The operation time of a disposal repository is generally more than one hundred years except for the institutional control phase. The structural integrity of a repository can be regarded as one of the most important research issues from the perspective of a long-term performance assessment, which is closely related to the public acceptance with regard to the nuclear safety. The objective of this study is to suggest the methodology for quantitative evaluation of structural integrity in a nuclear waste repository based on the adaptive artificial intelligence (AI), fractal theory, and acoustic emission (AE) monitoring. Here, adaptive AI means that the advanced AI model trained additionally based on the expert’s decision, engineering & field scale tests, numerical studies etc. in addition to the lab. test. In the process of a methodology development, AE source location, wave attenuation, the maximum AE energy and crack type classification were subsequently studied from the various lab. tests and Mazars damage model. The developed methodology for structural integrity was also applied to engineering scale concrete block (1.3 m × 1.3 m × 1.3 m) by artificial crack generation using a plate jacking method (up to 30 MPa) in KURT (KAERI Underground Research Tunnel). The concrete recipe used in engineering scale test was same as that of Gyeongju low & intermediate level waste repository. From this study, the reliability for AE crack source location, crack type classification, and damage assessment increased and all the processes for the technology development were verified from the Korea Testing Laboratory (KTL) in 2022.

This study investigated the effectiveness of various chlorinating agents in partitioning light water reactor spent fuel, with the aim of optimizing the chlorination process. Through thermodynamic equilibrium calculations, the effects of using MgCl2, NH4Cl, and Cl2 as a single chlorinating agent or applying MgCl2, NH4Cl, and Cl2 sequentially for spent fuel chlorination were evaluated Furthermore, in this study, assuming the actual process operation situation, where only a part of the semi-volatile nuclides is removed during the heat treatment process, and including the process of precipitating the molten salt from the chlorination process with K3PO4 and K2CO3 precipitants, the percentage distribution of 50 nuclides in the light water reactor spent fuel into each process stream was quantitatively calculated using the simulation function of the HSC program and tabulated for intuitive viewing. Compared to a single chlorinator, sequential chlorination more effectively separated the heat and radioactivity of the spent fuel from the uranium-dominated product solids. Specifically, the sequential application of the chlorinating agents following heat treatment led to a final solid separation characterized by 93.1% mass retention, 5.1% radioactivity, and 15.4% decay heat, relative to the original spent fuel. The findings underscore that sequential chlorination can be an effective method for spent fuel partitioning, either as a standalone approach or in combination with other partitioning processes such as pyroprocessing.

Korea has an agreement for cooperation with 31 countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia, and Japan. Under the agreement, the obligated items must be used for peaceful purposes, comply with nuclear non-proliferation and international safeguards, and obtain prior consent of shipment in case of enrichment, reprocessing, retransfer. Among them, the United States, Canada, and Australia have signed Administrative Arrangements of Cooperation Agreements (Supplementary Arrangements in Canada) for the international transfer and annual reports of obligated items. When operators submit an annual report, the government compiles and make the annual report based on the data. Ideally, the final report is submitted by the operator should be the national annual report, but in practice, discrepancies occur between sum of the operator’s and goverment’s. In order to resolve these problems and strengthen the linkage between exports contrpol and safeguards, our institute has begun the project to develop an ‘Obligation Tracking System for internationally controlled items (OTS)’. It is believed that obligated items which are unnecessarily included or omitted in annual report could be managed properly by developing OTS for life cycle of the items such as import, disposal/ termination or transfer to other countries. In case of nuclear material, especially, the characteristics of the facilities (e.g., bulk-handling facilities) must be considered and principles of fungibility, equivalence, and proportionality should be applied to materials. In order to computerize these procedures, we would like to propose to adopt the format of Code 10 for obligated item management. Code 10 is the form of the annex to the Korea-IAEA safeguards agreement which includes all records of inventory changes, import/export, and domestic movement of nuclear materials. It is expected to minimize discrepancies between operators’ annual reporting data and national annual reporting and further contribute to enhancing national trust and nuclear transparency.

