• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.228-235
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• 1992

Background: Although polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN) are important in protecting the airways and alveolar surfaces, there is evidence that they can also injure the lung while exercising their defensive role. However it has been unclear whether PMN-induced pneumocyte injury is mediated by their direct cytotoxic effect on target cells or by PMN-derived cytotoxic mediators. On the other hand histamine was known not only to act as an important chemical mediator participated in the pathogenesis of some atotic and allegic disorders, but also to have an inhibitory effect on normal PMN functions. Method: To study the mechanism by which PMN induce pneumocyte injury, we cocultured PMN from four healthy nonsmokers or their PMN-derived supernatants (PMN-SPN) with monolayers of $^{51}Cr$-labeled human A549 pneumocytes and compared PMN-and PMN-SPN-mediated pneumocyte injuries measured by $^{51}Cr$ release assay. We also compared the effects of histamine on each pneumocyte injury. Results: 1) PMN-SPN showed more injurious effect on A549 pneumocytes than that of PMN itself regardless histamine pretreatment of PMN. 2) Pneumocyte injury by PMN with histamine pretreatment was increased or decreased compared with that by PMN without histamine pretreatment, according to histamine concentrations, and PMN stimulating agents and their concentrations. 3) Pneumocyte injury by PMN-SPN with histamine pretreatment tended to be decreased compared with that by PMN-SPN without histamine pretreatment. Conclusion: Our results suggest that PMN-SPN may play more important role in mediating pneumocyte injury than PMN itself and that histamine may partially play a protective role on PMN-induced pneumocyte injury. Alternatively we conclude that the effects of histamine on PMN-induced pneumocyte injury may be affected by microenvironment in vivo.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.31-31
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• 2010

The growth of the high-quality GaN epilayers is of significant technological importance because of their commercializedoptoelectronic applications as high-brightness light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and laser diodes (LDs) in the visible and ultraviolet spectral range. The GaN-based heterostructural epilayers have the polar c-axis of the hexagonal structure perpendicular to the interfaces of the active layers. The Ga and N atoms in the c-GaN are alternatively stacked along the polar [0001] crystallographic direction, which leads to spontaneous polarization. In addition, in the InGaN/GaN MQWs, the stress applied along the same axis contributes topiezoelectric polarization, and thus the total polarization is determined as the sum of spontaneous and piezoelectric polarizations. The total polarization in the c-GaN heterolayers, which can generate internal fields and spatial separation of the electron and hole wave functions and consequently a decrease of efficiency and peak shift. One of the possible solutions to eliminate these undesirable effects is to grow GaN-based epilayers in nonpolar orientations. The polarization effects in the GaN are eliminated by growing the films along the nonpolar [$11\bar{2}0$] ($\alpha$-GaN) or [$1\bar{1}00$] (m-GaN) orientation. Although the use of the nonpolar epilayers in wurtzite structure clearly removes the polarization matters, however, it induces another problem related to the formation of a high density of planar defects. The large lattice mismatch between sapphiresubstrates and GaN layers leads to a high density of defects (dislocations and stacking faults). The dominant defects observed in the GaN epilayers with wurtzite structure are one-dimensional (1D) dislocations and two-dimensional (2D) stacking faults. In particular, the 1D threading dislocations in the c-GaN are generated from the film/substrate interface due to their large lattice and thermal coefficient mismatch. However, because the c-GaN epilayers were grown along the normal direction to the basal slip planes, the generation of basal stacking faults (BSFs) is localized on the c-plane and the generated BSFs did not propagate into the surface during the growth. Thus, the primary defects in the c-GaN epilayers are 1D threading dislocations. Occasionally, the particular planar defects such as prismatic stacking faults (PSFs) and inversion domain boundaries are observed. However, since the basal slip planes in the $\alpha$-GaN are parallel to the growth direction unlike c-GaN, the BSFs with lower formation energy can be easily formed along the growth direction, where the BSFs propagate straightly into the surface. Consequently, the lattice mismatch between film and substrate in $\alpha$-GaN epilayers is mainly relaxed through the formation of BSFs. These 2D planar defects are placed along only one direction in the cross-sectional view. Thus, the nonpolar $\alpha$-GaN films have different atomic arrangements along the two orthogonal directions ($[0001]_{GaN}$ and $[\bar{1}100]_{GaN}$ axes) on the $\alpha$-plane, which are expected to induce anisotropic biaxial strain. In this study, the anisotropic strain relaxation behaviors in the nonpolar $\alpha$-GaN epilayers grown on ($1\bar{1}02$) r-plane sapphire substrates by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVO) were investigated, and the formation mechanism of the abnormal zigzag shape PSFs was discussed using high-resolution transmission electron microscope (HRTEM).

