• Title/Summary/Keyword: negative bias

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Characterization of the first mitogenomes of the smallest fish in the world, Paedocypris progenetica, from peat swamp of Peninsular Malaysia, Selangor, and Perak

  • Hussin, NorJasmin;Azmir, Izzati Adilah;Esa, Yuzine;Ahmad, Amirrudin;Salleh, Faezah Mohd;Jahari, Puteri Nur Syahzanani;Munian, Kaviarasu;Gan, Han Ming
    • Genomics & Informatics
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    • v.20 no.1
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    • pp.12.1-12.7
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    • 2022
  • The two complete mitochondrial genomes (mitogenomes) of Paedocypris progenetica, the smallest fish in the world which belonged to the Cyprinidae family, were sequenced and assembled. The circular DNA molecules of mitogenomes P1-P. progenetica and S3-P. progenetica were 16,827 and 16,616 bp in length, respectively, and encoded 13 protein-coding genes, 22 transfer RNA genes, two ribosomal RNA genes, and one control region. The gene arrangements of P. progenetica were identical to those of other Paedocypris species. BLAST and phylogenetic analyses revealed variations in the mitogenome sequences of two Paedocypris species from Perak and Selangor. The circular DNA molecule of P. progenetica yield a standard vertebrate gene arrangement and an overall nucleotide composition of A 33.0%, T 27.2%, C 23.5%, and G 15.5%. The overall AT content of this species was consistent with that of other species in other genera. The negative GC-skew and positive AT-skew of the control region in P. progenetica indicated rich genetic variability and AT nucleotide bias, respectively. The results of this study provide genomic variation information and enhance the understanding of the mitogenome of P. progenetica. They could later deliver highly valuable new insight into data for phylogenetic analysis and population genetics.

Effects of Fear of Coronavirus Disease 2019 and Social Distancing on Women's Suicidal Ideation: Mediating Effect of Depression (코로나바이러스감염증-19로 인한 두려움, 사회적 거리두기가 여성의 자살 생각에 미치는 영향: 우울의 매개효과)

  • Kim, Hyo Yeon;Park, Hanjong
    • Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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    • v.52 no.4
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    • pp.464-475
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    • 2022
  • Purpose: This study aimed to identify the mediating effects of depression amid the influence of fear and social distancing arising from Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Korean women's suicidal ideation. Methods: A descriptive correlation study was conducted. Study participants, recruited by Hankook Research from March 2 to March 5, 2021, included 300 women aged 19 to 49 living in South Korea, and 100 people were randomly allocated and enlisted for each age group out of 700,000 Hankook Research Panels recruited in advance from 17 cities and provinces nationwide. Data were collected through a self-reported questionnaire and analyzed using Pearson's correlation coefficient and Hayes' Process Macro Model 4 with 95% bias-corrected bootstrap confidence interval via SPSS statistics 27.0. Results: Suicidal ideation was significantly correlated with fear of COVID-19 (r = .16, p = .006) and depression (r = .65, p < .001). The mediation effect of depression in the relationship between the fear of COVID-19 and suicidal ideation was found to be significant (B = 0.40, boot 95% CI: 0.21~0.61). However, social distancing did not significantly affect suicidal ideation via depression (B = - 0.79, boot 95% CI: - 1.94~0.26). Conclusion: It is necessary to develop and apply interventions to prevent depression and suicidal behaviors by continuously observing and reducing the negative psychological responses caused by COVID-19.

How perceptions of inter-party conflict influence partisan affect: The moderating role of party identification (당파적 편향에 따른 책임 귀속: 여야간 갈등인식과 정당 호감도를 중심으로)

  • Gil, Jung-ah;Ha, Shang E.
    • Korean Journal of Legislative Studies
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    • v.25 no.1
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    • pp.45-78
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    • 2019
  • This study examines the relationship between individuals' perceptions on party conflict and affective polarization. It pays particular attention to party identification as a moderating variable. Using a survey conducted in the context of the 2014 Korean local election, the present study hypothesizes that perceiving serious inter-party conflict in the political arena is likely to increase negative feelings toward out-group political party among partisans only. Not only do the results confirm our hypothesis but suggest that conflict perception leads to affective polarization among partisan voters. This paper contributes to our understanding of the mechanism that links the attribution of blame to out-group political party for legislative gridlock with ever-growing affective polarization of the electorate.

