Treatment of Secured Claims in Korean Rehabilitation Proceeding

After the Debtor Rehabilitation and Bankruptcy Law (RBL took effect in 2006, the pro-debtor insolvency system including DIP-type trustee has been enforced. However, the DRBL has not modified much with respect to the rights and obligations of the creditors, especially secured creditors. This article conducts an overall review on the treatment of secured creditors in the rehabilitation proceeding under the DRBL. Secured creditors have a priority to get paid when their secured property is sold or foreclosed. The insolvent debtor has to bargain with secured creditors if it needs to continue to use the secured property. Theoretically, the debtor shall be able to utilize the secured property by making a payment to relevant secured creditor and whether or not to make such payment shall be determined in consideration of the going-concern value and the liquidation value of the secured property. However, the parties fail to reach, in many occasions, a conclusion due to the information asymmetry, hold-out of any party, etc. In such cases, the creditorsright to the secured property shall be restricted for the debtor revival for the benefit of all interested parties

On Estimation and Inference under Order Restrictions.

The aim of statistical analysis and inference is to draw meaningful conclusions. In the case where there is prior knowledge of stochastic orderings or inequalities, it is desirable to incorporate this information in the estimation. This avoids possible unrealistic estimates, and may also lead to gain in efficiency. In this dissertation we first present the constrained nonparametric maximum likelihood estimator (C-NPMLE) of the survivor functions in one- and two-sample settings. Dykstra (1982) also considered C-NPMLE for such problems, however, as we show, Dykstra's method has an error and does not always give the C-NPMLE. We corrected this error and simulation shows improvement in efficiency compared to Dykstra's estimator. Confidence intervals based on bootstrap methods are proposed. Uniqueness and consistency of the proposed estimators is established. Second, we propose a new estimator, the pointwise C-NPMLE, which is defined at each time t by the estimates of the survivor functions subject to constraints at t only. The estimator is shown to be non-increasing in t, and the consistency and the asymptotic distribution of the estimators are presented. In the development of this estimator and the characterization of its properties, we transform the problem into one that uses the profile likelihood; we adapt the pool-adjacent-violators algorithm, in which pooling is defined in a special way. Different methods to construct confidence intervals are also proposed. The estimator is shown to have good properties compared to other potential estimators. Finally, we propose a new method to construct confidence intervals (CIs) for G independent normal means under the linear ordering constraint. The method is based on defining intermediate random variables that are related to the original observations and using the CIs of the means of these intermediate random variables to restrict the original CIs from the separate groups. This method is extended to the case with three or more groups and the simulation studies show that the proposed CIs have coverage rates close to nominal levels with reduced average widths.Ph.D.BiostatisticsUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/89689/1/yongpark_1.pd

Salmonella typhimurium harboring plasmid expressing interleukin-12 induced attenuation of infection and protective immune responses

IL-12 is known to be an essential cytokine which appears to provide protective immunity against intracellular bacteria, such as Salmonella. In this study, we investigated the possibility of developing a vaccine using IL-12 against virulent Salmonella. We used the host defense system activated by cytokine IL-12. The highly virulent Salmonella strain (Salmonella typhimurium UK-1) was transformed with cytokine-expressing plasmids. These live, wild-type pathogens were used as vaccine strains without undergoing any other biological or genetic attenuating processes. The newly developed strains induced partial protection from infections (30-40%). Of note, the interleukin-12 transformed pathogen was safe upon immunization with low doses (103 CFU), induced IgG responses, and stimulated protective immune responses against Salmonella Typhimurium in mice (80-100%). These results suggest that IL-12 induced attenuation of wild-type Salmonella in the host infection stage and vaccine development using the wild-type strain harboring IL-12 secreting plasmids may be considered as an alternative process for intracellular bacterial vaccine development without the inconvenience of time-consuming attenuation processes

The complete mitochondrial genome of the sea spider Achelia bituberculata (Pycnogonida, Ammotheidae): arthropod ground pattern of gene arrangement

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The phylogenetic position of pycnogonids is a long-standing and controversial issue in arthropod phylogeny. This controversy has recently been rekindled by differences in the conclusions based on neuroanatomical data concerning the chelifore and the patterns of <it>Hox </it>expression. The mitochondrial genome of a sea spider, <it>Nymphon gracile </it>(Pycnogonida, Nymphonidae), was recently reported in an attempt to address this issue. However, <it>N. gracile </it>appears to be a long-branch taxon on the phylogenetic tree and exhibits a number of peculiar features, such as 10 tRNA translocations and even an inversion of several protein-coding genes. Sequences of other pycnogonid mitochondrial genomes are needed if the position of pycnogonids is to be elucidated on this basis.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The complete mitochondrial genome (15,474 bp) of a sea spider (<it>Achelia bituberculata</it>) belonging to the family Ammotheidae, which combines a number of anatomical features considered plesiomorphic with respect to other pycnogonids, was sequenced and characterized. The genome organization shows the features typical of most metazoan animal genomes (37 tightly-packed genes). The overall gene arrangement is completely identical to the arthropod ground pattern, with one exception: the position of the <it>trnQ </it>gene between the <it>rrnS </it>gene and the control region. Maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference trees inferred from the amino acid sequences of mitochondrial protein-coding genes consistently indicate that the pycnogonids (<it>A. bituberculata </it>and <it>N. gracile</it>) may be closely related to the clade of Acari and Araneae.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The complete mitochondrial genome sequence of <it>A. bituberculata </it>(Family Ammotheidae) and the previously-reported partial sequence of <it>Endeis spinosa </it>show the gene arrangement patterns typical of arthropods (<it>Limulus</it>-like), but they differ markedly from that of <it>N. gracile</it>. Phylogenetic analyses based on mitochondrial protein-coding genes showed that Pycnogonida may be authentic arachnids (= aquatic arachnids) within Chelicerata <it>sensu lato</it>, as indicated by the name 'sea spider,' and suggest that the Cormogonida theory – that the pycnogonids are a sister group of all other arthropods – should be rejected. However, in view of the relatively weak node confidence, strand-biased nucleotide composition and long-branch attraction artifact, further more intensive studies seem necessary to resolve the exact position of the pycnogonids.</p

