• Journal of Life Science
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• v.31 no.9
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• pp.827-833
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• 2021

Dendropanax morbiferus leaves (DPL) has been used as a medicine since ancient times in various diseases such as inflammation, diabetes, and cancer. In particular, it has been found to have anticancer effects on several types of cancer cells, but the anticancer effect on breast cancer cells SK-BR-3 has not yet been revealed. Therefore, in this study, DPL caused proliferation inhibition in breast cancer cells SK-BR-3 and the anticancer effect by inducing apoptosis was confirmed, through an in vitro experiment. In order to examine the effect of DPL on cell viability, MTT assay was performed to confirm a significant decrease in the concentration of cell viability. DAPI staining was performed to examine the effect of DPL on cellular morphological changes and increase of apoptotic bodies. To supplement this, an increase in the apoptosis rate was also confirmed through flow cytometry after staining with annexin V/PI. Western blot was performed to confirm apoptosis-related proteins. DPL increased the expression of Cleaved-PARP, Bax whereas decreased the expression of Bcl-2. Changes in the expression levels of MAPK pathway proteins p-ERK1/2, p-JNK, and p-p38 were also confirmed, and a significant increase in p-p38 was observed. These results indicated that DPL induced apoptosis, through p-p38 MAPK signal pathway in SK-BR-3 breast cancer cells.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.49 no.5
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• pp.112-124
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• 2021

This study was conducted to examine and analyze local governments, park status, project characteristics, and the implementation in detail for private park special projects across the country as a means of responding to the sunsetting of urban parks. As a result of the analysis, first, the private park special project, was found to be mainly implemented in cities with a population of more than 100,000, so there was a limit to the application on military installations or in local small cities. Therefore, rather than applying the special system collectively, it was judged that institutional flexibility, considering the characteristics and size of local government, was needed. Second, the current special projects by the park creation donation collection method shows monotonous development centered on apartment houses, so it is necessary to diversify the development by introducing a park preservation method that purchases and donates park sites. Third, it was found that the area standard needs to be eased to less than 50,000m² to include parks with high utilization and good accessibility in urban areas of large cities, as the type and area of parks are limited. Fourth, most special projects are mountain parks, which are feared to damage the natural terrain and skyline, so separate ordinances should be established and applied, and development approaches should be made to allow nature and parks to coexist with the setting of detailed building guidelines for each type of facility. The guidelines should include, first, after the nationwide private park special projects are completed, standards for appropriate returns for similar projects should be established, institutional standards such as the recovery of excess profits should be established, and environmental reviews should be conducted. Second, it was found that local governments should institutionalize the composition of private consultations to promote the efficient management of projects through a cooperative system, and third, a roadmap for maintenance after the donation of special parks should be established.

• Knowledge Management Research
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.151-172
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• 2021

The government's implementation of customer-friendly financial policies, such as lowering commission fees for credit card merchants and lowering the maximum interest rate, put the specialized credit finance companies in a crisis of lowering profitability. In this unfavorable situation, the efficiency study of specialized credit finance companies is meaningful. Accordingly, this study measured the efficiency of 34 specialized credit finance companies through Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and meta-frontier analysis. For meta-frontier analysis, specialized credit finance companies were divided into two groups (card companies and non-card companies) by industry or three groups (AA0 and above, AA-, and A+ or below) by credit rating. The results of the analysis will provide general insight into the efficiency of specialized credit finance companies. The results of this study are as follows. First, the average meta-efficiency of card companies was analyzed higher than that of non-card companies. Second, 80% of non-card's decision-making units (DMUs) were inefficient by pure technology rather than by scale. Third, decision-making units (DMUs), which account for 62.5% of the credit card company group and 80% of the 'AA-' credit rating group, are in non-economic areas of scale. Fourth, there was no statistically significant difference in meta-efficiency values (TE and PTE) by industry (card companies, non-card companies) and credit rating (AA0 or higher, AA-, A+ or lower). The contribution of this study will provide strategic initiatives for establishing management strategies to improve inefficiency by measuring the efficiency level of companies under an unfriendly business environment for specialized credit finance companies.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.54 no.2
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• pp.161-176
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• 2021

In this study, one of the distributed hydrologic models, VELAS, was used to analyze the variation of hydrologic elements based on water balance analysis to evaluate the groundwater recharge in more detail than the annual time scale for the past and future. The study area is located in Yanggok-ri, Seobu-myeon, Hongseong-gun, Chungnam-do, which is very vulnerable to drought. To implement the VELAS model, spatial characteristic data such as digital elevation model (DEM), vegetation, and slope were established, and GIS data were constructed through spatial interpolation on the daily air temperature, precipitation, average wind speed, and relative humidity of the Korea Meteorological Stations. The results of the analysis showed that annual precipitation was 799.1-1750.8 mm, average 1210.7 mm, groundwater recharge of 28.8-492.9 mm, and average 196.9 mm over the past 18 years from 2001 to 2018 in the study area. Annual groundwater recharge rate compared to annual precipitation was from 3.6 to 28.2% with a very large variation and average 14.9%. By the climate change RCP 8.5 scenario, the annual precipitation from 2019 to 2100 was 572.8-1996.5 mm (average 1078.4 mm) and groundwater recharge of 26.7-432.5 mm (average precipitation 16.2%). The annual groundwater recharge rates in the future were projected from 2.8% to 45.1%, 18.2% on average. The components that make up the water balance were well correlated with precipitation, especially in the annual data rather than the daily data. However, the amount of evapotranspiration seems to be more affected by other climatic factors such as temperature. Groundwater recharge in more detailed time scale rather than annual scale is expected to provide basic data that can be used for groundwater development and management if precipitation are severely varied by time, such as droughts or floods.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.43-52
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• 2021

