• Journal of Acupuncture Research
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.151-164
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• 2016

Objectives : The purpose of this study is to review clinical studies about the efficacy of fire needling for the treatment of acne vulgaris. Methods and Results : In this review, Oasis, NDSL, CNKI, PubMed, Cochrane, J STAGE and CINII were used as the main databases for searching for medical journals, using the keywords "acne and fire needling"," acne and fire needle"," acne and fire acupuncture", and" acne and red hot needle". The initial search range included only randomized controlled trials (RCTs), and papers not matching inclusion criteria were excluded. Initially a total of 108 studies were found, with ten being excluded during title and abstract screening. After scanning 98 papers, a total of 31 RCTs were selected and analyzed. In the 31 RCTs, patients with acne were randomized into groups for treatment and control. Specifically, the treatment group received fire needling, while the control group were concurrently given other treatments. The results of the completed studies have shown that the treatment group receiving fire needling demonstrated significant improvement compared to the control group. Conclusion : During our study, it was verified that the efficacy of fire needling for the treatment of acne vulgaris was both significant and meaningful. Therefore, fire needling can be a safe and effective alternative treatment for acne. However, to confirm this result, further investigation in a traditional clinic is required, accompanied by high quality studies including randomized, placebo-controlled double-blind trials.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Electromagnetic Engineering and Science
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• v.16 no.9 s.100
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• pp.949-956
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• 2005

In this paper, a new CPW-fed cross shape fractal antenna having a self-affinity is presented. This novel configuration, which has anisotropic scaling symmetry, makes smaller profile characteristic compared to the fractal antenna using a self-similarity. Increase of the iteration coefficient, which leads to decrease of the fundamental resonant frequency, shows a good impedance matching condition and multi-band characteristics due to new surface current paths. The radiation patterns are similar to those of monopole antennas. In the K3 stage of iteration, the proposed antenna shows a measured maximum gain 2.27 dBi at 940 MHz. A commercially available software based on the FDTD algorithm has been used to obtain the predicted results. In addition, an RT/Duroid 5880 substrate has been employed for the experimental results.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.83 no.1
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• pp.61-70
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• 2020

Background: Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are frequently detected in patients with advanced-stage malignant tumors and could act as a predictor of poor prognosis. However, there is a paucity of data on the relationship between CTC number and primary tumor volume in patients with lung cancer. Therefore, our study aimed to evaluate the relationship between CTC number and primary tumor volume in patients with lung adenocarcinoma. Methods: We collected blood samples from 21 patients with treatment-naive lung adenocarcinoma and 73 healthy individuals. To count CTCs, we used a CTC enrichment method based on fluid-assisted separation technology. We compared CTC numbers between lung adenocarcinoma patients and healthy individuals using propensity score matching, and performed linear regression analysis to analyze the relationship between CTC number and primary tumor volume in lung adenocarcinoma patients. Results: CTC positivity was significantly more common in lung adenocarcinoma patients than in healthy individuals (p<0.001). The median primary tumor volume in CTC-negative and CTC-positive patients was 10.0 ㎤ and 64.8 ㎤, respectively. Multiple linear regression analysis showed that the number of CTCs correlated with primary tumor volume in lung adenocarcinoma patients (β=0.903, p=0.002). Further subgroup analysis showed a correlation between CTC number and primary tumor volume in patients with distant (p=0.024) and extra-thoracic (p=0.033) metastasis (not in patients with distant metastasis). Conclusion: Our study showed that CTC numbers may be associated with primary tumor volume in lung adenocarcinomas patients, especially in those with distant metastasis.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.24 no.11
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• pp.1187-1192
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• 2014

Pepper, consumed as a typical spice food around world, is mainly cultivated in warm countries, including Korea, China, and Mexico. Phytophthora capsici is a pathogen on several economically important crops, including pepper. The oomycete attacks the roots, stems, leaves, and fruit of the host plants. To understand the molecular mechanisms underlying development of the disease, the genes expressed during pepper-P. capsici interaction were explored by analyzing expressed sequence tags (ESTs). A cDNA library was constructed from total RNA extracted from pepper leaves challenged with P. capsici for three days, resulting in an early stage of symptom development for comparable interaction. A comprehensive analysis of single-pass sequencing of 5,760 randomly selected cDNA clones extracted 5,148 high-quality entries for contig assembly, which generated 2,990 unigenes. A homology search of the unigenes with BLASTX resulted in 2,409 matches, of which 606 showed classified functional catalogs.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.26-36
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• 2004

Objective : To examine the association between hospital procedure volume and treatment outcomes following allogeneic bone marrow transplantation (allo-BMT). Methods : Out of 1,050 patients who received allo-BMTs between 1998 and 2000 in 21 Korean hospitals, 752 with first allo-BMT and complete data were included in this study. Study subjects were divided into the following three groups according to cumulative hospital experience of all-BMTs during the study period: low (<30 cases), medium (30-49) and high ($\geq$50 cases) volume. Patient outcome was defined as early survival at day 100 and one-year survival. Multiple logistic regression analyses were performed to examine the association between hospital experience and survival at day 100 and one year. Results : When the low volume group was defined as the reference group, the adjusted relative risks (RR) of survival at day 100 for the high volume group were 2.46(95% CI, 1.13-5.36) for all patients, 2.61(1.04-6.57) for those with leukemia, and 2.20(0.47-10.32) for those with aplastic anemia. For one-year survival, adjusted RR for the high volume group were 2.52(1.40-4.51) for all patients, 1.99 (1.01-3.93) for leukemia, and 6.50(1.57-26.80) for aplastic anemia. None of the RR for the medium volume group was statistically significant. Patient factors showing significant relationship with survival were donor-recipient relation, human leukocyte antigen matching status, time from diagnosis to transplant, and disease stage. Conclusions : The study results suggest that the cumulative experience of hospitals in providing allo-BMT is positively associated with patient survival.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.635-641
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• 1998