Inhomogeneous Kondo destruction by RKKY correlations

The competition between the indirect exchange interaction (IEC) of magnetic impurities in metals and the Kondo effect gives rise to a rich quantum phase diagram, the Doniach Diagram. In disordered metals, both the Kondo temperature and the IEC are widely distributed due to the scattering of the conduction electrons from the impurity potential. Therefore, it is a question of fundamental importance, how this Doniach diagram is modified by the disorder, and if one can still identify separate phases. Recently, it has been investigated the effect of Ruderman-Kittel-Kasuya-Yosida (RKKY) correlations on the Kondo effect of two magnetic impurities, renormalizing the Kondo interaction based on the Bethe-Salpeter equation and performing the poor men's renormalization group (RG) analysis with the RKKY-renormalized Kondo coupling. In the present study, we extend this theoretical framework, allowing for different Kondo temperatures of two RKKY-coupled magnetic impurities due to different local exchange couplings and density of states. As a result, we find that the smaller one of the two Kondo temperatures is suppressed more strongly by the RKKY interaction, thereby enhancing their initial inequality. In order to find out if this relevance of inequalities between Kondo temperatures modifies the distribution of the Kondo temperature in a system of a finite density of randomly distributed magnetic impurities, we present an extension of the RKKY coupled Kondo RG equations. We discuss the implication of these results for the interplay between Kondo coupling and RKKY interaction in disordered electron systems and the Doniach diagram in disordered electron systems

Initial Experience with Laparoendoscopic Single-Site Surgery by Use of a Homemade Transumbilical Port in Urology

Purpose: We present our initial experience with laparoendoscopic single-site surgery (LESS) by a single surgeon in the urologic field. Materials and Methods: From May 2009 to April 2010, 30 consecutive patients underwent LESS including seven cases of nephrectomy, five cases of nephroureterectomy with bladder cuff excision, four cases of ureterolithotomy, eight cases of marsupialization, and six cases of varicocelectomy. We performed a retrospective analysis of the medical records of the above patients. The single port was made with a surgical glove and an Alexis?? wound retractor (Applied Medical, Rancho Santa Margarita, CA, USA). The wound retractor was put into the peritoneal space through an umbilical incision, and a laparoscopic triangle was secured by crossing both instruments. All operations were performed by the transperitoneal approach. Results: Mean patient age was 54.8 years. Mean operative time was 171.2??109.1 minutes. Mean estimated blood loss was 265.0??395.5 ml. Mean incision length was 3.2??1.4 cm. Mean length of hospitalization was 5.2??2.9 days. There was one laparoscopic conversion and two open conversions. There were two cases of transient ileus that improved with conservative treatment. Mean visual analogue pain scales on the operative day and first postoperative day were 6.3/10 and 3.1/10, respectively. Conclusions: In our experience, LESS for urologic surgery is feasible, safe, and clinically applicable. We consider the homemade single-port device to be a relatively cost-effective and convenient device. If surgical instruments for LESS and appropriate ports specified for LESS are developed, LESS would be a surgical treatment technique that could be used as an alternative to the conventional types of laparoscopic surgery. ?? The Korean Urological Association, 2010

Baryonic Matter in the Hidden Local Symmetry Induced from Holographic QCD Models

Baryonic matter is studied in the Skyrme model by taking into account the roles of $\pi,$ $\rho$, and $\omega$ mesons through the hidden local symmetry up to $\mathcal{O}(p^4)$ terms including the homogeneous Wess-Zumino (hWZ) terms. Using the master formulas for the low energy constants derived from holographic QCD models the skyrmion matter properties can be quantitatively calculated with the input values of the pion decay constant $f_\pi$ and the vector meson mass $m_\rho^{}$. We find that the hWZ terms are responsible for the repulsive interactions of the $\omega$ meson. In addition, the self-consistently included $\mathcal{O}(p^4)$ terms with the hWZ terms is found to increase the half skyrmion phase transition point above the normal nucleon density.Comment: Contribution to SCGT12 "KMI-GCOE Workshop on Strong Coupling Gauge Theories in the LHC Perspective", 4-7 Dec. 2012, Nagoya Universit