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.571-581
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• 2007

The mechanism of water pollution in Lake Shihwa, one of highly eutrophicated artificial lakes in Korea, has been studied using a numerical 3D physical-biochemical coupled model. In this study, the model was applied to estimate the contribution of land-based pollutant load to water quality of heavily polluted Lake Shihwa. The chemical oxygen demand(COD) was adopted as an index of the lake water quality, and the spatial distribution of an average COD concentration during the summer from 1999 to 2000 was simulated by the model. The simulated COD showed a good agreement with the observed data. According to reproducibility of COD, the high-est levels between 8 and 9 mg/L were shown at the inner site of the lake with inflow of many rivers and ditches, while the lowest was found to be about 5 mg/L at the southwestern site near to dike gate. In the pre-diction of water quality of Lake Shihwa, COD showed still higher levels than 3 mg/L in case of reduction of 95% for land-based pollutant load. This suggests that the curtailment of land-based pollutant load is not only sufficient but the improvement of sediment quality or the increase of seawater exchange should be considered together to improve a water quality in Lake Shihwa.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.90-108
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• 2015

The WRF-Chem model was applied to simulate the Asian dust event affecting the Korean Peninsula from 11 to 13 November 2010. GOCART dust emission schemes, RADM2 chemical mechanism, and MADE/SORGAM aerosol scheme were adopted within the WRF-Chem model to predict dust aerosol concentrations. The results in the model simulations were identified by comparing with the weather maps, satellite images, monitoring data of $PM_{10}$ concentration, and LIDAR images. The model results showed a good agreement with the long-range transport from the dust source area such as Northeastern China and Mongolia to the Korean Peninsula. Comparison of the time series of $PM_{10}$ concentration measured at Backnungdo showed that the correlation coefficient was 0.736, and the root mean square error was $192.73{\mu}g/m^3$. The spatial distribution of $PM_{10}$ concentration using the WRF-Chem model was similar to that of the $PM_{2.5}$ which were about a half of $PM_{10}$. Also, they were much alike in those of the UM-ADAM model simulated by the Korean Meteorological Administration. Meanwhile, the spatial distributions of $PM_{10}$ concentrations during the Asian dust events had relevance to those of both the wind speed of u component ($ms^{-1}$) and the PBL height (m). We performed a regressive analysis between $PM_{10}$ concentrations and two meteorological variables (u component and PBL) in the strong dust event in autumn (CASE 1, on 11 to 23 March 2010) and the weak dust event in spring (CASE 2, on 19 to 20 March 2011), respectively.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.37 no.4 s.109
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• pp.436-447
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• 2004

Wetland plants have evolved specialized adaptations to survive in the low-oxygen conditions associated with prolonged flooding. The development of internal gas space by means of aerenchyma is crucial for wetland plants to transport $O_2$ from the atmosphere into the roots and rhizome. The formation of tissue with high porosity depends on the species and environmental condition, which can control the depth of root penetration and the duration of root tolerance in the flooded sediments. The oxygen in the internal gas space of plants can be delivered from the atmosphere to the root and rhizome by both passive molecular diffusion and convective throughflow. The release of $O_2$ from the roots supplies oxygen demand for root respiration, microbial respiration, and chemical oxidation processes and stimulates aerobic decomposition of organic matter. Another essential mechanism of wetland plants is downward water movement across the root zone induced by water uptake. Natural and constructed wetlands sediments have low hydraulic conductivity due to the relatively fine particle sizes in the litter layer and, therefore, negligible water movement. Under such condition, the water uptake by wetland plants creates a water potential difference in the rhizosphere which acts as a driving force to draw water and dissolved solutes into the sediments. A large number of anatomical, morphological and physiological studies have been conducted to investigate the specialized adaptations of wetland plants that enable them to tolerate water saturated environment and to support their biochemical activities. Despite this, there is little knowledge regarding how the combined effects of wetland plants influence the biogeochemistry of wetland sediments. A further investigation of how the Presence of plants and their growth cycle affects the biogeochemistry of sediments will be of particular importance to understand the role of wetland in the ecological environment.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.41-49
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• 1979

