Towards a thick understanding of the barriers to national climate adaptation policy process: the cases of South Korea and the United Kingdom

The world is already committed to some climate change which makes climate adaptation an important response strategy. Despite the substantial progress of national climate adaptation policies, the adaptation deficit is getting wider. Barriers to adaptation have been pointed out as a reason for the adaptation deficits and analysed for about 20 years. However, previous studies have provided a limited understanding of the barriers, especially at the national level, and the research results have rarely been used in real-world adaptation policy processes. This thesis provides a thick understanding of barriers to national climate adaptation policy processes through a systematic literature review, empirical analysis using case studies, and theoretical analysis. Through a systematic literature review, this thesis identifies eight categories of barriers to national climate adaptation policy and its process in previous studies. It also clarifies three critical limitations of earlier studies. Based on the Korean case, this thesis finds 49 factors (16 barriers, 14 origins, 19 influences) related to barriers to the national climate adaptation policy process in Korea and draws a barrier map that shows all relationships between the identified factors. This thesis identifies eight key common barriers to the national climate adaptation policy processes through a comparative analysis of the Korean and UK cases and presents potential common causal mechanisms of the barriers, with a common barrier map of the national adaptation policies. By applying a multi-loop learning theoretical framework, it analyses the social learning levels of the national climate adaptation policy of Korea and the UK. Potential solutions to address the identified barriers to national climate adaptation policy processes are suggested based on the wicked problem and social learning theory. This thesis contributes valuable theoretical and methodological advancements to our understanding of the barriers to adaptation and practical understanding of the barriers to adaptation within the adaptation process and potential solutions to these barriers

Effect of RGD Peptide-Coated TiO 2

The purpose of this research was to characterize an Arg-Gly-Asp (RGD) peptide immobilized on TiO2 nanotubes. In addition, we investigated the effects of the RGD peptide-coated TiO2 nanotubes on the cellular response, proliferation, and functionality of osteogenic-induced human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs), which are osteoclasts that have been induced by bone marrow macrophages. The RGD peptide was grafted covalently onto the surface of TiO2 nanotubes based on the results of SEM, FT-IR, and XPS. Furthermore, the RGD peptide promoted the initial attachment and proliferation of the hMSCs, regardless of the size of the TiO2 nanotubes. However, the RGD peptide did not prominently affect the osteogenic functionality of the hMSCs because the peptide suppressed hMSC motility associated with osteogenic differentiation. The result of an in vitro osteoclast test showed that the RGD peptide accelerated the initial attachment of preosteoclasts and the formation of mature osteoclasts, which could resorb the bone matrix. Therefore, we believe that an RGD coating on TiO2 nanotubes synthesized on Ti implants might not offer significant acceleration of bone formation in vivo because osteoblasts and osteoclasts reside in the same compartment

Interactive effect of dietary gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) and water temperature on growth performance, blood plasma indices, heat shock proteins and GABAergic gene expression in juvenile olive flounder Paralichthys olivaceus

publishedVersio

Evaluation of dietary selenium, vitamin C and E as the multi-antioxidants on the methylmercury intoxicated mice based on mercury bioaccumulation, antioxidant enzyme activity, lipid peroxidation and mitochondrial oxidative stress

Author's accepted version (postprint).This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Elsevier in Chemosphere on 18/01/2021.Available online: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0045653521001429?via%3DihubMercury (Hg) in high exposures can be a potent life threatening heavy metal that bioaccumulate in aquatic food-chain mainly as organic methylmercury (MeHg). In this regard, fish and seafood consumptions could be the primary sources of MeHg exposure for human and fish-eating animals. The objective of the present study was to elucidate the effects of dietary supplementation of some antioxidants on induced mercury toxicity in mice model. In this study, a 30-day long investigation has been conducted to evaluate the dietary effect of selenium (Se) in combination with vitamin C and vitamin E on methylmercury induced toxicity in mice. Total 54 mice fed the diets with three levels of Hg (0, 50 or 500 μg kg−1) and two levels of Se in combination with vitamin C and E (Se: 0, 2 mg kg−1; vitamin C: 0, 400 mg kg−1; vitamin E: 0, 200 mg kg−1) in triplicates. The results show that Hg accumulated in blood and different tissues such as muscle, liver and kidney tissues of mice on dose dependent manner. The bioaccumulation pattern of dietary Hg, in decreasing order, kidney > liver > muscle > blood. Superoxide dismutase levels in blood serum showed no significant differences in mice fed the diets. However, dietary antioxidants significantly reduced the levels of thiobarbituric acid reactive substances in mice fed the mercury containing diets. Cytochrome c oxidase enzyme activities showed no significant differences as the mercury level increases in liver and kidney tissues of mice. Kaplan-Meier curve showed a dose- and time-dependent survivability of mice. Cumulative survival rate of Hg intoxicated mice fed the antioxidant supplemented diets were increased during the experimental period. Overall, the results showed that dietary Se, vitamin C and vitamin E had no effect on reducing the mercury bioaccumulation in tissues but reduced the serum lipid peroxidation as well as prolonged the cumulative survival rate in terms of high Hg exposures in mice.acceptedVersio