Pine Wilt Disease (PWD) is a disease causing mass deaths of pine trees in South Korea, and the dead trees serve as breeding grounds for insect vectors responsible for spreading the disease to other host trees. Because the PWD requires early monitoring to minimize its damage on domestic forestry, this study aims to develop a species distribution model for predicting the potential distribution of PWD by using artificial neural network (ANN) with time-series data. Among the architectures, the Convolutional Neural Network exhibited the highest performance, achieving a validation accuracy of 0.854 and a cross-entropy loss of 0.401, and the InceptionTime model emerged as the second-best performer. This study identified the best-performing ANN architecture for a spatiotemporal evaluation of PWD occurrence, emphasizing the importance for determining hyperparameters with ecological characteristics and data types to apply deep learning into SDMs.

Fall armyworm Spodoptera frugiperda (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) is a polyphagous agricultural pest that damages about 80 species of plants. It mainly damages Poaceae and plants used as food resources for humans. Its original habitat is the American continent, but it unintentionally settled in tropical and subtropical Asia, including Africa, India, and Sri Lanka. It occurs every year even in southern China, which is geographically adjacent to the Korean Peninsula, causing damage to crops. In Korea, it was first discovered on Jeju Island in June 2019 and is being discovered every year in Jeju and some inland areas. In 2023, there were a total of 13 discoveries, including those in the Jeju and Jeonbuk regions. Quarantine agency identified the maternal genotypes of all currently discovered individuals using COI and identified differences in genetic traits between individuals using the sex-related Z-chromosome. For comparison with the information on the individuals that invaded the country, 15 individuals from Guangxi and Guangdong provinces in China were collected and secured. Through the analysis of overseas samples, a database has been added to compare genetic information with domestic invasive species, and the reliability of the analysis is expected to increase.

Solenopsis invicta, known as the red imported fire ant, is an insect native to South America. This species was unintentionally introduced into Australia, New Zealand, several Asian countries, Caribbean countries, and the United States. It shows a high survival rate and settlement potential in human-habitable and non-living areas such as tropical rainforests, disturbed areas, deserts, grasslands, and roads. In Korea, invasions of red fire ants have been reported every year since 2017, and two invasions were discovered in 2023. Quarantine agency analyzing the haplotype and colony social type of S. invicta for surveillance and control. Population genetic analysis using Microsatellite Alleleic data of 66 loci to trace the origin of the invasion. Through research cooperation with the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), we have received samples and expanded our genetic information database. This study analyzed genetic differences between 15 invasive populations and 44 reference groups. As a result of microsatellite analysis, the domestic invasive population showed a genetic structure similar to those in Guangzhou, China, and Florida, USA.

The box tree moth, Cydalima perspectalis (Walker, 1859) (Lepidoptera: Crambidae), is a native species in East Asia specialized in box trees (Buxus sp.) but has recently invaded most European countries. Due to the absence of its natural enemies in Europe, the economic impact is serious in most countries. In order to find parasitoids as biological control agents in Korea, C. perspectalis larvae were collected from ornamental and native box trees from various regions of the country from 2022 to 2023. While rearing them in the insectary, several parasitoids emerged from the larvae. We found at least six larval parasitoids, including five wasp species and one fly species. Molecular diagnosis using the nucleotide sequences of the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) showed that most samples were 90–97% identical to the data in the NCBI database. Further studies are required to determine biological and parasitic characteristics, such as developmental rate, fecundity, host specificity, and parasitic rate, to clarify the suitability of parasitoids as biological control agents.

This study examined the efficacy of various chlorinating agents in partitioning light water reactor spent fuel, with the aim of optimizing the chlorination process. Through thermodynamic equilibrium calculations, we assessed the outcomes of employing MgCl2, NH4Cl, and Cl2 as chlorinating agents. A comparison was drawn between using a single agent and a sequential approach involving all three agents (MgCl2, NH4Cl, and Cl2). Following heat treatment, the utilization of MgCl2 as the sole chlorinating agent resulted in a moderate separation. Specifically, this method yielded a solid separation with 96.9% mass retention, 31.7% radioactivity, and 44.2% decay heat, relative to the initial spent fuel. In contrast, the sequential application of the chlorinating agents following heat treatment led to a final solid separation characterized by 93.1% mass retention, 5.1% radioactivity, and 15.4% decay heat, relative to the original spent fuel. The findings underscore the potential effectiveness of a sequential chlorination strategy for partitioning spent fuel. This approach holds promise as a standalone technique or as a complementary process alongside other partitioning processes such as pyroprocessing. Overall, our findings contribute to the advancement of spent fuel management strategies.

