• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
• /
• v.32 no.3
• /
• pp.251-256
• /
• 2011

Virtual colonoscopy is favored over conventional colonoscopy because its non-invasive procedure can avoid complications that may happen in a conventional approach and because it can cleanse colon electronically instead of uncomfortable conventional colon cleansing. Electronic Colon Cleansing(ECC) has to deal with not only removing tagged fecal material but also recovering Partial Volume Effect(PVE) due to tagging material. This paper proposes an ECC method restoring inherent natural PVE while previous approaches focused only on reducing PVE due to tagged fecal material. The proposed method reduces PVE using 3-dimensional adaptive density correction and then replaces tagged fecal material into air. Next, it generates natural PVE for the replaced air adjacent to soft tissue and finally makes smooth transition of gray values for soft tissue adjacent to the replaced air. The proposed method applied to eleven patient data, and showed promising results.

• Transactions of Materials Processing
• /
• v.3 no.3
• /
• pp.359-374
• /
• 1994

Process sequence design in sheet metal forming process by the finite element method is investigated. The forming of sheet metal into a washing machine container is used to demonstrate the design of an improved process sequence which has fewer operations. The design procedure makes extensive use of the finite element method which has simulation capabilities of elastic-plastic modeling. A one-stage process to make an initial blank to the final product is simulated to obtain information on metal flow requirements. Loading simulation for a conventional method is also performed to evaluate the design criteria which are uniform thickness distribution around the finished part and maximum punch load within limit of available press capacity. The newly designed sequence has two forming operations and can achieve net-shape manufacturing, while the conventional process sequence has three forming operations. This specific case conventional process sequence has three forming operations. This specific case can be considered for application of the method and for development of the sequence design methodology in general.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
• /
• v.22 no.2
• /
• pp.213-220
• /
• 1998

The conventional discrete-ordinates method (DOM) is modified and developed for the analysis of two-dimensional axisymmetric cylindrical enclosure with curved wall. The objective of the present work is to extend the capability of the conventional DOM into a general axisymmetric geometry like nozzle-shaped enclosure, by adopting the arbitrary control angle as was done in the finite-volume method (FVM), while keeping the same two-dimensional solution procedure as in the conventional DOM. The present method is validated by applying it to three different benchmark problems of axisymmetric enclosure containing absorbing, emitting and scattering medium. Results presented in this work not only support the solution accuracy, but also moderate efficiency in the numerical calculation of axisymmetric radiation problem.

• Steel and Composite Structures
• /
• v.21 no.6
• /
• pp.1389-1410
• /
• 2016

This paper proposes a hybrid of topological derivative-based level set method (LSM) and isogeometric analysis (IGA) for structural topology optimization. In topology optimization a significant drawback of the conventional LSM is that it cannot create new holes in the design domain. In this study, the topological derivative approach is used to create new holes in appropriate places of the design domain, and alleviate the strong dependency of the optimal topology on the initial design. Furthermore, the values of the gradient vector in Hamilton-Jacobi equation in the conventional LSM are replaced with a Delta function. In the topology optimization procedure IGA based on Non-Uniform Rational B-Spline (NURBS) functions is utilized to overcome the drawbacks in the conventional finite element method (FEM) based topology optimization approaches. Several numerical examples are provided to confirm the computational efficiency and robustness of the proposed method in comparison with derivative-based LSM and FEM.

• Advances in concrete construction
• /
• v.14 no.5
• /
• pp.331-339
• /
• 2022

Geopolymer concrete (GPC) is one of the best substitute materials for conventional concrete in construction. The conventional concrete provided by Portland cement has a detrimental influence on the environment during its production. In this study, the bond strength, which is an important structural property, of deformed steel bars with slag-based GPC was measured. In accordance with the ASTM C234 procedure, bond strength was measured on 18 specimens of slag-based GPC with three sizes of steel bars and different embedded lengths. Two groups of GPC specimens with different compressive strengths, which were cured under ambient conditions, were tested. The results indicated that the bar diameter has a great effect on the bond strength, and the bond strength behavior of the slag-based GPC is comparable with that of conventional concrete. The ACI-318 Code for the bond strength of ordinary Portland cement concrete can be used conservatively to determine the bond strength of the GPC reinforced with deformed steel bars.

• New & Renewable Energy
• /
• v.9 no.2
• /
• pp.5-14
• /
• 2013

The efficiency of microwave-assisted acid hydrolysis of seaweeds for the production of ethanol was investigated and its effect on hydrolysis into reducing sugar and fermentation into ethanol evaluated as compared with those by conventional heating. A brown seaweed, Laminaria japonica (10-100g/L) was hydrolysed under dilute acidic condition (0.5N $H_2SO_4$, $100^{\circ}C$) with two sorts of heating: microwave irradiation for ${\leq}10min$ and conventional heating for 10-60min. Microwave-assisted hydrolysis was shown to be more efficient. A similar range of reducing sugar and ethanol yields as with the conventional autoclave heating procedure(${\geq}30min$) was observed, but it was obvious that production of ethanol from microwave-assisted hydrolysis had a 3 times faster reaction rate leading to very short production times, lower energy consumption/loss than from the conventional heating mode, and higher biomass loading without significant reducing ethanol yield, thus microwave-assisted acid hydrolysis is a potential alternative method for more effective hydrolysis of Laminaria japonica.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Oral and Maxillofacial Radiology
• /
• v.24 no.2
• /
• pp.439-450
• /
• 1994