Re-evaluation of the optimum dietary protein level for maximum growth of juvenile barred knifejaw Oplegnathus fasciatus reared in cages

Abstract We determined the optimum dietary protein level in juvenile barred knifejaw Oplegnathus fasciatus in cages. Five semi-purified isocaloric diets were formulated with white fish meal and casein-based diets to contain 35, 40, 45, 50, and 60 % crude protein (CP). Fish with an initial body weight of 7.1 ± 0.06 g (mean ± SD) were randomly distributed into 15 net cages (each size: 60 cm × 40 cm × 90 cm, W × L × H) as groups of 20 fish in triplicates. The fish were fed at apparent satiation level twice a day. After 8 weeks of feeding, the weight gain (WG) of fish fed 45, 50, and 60 % CP diets were significantly higher than those of fish fed 35 and 40 % CP diets. However, there were no significant differences in WG among fish fed 45, 50, and 60 % CP diets. Generally, feed efficiency (FE) and specific growth rate (SGR) showed a similar trend as WG. However, the protein efficiency ratio (PER) was inversely related to dietary protein levels. Energy retention efficiency increased with the increase of dietary protein levels by protein sparing from non-protein energy sources. Blood hematocrit content was not affected by dietary protein levels. However, a significantly lower amount of hemoglobin was found in fish fed 35 % CP than in fish fed 40, 45, 50, and 60 % CP diets. Fish fed 60 % CP showed the lowest survival rate than the fish fed 35, 40, 45, and 50 % CP diets. Broken-line analysis of WG showed the optimum dietary protein level was 45.2 % with 18.8 kJ/g diet for juvenile barred knifejaw. This study has potential implication for the successful cage culture of barred knifejaw

Temperature-Aware Runtime Power Management for Chip-Multiprocessors with 3-D Stacked Cache

The advent of 3-D fabrication technology makes it possible to stack a large amount of last-level cache memory onto a multi-core die to reduce off-chip memory accesses and, thus, increases system performance. However, the higher power density (i.e., power dissipation per unit volume) of 3-D integrated circuits (ICs) might incur temperature-related problems in reliability, leakage power, system performance, and cooling cost. In this paper, we propose a runtime solution to maximize the performance (i.e., instruction throughput) of chip-multiprocessors with 3-D stacked last-level cache memory, without thermal-constraint violation. The proposed method combines runtime cache tuning (e.g., cache-way partitioning, cache-way power-gating, cache data placement) with per-core dynamic voltage/frequency scaling (DVFS) in a temperature-aware manner. Experimental results show that the integrated method offers 23% performance improvement on average in terms of instructions per second (IPS) compared with temperature-aware runtime cache tuning only

Titanium Oxide Nanotube Surface Topography and MicroRNA-488 Contribute to Modulating Osteogenesis

Understanding the biocomplexity of cell behavior in relation to the topographical characteristics of implants is essential for successful osseointegration with good longevity and minimum failure. Here, we investigated whether culture on titanium oxide (TiO2) nanotubes of various diameters could affect the behavior and differentiation of MC3T3-E1 cells. Among the tested nanotubes, those of 50 nm in diameter were found to trigger the expression of the osteoblast-specific transcription factors, sp7 and Dlx5, and upregulate the expression of alkaline phosphatase (ALP). Here, we report that miR-488 was significantly induced in osteoblasts cultured on 50 nm nanotubes and continued to increase with the progression of osteoblast differentiation. Furthermore, downregulation of miR-488 suppressed the expression levels of ALP and matrix metalloprotease-2 (MMP-2). This suppression of ALP transcription was overcome by treatment with the MMP-2 activator, bafilomycin A1. Collectively, these results suggest that 50 nm is the optimum TiO2 nanotube diameter for implants, and that modulation of miR-488 can change the differentiation activity of cells on TiO2 nanotubes. This emphasizes that we must fully understand the physicochemical properties of TiO2 nanotubes and the endogenous biomolecules that interact with such surfaces, in order to fully support their clinical application