Canine parvovirus-2 (CPV-2) has been reported worldwide as a major pathogen associated with acute hemorrhagic enteritis. The disease is a major infectious cause of death, particularly in young dogs. The earliest type of CPV-2 was replaced with three main subspecies, CPV-2a, CPV-2b, and CPV-2c, within a few years. Vaccination is carried out regularly, but the emergence of antigenic variants and the influence of maternal antibodies have limited the efficacy of commercial vaccines. New vaccines, such as the subunit vaccine, have been developed for alternative, safe, and effective vaccination. The baculovirus expression vector system (BEVS) is an excellent eukaryotic expression system with a high-level expression of foreign proteins and the ability of post-translational modification. Therefore, it is used widely to produce recombinant protein and subunit vaccines. In this study, the VP2 protein of CPV-2b cloned in the gateway vector system was generated using a baculovirus expression system in Spodoptera frugiperda (SF9) insect cells. Hemagglutination assay (HA) titers (24) were obtained, and the expression was detected in 6-His tagged VP2 and monoclonal antibody (mAb) against CPV-2 by western blotting. The VP2 protein of CPV-2b expressed in this study may provide a basis for a clinical diagnosis and vaccination applications for CPV-2.

본 연구에서는 한국산 미기록속인 밑들이자루맵시벌속(신칭)과 미기록종인 밑들이짧은자루맵시벌(신칭)을 처음으로 보고한다. 밑들이자루 맵시벌속은 잎벌류에 기생하는 것으로 알려져 있으며, 배마디 끝부분이 위쪽으로 굽어져있는 것이 특징이다. 본 논문에는 미기록속, 미기록종의 기 재문과 사진을 제공한다.

The objective of this study was to explore the symbolism associated with phoenix patterns in China and the temporal aesthetic characteristics of these patterns found in Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes. The study involved collecting examples of clothing designs featuring phoenix patterns from China Fashion Week and the Vogue website, spanning from spring and summer of 2016 to fall and winter of 2022. After collecting and organizing these examples, representative cases were selected for analysis. The objective was to identify effective techniques for incorporating phoenix patterns within the context of Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes and provided insights for future clothing design and textile pattern design research. Phoenix patterns boasted a lengthy history and were laden with symbolic meaning. Early renditions of phoenix patterns found at Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang were relatively simplistic in design, mainly employing elements like rhythm, coordination, balance and symmetry to convey a sense of nature and gravity. Over time, these patterns evolved under the influence of the prevailing cultural backdrop, employing repeated emphasis to portray notions of abundance and tenacity. Furthermore, regarding the use of phoenix patterns in clothing, there were four prevalent expression techniques: embroidery, beading, printing, and knitting. Traditional techniques like embroidery and beadwork often prioritized aesthetic features like coordination, emphasis, and symmetry, thereby showcasing the opulent characteristics of phoenix patterns. On the other hand, printing and knitting techniques used a single phoenix pattern or a modified version to simplify designs by emphasizing or repeating aesthetic characteristics while adhering to a modern artistic approach.

Due to the rapid development of technology, the environment is rapidly changing, and new regulations are emerging in the global society. In addition, environmental and social problems such as the pandemic and deepening social polarization have intensified, and the international community and investors have begun to regard ESG as a key factor in decision making. Regulations and systems reflecting ESG elements, such as the Carbon Neutral Act to cope with environmental problems and the Serious Disaster Act to cope with social problems, have already been enacted and implemented in major countries such as the EU and the Republic of Korea. In particular, the EU is pushing to publish ESG disclosure standards and make ESG disclosure mandatory next year. Given this trend, companies should consider ESG management as their business key strategy, as well as consumer characteristics and regulation.