Periodontal disease is an inflammatory disease that affects the destruction of the bone supporting the tooth and connective tissues surrounding it. Periodontal ligament fibroblasts (PDLFs) induce overexpression of matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) involved in periodontal diseaseʼs inflammatory destruction. Osteoclasts take part in physiological bone remodeling, but they are also involved in bone destruction in many kinds of bone diseases, including osteoporosis and periodontal disease. This study examined the effect of baicalin on proteolytic enzymesʼ production and secretion of inflammatory cytokines in PDLFs and RAW 264.7 cells under the lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced inflammatory conditions. Baicalin inhibited the expression of the protein, MMP-1 and MMP-2, without affecting PDLFs’ cell viability, suggesting its possibility because of the inhibition of phosphorylation activation of mitogen-activated protein kinase’s p38, and the signal transduction process of nuclear factor κB (NFκB)-related protein. Also, baicalin reduced the expression of MMP-8 and MMP-9 in RAW 264.7 cells. This reduction is thought to be due to the inhibition of the signal transduction process of NFκB-related proteins affected by inhibiting p65RelA phosphorylation. Also, baicalin inhibited the secretion of nitric oxide and interleukin-6 induced by LPS in RAW 264.7 cells. These results suggest that baicalin inhibits connective tissue destruction in periodontal disease. The inhibition of periodontal tissue destruction may be a therapeutic strategy for treating inflammatory periodontal-diseased patients.

Environmental fundamental facilities have different odor emission characteristics depending on the type of treatment facilities. To overcome the limitations of the olfactometry method, research needs to be conducted on how to calculate the dilution factor from the individual odor concentrations. The aim of this study was to determine the air dilution factor estimated from manually measured concentration data of individual odor substances (22 specified odor species) in three environmental treatment facilities. In order to calculate the optimum algorism for each environmental fundamental facility, three types of facilities were selected, the concentration of odor substances in the exhaust gas was measured, and the contribution of the overall dilution factor was evaluated. To estimate the dilution factor, four to six algorism were induced and evaluated by correlation analysis between substance concentration and complex odor data. Dilution factors from O municipal water treatment (MWT) and Y livestock wastewater treatment (LWT) facilities showed high level of dilution factors, because concentration levels of hydrogen sulfide and methylmercaptan, which had low odor threshold concentrations, were high. In S food waste treatment (FWT) facility, the aldehyde group strongly influenced dilution the factor (dominant substance: acetaldehyde, i-valeraldhyde and methylmercaptan). In the evaluation of four to six algorism to estimate the dilution factor, the vector algorism (described in the text) was optimum for O MWT and Y LWT, while the algorism using the sum of the top-three dominant substances showed the best outcome for S FWT. In further studies, estimation of the dilution factor from simultaneously monitored data by odor sensors will be developed and integrated with the results in this study.

Background: A pressure ulcer is common in soft tissue over the greater trochanter (GT) in side-lying position, and sustained tissue deformation induced by the prolonged external force is a primary cause, which can be discussed with soft tissues’ viscoelastic properties (i.e., stress relaxation, creep response). Objects: Using an automated hand-held indentation device, we measured the viscoelastic properties of soft tissue over the hip area, in order to examine how the properties are affected by site with respect to the GT. Methods: Twenty participants (15 males and 5 females) who aged from 21 to 32 were participated. An automated hand-held indentation device was used to measure the stress relaxation time and creep response. Trials were acquired for three different locations with respect to the GT (i.e., right over the GT, 6 cm anterior or posterior to the GT). For each location, five trials were acquired and averaged for data analyses. Results: Soft tissues’ stress relaxation time and creep response were associated with site (F = 23.98, p < 0.005; F = 24.09, p < 0.005; respectively). The stress relaxation time was greatest at posterior gluteal region (19.22 ± 2.49 ms), and followed by anterior region (15.39 ± 2.47 ms) and right over the GT (14.40 ± 3.18 ms). Similarly, creep response was greatest at posterior gluteal region (1.16 ± 0.14), and followed by anterior region (0.95 ± 0.14) and right over the GT (0.89 ± 0.18). Conclusion: Our results showed that the stress relaxation and creep were greatest at the posterior gluteal region and least at right over the GT, indicating that the gluteal soft tissue is more protective to the prolonged external force, when compared to the trochanteric soft tissue. The results suggest that a risk of pressure ulcer over the GT may decrease with slightly posteriorly rotated side-lying position.