Covert Cohabitation of News and Advertisement: News Frame Towards Advertisers of the Media (뉴스와 광고의 은밀한 동거: 광고주에 대한 언론의 뉴스구성)

  • Lim, Bong-Soo;Lee, Wan-Soo;Lee, Min-Kyu
    • Korean journal of communication and information
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    • v.66
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    • pp.133-158
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    • 2014
  • This research followed the major South Korean newspapers, Chosun, JoongAng, HanKyoreh and KyungHyang newspapers to study their relationship with advertisement - on how they use advertisement to what degree and which views they take, also looking into the quantity of advertisement. The results of analysis is as thus: first, the more advertised companies tended to have more news reports about them overall. Also, advertised companies were usually shown in positive light rather than a negative one. The most notable constructive commonality found in the positively advertised companies were that they were not usually introduced upfront through the title of the news article (or within the body of the article) but rather mentioned within the media frame. The reasons for this pattern in advertising is to make bias towards JoongAng which is obvious for pro companies, especially for the Chosun which is known for being neutral in most company matters even for the HanKyoreh, KyungHyang known for their usual negative attitude towards private companies.

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Donation Expenses and Corporate Value: A Focus on the Corporate Governance Structure (기부금 지출과 기업 가치: 기업지배구조를 중심으로)

  • Kim, Soo-Jung;Kang, Shin-Ae
    • Journal of Distribution Science
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    • v.12 no.8
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    • pp.113-121
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    • 2014
  • Purpose - Recently, the number of corporations that practice environmental and social responsibility, besides engaging in traditional profit-seeking activities, has been growing steadily, as interest in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is increasing. Recent research on CSR practices has identified the relationship between CSR activities and corporate value as one of the main issues in this respect. Considering that donations constitute a large proportion of a company's charitable activities, we considered the extent of donation expenses as a charitable activity in order to mitigate sample selection bias. Specifically, we analyzed the impact of donation expenses on firm value, while investigating if this impact varied in response to the level of corporate governance of firms. Research design, data, and methodology - We used non-financial firms listed on the Korean Stock Exchange, having their fiscal year end in December, and the sample period was 2006-2013. For the dependent variable, Tobin's q was used as the corporate value, and for the independent variable, donations were measured as the donation-expense-to-sales ratio. Corporate governance scores, as rated by the Korea Corporate Governance Service, were used to measure corporate governance levels because they consider the overall aspects of governance, including ownership structure, the board of directors, and the audit mechanism of individual companies. To examine the impact of donations on a company in relation to the level of corporate governance, we estimated regression models using the interaction terms of the governance dummy and donation variables. Then, we further estimated the regression models of two sub-samples that were classified according to the level of corporate governance. Similar to previous studies, the study uses variables that affect firm value, such as R&D expenditure, advertising expenses, EBITDA, debt-to-equity ratio, sales growth, company age, and company size as control variables. Results - The empirical results show that firm value significantly increased in response to an increase in donation expenses. Upon including the interaction terms of governance level dummy variables and donations, the coefficients of the interaction terms show significant positive values, while those of donation variables show significant negative values. In the strong governance sub-sample, the relationship between the donation expenses and corporate value was statistically positive (+) and significant. However, in the weak governance sub-sample, the relationship between the donation expenses and corporate value was statistically insignificant and negative (-). Conclusions - The empirical results suggest that donation expenses are significantly linked to an enhanced corporate value if firms have a good corporate governance structure. However, if the corporate governance structure is weak, the same relationship is not necessarily observed. The results of this study show that if a firm has high corporate governance, CSR practices enhance the company's reputation such that it has a positive (+) relationship with corporate value. If a firm has weak corporate governance, on the other hand, CSR practices are recognized as an agency cost and do not increase corporate value.

