• IMMUNE NETWORK
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.6.1-6.24
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• 2023

Intestinal microorganisms interact with various immune cells and are involved in gut homeostasis and immune regulation. Although many studies have discussed the roles of the microorganisms themselves, interest in the effector function of their metabolites is increasing. The metabolic processes of these molecules provide important clues to the existence and function of gut microbes. The interrelationship between metabolites and T lymphocytes in particular plays a significant role in adaptive immune functions. Our current review focuses on 3 groups of metabolites: short-chain fatty acids, bile acids metabolites, and polyamines. We collated the findings of several studies on the transformation and production of these metabolites by gut microbes and explained their immunological roles. Specifically, we summarized the reports on changes in mucosal immune homeostasis represented by the Tregs and Th17 cells balance. The relationship between specific metabolites and diseases was also analyzed through latest studies. Thus, this review highlights microbial metabolites as the hidden treasure having potential diagnostic markers and therapeutic targets through a comprehensive understanding of the gut-immune interaction.

• Advances in nano research
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.53-69
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• 2024

Advancements in the technology of building materials has led to diverse applications of nanomaterials with the aim to monitor concrete structures. While there are myriad instances of the use of nanoparticles in building materials, the production of smart nano cement-composites is often expensive. Thereupon, this research aims to discover a sustainable nanomaterial from tyre waste using the pyrolysis process as part of the green manufacturing circle. Here, Nano Structure Tyre-Char (NSTC) is introduced as a zero-dimension carbon-based nanoparticle. The NSTC particles were characterized using various standard characterization techniques. Several salient results for the NSTC particles were obtained using microscopic and spectroscopic techniques. The size of the particles as well as that of the agglomerates were reduced significantly using the milling process and the results were validated through a scanning electron microscope. The crystallite size and crystallinity were found to be ~35nm and 10.42%, respectively. The direct bandgap value of 5.93eV and good optical conductivity at 786 nm were obtained from the ultra violet visible spectroscopy measurements. The thermal analysis reveals the presence of a substantial amount of carbon, the rate of maximum weight loss, and the two stages of phase transformation. The FT-Raman confirms the presence of carboxyl groups and a ID/IG ratio of 0.83. Water contact angle around 140° on the surface implies the highly hydrophobic nature of the material and its low surface energy. This characteristic process assists to obtain a sustainable nanomaterial from waste tyres, contributing to the development of a smart building material.

• Journal of the Korea Computer Graphics Society
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.179-188
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• 2024

Recently, unmanned terminals (kiosks) have greatly increased their scope of use by allowing orders or payments to be made efficiently while replacing existing manpower. With the acceleration of digital transformation, the rate of kiosk installations has soared, making it an important task to help all age groups easily use kiosks. In this study, based on the function of the game engine and Hand Tracking technology, we developed content that can conduct kiosk education in a virtual world. The goal of this content is to help users unfamiliar with kiosks confidently cope with real-world situations by experiencing visual and auditory stress caused by waiting guests in virtual reality. To this end, two VR contents were developed. One is a simple kiosk experience content, and the other is specialized content that causes visual and auditory stress. The experiment was divided into two groups: one group experienced general VR content, while the other group experienced specialized VR content. After the experience, both groups proceeded to place orders in an actual store. Survey results showed that 85% of the experimental group and 95% of the control group were satisfied with the training. This confirms that the specialized experience described in this paper is effective for kiosk education.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.340-359
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• 1994