The aims of the present study were to confirm that regulation of the PA and environment via TGF-β regulation of sperm by Percoll-separated in porcine uterine epithelial cells. And, it was performed to identify the cytokines (TGF-β1, 2 and 3, TGF-β receptor1 and 2; interleukin, IL-6, IL-8) and PA-related genes (urokinase-PA, uPA; tissue- PA, tPA; PA inhibitor, PAI; uPA-receptor, uPAR) by spermatozoa. The experiment used porcine uterus epithelial cells (pUECs) and uterine tissue epithelial cells, Boar sperm were separated by discontinuous Percoll density gradient (45/90%), and tissues were co-incubated with spermatozoa, followed by real-time PCR. PA activity was measured of sperm by discontinuous Percoll density gradient (45/90%) for 24 hours. To measure viability and acrosome damage of sperm double stained propidium iodide (PI) and SYBR- 14 or FITC-PNA were used. In results, binding ratio of Percoll-separated sperm was found no differences, but sperms isolated from 90% Percoll layer reduced PA activity (p < 0.05). when co-cultured sperm selected Percoll in porcine uterus tissues epithelial cells, 90% layer sperm increased TGF-β R1, contrastively tPA and PAI-1 in comparison with control (p < 0.05). 45% sperm was decreased the expression of uPA (p < 0.05). TGF-β decreased PA activity in the supernatant collected from pUECs (p < 0.05). Especially, The group including uPA, PAI-1 were induce sperm intact, while it was reduced in sperm damage when compared to control (p < 0.05). Also, there was no significant difference group of tPA and tPA+I in the dead sperm and acrosome damage compared to control. The expression of tPA and PAI showed a common response. Percoll-separated spermatozoa in 90% layer reduced tPA and IL-related gene mRNA expression. Thus, Percoll-sparated sperm in 90% layer show that it can suppress inflammation through increased expression of TGF-β and downregulation of PA and IL in epithelial cells compared to 45% layer Percoll.

L-ascorbic acid (L-AA; vitamin C) induces apoptosis in cancer cells. This study aimed to elucidate the molecular mechanisms of L-AA-induced apoptosis in human laryngeal epidermoid carcinoma Hep-2 cells. L-AA suppressed the viability of Hep-2 cells and induced apoptosis, as shown by the cleavage and condensation of nuclear chromatin and increased number of Annexin V-positive cells. L-AA decreased Bcl-2 protein expression but upregulated Bax protein levels. In addition, cytochrome c release from the mitochondria into the cytosol and activation of caspase-9, -8, and -3 were enhanced by L-AA treatment. Furthermore, apoptosis-inducing factor (AIF) and endonuclease G (EndoG) were translocated into the nucleus during apoptosis of L-AA-treated Hep-2 cells. L-AA effectively inhibited the constitutive nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) activation and attenuated the nuclear expression of the p65 subunit of NF-κB. Interestingly, L-AA treatment of Hep-2 cells markedly activated Akt and mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK; extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2, p38, and c-Jun N-terminal kinase [JNK]) and and LY294002 (Akt inhibitor), SB203580 (p38 inhibitor) or SP600125 (a JNK inhibitor) decreased the levels of Annexin V-positive cells. These results suggested that L-AA induces the apoptosis of Hep-2 cells via the nuclear translocation of AIF and EndoG by modulating the Bcl- 2 family and MAPK/Akt signaling pathways.

The radionuclide inventory in radioactive waste from nuclear power plants should be determined to secure the safety of final repositories. As an alternative to time-consuming, labor-intensive, and destructive radiochemical analysis, the indirect scaling factor (SF) method has been used to determine the concentrations of difficult-to-measure radionuclides. Despite its long history, the original SF methodology remains almost unchanged and now needs to be improved for advanced SF implementation. Intense public attention and interest have been strongly directed to the reliability of the procedures and data regarding repository safety since the first operation of the low- and intermediate-level radioactive waste disposal facility in Gyeongju, Korea. In this review, statistical methodologies for SF implementation are described and evaluated to achieve reasonable and advanced decision-making. The first part of this review begins with an overview of the current status of the scaling factor method and global experiences, including some specific statistical issues associated with SF implementation. In addition, this review aims to extend the applicability of SF to the characterization of large quantities of waste from the decommissioning of nuclear facilities.