Recently, the digital image was introduced into radiological image. The digital image has the power of contrast enhancement, histogram control, and other digitally enhancement. At the point of the resolution, periapical radiograph is superior to the digital image, but enhanced digital procedure improves the diagnostic ability of the digital image. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the diagnostic ability of artificial proximal caries in conventional radiographs, digital radiographs and enhanced digital radiographs (histogram specification). ROC (Receiver Operating Characteristic) analysis and paired t-test were used for the evaluation of detectability, and following results were acquired: 1. The mean ROC area of conventional radiographs was 0.9274. 2. The mean ROC area of unenhanced digital image was 0.9168. 3. The mean ROC area of enhanced digital image was 0.9339. 4. The diagnostic ability of three imaging methods was not significant difference(p>0.05). So, the digital images had similar diagnostic ability of artificial proximal caries to conventional radiographs. If properly enhanced digital image, it may be superior to conventional radiographs.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
• /
• v.29 no.1A
• /
• pp.31-43
• /
• 2009

In this study, the numerical method is presented, which can consider the various train types and can solve the equations of motion for a vehicle-bridge interaction analysis by non-iteration procedure through formulating the coupled equations of motion. The coupled equations of motion for the vehicle-bridge interaction are solved by the Newmark ${\beta}$ of a direct integration method, and by composing the effective stiffness matrix and the effective force vector according to a analysis step, those can be solved with the same manner of the solving procedure of equilibrium equations in static analysis. Also, the effective stiffness matrix is reconstructed by the Skyline method for increasing the analysis effectiveness. The Cholesky's matrix decomposition scheme is applied to the analysis procedure for minimizing the numerical errors that can be generated in directly calculating the inverse matrix. The equations of motion for the conventional trains are derived, and the numerical models of the conventional trains are idealized by a set of linear springs and dashpots with 16 degrees of freedom. The bridge models are simplified by the 3 dimensional space frame element which is based on the Euler-Bernoulli theory. The rail irregularities of vertical and lateral directions are generated by the PSD functions of the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA). The results of the vehicle-bridge interaction analysis are verified by the experimental results for the railway plate girder bridges of a span length with 12 m, 18 m, and the experimental and analytical data are applied to the low pass filtering scheme, and the basis frequency of the filtering is a 2 times of the 1st fundamental frequency of a bridge bending.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers D
• /
• v.53 no.1
• /
• pp.40-49
• /
• 2004

In this paper, we propose a new architecture of Genetic Algorithms(GAs)-based Self-Organizing Polynomial Neural Networks(SOPNN), discuss a comprehensive design methodology and carry out a series of numeric experiments. The conventional SOPNN is based on the extended Group Method of Data Handling(GMDH) method and utilized the polynomial order (viz. linear, quadratic, and modified quadratic) as well as the number of node inputs fixed (selected in advance by designer) at Polynomial Neurons (or nodes) located in each layer through a growth process of the network. Moreover it does not guarantee that the SOPNN generated through learning has the optimal network architecture. But the proposed GA-based SOPNN enable the architecture to be a structurally more optimized network, and to be much more flexible and preferable neural network than the conventional SOPNN. In order to generate the structurally optimized SOPNN, GA-based design procedure at each stage (layer) of SOPNN leads to the selection of preferred nodes (or PNs) with optimal parameters- such as the number of input variables, input variables, and the order of the polynomial-available within SOPNN. An aggregate performance index with a weighting factor is proposed in order to achieve a sound balance between approximation and generalization (predictive) abilities of the model. A detailed design procedure is discussed in detail. To evaluate the performance of the GA-based SOPNN, the model is experimented with using two time series data (gas furnace and NOx emission process data of gas turbine power plant). A comparative analysis shows that the proposed GA-based SOPNN is model with higher accuracy as well as more superb predictive capability than other intelligent models presented previously.

• Journal of Trauma and Injury
• /
• v.31 no.1
• /
• pp.12-15
• /
• 2018

Rib fixations for flail chest or displaced rib fractures are not a new technique. However, reports on rib fixations involving costal cartilage fractures are very few and surprisingly there are no reports of internal fixations involving only the costal cartilage in the English literature. The diagnosis is difficult and the necessity of the procedure may be quite controversial. Placing plates in screws into the costal cartilage alone may seem unstable and easily dislodged or stripped through the cartilage. We report a 31-year-old male scuba diver instructor who underwent rib fixations over his 7th and 8th costal cartilage ribs for severe pain. The procedure was done with conventional plates and screws. He had the plates and screws removed 2 months later due to lingering pain, but with them removed he is now quite happy with the results without pain. The procedure for fixation of painful overlapped costal cartilage is quite simple and can be done with the usual conventional methods, fixating plate and screws directly over the cartilage alone without fixation over the bony rib.