum Thaumarchaeota. The sequences were related with that of Candidatus Nitrosotalea devanaterra which was known to oxidize ammonia under acidic condition (ca. pH 5.0). Nutrients leached through volcanic soils contribute formation of unique microbial communities of wall biofilm of cave Daesubee.

Evaluation of the Wet Bulb Globe Temperature (WBGT) Index for Digital Fashion Application in Outdoor Environments

  • Kwon, JuYoun;Parsons, Ken
    • Journal of the Ergonomics Society of Korea
    • /
    • v.36 no.1
    • /
    • pp.23-36
    • /
    • 2017
  • Objective: This paper presents a study to evaluate the WBGT index for assessing the effects of a wide range of outdoor weather conditions on human responses. Background: The Wet Bulb Globe Temperature (WBGT) index was firstly developed for the assessment of hot outdoor conditions. It is a recognised index that is used world-wide. It may be useful over a range of outdoor conditions and not just for hot climates. Method: Four group experiments, involving people performing a light stepping activity, were conducted to determine human responses to outside conditions in the U.K. They were conducted in September 2007 (autumn), December 2007 (winter), March 2008 (spring) and June 2008 (summer). Environmental measurements included WBGT, air temperature, radiant temperature (including solar load), humidity and wind speed all measured at 1.2m above the ground, as well as weather data measured by a standard weather station at 3m to 4m above the ground. Participants' physiological and subjective responses were measured. When the overall results of the four seasons are considered, WBGT provided a strong prediction of physiological responses as well as subjective responses if aural temperature, heart rate and sweat production were measured. Results: WBGT is appropriate to predict thermal strain on a large group of ordinary people in moderate conditions. Consideration should be given to include the WBGT index in warning systems for a wide range of weather conditions. However, the WBGT overestimated physiological responses of subjects. In addition, tenfold Borg's RPE was significantly different with heart rate measured for the four conditions except autumn (p<0.05). Physiological and subjective responses over 60 minutes consistently showed a similar tendency in the relationships with the $WBGT_{head}$ and $WBGT_{abdomen}$. Conclusion: It was found that either $WBGT_{head}$ or $WBGT_{abdomen}$ could be measured if a measurement should be conducted at only one height. The relationship between the WBGT values and weather station data was also investigated. There was a significant relationship between WBGT values at the position of a person and weather station data. For UK daytime weather conditions ranging from an average air temperature of $6^{\circ}C$ to $21^{\circ}C$ with mean radiant temperatures of up to $57^{\circ}C$, the WBGT index could be used as a simple thermal index to indicate the effects of weather on people. Application: The result of evaluation of WBGT might help to develop the smart clothing for workers in industrial sites and improve the work environment in terms of considering workers' wellness.

Wood Decay Properties of Difference MCQ Retention Level (MCQ 보유량에 따른 목재의 부후 특성)

  • Lee, Hansol;Hwang, Won-Joung;Lee, Hyun-Mi;Son, Dong-Won
    • Journal of the Korean Wood Science and Technology
    • /
    • v.44 no.5
    • /
    • pp.716-725
    • /
    • 2016
  • In this study, MCQ (Micronized copper Quat) which was copper-based wood preservative, was investigated on decay properties by difference of the its infiltration volume. After pressure-treatment with different MCQ concentration, test specimens (Japanese Red Pine) were exposed by a brown-rot fungus (Fomitopsis palustris). At the end of the 12 weeks exposure to the fungus, untreated specimen was showed the mass loss of more than 35%, and the value of preservative effectiveness of MCQ by indoor decay was $3.99{\pm}0.42kg/m^3$. Therefore, MCQ should be pressure-injected at least $3.99kg/m^3$. The three dimensional of the specimens were observed by using the light microscope and scanning electron microscope, Untreated and treatment specimens with low concentration generally had underwent serious decays and had a lot of fungal hyphae. Howere, the formation of bore hole by hyphae were not observed. Mass loss and decay properties of specimens were affected by amount of MCQ injection. Therefore, it is necessary to the review of the adequacy of the MCQ injection amount in domestic environments.

