• Title/Summary/Keyword: scientific research process

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The Tobacco Industry's Abuse of Scientific Evidence and Activities to Recruit Scientists During Tobacco Litigation (담배소송 중 담배회사의 과학적 근거 오용과 과학자 포섭 활동)

  • Lee, Sungkyu
    • Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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    • v.49 no.1
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    • pp.23-34
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    • 2016
  • South Korea's state health insurer, the National Health Insurance Service (NHIS), is in the process of a compensation suit against tobacco industry. The tobacco companies have habitually endeavored to ensure favorable outcomes in litigation by misusing scientific evidence or recruiting scientists to support its interests. This study analyzed strategies that tobacco companies have used during the NHIS litigation, which has been receiving world-wide attention. To understand the litigation strategies of tobacco companies, the present study reviewed the existing literature and carried out content analysis of petitions, preparatory documents, and supporting evidence submitted to the court by the NHIS and the tobacco companies during the suit. Tobacco companies misrepresented the World Health Organization (WHO) report's argument and misused scientific evidence, and removed the word "deadly" from the title of the citation. Tobacco companies submitted the research results of scientists who had worked as a consultant for the tobacco industry as evidence. Such litigation strategies employed by the tobacco companies internationally were applied similarly in Korean lawsuits. Results of tobacco litigation have a huge influence on tobacco control policies. For desirable outcomes of the suits, healthcare professionals need to pay a great deal of attention to the enormous volume of written opinions and supporting evidence that tobacco companies submit. They also need to face the fact that the companies engage in recruitment of scientists. Healthcare professionals should refuse to partner with tobacco industry, as recommended by Article 5.3 of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

Using the METHONTOLOGY Approach to a Graduation Screen Ontology Development: An Experiential Investigation of the METHONTOLOGY Framework

  • Park, Jin-Soo;Sung, Ki-Moon;Moon, Se-Won
    • Asia pacific journal of information systems
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    • v.20 no.2
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    • pp.125-155
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    • 2010
  • Ontologies have been adopted in various business and scientific communities as a key component of the Semantic Web. Despite the increasing importance of ontologies, ontology developers still perceive construction tasks as a challenge. A clearly defined and well-structured methodology can reduce the time required to develop an ontology and increase the probability of success of a project. However, no reliable knowledge-engineering methodology for ontology development currently exists; every methodology has been tailored toward the development of a particular ontology. In this study, we developed a Graduation Screen Ontology (GSO). The graduation screen domain was chosen for the several reasons. First, the graduation screen process is a complicated task requiring a complex reasoning process. Second, GSO may be reused for other universities because the graduation screen process is similar for most universities. Finally, GSO can be built within a given period because the size of the selected domain is reasonable. No standard ontology development methodology exists; thus, one of the existing ontology development methodologies had to be chosen. The most important considerations for selecting the ontology development methodology of GSO included whether it can be applied to a new domain; whether it covers a broader set of development tasks; and whether it gives sufficient explanation of each development task. We evaluated various ontology development methodologies based on the evaluation framework proposed by G$\acute{o}$mez-P$\acute{e}$rez et al. We concluded that METHONTOLOGY was the most applicable to the building of GSO for this study. METHONTOLOGY was derived from the experience of developing Chemical Ontology at the Polytechnic University of Madrid by Fern$\acute{a}$ndez-L$\acute{o}$pez et al. and is regarded as the most mature ontology development methodology. METHONTOLOGY describes a very detailed approach for building an ontology under a centralized development environment at the conceptual level. This methodology consists of three broad processes, with each process containing specific sub-processes: management (scheduling, control, and quality assurance); development (specification, conceptualization, formalization, implementation, and maintenance); and support process (knowledge acquisition, evaluation, documentation, configuration management, and integration). An ontology development language and ontology development tool for GSO construction also had to be selected. We adopted OWL-DL as the ontology development language. OWL was selected because of its computational quality of consistency in checking and classification, which is crucial in developing coherent and useful ontological models for very complex domains. In addition, Protege-OWL was chosen for an ontology development tool because it is supported by METHONTOLOGY and is widely used because of its platform-independent characteristics. Based on the GSO development experience of the researchers, some issues relating to the METHONTOLOGY, OWL-DL, and Prot$\acute{e}$g$\acute{e}$-OWL were identified. We focused on presenting drawbacks of METHONTOLOGY and discussing how each weakness could be addressed. First, METHONTOLOGY insists that domain experts who do not have ontology construction experience can easily build ontologies. However, it is still difficult for these domain experts to develop a sophisticated ontology, especially if they have insufficient background knowledge related to the ontology. Second, METHONTOLOGY does not include a development stage called the "feasibility study." This pre-development stage helps developers ensure not only that a planned ontology is necessary and sufficiently valuable to begin an ontology building project, but also to determine whether the project will be successful. Third, METHONTOLOGY excludes an explanation on the use and integration of existing ontologies. If an additional stage for considering reuse is introduced, developers might share benefits of reuse. Fourth, METHONTOLOGY fails to address the importance of collaboration. This methodology needs to explain the allocation of specific tasks to different developer groups, and how to combine these tasks once specific given jobs are completed. Fifth, METHONTOLOGY fails to suggest the methods and techniques applied in the conceptualization stage sufficiently. Introducing methods of concept extraction from multiple informal sources or methods of identifying relations may enhance the quality of ontologies. Sixth, METHONTOLOGY does not provide an evaluation process to confirm whether WebODE perfectly transforms a conceptual ontology into a formal ontology. It also does not guarantee whether the outcomes of the conceptualization stage are completely reflected in the implementation stage. Seventh, METHONTOLOGY needs to add criteria for user evaluation of the actual use of the constructed ontology under user environments. Eighth, although METHONTOLOGY allows continual knowledge acquisition while working on the ontology development process, consistent updates can be difficult for developers. Ninth, METHONTOLOGY demands that developers complete various documents during the conceptualization stage; thus, it can be considered a heavy methodology. Adopting an agile methodology will result in reinforcing active communication among developers and reducing the burden of documentation completion. Finally, this study concludes with contributions and practical implications. No previous research has addressed issues related to METHONTOLOGY from empirical experiences; this study is an initial attempt. In addition, several lessons learned from the development experience are discussed. This study also affords some insights for ontology methodology researchers who want to design a more advanced ontology development methodology.

