After the Fukushima accident in 2011, relevant concerns regarding the contamination of the natural environment rose abruptly. For example, water contaminated by radionuclides such as Cs and Sr may directly flow into the ocean and threaten the marine ecosystem. In this respect, costeffective and efficient decontamination techniques need to be developed and verified to remediate the contaminated water. Prussian blue (PB) is known as a representative material that can adsorb Cs by ion-trapping and is widely used for medical purposes. However, there is a limitation that PB itself is non-separable and highly mobile in aqueous system, so it needs a fixture, such as bentonite, to be collected after the adsorption. Furthermore, while the performance of PB toward Cs is relatively well known, its behavior toward Sr has rarely been reported. The object of this study is to investigate the sorption characteristics of Cs and Sr onto PB-functionalized bentonite at various conditions. The adsorbent employed in the present work was prepared by mixing bentonite, FeCl3, and K4[Fe(CN)6] at room temperature for 24 hours in the aqueous solution. The concentrations of FeCl3 and K4[Fe(CN)6] were set to a range of 5-200 % compared to the cation exchange capacity of bentonite. After that, the PB-functionalized bentonite was sieved with a mesh size of 63 μm and then reacted with the Cs and Sr solution at various liquid-to-solid (L/S) ratios of 2-10 g/L for up to 500 minutes. Moreover, synthetic seawater containing additional Cs and Sr was reacted with PBfunctionalized bentonite to characterize the ion selectivity of PB. After the completion of the adsorption experiment, a part of the adsorbent was separated and desorption of Cs and Sr with 2 M of nitric acid was performed. For the quantification of aqueous Cs and Sr concentrations, ICP-MS was employed after the filtration with a pore size of 0.45 μm. The result obtained in this study revealed a high sorption affinity of Cs and Sr onto PBfunctionalized bentonite. The analysis results also presented that the sorption reactions of Cs and Sr reached their steady state within 10 minutes of reaction time. Furthermore, the ion selectivity toward Cs and Sr was verified through sorption test with synthetic seawater. According to the high sorption affinity and selectivity, the PB-functionalized bentonite synthesized through this study is expected to be widely used for remediating the Cs- and Sr-contaminated groundwater and seawater, particularly in nuclear waste-relevant industries.

Recycled aggregate is a solution to reduce construction waste and to be environmentally friendly, but concrete using it has various disadvantages in terms of structure. Therefore, the interaction effect of the two materials can be expected by filling the cyclic aggregate concrete in the CFT column. Eighteen specimens were constructed to confirm the compressive behavior of RCFT (Recylced Concrete Filled Tube) columns, which can be applied to real buildings by making high strength concrete with recycled aggregate. Variable is the shape and thickness of steel pipe, concrete strength and mixing ratio, and coarse aggregate and fine aggregate are all used as recycled aggregate. A total of three recycled aggregate concrete preformulations were used to find the optimal mixing ratio and the compressive behavior was analyzed through the load - displacement curves of RCFT columns.

A coagulation-flocculation (CF) process using aluminum sulfate as a coagulant was employed to treat highly suspended solids in tunnel wastewater. Response surface methodology (RSM) based on a Box-Behnken design was applied to evaluate the effects of three factors (coagulant dosage, pH and temperature) on total suspended solids (TSS) removal efficiency as well as to identify optimal values of those factors to maximize removal of TSS. Optimal conditions of coagulant dosage and pH for maximum TSS removal changed depending on the temperature (4 ~ 24°C). As temperature increased, the amount of coagulant dosage and pH level decreased for maximum TSS removal efficiency during the CF process. Proper adjustment of optimal pH and coagulant dosage to accommodate temperature fluctuations can improve TSS removal performance of the CF process.

The objective of the study is to assess the water quality improvement resulted from the rearrangement ofthe irrigation water supply systems at Mankyeong River Basin in Korea. There is a mixed type of watershed composed of urban and rural areas in the region. When the current intake of irrigation water installed at the Eo-u weir is moved downward to the confluence of Jeon-ju stream, it was expected that the water quality of main stream could be significantly improved

The primary purpose of this study was to determine the risk of various disease outcomes due to exposure to cyanobacteria toxin (microcystin-LR) through drinking water in a Korean watershed. In order to determine the risk in a more quantitative way, the risk assessment framework developed by the National Research Council (NRC) of the United States (US) - hazard identification, dose-response relationship, exposure assessment, and risk characterization - was used in this study. For dose-response relationships, a computer software (BenchMark Dose Software (BMDS)) developed by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was used to fit the data from previous studies showing the relationship between the concentration of microcystin-LR and various disease outcomes into various dose-response models. For exposure assessment, the concentrations of microcystin-LR in the source water and finished water in a Korean watershed obtained from a recent study conducted by the Ministry of Environment of Korea were used. Finally, the risk of various disease outcomes due to exposure to cyanobacteria toxin (microcystin-LR) through drinking water was characterized by Monte-Carlo simulation using Crystall Ball program (Oracle Inc.) for adults and children. The results of this study suggest that the risk of disease due to microcystin-LR toxin through drinking water is very low and it appears that current water treatment practice should be able to protect the public from the harmful effects of cyanobacteria toxin (microcystin-LR) through drinking water.