Biology and Health Aspects of Molds in Foods and the Environment

  • Bullerman, Lloyd-B.
    • Journal of the Korean Society of Food Science and Nutrition
    • /
    • v.22 no.3
    • /
    • pp.359-366
    • /
    • 1993
  • Molds are eucaryotic, multicellular, multinucleate, filamentous organisms that reproduce by forming asexual and sexual spores. The spores are readily spread through the air and because they are very light-weight and tend to behave like dust particles, they are easily disseminated on air currents. Molds therefore are ubiquitous organisms that are found everywhere, throughout the environment. The natural habitat of most molds is the soil where they grow on and break down decaying vegetable matter. Thus, where there is decaying organic matter in an area, there are often high numbers of mold spores in the atmosphere of the environment. Molds are common contaminants of plant materials, including grains and seeds, and therefore readily contaminate human foods and animal feeds. Molds can tolerate relatively harsh environments and adapt to more severe stresses than most microorganisms. They require less available moisture for growth than bacteria and yeasts and can grow on substrates containing concentrations of sugar or salt that bacteria can not tolerate. Most molds are highly aerobic, requiring oxygen for growth. Molds grow over a wide temperature range, but few can grow at extremely high temperatures. Molds have simple nutritional requirements, requiring primarily a source of carbon and simple organic nitrogen. Because of this, molds can grow on many foods and feed materials and cause spoilage and deterioration. Some molds ran produce toxic substances known as mycotoxins, which are toxic to humans and animals. Mold growth in foods can be controlled by manipulating factors such as atmosphere, moisture content, water activity, relative humidity and temperature. The presence of other microorganisms tends to restrict mold growth, especially if conditions are favorable for growth of bacteria or yeasts. Certain chemicals in the substrate may also inhibit mold growth. These may be naturally occurring or added for the purpose of preservation. Only a relatively few of the approximately 100,000 different species of fungi are involved in the deterioration of food and agricultural commodities and production of mycotoxins. Deteriorative and toxic mold species are found primarily in the genera Aspergillus, Penicillium, Fusarium, Alternaria, Trichothecium, Trichoderma, Rhizopus, Mucor and Cladosporium. While many molds can be observed as surface growth on foods, they also often occur as internal contaminants of nuts, seeds and grains. Mold deterioration of foods and agricultural commodities is a serious problem world-wide. However, molds also pose hazards to human and animal health in the form of mycotoxins, as infectious agents and as respiratory irritants and allergens. Thus, molds are involved in a number of human and animal diseases with serious implication for health.

  • PDF

A Study on the Contextuality of the Science Education System (과학교육체제의 맥락성에 관한 연구)

  • Youn, Sun-Jin;Woo, Jong-Ok;Kim, Beom-Ki
    • Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
    • /
    • v.17 no.3
    • /
    • pp.229-237
    • /
    • 1997
  • Due mainly to the complexity of educational system, it is difficult to comprehend the phenomena and nature of the science education. Educators have developed various kinds of means and methods useful for easy understanding of the phenomena and nature. This study added another method supporting that the phenomena and nature of the science education should be understood in the context of educational system. System approach into thought is holistic and contextual in nature. It focuses on both the whole and its relevant parts, and is concerned with environmental context. By its definition, a system interact not only with another system but also with its environments. The purpose of this study was to answer such questions as "What is the science education?", or "What is the meaning of the science education?", "Why do we teach science?", "Why are we ought to teach science?", and "How do we know that those facts and methods are valid?" The results for the study are as follows: 1. Science education is the human behavior with the purpose to attain something through science and education. It is socio-cultural process, social and organizational activity into which the public deeply involved. The process and activity are usually undergirded upon the value of science education. 2. The science education system is analyzed in the light of the legislative institution. The system model that characterize of the system and the interrelationship among the systems is suggested in terms of the conceptions of boundary, components, variables, parameters and linkage, etc. Then, the science education system is divided into the plan-system, do-system and see-system by the use of the criterion of plan-do-see that is the general process of human activity. The study also identified that the system of science education is consisted of the aspects of science education administration, school science education, and science education evaluation. 3. As the frame of thought on the contextuality in the science education system, the contexts of meaning, organization, legislation and policy were presented, along with the main cognitive interest, the system, the orientation, and the premise of each context which were used to explain the reasons. The results of this study suggested a new approach into the comprehension of the educational phenomena in teaching science and the possibility of understanding science education as a whole.