In this study, the optimal nitration process for selective lithium leaching from powder of a spent battery cell (LiNi_xCo_yMn_zO₂, LiCoO₂) was studied using Taguchi method. The nitration process is a method of selective lithium leaching that involves converting non-lithium nitric compounds into oxides via nitric acid leaching and roasting. The influence of pretreatment temperature, nitric acid concentration, amount of nitric acid, and roasting temperature were evaluated. The signal-to-noise ratio and analysis of variance of the results were determined using L₁₆(4⁴) orthogonal arrays. The findings indicated that the roasting temperature followed by the nitric acid concentration, pretreatment temperature, and amount of nitric acid used had the greatest impact on the lithium leaching ratio. Following detailed experiments, the optimal conditions were found to be 10 h of pretreatment at 700℃ with 2 ml/g of 10 M nitric acid leaching followed by 10 h of roasting at 275℃. Under these conditions, the overall recovery of lithium exceeded 80%. X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis of the leaching residue in deionized water after roasting of lithium nitrate and other nitrate compounds was performed. This was done to determine the cause of rapid decrease in lithium leaching rate above a roasting temperature of 400℃. The results confirmed that lithium manganese oxide was formed from lithium nitrate and manganese nitrate at these temperatures, and that it did not leach in deionized water. XRD analysis was also used to confirm the recovery of pure LiNO₃ from the solution that was leached during the nitration process. This was carried out by evaporating and concentrating the leached solution through solid-liquid separation.

• Journal of Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.64 no.4
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• pp.421-431
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• 2021

It has been suggested that some toothpastes have the potential to promote hair growth. However, there was no scientific verification on the hair growth effect of toothpaste and no scientific report on major active ingredients in toothpaste. In this work, toothpaste and its constituents were applied topically over the shaved skin of C57BL/6 mice and evaluated. Results indicated that toothpaste showed hair growth effect. Also, the effect of toothpaste constituents on the proliferation rate of keratinocyte cells was investigated. The mixture solution of 𝛼-tocopherol acetate, l-menthol, and stevioside, each of that was known to promote hair growth and other toothpaste constituents were applied topically on mouse skin. When the mixture solution was included, hair growth effect was observed in mice. Transcriptome analysis was performed using the dorsal epidermis of mice from the group treated with toothpaste, the mixture which are presumed to be active ingredients for hair growth, and from mice used for the control group. As a result of analyzing the genes whose expression was significantly changed in each treatment group, the gene patterns of the two groups were very similar. Also, when functional genomic analysis was performed, genes with functions related to hair growth regulation showed a high extent of the change in both groups. Hair growth-related genes whose expression was changed in both groups included keratin, keratin-related proteins, forkhead box, and sonic hedgehog. Therefore, the hair growth effect of toothpaste is thought to be due to the effect of a mixture of 𝛼-tocopherol acetate, l-menthol, and stevioside.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.37 no.6_1
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• pp.1757-1766
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• 2021

The green coverage ratio is the ratio of the land area to green coverage area, and it is used as a practical urban greening index. The green coverage ratio is calculated based on the land cover map, but low spatial resolution and inconsistent production cycle of land cover map make it difficult to calculate the correct green coverage area and analyze the precise green coverage. Therefore, this study proposes a new method to calculate green coverage area using aerial images and deep neural networks. Green coverage ratio can be quickly calculated using manned aerial images acquired by local governments, but precise analysis is difficult because components of image such as acquisition date, resolution, and sensors cannot be selected and modified. This limitation can be supplemented by using an unmanned aerial vehicle that can mount various sensors and acquire high-resolution images due to low-altitude flight. In this study, we proposed a method to calculate green coverage ratio from manned or unmanned aerial images, and experimentally verified the proposed method. Aerial images enable precise analysis by high resolution and relatively constant cycles, and deep learning can automatically detect green coverage area in aerial images. Local governments acquire manned aerial images for various purposes every year and we can utilize them to calculate green coverage ratio quickly. However, acquired manned aerial images may be difficult to accurately analyze because details such as acquisition date, resolution, and sensors cannot be selected. These limitations can be supplemented by using unmanned aerial vehicles that can mount various sensors and acquire high-resolution images due to low-altitude flight. Accordingly, the green coverage ratio was calculated from the two aerial images, and as a result, it could be calculated with high accuracy from all green types. However, the green coverage ratio calculated from manned aerial images had limitations in complex environments. The unmanned aerial images used to compensate for this were able to calculate a high accuracy of green coverage ratio even in complex environments, and more precise green area detection was possible through additional band images. In the future, it is expected that the rust rate can be calculated effectively by using the newly acquired unmanned aerial imagery supplementary to the existing manned aerial imagery.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.37 no.6_1
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• pp.1657-1667
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• 2021