A literature review is made on the physical and chemical characteristics of clay minerals in acidic solutions from the mineralogical and hydrometallurgical viewpoints. Some of the important characteristics of clays are their ability to cation exchange, swelling, and incongruent dissolution in acidic solutions. Various clay minerals can take up metallic ions from solution via cation exchange mechanism. Generally, cation exchange capacity increases in the following order : kaolinite, halloysite, illite, vermiculite, and montmorillonite. In acidic solutions, the cation uptake such as copper by clay minerals is strongly inhibited by hydrogen and aluminum ions and thus is not economically significant factor for recovery of metals such as uranium and copper. In acidic solutions, the cation uptake is substial. Swelling is minimal at lower pH, possibly due to lattice collapse. Swelling may be controllable with montmorillonite type clays by exchanging interlayer sodium with lithium and/or hydroxylated aluminum species. The effect of add on clay minerals are : 1. Division of aggregates into smaller plates with increase in surface area and porosity. 2. Clay-acid reactions occur in the following order: (i) $H^+$ replacement of interlayer cations, (ii) removal of octahedral cations, such as Al, Fe, and Mg, and (iii) removal of tetrahedral Al ions. Acid attack initiates, around the edges of the clay particles and continued inward, leaving hydrated silica gel residue around the edges. 3. Reaction rates of (ii) and (iii) are pseudo-1st order and proportional to acid concentration. Rate doubles for every temperature increment of $10^{\circ}C$. Implications in in-situ leaching of copper or uranium with acid are : 1. Over the life span of the operation for a year or more, clays attacked by acid will leave silica gel. If such gel covers the surface of valuable mineral surfaces being leached, recovery could be substantially delayed. 2. For a copper deposit containing 0.5% each of clay minerals and recoverable copper, the added cost due to clay-acid reaction is about 1.5c/lb of copper (or 0.93 lbs of $H_2SO_4/1b$ of copper). This acid consumption by clay may be a factor for economic evaluation of in-situ leaching of an oxide copper deposit.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.220-230
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• 1992

Soil temperature is one of the important environmental factors which control all the physical, chemical and biological processes in soil including germination and root growth of plants and other organisms living in the soil ecosystem. Soil water and nutrient availability and mobility are temperature dependent. Soil temperature change is depended primarily upon energy exchange in soil surface, meteorological variance and physical properties of the soils which are closely related to heat transfer mechanism. In this study physical properties including bulk density, soil texture and organic matter content were measured and thermal diffusivity on the soils was calculated. Soil samples from the 66 meteorological stations under the Korea Meteorology were collected and the physical parameters were measured. To obtain relationship between thermal diffusivity and soil water content a heat probe thermal diffusivity measurement apparatus was designed and used in this experiment. According to the survey on soil physicsal properties on the 66 meteorological stations, the 52% of the surface soil texture were sandy loam and laomy sand or sand, 38% were loam and silty loam, and 10% were clay loam and silty clay loam. The bulk density which was closely related with thermal properties showed average of $1.41g/cm^3$ for sandy soils, $1.33g/cm^3$ for loam and silty loam soils, and $1.21g/cm^3$ for clay loam and silty clay loam soils. The apparent thermal diffusivity of the upper layer from 0 to 30cm ranged from 1.16 to $8.40{\times}10^{-3}cm^3/sec$ with average of $3.53{\times}10^{-3}cm^3/sec$. The apparent thermal diffusivities of the Jeju soils of which organic matter contents were high and the bulk densities were low were near $2{\times}10^{-3}cm^3/sec$. The thermal diffusivity of snow measured in Chuncheon ranged from 0.822 to $2.237{\times}10^{-3}cm^3/sec$. The damping depth calculated from the thermal diffusivity ranged from 5.92 to 13.65cm for daily basis and 124 to 342cm for yearly basis. The significant regression equation to estimate thermal diffusivity with bulk density and soil water content was obtained by the heat probe in laboratory.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.249-254
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• 1992