  • PDF

Development of an Verification System for Enhancing BIM Design Base on Usability (활용성을 고려한 BIM 설계 오류 검증시스템 개발)

  • Yang, Dong-Suk
    • Land and Housing Review
    • /
    • v.8 no.1
    • /
    • pp.23-29
    • /
    • 2017
  • The BIM design is expected to expand to the domestic and overseas construction industries, depending on the effect of construction productivity and quality improvement. However, with the obligation of Public Procurement Service to design the BIM design, it includes a design error and the problem of utilization of 3D design by choosing a simple 2D to 3D remodelling method that can not be modelled in 3D modeling or use of the construction and maintenance phases. The results reviewed by BIM design results were largely underutilized and were not even performed with the verification of the error. In order to resolve this, one must develop the check system that secures the quality of BIM design and ensure that the reliability of BIM results are available. In this study, it is designed to develop a program that can automatically verify the design of the BIM design results such as violation of the rules of the BIM design, design flaws, and improve the usability of the BIM design. In particular, this programs were developed not only to identify programmes that were not commercially available, but also to validate drawings in low-light computer environments. The developed program(LH-BIM) store the information of attribute extracted from the Revit file(ArchiCAD, IFC file included) in the integrated DB. This provides the ability to freely lookup the features and properties of drawings delivered exclusively by the LH-BIM Program without using the Revit tools. By doing so, it was possible to resolve the difficulties of using traditional commercial programs and to ensure that they operate only with traditional PC performance. Further, the results of the various BIM software can be readily validated, which can be solved the conversion process error of IFC in the case of SMC. Additionally, the developed program has the ability to automatically check the error and design criteria of the drawings, as well as the ability to calculate the area estimation. These functions allow businesses to apply simple and easy tasks to operate tasks of BIM modelling. The developed system(LH-BIM) carried out a verification test by reviewing the review of the BIM Design model of the Korea Land & Housing Corporation. It is hoped that the verification system will not only be able to achieve the Quality of BIM design, but also contribute to the expansion of BIM and future construction BIM.

Characterization of Behavior of Colloidal Zero-Valent Iron and Magnetite in Aqueous Environment (나노크기의 교질상 영가철 및 자철석에 대한 수용상의 거동특성)

  • Lee, Woo Chun;Kim, Soon-Oh;Kim, Young-Ho
    • Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
    • /
    • v.28 no.2
    • /
    • pp.95-108
    • /
    • 2015
  • Nano-sized iron colloids are formed as acid mine drainage is exposed to surface environments and is introduced into surrounding water bodies. These iron nanomaterials invoke aesthetic contamination as well as adverse effects on aqueous ecosystems. In order to control them, the characteristics of their behaviour should be understood first, but the cumulative research outputs up to now are much less than the expected. Using zero-valent iron (ZVI) and magnetite, this study aims to investigate the behaviour of iron nanomaterials according to the change in the composition and pH of background electrolyte and the concentration of natural organic matter (NOM). The size and surface zeta potential of iron nanomaterials were measured using dynamic light scattering. Characteristic behaviour, such as aggregation and dispersion was compared each other based on the DLVO (Derjaguin, Landau, Verwey, and Overbeek) theory. Whereas iron nanomaterials showed a strong tendency of aggregation at the pH near point of zero charge (PZC) due to electrostatic attraction between particles, their dispersions became dominant at the pH which was higher or lower than PZC. In addition, the behaviour of iron nanomaterials was likely to be more significantly influenced by cations than anions in the electrolyte solutions. Particularly, it was observed that divalent cation influenced more effectively than monovalent cation in electrostatic attraction and repulsion between particles. It was also confirmed that the NOM enhanced the dispersion nanomaterials with increasing the negative charge of nanomaterials by coating on their surface. Under identical conditions, ZVI aggregated more easily than magnetite, and which would be attributed to the lower stability and larger reactivity of ZVI.

