• Advances in aircraft and spacecraft science
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• v.6 no.6
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• pp.529-550
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• 2019

The effect of multiple process parameters on a set of continuous response variables is, especially in experimental designs, difficult and intricate to determine. Due to the complexity in aeroacoustic and vibroacoustic studies, the often-performed simple one-factor-at-a-time method turns out to be the least effective approach. In contrast, the statistical Design of Experiments is a technique used with the objective to maximize the obtained information while keeping the experimental effort at a minimum. The presented work aims at giving insights on Design of Experiments applied to aeroacoustic and vibroacoustic problems while comparing different experimental designs and approximation models. For this purpose, an experimental rig of a ducted low-pressure fan is developed that allows gathering data of both, aerodynamic and aeroacoustic nature while analysing three independent process parameters. The experimental designs used to sample the design space are a Central Composite design and a Box-Behnken design, both used to model a response surface regression, and Latin Hypercube sampling to model an Artificial Neural network. The results indicate that Latin Hypercube sampling extracts information that is more diverse and, in combination with an Artificial Neural network, outperforms the quadratic response surface regressions. It is shown that the Latin Hypercube sampling, initially developed for computer-aided experiments, can also be used as an experimental design. To further increase the benefit of the presented approach, spectral information of every experimental test point is extracted and Artificial Neural networks are chosen for modelling the spectral information since they show to be the most universal approximators.

• CELLMED
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.33.1-33.3
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• 2012

Menorrhagia (kasrate tams) is the most common gynecologic complaint in contemporary gynecology, affecting 10 to 15% of the adult female population. It can occur at any age. In the Unani system of medicine, since antiquity, dry cupping therapy (hijamat bila shurt) has been used to treat menorrhagia. An effort was made to evaluate the usefulness of dry cupping on excessive menstrual blood loss in menorrhagia with a well validated menstrual pictogram. This study was conducted on 15 patients at the National Institute of Unani Medicine, Hospital Bangalore, from January 2010 and July 2010. Unmarried or married patients aged 17 - 47 year with a history of excessive or prolonged bleeding per vaginum were included. Two large cups (with 5.7 cm internal diameter) were applied below each breast for 15 min, only once during the menstrual period when the patient reported to the outpatient department. If the menstrual flow was not reduced, the next day again dry cupping was repeated. The outcome was to assess the efficacy of dry cupping on the reduction in the amount of menstrual blood loss. The data was analyzed by the Wilcoxon matched test. The mean scores of menstrual blood loss before and after the treatment was 400.26 (277.95) and 48.4 (32.082) ml respectively, p = 0.002, considered statistically significant. A dry cupping therapy is a useful treatment modality in decreasing the amount of menstrual blood flow in menorrhagia. Further randomized controlled clinical trials and validation are needed in a large population.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.333-338
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• 2015

Background: Oral health professionals are responsible in Iran for providing a brief tobacco cessation program to smoker patients. The aim of this study was to assess Iranian dental student and dentist practice, knowledge and attitudes toward smoking cessation programs. Materials and Methods: A valid and reliable self-administered questionnaire was designed and distributed to 150 dentists working in Isfahan-Iran and 60 dental students. Some questions were developed based on the expected 5A tobacco cessation protocol. Statements on attitudes focused on professional responsibility towards smoking cessation and its effectiveness. Chi-square, ANOVA, and t test were used for statistical analysis. Results: The cessation program in dental settings covers a small group of patients (18%). Some 69.1% (n=96) of dentists reported asking their patients about tobacco use, 64% (n=83) advising their patients to quit, 33.8% (n=47) assessing their patients willingness to quit and 20% (n=28) reported helping their patients in changing their behavior. A far lower percentage reported active involvement in arranging assistance for smokers to quit (4.3%, n=5). Some 22% of students and 26% of dentists disagreed that the tobacco cessation programs should be as part of dentists' professional responsibility and 70% of them were willing to follow the protocol of tobacco cessation for patients. Conclusions: Iranian dentist performance regarding tobacco cessation is weak. Dentists and students indicated their lack of knowledge as the major reason for non-adherence to the protocol. Therefore, planning to encourage dentist to follow the protocol needs continuous educational programs.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.625-636
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• 2016