Marina is a small port located along a coastline that provides facilities and services for small boats and yachts. The main facilities of marina are pontoon, freshwater, and power supplies. Marina also provides service for boat maintenance and service, and security. In Malaysia, the marina is operated by private companies and Marine Department Malaysia. All the marinas in Malaysia provide the same facilities and services, however they are not operating at the same level. Few marinas had closed their operation due to insufficient number of boats arrived to their marina. The reason of this issue is lack of study about marina operation and management in Malaysia. Further study should be done in this field to overcome this issue and increased the growth of economy for marina. Therefore, the objective of this study to determine the factors to establish a marina in Malaysia and to identify the reason certain marina less performed. This research focused on the marina operators on the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia. The literature review was used to identify the factors to establish a marina. The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) approach was used to analyse the data. This method had ranked the crucial factors from the highest to the lowest percentage. Four main criteria to establish a marina had been identified, namely locations, facilities, services, and promotion. Besides that, there also the sub-criteria for all the main factor to describe it. All the identified factors had been analysed to find the most important factor. The consolidate result showed that geography, security, berthing, purpose, boat chandlery and boat service are the highest percentage among other factors. It concludes that it is the most important factor to establish a marina. These results can be used to improve the operation of marina in Malaysia by focusing on these aforementioned factors.

Naval weapons systems of the Republic of Korea are acquired through the Defense Planning Management System. Recently, acquisition of some naval ships have been delayed, and the causes of the delays have been recognized as inappropriate project management at the Execution Phase. However, we argue that the delay problem in naval ships acquisition should be approached, with due regard for the entire Defense Planning Management System. That is, We should try to investigate from Planning Phase to those of Programming, Budgeting and Execution Phases. Therefore, in this study, we investigated the actual cases of the delay in naval acquisition at all phases of the Defense Planning Management System. Based on the investigation, we tried to identify the naval ship Acquisition Delay Factors and find out the Weights of those factors. As the next step, we calculated the Influence Measures on the naval missions, including the Cost of Naval Capability Gap derived from the delays in acquisition of naval ships. As a final step, we calculated the Acquisition Delay Measures based on the interrelationship between the Acquisition Delay Factors and the Influence Measures. Then we evaluated and analyzed what the results stand for. Finally, we made suggestions for future improvement. The improvement suggestions we made for preventing delay in acquisition of naval ships in this study are as follows. First, we need a shift in perception. It is necessary to measure the Acquisition Delay Factors in acquiring naval ships and manage them from the Planning Phase. Second, resolution must be concerted efforts. All relevant agencies, not just a few, should work together to resolve the problems of acquisition delay. Third, analysis must be based on the accumulation of data. This allows the elaborating of naval ship Acquisition Delay Factors and Delay Measures. If this research method is applied to other military weapons systems in the future, we may be able to not just identify the Acquisition Delay Factors in acquisition of other military weapons systems, but also pursue improvement in those cases.

본 논문은 K-POP의 주요 성공 요인을 K-POP 아이돌의 총괄적 배경과 특징을 통해 도출하고 그에 따른 발전방안을 코로나19 시대에 비추어 제언하였다. 아이돌 중심의 K-POP은 한류 문화의 글로벌 확산에 기여한 대표적인 문화 상품이라 할 수 있다. 이러한 K-POP의 문화적 지형은 과거 할리우드의 스타시스템을 기반으로 정립되었으며, 다양하고 혁신적인 시도를 통해 발전해 왔다. 이에 선행연구를 통해 K-POP의 정의에 대한 전반적인 주장들을 취합하여 정리했으며, K-POP 아이돌의 기본적인 배경을 정리하고 K-POP의 성공 요인으로 혁신적 비즈니스 모델의 창출을 예로 들었다. 하지만 혁신적 비즈니스 모델의 창출을 K-POP의 단일적 성공 요인으로 볼 수는 없으며, 듣는 음악에서 보는 음악으로의 시대적 변화, 실물음반의 역할변화 그리고 글로벌화와 더불어 신장된 소비자 즉, 팬덤의 역할변화 등의 영향이 있었다. 반면, K-POP 의 성공은 사행성, 스타시스템의 비인간적 상품화 등으로 인해 몇 가지 부작용을 불러왔고 사회문제로 대두되기까지 했다. 이에 K-POP의 성공 뒤에 가려진 문제점들을 정립하고 해결방안 을 모색하였다. 2020년 코로나바이러스-19의 창궐과 함께 시행된 사회적 거리두기는 대중음악계에 큰 변화를 야기했고, 이는 K-POP에도 영향을 미쳤다. 하지만 K-POP 시장의 양상은 세계 대중음악 시장의 그것과는 전혀 다른 양상을 보였다. 결과적으로 언택트 문화와 더불어 비대면 방식의 삶이 정착되는 와중, 이러한 현상이 나타난 이유는 K-POP의 특수성이 있었다는 결과를 도출하였다. 본 연구는 이에 착안해 K-POP 시장의 현 양상을 분석하여 발전 방안을 모색 했으며 포스트 코로나 시대의 K-POP 시장의 방향성을 제시하였다.