Constraints and opportunities to sustain future wheat yield and water productivity in semi-arid environment

  • Ahmad, Mirza Junaid;Choi, Kyung-Sook
    • Proceedings of the Korea Water Resources Association Conference
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    • 2019.05a
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    • pp.185-185
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    • 2019
  • Sustaining future wheat production is challenged by anthropogenically forced climate warming and drying led by increased concentration of greenhouse gases all around the globe. Warming stresses, originating from the elevated $CO_2$ concentration, are continuously reported to have negative impacts on wheat growth and yield. Yet, elevated $CO_2$ concentration, despite being disparagingly blamed for promoting warming, is also associated with a phenomenon called $CO_2$ enrichment; in which wheat yield can improve due to the enhanced photosynthesis rates and less water loss through transpiration. The conflicting nature of climate warming and $CO_2$ enrichment and their interplay can have specific implications under different environments. It is established form the field and simulation studies that the two contrasting phenomena would act severely in their own respect under arid and semi-arid environments. Wheat is a dietary staple for masses in Pakistan. The country's wheat production system is under constant stress to produce more from irrigated agricultural lands, primarily lying under arid to semi-arid environments, to meet the rapidly growing domestic needs. This work comprehensively examines the warming impacts over wheat yield and water productivity (WP), with and without the inclusion of $CO_2$ enrichment, under semi-arid environment of Punjab which is the largest agricultural province of Pakistan. Future wheat yields and WPs were simulated by FAO developed AquaCrop model v 5.0. The model was run using the bias-correction climate change projections up to 2080 under two representative concentration pathways (RCP) scenarios: 4.5 and 8.5. Wheat yield and WPs decreased without considering the $CO_2$ enrichment effects owing to the elevated irrigation demands and accelerated evapotranspiration rates. The results suggested that $CO_2$ enrichment could help maintain the current yield and WPs levels during the 2030s (2021-2050); however, it might not withhold the negative climate warming impacts during the 2060s (2051-2080). Furthermore, 10 - 20 day backward shift in sowing dates could also help ease the constraints imposed by climate warming over wheat yields and WPs. Although, $CO_2$ enrichment showed promises to counteract the adverse climate warming impacts but the interactions between climate warming and $CO_2$ concentrations were quite uncertain and required further examination.

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PREPARATION OF AMORPHOUS CARBON NITRIDE FILMS AND DLC FILMS BY SHIELDED ARC ION PLATING AND THEIR TRIBOLOGICAL PROPERTIES

  • Takai, Osamu
    • Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Surface Engineering Conference
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    • 2000.11a
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    • pp.3-4
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    • 2000
  • Many researchers are interested in the synthesis and characterization of carbon nitride and diamond-like carbon (DLq because they show excellent mechanical properties such as low friction and high wear resistance and excellent electrical properties such as controllable electical resistivity and good field electron emission. We have deposited amorphous carbon nitride (a-C:N) thin films and DLC thin films by shielded arc ion plating (SAIP) and evaluated the structural and tribological properties. The application of appropriate negative bias on substrates is effective to increase the film hardness and wear resistance. This paper reports on the deposition and tribological OLC films in relation to the substrate bias voltage (Vs). films are compared with those of the OLC films. A high purity sintered graphite target was mounted on a cathode as a carbon source. Nitrogen or argon was introduced into a deposition chamber through each mass flow controller. After the initiation of an arc plasma at 60 A and 1 Pa, the target surface was heated and evaporated by the plasma. Carbon atoms and clusters evaporated from the target were ionized partially and reacted with activated nitrogen species, and a carbon nitride film was deposited onto a Si (100) substrate when we used nitrogen as a reactant gas. The surface of the growing film also reacted with activated nitrogen species. Carbon macropartic1es (0.1 -100 maicro-m) evaporated from the target at the same time were not ionized and did not react fully with nitrogen species. These macroparticles interfered with the formation of the carbon nitride film. Therefore we set a shielding plate made of stainless steel between the target and the substrate to trap the macropartic1es. This shielding method is very effective to prepare smooth a-CN films. We, therefore, call this method "shielded arc ion plating (SAIP)". For the deposition of DLC films we used argon instead of nitrogen. Films of about 150 nm in thickness were deposited onto Si substrates. Their structures, chemical compositions and chemical bonding states were analyzed by using X-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and infrared spectroscopy. Hardness of the films was measured with a nanointender interfaced with an atomic force microscope (AFM). A Berkovich-type diamond tip whose radius was less than 100 nm was used for the measurement. A force-displacement curve of each film was measured at a peak load force of 250 maicro-N. Load, hold and unload times for each indentation were 2.5, 0 and 2.5 s, respectively. Hardness of each film was determined from five force-displacement curves. Wear resistance of the films was analyzed as follows. First, each film surface was scanned with the diamond tip at a constant load force of 20 maicro-N. The tip scanning was repeated 30 times in a 1 urn-square region with 512 lines at a scanning rate of 2 um/ s. After this tip-scanning, the film surface was observed in the AFM mode at a constant force of 5 maicro-N with the same Berkovich-type tip. The hardness of a-CN films was less dependent on Vs. The hardness of the film deposited at Vs=O V in a nitrogen plasma was about 10 GPa and almost similar to that of Si. It slightly increased to 12 - 15 GPa when a bias voltage of -100 - -500 V was applied to the substrate with showing its maximum at Vs=-300 V. The film deposited at Vs=O V was least wear resistant which was consistent with its lowest hardness. The biased films became more wear resistant. Particularly the film deposited at Vs=-300 V showed remarkable wear resistance. Its wear depth was too shallow to be measured with AFM. On the other hand, the DLC film, deposited at Vs=-l00 V in an argon plasma, whose hardness was 35 GPa was obviously worn under the same wear test conditions. The a-C:N films show higher wear resistance than DLC films and are useful for wear resistant coatings on various mechanical and electronic parts.nic parts.