Modern Paper Quality Control

  • Olavi Komppa
    • Proceedings of the Korea Technical Association of the Pulp and Paper Industry Conference
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    • 2000.06a
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    • pp.16-23
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    • 2000
  • The increasing functional needs of top-quality printing papers and packaging paperboards, and especially the rapid developments in electronic printing processes and various computer printers during past few years, set new targets and requirements for modern paper quality. Most of these paper grades of today have relatively high filler content, are moderately or heavily calendered , and have many coating layers for the best appearance and performance. In practice, this means that many of the traditional quality assurance methods, mostly designed to measure papers made of pure. native pulp only, can not reliably (or at all) be used to analyze or rank the quality of modern papers. Hence, introduction of new measurement techniques is necessary to assure and further develop the paper quality today and in the future. Paper formation , i.e. small scale (millimeter scale) variation of basis weight, is the most important quality parameter of paper-making due to its influence on practically all the other quality properties of paper. The ideal paper would be completely uniform so that the basis weight of each small point (area) measured would be the same. In practice, of course, this is not possible because there always exists relatively large local variations in paper. However, these small scale basis weight variations are the major reason for many other quality problems, including calender blacking uneven coating result, uneven printing result, etc. The traditionally used visual inspection or optical measurement of the paper does not give us a reliable understanding of the material variations in the paper because in modern paper making process the optical behavior of paper is strongly affected by using e.g. fillers, dye or coating colors. Futhermore, the opacity (optical density) of the paper is changed at different process stages like wet pressing and calendering. The greatest advantage of using beta transmission method to measure paper formation is that it can be very reliably calibrated to measure true basis weight variation of all kinds of paper and board, independently on sample basis weight or paper grade. This gives us the possibility to measure, compare and judge papers made of different raw materials, different color, or even to measure heavily calendered, coated or printed papers. Scientific research of paper physics has shown that the orientation of the top layer (paper surface) fibers of the sheet paly the key role in paper curling and cockling , causing the typical practical problems (paper jam) with modern fax and copy machines, electronic printing , etc. On the other hand, the fiber orientation at the surface and middle layer of the sheet controls the bending stiffness of paperboard . Therefore, a reliable measurement of paper surface fiber orientation gives us a magnificent tool to investigate and predict paper curling and coclking tendency, and provides the necessary information to finetune, the manufacturing process for optimum quality. many papers, especially heavily calendered and coated grades, do resist liquid and gas penetration very much, bing beyond the measurement range of the traditional instruments or resulting invonveniently long measuring time per sample . The increased surface hardness and use of filler minerals and mechanical pulp make a reliable, nonleaking sample contact to the measurement head a challenge of its own. Paper surface coating causes, as expected, a layer which has completely different permeability characteristics compared to the other layer of the sheet. The latest developments in sensor technologies have made it possible to reliably measure gas flow in well controlled conditions, allowing us to investigate the gas penetration of open structures, such as cigarette paper, tissue or sack paper, and in the low permeability range analyze even fully greaseproof papers, silicon papers, heavily coated papers and boards or even detect defects in barrier coatings ! Even nitrogen or helium may be used as the gas, giving us completely new possibilities to rank the products or to find correlation to critical process or converting parameters. All the modern paper machines include many on-line measuring instruments which are used to give the necessary information for automatic process control systems. hence, the reliability of this information obtained from different sensors is vital for good optimizing and process stability. If any of these on-line sensors do not operate perfectly ass planned (having even small measurement error or malfunction ), the process control will set the machine to operate away from the optimum , resulting loss of profit or eventual problems in quality or runnability. To assure optimum operation of the paper machines, a novel quality assurance policy for the on-line measurements has been developed, including control procedures utilizing traceable, accredited standards for the best reliability and performance.