This study intends to describe the characteristics of the transformation of the rural society by tracing the changing social and economic processes of traditional clan villiage (Yeolmi-ri, Silchon-myeon, Kwangju-gun, Kyunggi-province) in the suburbs of Seoul Metropolitan Area. Rural society has experienced serious change of the social structure by the ever expanding urbanization and industrialization since 1960's. The suburbs of Seoul Metropolitan Area is the representative case area of such transformation. This study analyzed various chracteristics of population structure of a villiage, the processes of residential movement and the occupational shift of each household of the villiage in terms of household's life-history collected by interviewing with each household. And the whole households of a villiage is divided by two groups of the native clan group and the non-dan in-migrant group. The results of this study are summarized as follows. 1) This villiage is located within a lineal distance of 40km and a time distance of about 30 to 40 minutes, adjoined dy the Joongbu(중부) national highway, the Kyungchoong (경충) industrial road, the local road between Yangpyuna(양평) and Gonjiam(곤지암) and having a advantageous iocational linkage to Seoul capital city. 2) It is a typical traditional dan villiae constituted of dan family Gu(구) one of whose ancestors had appointed to the prime minister of Chosun Dynasty, and until 1979, 56 out of 60 families of the villiage households were clan families. 3) Since 1979, as the villiage invaded by the out-movement of the small scale manufacturing industries from Seoul capital city, labours moved in this vallige from outside and increased villiage size up to 203 households in 1993, consequently the constitutional proportion between the native clan group and the non-clan in-migrant group was reversed up to 28% vs 72% deepening the sociological heterogeneity. 4) Because of the small scale of industries in this villiage and the vicinity with the city of Seoul, the population turnover of this villiage is very high. The turnover frequency is firstly high within same administrative district of gun(군) level and secondly high between this villiage and the city of Seoul. Thus short-distance movement is identified. 5) There is a close correlation between the residential movement and the occupational shift. The most numbers of non-farm native group have the experiences of migration while the members of native farming group don't shift both the job and the place of residence. The inmigrant group had several migration experiences but few occupational shifts. Thus occupatioanl shift is high for the native group while residential shift is high for the in-migrant group. It is concluded that the change proceeded in Metropolitan suburbs was not directed to form the traditional rural village as 'gesund Gebiet' with respect to the ballance among the economic, cultural and environmental adequency.

• The Korean journal of internal medicine
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.1194-1202
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• 2018

Background/Aims: This study evaluated the role of hypomethylating agents (HMA) compared to best supportive care (BSC) for patients with high or very-high (H/VH) risk myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) according to the Revised International Prognostic Scoring System. Methods: A total of 279 H/VH risk MDS patients registered in the Korean MDS Working Party database were retrospectively analyzed. Results: HMA therapy was administered to 205 patients (73.5%), including 31 patients (11.1%) who then received allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (allo-HCT), while 74 patients (26.5%) received BSC or allo-HCT without HMA. The 3-year overall survival (OS) rates were $53.1%{\pm}10.7%$ for allo-HCT with HMA, $75%{\pm}21.7%$ for allo-HCT without HMA, $17.3%{\pm}3.6%$ for HMA, and $20.8%{\pm}6.9%$ for BSC groups (p < 0.001). In the multivariate analysis, only allo-HCT was related with favorable OS (hazard ratio [HR], 0.356; p = 0.002), while very poor cytogenetic risk (HR, 5.696; p = 0.042), age ${\geq}65years$ (HR, 1.578; p = 0.022), Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status (ECOG PS) 2 to 4 (HR, 2.837; p < 0.001), and transformation to acute myeloid leukemia (AML) (HR, 1.901; p = 0.001) all had an adverse effect on OS. Conclusions: For the H/VH risk group, very poor cytogenetic risk, age ${\geq}65years$, ECOG PS 2 to 4, and AML transformation were poor prognostic factors. HMA showed no benefit in terms of OS when compared to BSC. Allo-HCT was the only factor predicting a favorable long-term outcome. The use of HMA therapy did not seem to have an adverse effect on the transplantation outcomes. However, the conclusion of this study should be carefully interpreted and proven by large scale research in the future.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.26 no.7
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• pp.147-159
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• 2010

The settlement prediction is very important in preloading method for a construction site on the soft ground. At the design stage, however, it is hard to predict the settlement exactly due to limitations of the site survey. Most of the settlement prediction is performed by a regression settlement curve based on the field data during construction. In Korea, hyperbolic method has been most commonly used to align the settlement curve with the field data, because of its simplicity and many application cases. The results from hyperbolic method, however, may differ by data selections or data fitting methods. In this study, the analyses using hyperbolic method were performed about the field data of $\bigcirc\bigcirc$ site in Pusan. Two data fitting methods, using an axis transformation or an alternative method which is a direct regression method, were applied with various data groups. If data was used only after the ground water level being stabilized, fitting results using both methods were in good agreement with the measured data. Regardless of the information about the ground water level, the alternative method gives better results with the field data than the method using an axis transformation.