The purposes of this study were to investigate the effects of social appearance anxiety, negative body image, appearance importance on appearance management behavior and cosmetic surgery intention. For data collection, a questionnaire was administrated to 428 female college students in Gwangju City, Korea. The results were summarized as follows. To analysis the data, the SPSS 20.0 was used, and frequence analysis, descriptive statistical analysis, reliability analysis, regression analysis, F-test were conducted. The results were summarized as follows. First, social appearance anxiety turned out to have significant positive effect on appearance management behavior and cosmetic surgery intention. Second, negative body image had positive effect on appearance management behavior and cosmetic surgery intention. Third, appearance importance turned out to have significant effect on appearance management behavior and cosmetic surgery intention. The results of this study above suggest that it would be necessary to seek for measures to reduce individual's appearance anxiety, negative body image, and appearance importance. Especially, People should get the realization of the beautiful on the inside that includes personality is more important than having external beauty. And, it is considered that the requirements of the social effort and education through a school and a media as well as a family for reducing the individual's appearance anxiety, negative body image, and the serious consideration of the appearance as rejecting the discrimination based on appearance.

• The Korean Journal of Community Living Science
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.411-425
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to examine the middle aged social preparation for later life and to explore the effect of social activities and social relationships on social preparation for later life. This research is also focused on gender differences in social activities, social relationships and social preparation for later life. The survey data was gathered from 424 middle aged citizens who live in the Gwangju & Jeonnam area, using a structured questionnaire. The statistical methods used for data analysis were descriptive statistics, cross tables, t-test, correlations, and hierarchical regression with SPSS win 18.0 program. The major findings of this study are as follows: Most of the respondents perceive an importance of social activities and social relationships. Middle aged women enjoy leisure activities such as learning and religious activity more than men. Middle aged men engage in hobby activities more than women. And most of respondents perceive they are making an effort to keep a relationship with spouses, family & friends. The results show that there are no differences in social preparation for later life between gender groups, but the variables which have an effect in social preparation for later life are different between gender groups. Social activities and Social relationships play an important role in social preparation for later life of Middle aged men and women. At the same time, Social activities and Social relationships have more positive effect on the social preparation of women. Implications of the results are discussed.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.745-757
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• 2018

The inclusion of a ductile steel bracing as means of repairing an earthquake-damaged bridge bent is evaluated and experimentally assessed for the purposes of restoring the damaged bent's strength and stiffness and further improving the energy dissipation capacity. The study is focused on substandard reinforced concrete multi-column bridge bents constructed in the 1950 to mid-1970 in the United States. These types of bents have numerous deficiencies making them susceptible to seismic damage. Large-scale experiments were used on a two-column reinforced concrete bent to impose considerable damage of the bent through increasing amplitude cyclic deformations. The damaged bent was then repaired by installing a ductile fuse steel brace in the form of a buckling-restrained brace in a diagonal configuration between the columns and using post-tensioned rods to strengthen the cap beam. The brace was secured to the bent using steel gusset plate brackets and post-installed adhesive anchors. The repaired bent was then subjected to increasing amplitude cyclic deformations to reassess the bent performance. A subassemblage test of a nominally identical steel brace was also conducted in an effort to quantify and isolate the ductile fuse behavior. The experimental data from these large-scale experiments were analyzed in terms of the hysteretic response, observed damage, internal member loads, as well as the overall stiffness and energy dissipation characteristics. The results of this study demonstrated the effectiveness of utilizing ductile steel bracing for restoring the bent and preventing further damage to the columns and cap beams while also improving the stiffness and energy dissipation characteristics.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.189-192
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• 2001