Trend Analysis of Curriculum Application Status of 2015 Revised Integrated Science and Scientific Laboratory Experiment Curriculum (2015 개정 통합과학과 과학탐구실험 교육과정의 2차 년도 적용 현황 추이 분석)

  • Kwak, Youngsun
    • Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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    • v.13 no.1
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    • pp.53-63
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    • 2020
  • The purpose of this study is to analyze the current status of the second year of application of Integrated Science and Science Laboratory Experiments, which are common courses of high school, and to explore suggestions for curriculum development in the future. To this end, the results of the survey of a total of 244 science-core and general high schools were compared with the survey result of 2018 school year. In addition, in-depth interviews were conducted with nine science teachers of the focus group to discuss the current state of curriculum implementation. According to the results, as in the first year, most of the Integrated Science courses were implemented in 6-8 units, and in most schools the number of teachers in charge of Integrated Science per class were 3-4. In the teacher's focus group interview, teachers insisted that Integrated Science requires integrated teaching approaches and is good for generating students' interest, but it is difficult to implement process-based assessment due to issues such as ensuring fairness of assessment. Most of Science Laboratory Experiments courses were implemented in two semesters, one unit per semester, and there was little link between Integrated Science and Science Laboratory Experiments because of the different teaching staff. The school life record entry method of Science Laboratory Experiments has been changed to criterion-based assessment starting in 2019, so students' satisfaction or flow of classes is much better than expected, and teachers can teach without burden. Based on the research results, ways to support the settlement of Integrated Science and Science Laboratory Experiments as common subjects, and ways to improve those subjects in the next curriculum revision were suggested.

Thomas Young's Problem Solving through Analogical Reasoning in the Process of Light Inference Theory Formation and Its Implications for Scientific Creativity Education (창의적 과학자 토마스 영(T. Young)의 빛의 간섭 이론 형성과정에서의 비유추론을 통한 문제해결과 과학창의성 교육적 함의)