This research was conducted to investigate the effects of fly ash applications on growth and yield parameters of corn (Zea mays L.), and soil chemical properties. Corn height at silking stage, and height and dry matter ratio at harvesting stage were enhanced by applications of fly ashes derived from bituminous coal and anthracite, respectively. Effects of fly ash treatment on growth parameters of corn were varied with kinds and levels of fly ash application and growth periods, but relatively small without revealing a major negative effect as compared to the control. Yield of corn was increased by applying fly ash of anthracite origin, but other yield components were not influenced negatively by fly ash treatment. Soil total carbon contents, cation exchange capacity, and phosphorus contents of soils sampled after harvest of corn were significantly increased by fly ash treatment, although there were slightly different effects according to kinds and levels of fly ash application. Exchangeable cations of soils were varied within an experimental error range. Phosphorus taken up by corn was enhanced by treating fly ash of the bituminous coal to the soil and there were a positive correlation between phosphorus uptake and soil Phosphorus level. Cation uptake by corn was changed a little, but no significant reduction was observed in cation uptake due to fly ash treatment. It seems to be difficult to figure out the mechanism of fly ash effects on growth and nutrient uptake by corn with one year field experiment, however treatment of fly ash enhanced some parameters of growth and yield, and nutrient uptake by corn without revealing any major negative effects. To determine the value of fly ash as a fertilizer source, continuous researches under various soil and crop conditions were considered to be necessary.

• Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.47-55
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• 2018

Talc, hydrous magnesium phyllosilicate, is one of the most popular industrial minerals due to their chemical stability and adsorptivity. While micro-sized talc has long been used as a filler and coating, nano-sized talc recently is attracting attention as additives for improving the stability of nanocomposites. In this study, we produced the nano-sized talc powder by mechanical method using high energy ball mill and investigated the changes in particle size and crystallinity with increasing milling time up to 720 minutes. X-ray diffraction results show that the peak width of talc gradually as the milling proceeded, and after 720 minutes of pulverization, the talc showed an amorphous-like X-ray diffraction pattern. Lase diffraction particle size analysis presents that particle size of talc which was ${\sim}12{\mu}m$ decreased to ${\sim}0.45{\mu}m$ as the milling progressed, but no significant reduction of particle size was observed even after grinding for 120 minutes or more. BET specific surface area, however, steadily increases up to the milling time of 720 minutes, indicating that the particle size and morphology change steadily as the milling progressed. Scanning electron microscope and transmission electron microscope images shows that layered particles of about 100 to 300 nm was aggregated as micro-sized particles after pulverization for 720 minutes. As the grinding time increases, the particle size and morphology of talc continuously change, but the nano-sized talc particles form micro sized agglomerates. These results suggest that there is a critical size along the a, b axes in which the size of plates is reduced even though the grinding proceeds, and the reduction of plate thickness along the c axis leads the increase in specific surface area with further grinding. This study could enhance the understanding of the mechanism of the formation of nano-sized talc by mechanical grinding.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.49 no.2
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• pp.77-88
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• 2016

Chrysotile is a 1:1 sheet silicate mineral belonging to serpentine group. It has been highlighted studies because of uses, shapes and structural characteristics of the fibrous chrysotile. However, it was designated as Class 1 carcinogen, so high attentions were being placed on detoxification studies of chrysotile. The objectives of this study were to investigate changes of mineralogical characteristics of chrysotile and to suggest detoxification mechanism of chrysotile by thermal decomposition. Samples for this study were obtained from LAB Chrysotile mine in Canada. The samples were heated in air in the range of 600 to $1,300^{\circ}C$. Changes of mineralogical characteristics such as crystal structure, shape, and chemical composition of the chrysotile fibers were examined by TG-DTA, XRD, FT-IR, TEM-EDS and SEM-EDS analyses. As a result of thermal decomposition, the fibrous chrysotile having hollow tube structure was dehydroxylated at $600-650^{\circ}C$ and transformed to disordered chrysotile by removal of OH at the octahedral sheet (MgOH) (Dehydroxylation 1). Upon increasing temperature, it was transformed to forsterite ($Mg_2SiO_4$) at $820^{\circ}C$ by rearrangement of Mg, Si and O (Dehydroxylation 2). In addition, crystal structure of forsterite had begun to transform at $800^{\circ}C$, and gradually grown 3-dimensionally to enstatite ($MgSiO_3$) by recrystallization after the heating above $1,100^{\circ}C$. And then finally transformed to spherical minerals. This study showed chrysotile structure was collapsed about $600-700^{\circ}C$ by dehydroxylation. And then the fibrous chrysotile was transformed to forsterite and enstatite, as non-hazardous minerals. Therefore, this study indicates heat treatment can be used to detoxification of chrysotile.