This study was initiated in an effort to determine the normal mean and variations of the somatic cell count (SCC) in milk of buffaloes as influenced by the milking time, stage of lactation, parity and season. The buffaloes were hand milked at 13 and 11 h. interval during evening and morning respectively. On the day of milk sampling the udders were tested for mastitis by California Mastitis Test (CMT). Only those buffaloes, which were found negative in the CMT, were included in the sampling plan. The mean values for morning and evening were 1.09 (range 0.39-1.76) and $0.97(range\;0.57-2.46){\times}10^5cells/ml$, respectively which did not differ significantly. When data of the morning and evening values was compared on the basis of total cell secretion in milk, even then there was no statistical difference between the morning and the evening values, thereby suggesting that no diurnal variation existed in SCC of milk. Paritywise differences were not significant between the 1st to 5th lactation and above. Similarly stage of lactation effect, when tested at 30 day intervals, did not differ significantly. Significant (p<0.05) correlation coefficients (r) between SCC and milk yield during different stages of lactation and parity suggested that SCC per ml of milk was higher during the later stages of lactation. SCC was higher in primiparous than in multiparous buffaloes. On an average the SCC recorded was $1.0{\times}10^5cells/ml$ of milk irrespective of time of milking, parity and stages of lactation. The SCC was low during cold and hot-dry season but were high during the hot-humid season (p<0.05), the respective values being 0.76, 1.08 and $1.35{\times}10^5cells/ml$. These values were lower than the SCC already reported in cows suggesting less stressful condition of the udder of buffaloes in this study.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.9 no.6
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• pp.826-831
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• 1999

${\beta}-Glucan$, one of the major cell wall components of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, is known to enhance the immune function, especially by activating macrophages. Accordingly, in an effort to develop a safe and efficient immune stimulatory agent, we prepared crude ${\beta}-glucan$ (glucan-p1) and partially purified ${\beta}-glucan$ that was free of mannoproteins (glucan-p2), and evaluated their effect on both the macrophage function and resistance to E. coli-induced peritonitis. To investigate the function of the macrophages, phagocytosis, $TNF-{\alpha}$ secretion, oxygen burst, and the expression of cytokine genes such as $IFN-{\gamma}$ and IL-12 were analyzed. Glucan-p2 markedly stimulated the macrophages with all these parameters. Glucan-p1, however, did not stimulate phagocytosis, yet it induced $TNF-{\alpha}$ secretion, oxygen burst, and the expression of $IFN-{\gamma}$ and IL-12, although less efficiently than glucan-p2. Finally, to test the in vivo protective effect of {\beta}-glucan against infection, the survival of mice from E. coli-induced peritonitis was investigated. After 24 h of the peritoneal challenge of E. coli, all of the mice treated with glucan-p2 survived whereas none survived in the control group. Glucan-p1 showed only a marginal effect in protecting the mice. These results suggest that mannoprotein-free gluean-p2, but not gluean-p1, can serve as an effective immune-stimulating agent.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.37-44
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• 2000

In this paper, we described the real-time implementation effort of MPEG-4 audio HVXC (Harmonic Vector eXcitation Coding) algorithm for very low bitrates, which has target applications from mobile communications to Internet telephony, on current high performance floating point TMS320C6701 DSP. We adopted a hardware structure for real-time operation. In order for software optimization, we used C- and assembly-language level optimizations for time-critical functional codes. Utilizing the internal program memory of the DSP as the program cache, the internal data memory overlap technique and DMA functionality, we could get a goal of realtime operation of HVXC codec both at 2 kbit/s and at 4 kbit/s. For an encoder at 2 kbit/s, the optimization ratio to original code is about 96 %. Finally, we got the subjective quality of MOS 2.45 at 2 kbit/s from an informal quality test.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing Administration
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.168-179
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• 2011

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify level of recognition of the importance, satisfaction and contribution of APNs' role by physicians, nurses, and advanced practice nurses. Method: Perceived importance and satisfaction were measured with a 23-item questionnaire on APN role with 5 subcategories. APNs' contribution was investigated using a 13-item outcome questionnaire developed by the researchers. Between August 15 and October 31, 2009, the researchers collected data from 68 physicians, 265 nurses, and 23 APNs all working in a single tertiary hospital. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, Kruskal-Wallis Test with Bonferroni's Correction and scatter plot. Result: The importance (3.24~3.39, 4 point scale), satisfaction (3.02~3.13, 4 point scale), and contribution of APNs' role (3.39~4.12, 5 point scale) were well recognized by the health care professionals. All the three health care professional groups rated APNs' contribution high in medical service management, continuity of care, patient accessibility, improvement in patient satisfaction, and patient and family education. 'Importance-Satisfaction Analysis' showed that patient data management by APNs needed greater effort. Conclusions: The findings show that the importance, satisfaction, contribution of APNs' role are recognized, and indicate a need for further development of APNs' role through efforts to overcome the gaps identified through this research.