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Development and Analysis of COMS AMV Target Tracking Algorithm using Gaussian Cluster Analysis (가우시안 군집분석을 이용한 천리안 위성의 대기운동벡터 표적추적 알고리듬 개발 및 분석)

  • Oh, Yurim;Kim, Jae Hwan;Park, Hyungmin;Baek, Kanghyun
    • Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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    • v.31 no.6
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    • pp.531-548
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    • 2015
  • Atmospheric Motion Vector (AMV) from satellite images have shown Slow Speed Bias (SSB) in comparison with rawinsonde. The causes of SSB are originated from tracking, selection, and height assignment error, which is known to be the leading error. However, recent works have shown that height assignment error cannot be fully explained the cause of SSB. This paper attempts a new approach to examine the possibility of SSB reduction of COMS AMV by using a new target tracking algorithm. Tracking error can be caused by averaging of various wind patterns within a target and changing of cloud shape in searching process over time. To overcome this problem, Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) has been adopted to extract the coldest cluster as target since the shape of such target is less subject to transformation. Then, an image filtering scheme is applied to weigh more on the selected coldest pixels than the other, which makes it easy to track the target. When AMV derived from our algorithm with sum of squared distance method and current COMS are compared with rawindsonde, our products show noticeable improvement over COMS products in mean wind speed by an increase of $2.7ms^{-1}$ and SSB reduction by 29%. However, the statistics regarding the bias show negative impact for mid/low level with our algorithm, and the number of vectors are reduced by 40% relative to COMS. Therefore, further study is required to improve accuracy for mid/low level winds and increase the number of AMV vectors.

The Role of T1-201 Brain SPECT in the Differentiating Recurrent Tumor from Radiation Necrosis (뇌종양의 재발과 방사선 괴사의 감별을 위한 탈륨 SPECT의 역할)