Osseointegration of Implants Surface-Treated with Various Diameters of TiO 2

The aim of this study was to evaluate the osseointegration of implants which were surface-treated with various diameters of TiO2 nanotubes (30 nm, 70 nm, and 100 nm) in rabbit. Resorbable blast media (RBM) surfaced implants (Osstem, Busan, Korea) 3.5 mm in diameter and 8.5 mm in length were designated as the control group and the implants surface-treated with various diameters of nanotubes (30 nm, 70 nm, and 100 nm) with the same shapes were designated as the experimental groups. The implants were maintained unloaded for 4 and 12 weeks. After this period, the animals were sacrificed and micro-CT analysis, histomorphometric analysis (bone to implant contact (BIC), bone volume (BV)), and removal torque test were performed. Micro-CT analysis, histomorphometric analysis, and removal torque test results all showed the similar pattern, showing that 70 nm experimental group had the highest value at 4 weeks while 30 nm experimental group had the highest value at 12 weeks. Therefore, on the basis of the results above, it can be concluded that 30 nm and 70 nm TiO2 nanotubes may have positive effects on osteogenesis and osseointegration depending on the healing time

The Evaluation of Osseointegration of Dental Implant Surface with Different Size of TiO 2

With the development of nanotechnology, many researches have shown that nanometer-scaled materials especially TiO2 nanotube have a positive effect on cellular behavior and surface characteristics of implant, which are considered to be crucial factors in osseointegration. However, it has not yet been verified which nanotube size is effective in osseointegration in vivo. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of implant surface-treated with different size of TiO2 nanotubes on osseointegration in rat femur. The customized implants (threaded and nonthreaded type), surface-treated with different diameter of TiO2 nanotubes (30 nm, 50 nm, 70 nm, and 100 nm nanotube), were placed on both sides of the femur of 50 male Sprague-Dawley rats (6 weeks old). Rats were sacrificed at 2 and 6 weeks following surgery; then the specimens were collected by perfusion fixation and the osseointegration of implants was evaluated by radiographic and histologic analyses and removal torque value test. The mean of bone area (%) and the mean of removal torque were different in each group, indicating that the difference in TiO2 nanotube size may influence new bone formation and osseointegration in rats

A Hierarchical Decision-Making Framework in the Network Environment with Social Learning and Forgetting

Modeling and analysis of human behaviors in social networks are essential in fields such as online business, marketing, and finance. However, the establishment of a generalized decision-making framework for human behavior is challenging due to different decision structures among individuals. This research proposes a new hierarchical human decision-making framework based on the evolution of preferences on alternatives over time. To this end, a well-known cognitive psychological model, Decision Field Theory (DFT) which is one of dynamic human decision-making models based on the evolution of preferences on the options over time, is utilized and extended to represent human forgetting and learning procedures with the properties of memory loss experience and influences under social interactions. The equilibrium status of social networks within this framework is derived as an explicit formula under the independent and identically distributed (IID) conditions on weight values, which facilitates the identification of limiting expected and covariance matrices for preference values. The extension establishes a hierarchical human behavior model in social networks by incorporating the dynamics of top-down and bottom-up information flows, which enables the better understanding of different behaviors in social networks such as innovation diffusion and opinion formation. The validity of the proposed model is demonstrated via agent-based simulation under various scenarios. In particular, simulation is used to analyze the impact of network structures (e.g., random, small-world, ring-lattice, and scale-free) as well as the significance of inherent society characteristics (e.g., conservative, neutral, and progressive) on the equilibrium states. The findings confirm that the diffusion process within the proposed model propagates fastest in the random network and slowest in the ring-lattice network. It is also shown that interaction among people affects the agent’s decision within the proposed models and intensifies the embedded society characteristics, which helps to analyze irregular behaviors such as information cascades in social networks. Two major applications of the proposed models in this dissertation are 1) disaster management with social sensing and 2) real-time border surveillance. The simulation results reveal that the proposed models allow for better disaster management strategies in natural disasters by increasing the efficiency of prepositioning supplies and by enhancing the effectiveness of disaster relief efforts. Moreover, physics-based simulation developed in the Unity3D engine has a potential to increase the modeling accuracy of a border surveillance system by enhancing the estimation of drug-traffickers’ behaviors with real-time environmental information, which will, in turn, help establish an effective control system in border areas.Release after 08/09/203