This paper presents development of a small size LNA operating at 824 ∼ 849 MHz used for a receiver of a CELLULAR CDMA Base station and a transponder. Using resistive decoupling circuits, a signal at low frequency is dissipated by a resistor. This design method increases the stability of the LNA and is suitable for input stage matching. The LNA consists of low noise GaAs FET ATF-10136 and internally matched VNA-25. The LNA is fabricated with both the RF circuit and the self-bias circuits in aluminum housing. As a result, the characteristics of the LNA implemented here shows above 35dB in gain and below 0.9dB in noise figure, 18.6dBm P1dB power, a typical two tone IM3, -31.17dB with single carrier backed off 10dB from P1dB.

• The KIPS Transactions:PartA
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• v.14A no.5
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• pp.301-308
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• 2007

This paper proposes high performance coprocessor architecture for real time dense disparity computation based on a phase-based binocular stereo matching technique called local weighted phase-correlation(LWPC). The algorithm combines the robustness of wavelet based phase difference methods and the basic control strategy of phase correlation methods, which consists of 4 stages. For parallel and efficient hardware implementation, the proposed architecture employs SIMD(Single Instruction Multiple Data Stream) architecture for each functional stage and all stages work on pipelined mode. Such that the newly devised pipelined linear array processor is optimized for the case of row-column image processing eliminating the need for transposed memory while preserving generality and high throughput. The proposed architecture is implemented with Xilinx HDL tool and the required hardware resources are calculated in terms of look up tables, flip flops, slices, and the amount of memory. The result shows the possibility that the proposed architecture can be integrated into one chip while maintaining the processing speed at video rate.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.482-490
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• 2018

Candida albicans infections are often problematic to treat owing to antifungal resistance, as such infections are mostly associated with biofilms. The ability of C. albicans to switch from a budding yeast to filamentous hyphae and to adhere to host cells or various surfaces supports biofilm formation. Previously, the ethanol extract from Paeonia lactiflora was reported to inhibit cell wall synthesis and cause depolarization and permeabilization of the cell membrane in C. albicans. In this study, the P. lactiflora extract was found to significantly reduce the initial stage of C. albicans biofilms from 12 clinical isolates by 38.4%. Thus, to assess the action mechanism, the effect of the P. lactiflora extract on the adhesion of C. albicans cells to polystyrene and germ tube formation was investigated using a microscopic analysis. The density of the adherent cells was diminished following incubation with the P. lactiflora extract in an acidic medium. Additionally, the P. lactiflora-treated C. albicans cells were mostly composed of less virulent pseudohyphae, and ruptured debris was found in the serum-containing medium. A quantitative real-time PCR analysis indicated that P. lactiflora downregulated the expression of C. albicans hypha-specific genes: ALS3 by 65% (p = 0.004), ECE1 by 34.9% (p = 0.001), HWP1 by 29.2% (p = 0.002), and SAP1 by 37.5% (p = 0.001), matching the microscopic analysis of the P. lactiflora action on biofilm formation. Therefore, the current findings demonstrate that the P. lactiflora ethanol extract is effective in inhibiting C. albicans biofilms in vitro, suggesting its therapeutic potential for the treatment of biofilm-associated infections.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.1-10
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• 2006

In this paper, a broadband RF module is designed and tested for 2.4GHz band applications. The RF module is composed of a low noise amplifier (LNA) with a three stage amplifier, a single ended gate mixer, matching circuits, a hairpin line band pass filter and a Chebyshev low pass filter to convert the radio frequency (RF) into the intermediate frequency (IF). The LNA has a high gain and stability, and the single ended gate mixer has a high conversion gain and wide dynamic range. In the analysis of the broadband RF module, the composite harmonic balance technique is used to analyze the operating characteristics of an RF module circuit. The RF module has a 55.2dB conversion gain with a 1.54dB low noise figure, $-120{\sim}-60dBm$ wide RF power dynamic range, -60dBm low harmonic spectrum and a good isolation factor among the RF, IF, and local oscillator (LO) ports.

• Journal of KIISE:Software and Applications
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• v.30 no.7_8
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• pp.773-779
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• 2003

Locating exact position of facial components is a key preprocessing for realizing highly accurate and reliable face recognition schemes. In this paper, we propose a simple but powerful method for detecting isolated facial components such as eyebrows, eyes, and a mouth, which are horizontally oriented and have relatively dark gray levels. The method is based on the shape-resolving locally optimum thresholding that may guarantee isolated detection of each component. We show that pure facial regions can be determined by grouping facial features satisfying simple geometric constraints on unique facial structure. In the test for over 1000 images in the AR -face database, pure facial regions were detected correctly for each face image without wearing glasses. Very few errors occurred in the face images wearing glasses with a thick frame because of the occluded eyebrow -pairs. The proposed scheme may be best suited for the later stage of classification using either the mappings or a template matching, because of its capability of handling rotational and translational variations.