  • Won, Kyoung-Sook;Ryu, Jin-Sook;Moon, Dae-Hyuk;Yang, Seoung-Oh;Lee, Hee-Kyung;Lee, Jung-Kyo;Kwun, Byung-Duk
    • The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine
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    • v.30 no.4
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    • pp.476-483
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    • 1996
  • Following radiation therapy for brain tumors, patients often have clinical deterioration due to either radiation necrosis or recurrent tumor progression in the treatment field. The distinction between these entities is important but difficult clinically or even with CT or MRI. T1-201 has been known to accumulate in various tumors and be useful to grade, predict prognosis or detect recurrence of glioma. The aim of this study was to evaluate the usefulness of T1-201 SPECT in the differentiation of recurrent tumor from radiation necrosis. Of 67 patients who did T1-201 brain SPECT imaging with clinically suspected recurrent tumor or radiation necrosis, 20 patients underwent histopathological examination and constituted the study population. T1-201 uptake indices on T1-201 brain SPECT imaging rrere calculated and correlated with histopathological diagnosis. Of 20 patients, 15 were histopathologically confirmed as recurrent original tumor or malignant transformation of benign tumor and 5 were diagnosed as radiation necrosis. On T1-201 SPECT, 18 of 20 had T1-201 index above 2.5 which was regarded as positive indicator for the presence of tumor. Seventeen cases showed concordance, which consisted of 15 true positive and 2 true negative. Discordant 3 cases were all false positive. There was no case of false negative. The sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive value of T1-201 SPECT were 100%, 40%, 83% and 100%. In conclusion, T1-201 brain SPECT is a sensitive diagnostic test in the detection of recurrent tumor following radiation therapy and is useful in the differentiation of recurrent tumor from radiation necrosis. Relatively low specificity should be evaluated further in larger number of patients in consideration of sampling error and referral bias for pathologic examination.

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Chemistry of mist deposition of organic polymer PEDOT:PSS on crystalline Si

  • Shirai, Hajime;Ohki, Tatsuya;Liu, Qiming;Ichikawa, Koki
    • Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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    • 2016.02a
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    • pp.388-388
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    • 2016
  • Chemical mist deposition (CMD) of poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) was investigated with cavitation frequency f, solvent, flow rate of nitrogen, substrate temperature $T_s$, and substrate dc bias $V_s$ as variables for efficient PEDOT:PSS/crystalline (c-)Si heterojunction solar cells (Fig. 1). The high-speed camera and differential mobility analysis characterizations revealed that average size and flux of PEDOT:PSS mist depend on f, solvent, and $V_s$. The size distribution of mist particles including EG/DI water cosolvent is also shown at three different $V_s$ of 0, 1.5, and 5 kV for a f of 3 MHz (Fig. 2). The size distribution of EG/DI water mist without PEDOT:PSS is also shown at the bottom. A peak maximum shifted from 300-350 to 20-30 nm with a narrow band width of ~150 nm for PEDOT:PSS solution, whose maximum number density increased significantly up to 8000/cc with increasing $V_s$. On the other hand, for EG/water cosolvent mist alone, the peak maximum was observed at a 72.3 nm with a number density of ~700/cc and a band width of ~160 nm and it decreased markedly with increasing $V_s$. These findings were not observed for PEDOT:PSS/EG/DI water mist. In addition, the Mie scattering image of PEDOT:PSS mist under white bias light was not observed at $V_s$ above 5 kV, because the average size of mist became smaller. These results imply that most of solvent is solvated in PEDOT:PSS molecule and/or solvent is vaporized. Thus, higher f and $V_s$ generate preferentially fine mist particle with a narrower band width. Film deposition occurred when $V_s$ was impressed on positive to a c-Si substrate at a Ts of $30-40^{\circ}C$, whereas no deposition of films occurred on negative, implying that negatively charged mist mainly provide the film deposition. The uniform deposition of PEDOT:PSS films occurred on textured c-Si(100) substrate by adjusting $T_s$ and $V_s$. The adhesion of CMD PEDOT:PSS to c-Si enhanced by $V_s$ conspicuously compared to that of spin-coated film. The CMD PEDOT:PSS/c-Si solar cell devices on textured c-Si(100) exhibited a ${\eta}$ of 11.0% with the better uniformity of the solar cell parameters. Furthermore, ${\eta}$ increased to 12.5% with a $J_{sc}$ of $35.6mA/cm^2$, a $V_{oc}$ of 0.53 V, and a FF of 0.67 with an antireflection (AR) coating layer of 20-nm-thick CMD molybdenum oxide $MoO_x$ (n= 2.1) using negatively charged mist of 0.1 wt% 12 Molybdo (VI) phosphoric acid n-Hydrate) $H_3(PMo_{12}O_40){\cdot}nH_2O$ in methanol. CMD. These findings suggest that the CMD with negatively charged mist has a great potential for the uniform deposition of organic and inorganic on textured c-Si substrate by adjusting $T_s$ and $V_s$.

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