Public Opinions on Inter-Korean Economic Cooperation: A Survey Analysis

This research attempts to provide an in-depth analysis of the public perceptions of inter-Korean economic cooperation. KDI survey data with a sample size of 1,000 were subjected to empirical analyses. By means of ordered logit estimations, we derive the following results. First, there is a significant effect of age on economic cooperation perceptions, where younger generations tend to be more negative. Second, the group who has positive view on the economic cooperation tends to prefer large-scale, domestic-entity-funded cooperation projects, whereas the group who has negative view tends to prefer small-scale projects and projects funded by international organizations. According to these results, prioritizing trade with the involvement of international organizations is likely to be an effective measure to alleviate potential political constraints and to achieve sustainable long-run economic cooperation systems when pursuing the economic cooperation

Perception-Oriented Single Image Super-Resolution using Optimal Objective Estimation

Single-image super-resolution (SISR) networks trained with perceptual and adversarial losses provide high-contrast outputs compared to those of networks trained with distortion-oriented losses, such as L1 or L2. However, it has been shown that using a single perceptual loss is insufficient for accurately restoring locally varying diverse shapes in images, often generating undesirable artifacts or unnatural details. For this reason, combinations of various losses, such as perceptual, adversarial, and distortion losses, have been attempted, yet it remains challenging to find optimal combinations. Hence, in this paper, we propose a new SISR framework that applies optimal objectives for each region to generate plausible results in overall areas of high-resolution outputs. Specifically, the framework comprises two models: a predictive model that infers an optimal objective map for a given low-resolution (LR) input and a generative model that applies a target objective map to produce the corresponding SR output. The generative model is trained over our proposed objective trajectory representing a set of essential objectives, which enables the single network to learn various SR results corresponding to combined losses on the trajectory. The predictive model is trained using pairs of LR images and corresponding optimal objective maps searched from the objective trajectory. Experimental results on five benchmarks show that the proposed method outperforms state-of-the-art perception-driven SR methods in LPIPS, DISTS, PSNR, and SSIM metrics. The visual results also demonstrate the superiority of our method in perception-oriented reconstruction. The code and models are available at https://github.com/seungho-snu/SROOE.Comment: Code and trained models will be available at https://github.com/seungho-snu/SROO

Sonography of Affected and Unaffected Shoulders in Hemiplegic Patients: Analysis of the Relationship Between Sonographic Imaging Data and Clinical Variables

Objective To explore the relationship between a number of clinically relevant variables and sonographic imaging data in respect to the level of impairment experienced in the affected and unaffected shoulders of hemiplegic stroke patients. Method Fifty-one hemiplegic stroke patients (32 males, 19 females; 29 right-sided hemiplegics, 22 left-sided hemiplegics) participated in this study. A musculoskeletal radiologist conducted a sonographic exam on both the affected and unaffected shoulders of all patients and two physicians classified the severity of the injury on a six-point rating scale. Clinical variables including age, sex, duration of injury, spasticity and muscle power of the hemiplegic side, and level of functional activity of the shoulder were assessed. Results The sonographic rating scores of hemiplegic shoulders were positively correlated with age (p<0.01) and negatively correlated with level of muscle spasticity (p<0.05). The sonographic rating scores of unaffected shoulders were positively correlated with duration of injury (p<0.01). Affected shoulders received sonographic rating scores that reflected significantly more impairment than those of unaffected shoulders (p<0.001), and premorbid handedness did not affect the relationship between impairment rating and shoulder injury status. Conclusion Hemiplegic stroke influences not only affected shoulders, but also unaffected sides. Proper management of spasticity, enhancement of motor recovery, and avoidance of unaffected shoulder overuse should be considered to prevent shoulder problems following strokes which result in hemiplegia

Fate of Sudden Deafness Occurring in the Only Hearing Ear: Outcomes and Timing to Consider Cochlear Implantation

The present study was undertaken to learn the outcome of patients with idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss (ISSNHL) in their only hearing ear. Timing to conduct a cochlear implantation was also determined in those who did not recover the hearing. The study group comprised 25 patients who confronted ISSNHL in their only hearing ear. A total of 192 patients, who had ISSNHL in one ear and had normal contralateral ear, served as the control. Demographically there were no significant differences between the groups. The recovery rate was similar between the groups: 64.0% in the experimental and 62.5% in the control group. The duration until the recovery of ISSNHL in the only hearing ear was 5-90 days (average 17.6 days). In the experimental group, 8 patients did not recover from ISSNHL, and underwent cochlear implantation in 6 with satisfactory results. These results suggest that the same treatment is applicable for patients with ISSNHL regardless of whether their contralateral ear is deaf or normal. For those who do not recover from ISSNHL in their only hearing ear, culminating in bilateral deafness, we may consider further definitive treatment including cochlear implantation as early as 3 months after initiating the treatment of ISSNHL