  • Kim, Wonsook;Kim, Youngmin;Seo, Hae-Ae;Park, Jongseok
    • Journal of Gifted/Talented Education
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    • v.23 no.5
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    • pp.817-833
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    • 2013
  • The study aims to analyze Thomas Young's problem solving processes of analogical reasoning during the formation of the interference theory of light, and to draw its implications for secondary science education, particularly for enhancing creativity in science. The research method employed in the study was literature review of the papers which Young himself had written about sound wave and property of light. His thinking processes and specific features in his thought that were obtained through analysis of his papers about light are as follows: Young reconsidered Newton's experiments and observations, and reinterpreted Newton's results in the new viewpoints. Through this analysis, Young discovered that Newton's interpretation about his own experiments and observations was faulty in a certain point of view and new interpretation is necessary. Based on the data, it is hypothesized that colors observed on thin plates and colors appeared repeatedly on Newton's ring are appeared because of the effect of light interference. Young used analogical reasoning during the process of inference of similarity between sound and light. And he formulated an hypothesis on the interference of light through using abductive reasoning from interference of water wave, and proved the hypothesis by constructing an creative experimental device, which is called a critical experiment. It is implicated that the analogical reasoning and experimental devices for explaining the light interference which Young created and used can be utilized for school science education enhancing creativity in science.

Real-time Natural Disaster Failure Analysis Information System Development using GIS Environment (GIS환경의 실시간 자연재해정보를 연계한 재해고장분석시스템 개발)

  • Ahn, Yeon-S.
    • Journal of Digital Contents Society
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    • v.10 no.4
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    • pp.639-648
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    • 2009
  • Earth's environment issues are introduced recently and every year the social loss have been occurred by the impact of various disaster. This kind of disaster and weather problems are the increasing reason of electricity transmission network equipment's failures because of exposing by the natural environment. The emergency and abnormal status of electricity equipment make the power outage of manufacturing plant and discomfort of people's lives. So, to protect the electricity equipment from the natural disasters and to supply the power to customer as stable, the supporting systems are required. In this paper, the research results are described the development process and the outcomes of the real-time natural disaster failure analysis information system including the describing about the impact of disaster and weather change, making the natural weather information, and linking the realtime monitoring system. As of development process, according to application development methodology, techniques are enumerated including the real time interface with related systems, the analysing the geographic information on the digital map using GIS application technology to extract the malfunction equipment potentially and to manage the equipments efficiently. Through this system makes remarkable performance it minimize the failures of the equipments, the increasing the efficiency of the equipment operation, the support of scientific information related on the mid-term enhancement plan, the savings on equipment investment, the quality upgrading of electricity supply, and the various supports in the field.

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A Study on the Manufacturing Technique by Scientific Analysis and Reproduction Experiment of Ancient Silver Objects Excavated from Neungnae-ri, Ganghwa Island (강화도 능내리출토 은제유물의 과학적 분석 및 재현실험을 통한 제작기법 연구)

  • Ryu, Dong-Wan;Kim, Soo-Ki
    • Journal of Conservation Science
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    • v.27 no.1
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    • pp.1-11
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    • 2011
  • For the silver artifacts in the Koryo Dynasty excavated from Neungnae-ri Ganghwa island, the metallographic section analysis and hardness and chemical analysis were conducted. After making samples in the similar ratio of the composition concentration, the changes of the microstructure were checked according to the working method and temperature. The results show that those silver artifacts are Au-Cu alloys with 2 to 6 % of Cu. From the results it is judged that Cu was artificially alloyed with them to keep the proper hardness and identified that they were gilded by the amalgamation process seeing that mercury was included at the guilt layer. Also the porous texture on the surface of them could be formed at over $400^{\circ}C$, therefore, it is assumed the hot working or heat treatment at over $400^{\circ}C$ were performed. In silver artifacts made by the relief and repousse, they have the similar composition analysis to other 7 artifacts but the hardness is lower than pure silver. Consequently from differences in the hardness, it can be inferred that the low hardness of silver artifacts is concerned with manufacturing techniques.

An Extraction and ANP Importance Analysis for Competence Factors of Junior Grade CM Engineer (초급 건설사업관리기술자(CMr)의 요구역량 추출 및 ANP 중요도 분석)

  • Yang, Jinkook;Kim, Sebeom;Lee, Sangbeom
    • Korean Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
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    • v.18 no.1
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    • pp.58-64
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    • 2017
  • Construction Management (CM) is being utilized as an efficient project management system. Construction management system provide scientific management techniques as well as the expert's service with the expertise. Accordingly, CM services demand is continuously increasing in construction project. Construction Management engineer grade is distinguished by the Index of Construction Engineer's Competency (ICEC). Construction management engineer requires a higher score than the other fields. However, junior grade CM engineer can get grade according to the education and qualification. This study was conducted junior grade CM engineer depth interview after analyzing the problem of the current CM engineer grade system. As a result, this study was to extracted the 23 kind competence factors. And, competence factors were five area grouped using affinity diagram method. Next, we analyzed the importance utilizing the Analytic Network Process (ANP) technique. As a result, high priority areas were analyzed to be quality and cost areas associated with project management.