Microcosm Study for Bioremediation of Oil-Contaminated Pebble Environments (자갈로 구성된 미소환경에서 미생물제제에 의한 유류분해)

  • Sim, Doo-Suep;Sohn, Jae-Hak;Kim, Sang-Jin
    • Korean Journal of Microbiology
    • /
    • v.34 no.3
    • /
    • pp.101-107
    • /
    • 1998
  • Biological treatment of Arabian light crude oil-contaminated pebble was investigated in laboratory microcosms after supplementation with inorganic nutrients and oil-degrading microorganisms. Glass columns ($10cm{\times}20cm$) were used as microcosms and each microcosm was filled with pebbles of diameter less than 40 mm. After initial oil contamination of 2.4% (w/v), Inipol EAP-22 or slow release fertilizer (SRF) was added as inorganic nutrients and microorganisms were sprayed over pebbles. When $C_{17}$/pristane and $C_{18}$/phytane ratios were used as a marker for oil biodegradation, both ratios for microcosm supplemented with SRF and microorganisms were the lowest (below detectable range) after 92 days. Elimination of oil by abiotic processes, however, were minimal with decrease of $C_{17}$/pristane and $C_{18}$/phytane ratios from 3.55 and 2.41 to 3.06 and 1.50, respectively. The numbers of heterotrophic and oil-degrading microorganisms, and biological activity (dehydrogenase activity) corresponded to the course of biodegradation activities in all microcosms. During the whole experimental period, there was no significant nutrient deficiency only in the microcosm with SRF and microorganisms. It seemed that a continuous supply of inorganic nutrients using SRF was the most important factor for the successful performance of biological treatment in oil-contaminated pebbles.

  • PDF

Use of Beam Transmissometer as an Indirect Measure of Suspended Sediment Concentration in the Estuarine Environment: Application and Problems (강하구에서의 부유물질농도 결정을 위한 광전도측정기의 이용 및 문제점)

  • KIM Seok-Yun
    • Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
    • /
    • v.27 no.6
    • /
    • pp.771-781
    • /
    • 1994
  • Monthly measurements made at 15 stations along the axis of the upper Neuse River estuary show a highly variable degree of correlation between concentration of suspended particulate material (SPM) and attenuation coefficient (c) of light as measured by transmissometer. Coefficients of determination along transect lines ranged from $0.12{\sim}0.93$ and calibration slopes ranged from $0.50{\sim}5.63$. When examined on a station-by-station basis, coefficients of determination ranged from $0.21{\sim}0.96$ and calibration slopes ranged from $1.04{\sim}4.94$. Surface calibrations made at individual stations over the full 13-month period were the most consistent of all observations and were considerably better than calibrations made using all of the stations on a given day. Organic content, which can dominate the suspended sediment load during some months, does not appear to explain the variations in reliability of the calibrations. However, an abundance of large aggregates with time-varying size and shape distributions may be partly responsible for variations in optical properties of the sediments, and thus may confound the relationship between SPM and c in the Neuse River estuary Time-varying calibrations to account for non-negligible changes in optical properties may not suffice in complex estuarine environments where the in situ particle dynamics are poorly understood. However, the best use of Beam Transmissometer will continue to be for applications such as detecting water-column events or for use in situations where wide error bars in establishing SPM concentrations are acceptable.

  • PDF

Characteristics of Meteorological and Marine Environments for the Red Tide Occurrence of Mid-South Sea in Korea (한국 남해중부해역의 적조발생에 관한 기상 및 해양환경 특성)

  • 윤홍주;김승철;박일흠
    • Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
    • /
    • v.7 no.4
    • /
    • pp.845-852
    • /
    • 2003
  • This study deals with the relationship between the red tide occurrence and the meteorological and marine factors, the prediction of areas where the red tide is likely to occur based on the information, and the satellite monitoring for the red tide in mid-South Sea of Korea. From 1990 to 2001, the red tide was observed every year and the number of occurrences increased as well. The red tide mostly occurred in July, August, and September. The most important meteorological factor governing the mechanisms of the increase in the number of red tide occurrences is found to be a heavy precipitation. It was found that the favorable marine environmental conditions for the red tide formation are some of marine factors such as the warm water temperature, the low salinity, the high suspended solid, the low phosphorus, and the low nitrogen. The necessary conditions for the red tide occurrence are found to be the heavy precipitation (23.4-54.5 mm) for 2∼4 days, the warm temperature $(24.6∼25.9^{\circ}C)$, proper sunshine (2∼10.3 h), and light winds (2∼4.6 m/s & SW) for the day in red tide occurrence. It was possible to monitor the spatial distributions and concentration of the red tide using the satellite images. It was found that the likely areas for red tide occurrence in August 2000 were Yosu - Dolsan coast, Gamak bay, Namhae coast, Marado coast, Goheung coast, and Deukryang bay.