• Journal of Bio-Environment Control
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.139-147
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• 2024

Mealworms are used as food, so it is preferable if the larval stage lasts longer. On the other hand, to accelerate the population growth of mealworms, it is preferable if the larvae become adults quickly. The purpose of this study is to explore the effects of population density on development time of mealworms. We used a container size of 7 cm at the top, 5 cm at the bottom, and 3 cm in height. Mealworms lived in the containers at densities of 1, 2, 5, 10, and 20 per container. The containers were bedded with 1 g of wheat bran and formed two groups, fed and not fed, at each density levels. The experiments were performed three times. In all of the experiments, higher population densities resulted in shorter transformation times from larva to pupa, but the time from pupa to imago was not significantly different. In addition, given the same density, the presence of food accelerated the time to transformation to pupa, but not to imago. The data supported that a lower density is needed to prolong the larval stage, and if adults are needed at a faster rate, the density should be higher. Therefore, we conclude that the development time of mealworms can be controlled by the density which is useful information for mealworm farmers.

• Journal of Bio-Environment Control
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.172-177
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• 2024

Many studies have reported that mealworms can ingest plastic during their larval stage. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of expanded polystyrene consumption on the growth and development of mealworms during their larval stage. We found that the growth rate is significantly different between mealworms consumed wheat bran and mealworms consumed expanded polystyrene (p < 0.001). The transformation into pupa occurred faster among the mealworms consumed expanded polystyrene than those consumed wheat bran (p < 0.001). However, the survival rate was not significantly different between the two groups of mealworms (p = 0.786). Based on the data, we conclude that mealworms consuming expanded polystyrene have a slower weight gain and a shorter development period than mealworms consuming wheat bran, but the expanded polystyrene does not affect the survival rate before the transformation into pupa. Practically, we anticipate that mealworms can be a resource for the sustainable and eco-friendly removal of expanded polystyrene waste.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.403-408
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• 2012

In this study, the homogenous Pd nanoparticles (Pd NPs) were first prepared with bayberry tannin (BT) as the stabilizers. Subsequently, the obtained bayberry tannin-stabilized Pd nanoparticles (BT-Pd) were immobilized onto ${\gamma}-Al_2O_3$ to prepare heterogeneous ${\gamma}-Al_2O_3$-BT-Pd catalysts. Fourier Transformation Infrared Spectrum (FTIR) and X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS) analyses confirmed that the Pd NPs were well stabilized by the phenolic hydroxyl groups of BT. Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) observation indicated that the diameter of the Pd NPs can be effectively controlled in the range of 4.2-16.0 nm by varying the amount of BT. It is found that the ${\gamma}-Al_2O_3$-BT-Pd catalysts exhibit highly activity for various olefin hydrogenations. For example, the initial TOF (turnover frequency) of the ${\gamma}-Al_2O_3$-BT-Pd in the allyl alcohol hydrogenation is as high as $12804 mol{\cdot}mol^{-1}{\cdot}h^{-1}$. Furthermore, the ${\gamma}-Al_2O_3$-BT-Pd can be reused 5 times without significant loss of activity, exhibiting a superior reusability as compared with conventionally prepared ${\gamma}-Al_2O_3$-Pd catalysts.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.2383-2388
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• 2016

Background: The reversion-inducing-cysteine-rich protein with Kazal motifs (RECK) gene is a novel transformation suppressor gene linked to several malignancies. Objective: To analyze any association between RECK gene rs10814325 single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) and HCC susceptibility with various clinicopathological and laboratory data. Materials and Methods: RECK gene rs10814325 SNP was estimated, using real-time PCR, in 30 HCC patients on top of HCV infection, 30 HCV related cirrhotic patients and 30 healthy controls. Results: No special pattern of association could be detected on comparing the RECK gene rs10814325 genotypes(P=0.5), or alleles(P=0.49) among the studied groups. HCC patients with TT genotype had younger age (mean of $54.1{\pm}6.0$ years vs $60.6{\pm}10.2$ years for TC/CC genotypes, P=0.035). Abdominal distension was significantly greater in TT genotype patients (75% vs 30%for TC/CC genotypes, P=0.045). The TT genotype was present in 75% of patients with lymph node metastasis. Serum GGT levels were higher in TT genotype patients [80 (48.5-134.8) IU/L vs 40 (33-87.5) IU/L for TC/CCgenotypes], and lower limb edema was observed in 60% for TT vs 20% for TC/CCgenotypes, but both just failed to reach significance (p=0.05 and p=0.06 respectively). Conclusions: RECK gene rs10814325 T>C could not be considered a risk factor for HCC development on top of HCV, but may be related to the disease progression and metastasis.