Study of Naturally Occurring Radioactive Material Present in Deep Soil of the Malwa Region of Punjab State of India Using Low Level Background Gamma-Ray Spectrometry

  • Srivastava, Alok;Chahar, Vikash;Chauhan, Neeraj;Krupp, Dominik;Scherer, Ulrich W.
    • Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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    • v.47 no.1
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    • pp.16-21
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    • 2022
  • Background: Epidemiological observations such as mental retardation, physical deformities, etc., in children besides different types of cancer in the adult population of the Malwa region have been reported. The present study is designed to get insight into the role of naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM) in causing detrimental health effects observed in the general population of this region. Materials and Methods: Deep soil samples were collected from different locations in the Malwa region. Their activity concentrations were determined using low-level background gammaray spectrometry. High efficiency and high purity germanium detector capped in a lead-shielded chamber having a resolution of 1.8 keV at 1,173 keV and 2.0 keV at the 1,332 keV line of 60Co was used in the present work. Data were evaluated with Genie-2000 software. Results and Discussion: Mean activity concentrations of 238U, 232Th, and 40K in deep soil were found to be 101.3 Bq/kg, 65.8 Bq/kg, and 688.6 Bq/kg, respectively. The mean activity concentration of 238U was found to be three and half times higher than the global average prescribed by the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR). It was further observed that the activity concentration of 232Th and 40K has a magnitude that is nearly one and half times higher than the global average prescribed by UNSCEAR. In addition, the radioisotope 137Cs which is likely to have its origin in radiation fallout was also observed. It is postulated that the NORM present in high quantity in deep soil somehow get mobilized into the water aquifers used by the general population and thereby causing harmful health problems. Conclusion: It can be stated that the present work has been able to demonstrate the use of low background gamma-ray spectrometry to understand the role of NORM in causing health-related effects in a general population of the Malwa region of Punjab, India.

New Approaches to Quality Monitoring of Higher Education in the Process of Distance Learning

  • Oseredchuk, Olga;Drachuk, Ihor;Teslenko, Valentyn;Ushnevych, Solomiia;Dushechkina, Nataliia;Kubitskyi, Serhii;Сhychuk, Antonina
    • International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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    • v.22 no.7
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    • pp.35-42
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    • 2022
  • The article identifies the problem of monitoring the quality of higher education in three main areas, which are comparative pedagogical systems of education. The first direction is determined by dissertation works, the second - monographs and textbooks, and the third reveals scientific periodicals. According to its internal structure, monitoring the quality of education combines important management components identified in the article (analysis, evaluation and forecasting of processes in education; a set of methods for tracking processes in education; collecting and processing information to prepare recommendations for research processes and make necessary adjustments). Depending on the objectives, three areas of monitoring are identified: informational (involves the accumulation, structuring and dissemination of information), basic (aimed at identifying new problems and threats before they are realized at the management level), problematic (clarification of patterns, processes, hazards, those problems that are known and significant from the point of view of management). According to its internal structure, monitoring the quality of education combines the following important management components: analysis, evaluation and forecasting of processes in education; a set of techniques for tracking processes in education; collection and processing of information in order to prepare recommendations for the development of the studied processes and make the necessary adjustments. One of the priorities of the higher education modernization program during the COVID-19 pandemic is distance learning, which is possible due to the existence of information and educational technologies and communication systems, especially for effective education and its monitoring in higher education. The conditions under which the effectiveness of pedagogical support of monitoring activities in the process of distance learning is achieved are highlighted. According to the results of the survey, the problems faced by higher education seekers are revealed. A survey of students was conducted, which had a certain level of subjectivity in personal assessments, but the sample was quite representative.