Anthropogenic activities and natural processes have been causes of land subsidence which is sudden sinking or gradual settlement of the earth's solid surface. Mexico City, the capital of Mexico, is one of the most severe land subsidence areas which are resulted from excessive groundwater extraction. Because groundwater is the primary water resource occupies almost 70% of total water usage in the city. Traditional terrestrial observations like the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) or leveling survey have been preferred to measure land subsidence accurately. Although the GNSS observations have highly accurate information of the surfaces' displacement with a very high temporal resolution, it has often been limited due to its sparse spatial resolution and highly time-consuming and high cost. However, space-based synthetic aperture radar (SAR) interferometry has been widely used as a powerful tool to monitor surfaces' displacement with high spatial resolution and high accuracy from mm to cm-scale, regardless of day-or-night and weather conditions. In this paper, advanced interferometric approaches have been applied to get a time-series of land subsidence of Mexico City using four-year-long twenty ALOS PALSAR L-band observations acquired from Feb-11, 2007 to Feb-22, 2011. We utilized persistent scatterer interferometry (PSI) and small baseline subset (SBAS) techniques to suppress atmospheric artifacts and topography errors. The results show that the maximum subsidence rates of the PSI and SBAS method were -29.5 cm/year and -27.0 cm/year, respectively. In addition, we discuss the different subsidence rates where the study area is discriminated into three districts according to distinctive geotechnical characteristics. The significant subsidence rate occurred in the lacustrine sediments with higher compressibility than harder bedrock.

• Land and Housing Review
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.47-59
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• 2021

This study aims to review the trends of the population outflows in the metropolitan area of Busan and to investigate the factors that affect population out-migration to the Seoul metropolitan area. The following variables are considered for analysis: traditional population movement variables and quality of life variables, such as population, society, employment, housing, culture, safety, medical care, greenery, education, and childcare. The 'domestic population movement data', provided by the MDIS of the National Statistical Office, was used for this research. Out of the total of 57 million population movement data in the period 2012 - 2017, population outmigration from Busan to the Seoul metropolitan area was extracted. Independent variables were drawn from public data sources in accordance with the temporal and spatial settings of the study. The multiple linear regression model was specified based on the dataset, and the fit of the model was measured by the p-value, and the values of Adjusted R2, Durbin-Watson analysis, and F-statistics. The results of the analysis showed that the variables that have a significant effect on population movement from Busan to the Seoul metropolitan area were as follows: 'single-person households', 'the elderly population', 'the total birth rate', 'the number of companies', 'the number of employees', 'the housing sales price index', 'cultural facilities', and 'the number of students per teacher'. More positive (+) influences of the population out-movement were observed in areas with higher numbers of single-person households, lowers proportions of the elderly, lower numbers of businesses, higher numbers of employees, higher numbers of housing sales, lower numbers of cultural facilities, and lower numbers of students. The findings suggest that policies should enhance the environments such as quality jobs, culture, and welfare that can retain young people within Busan. Improvements in the quality of life and job creation are critical factors that can mitigate the outflows of the Busan residents to the Seoul metropolitan area.

• Journal of Korea Port Economic Association
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.73-89
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• 2021

The handysize bulk carriers are capable of transporting a variety of cargo that cannot be transported by mid-large size ship, and the spot chartering market is active, and it is a market that is independent of mid-large size market, and is more risky due to market conditions and charterage variability. In this study, Granger causality test, the Impulse Response Function(IRF) and Forecast Error Variance Decomposition(FEVD) were performed using monthly time series data. As a result of Granger causality test, coal price for coke making, Japan steel plate commodity price, hot rolled steel sheet price, fleet volume and bunker price have causality to Baltic Handysize Index(BHSI) and charterage. After confirming the appropriate lag and stability of the Vector Autoregressive model(VAR), IRF and FEVD were analyzed. As a result of IRF, the three variables of coal price for coke making, hot rolled steel sheet price and bunker price were found to have significant at both upper and lower limit of the confidence interval. Among them, the impulse of hot rolled steel sheet price was found to have the most significant effect. As a result of FEVD, the explanatory power that affects BHSI and charterage is the same in the order of hot rolled steel sheet price, coal price for coke making, bunker price, Japan steel plate price, and fleet volume. It was found that it gradually increased, affecting BHSI by 30% and charterage by 26%. In order to differentiate from previous studies and to find out the effect of short term lag, analysis was performed using monthly price data of major cargoes for Handysize bulk carriers, and meaningful results were derived that can predict monthly market conditions. This study can be helpful in predicting the short term market conditions for shipping companies that operate Handysize bulk carriers and concerned parties in the handysize chartering market.