PURPOSES : In this study, the causality between smart parking user services and its satisfaction level was analyzed statistically, and a smart parking priority decision model was established in terms of the user side. METHODS :The results of the Daegu Metropolitan City survey for the parking state, parking fee, transfer, convenience of use, facilities, and safety that could influence smart parking user satisfaction were used. A structural equation model in SPSS 26 and AMOS 26 programs that facilitates hypothesis testing and importance factor analysis between observed and latent variables was used. RESULTS : The results demonstrated that the importance factor loading on smart parking user services was in the following order: convenience of use (0.996), parking facilities (0.814), safety (0.803), parking information (0.706), transfer (0.618), and parking fee (0.426). Among them, the parking fee was not quite influential in decision making. CONCLUSIONS : The most influential user service on smart parking information systems was the convenience of use, in which congestion in parking lots and parking time were the most influential variables. The most influential variables were in the following order: in parking facilities, the route design of vehicle flow and size of the parking garage; in safety, the entrance location and the level of wear; in the parking state, the availability of parking space and parking fees; and finally in transfer, the convenience of transfer to other modes and the number of transfer parking lots.

Companies struggle to make their best products with high quality and service at a competitive price in global markets. However, customer needs and requirements keep changing with a variety of situations. Companies that face the changes can not stay the same and make an effort to adapt themselves to new circumstances. They would probably review the overall management system that is currently implementing to improve management efficiency. Among other things, quality might be considered to be a crucial element if they are manufacturing industries to be sustained in global markets. KSA (Korean Standards Association) is a government- affiliated organization under the Ministry of Trade, Infrastructure, and Energy. It is a Korean standards provider for quality and service industry. KSA confers national commendations for organizations, quality circles, artisans, QCEC (Quality Competitive Excellent Company), and the most honorable KNQA (Korean National Quality Award) every year. KSA established KNQA on the basis of Malcom Baldrige National Quality Award, Deming Prize, and European Quality Award. Research on quality awards shows that there are many similarities in the framework. Although KSA summarizes two factors for 13 evaluation indicators in the quality competitive excellent model of QCEC, the categorization is ambiguous to explain them according to earlier studies. We performed a deep analysis of foreign quality awards and background for KNQA and QCEC. We conducted a content analysis of KNQA and QCEC and matched evaluation items that were closely related. We proposed a quality competitiveness model with three factors, Technology, System, and Tools, summarizing 13 evaluation indicators in QCEC. Based on audit data for six years from 2012 to 2017 we carried out a confirmatory factor analysis for the proposed model by examining the model validity and fitness.

본 연구는 노인 스포츠 참여동기와 재미요인, 여가만족 및 운동지속의 관계를 규명하는데 목적이 있다. 자료분석을 위하여 서울 소재의 노인종합복지관에서 스포츠 프로그램에 참여하는 노인을 모집단으로 총 200부의 설문지를 배포하였으며, 불성실한 응답 17부를 제외한 총 183부(91.5%)의 자료를 유효표 본으로 사용하였다. 자료처리를 위하여 IBM AMOS 21을 이용하여 빈도분석, 확인적 요인분석, 집중타당 도, 판별타당도, 개념신뢰도, Cronbach’s α, 상관관계분석, 구조방정식 모형 검증을 실시하였다. 이에 다음과 같은 결과를 도출하였다. 첫째, 노인 스포츠 참여동기는 재미요인에 영향을 미쳤다. 둘째, 노인 스포츠 참여동기는 여가만족에 영향을 미쳤다. 셋째, 노인스포츠 참여동기는 운동지속에 영향을 미쳤다. 넷째, 노인 스포츠 재미요인은 여가만족에 영향을 미쳤다. 다섯째, 노인스포츠 재미요인은 운동지속에 영향을 미쳤다. 여섯째, 노인스포츠 운동만족은 운동지속에 영향을 미쳤다.