Search Results (20)

In the rapidly emerging era of untact (“contact-free”) technologies, the requirement for three-dimensional (3D) virtual environments utilized in virtual reality (VR)/augmented reality (AR) and the metaverse has seen significant growth, owing to their extensive application across various domains. Current research focuses on the automatic transfer of the style of rendering images within a 3D virtual environment using artificial intelligence, which aims to minimize human intervention. However, the prevalent studies on rendering-based 3D environment-style transfers have certain inherent limitations. First, the training of a style transfer network dedicated to 3D virtual environments demands considerable style image data. These data must align with viewpoints that closely resemble those of the virtual environment. Second, there was noticeable inconsistency within the 3D structures. Predominant studies often neglect 3D scene geometry information instead of relying solely on 2D input image features. Finally, style adaptation fails to accommodate the unique characteristics inherent in each object. To address these issues, we propose a novel approach: a neural rendering-based 3D scene-style conversion technique. This methodology employs semantic nearest-neighbor feature matching, thereby facilitating the transfer of style within a 3D scene while considering the distinctive characteristics of each object, even when employing a single style image. The neural radiance field enables the network to comprehend the geometric information of a 3D scene in relation to its viewpoint. Subsequently, it transfers style features by employing the unique features of a single style image via semantic nearest-neighbor feature matching. In an empirical context, our proposed semantic 3D scene style transfer method was applied to 3D scene style transfers for both interior and exterior environments. This application utilizes the replica, 3DFront, and Tanks and Temples datasets for testing. The results illustrate that the proposed methodology surpasses existing style transfer techniques in terms of maintaining 3D viewpoint consistency, style uniformity, and semantic coherence. Full article

Since 2019, the Korean government’s investments in making data more accessible to the public have grown by 337%. However, open government data, which should be accessible to everyone, are not entirely accessible to people with low vision, who represent an information-vulnerable class. Emergencies, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, decrease face-to-face encounters and inevitably increase untact encounters. Thus, the information gap experienced by low-vision people, who are underprivileged in terms of information, will be further widened, and they may consequently face various disadvantages. This study proposed visual communication design accessibility (VCDA) guidelines for people with low vision. Introduced screens enhanced by accessibility guidelines were presented to 16 people with low vision and 16 people with normal vision and the speed of visual information recognition was analyzed. No statistically significant difference (p > 0.05) was found due to the small sample size; however, this study’s results approached significance with improved visual recognition speed for people with low vision after adopting VCDA. As a result of the intervention, the visual information recognition speed of both normal and low-vision people improved. Thus, our results can help improve information recognition speed among people with normal and low vision. Full article

Since COVID-19, social distancing has become common, and the demand for untact services has increased rapidly, resulting in an economic phenomenon centered on untact worldwide. Due to social distancing, the untact service area is expanding not only to shopping but also to online learning, home training, and telemedicine, and untact services are expected to expand to more diverse areas in the future. This study investigates four types of untact services: online lectures, online meetings related to work and study, online seminars, and online performances, and the effects of concerns about untact services on the intention of use have been examined using a path analysis model. As a result of the analysis, the perceived usefulness had a positive effect on the user’s continuous intention to use untact services. However, depending on the type of untact service, it can be confirmed that the factors that affect the intention to continue using the service differ from each other. Practitioners can use the results of this study when designing untact services in the future. Full article

Due to the “untact” society caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, urban functions have grown increasingly reliant on the mobility of things rather than human mobility, giving rise to the “delivery city phenomenon” with real significance. This study explores the necessity to comprehend the demands and social views of delivery city inhabitants (“actors”) to future urban planning, recognizing that the phenomenon of the delivery city has a significant impact on the shape and structure of modern cities. To do this, a grounded theory-based approach was used to evaluate keywords in Korean media articles and thoroughly code the content of actors’ contextual interviews and shadowing data. The results indicate that the delivery city phenomenon has changed the geographical sense of actors and the role of each space, and has urban planning implications such as in the establishment of social and spatial infrastructure, the institutional basis for technological development, and the call for sustainability. This study is meaningful in understanding modern cities centered around delivery services, which have gained global prominence, and it can contribute to sustainable urban planning by deriving urban tasks for this new phenomenon. Full article

The mobility of things is becoming increasingly significant in modern cities owing to the ‘untact’ phenomena to sustain people’s lives during the COVID-19 pandemic and adopt platform urbanism. This study argues that the feature of mobility had a significant impact on the formation of modern cities’ landscapes. We examine the necessity for a distinct perspective on the urban landscape based on the mobility of things. Consequently, a literature research on mobility and landscape concepts and fieldwork such as shadowing and contextual interviews was conducted. The findings suggest that the notion of taskscape can be used as the interaction of actors within mobility tends to shape the landscape of the mobility of things. It discusses the re-recognition of the landscape concept according to the phenomenon of the mobility of things, which is significant for future landscape research in sustainable urban planning. Landmarks also exhibit the qualities of a mobility scape that acquires a high-level image at a high speed and a navigation landscape that experiences space through a mobile map in the mobility of things. Further, platform urbanism allows for the implementation of the mobility of things’ landscape in both physical and virtual spaces, creating a virtual landscape in mobile applications. Full article

The global market is experiencing stagnation and recession in the “untact era”, and the emergence of the metaverse provides platform support and presents a new paradigm. This study aims to provide a framework for content creators and marketers to verify the effectiveness of metaverse marketing. An analysis was carried out of the fit of the model and the hypotheses between the metaverse seamlessness, presence, interoperability, concurrence, and economic flow (SPICE) model factors, customer satisfaction, and purchase intention. In the test, 9 out of 11 hypotheses were accepted. In conclusion, the data are meaningful, and this study presents the value of music content marketing in the metaverse through the metaverse SPICE model. Full article

The purpose of this research was to verify the importance and performance of sustainable crisis management in Korean fitness centers using Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA). For this study, 304 fitness center executives and managers in Seoul and Gyeonggi region were selected from 21 March to 17 May 2020. Frequency analysis was performed using SPSS 24.0, and exploratory factor analysis was conducted to verify the validity and reliability. Priority analysis and IPA analysis were performed to compare the mean values, and the following results were obtained. In the first quadrant, there were six attributes besides keeping social distancing between employees and customers. In the second quadrant, there were four attributes in addition to regular disinfection of the gymnasium. In the third quadrant, there were six attributes besides maintain clean furniture. Third, there were six attributes other than maintaining clean furniture in the third quadrant. Lastly, in the fourth quadrant, there were three attributes in addition to the restriction of face-to-face meetings. The conclusion was as follows. First, equip supplies for the prevention of COVID-19, keep social distance, and check government support policies. Second, analyze economic support policies, and research their application methods. Third, prepare various non-face-to-face communication methods and Untact (noncontact) marketing strategies. Fourth, make a checklist for factors with relatively little importance. Full article

With the spread of COVID-19, understanding the spread of food poisoning, managing food materials related to chronic diseases, food ingredients’ reliability, and non-face-to-face or untact delivery methods are rapidly emerging. A new field of meat research has been introduced for hygienic and healthy recipes to maintain freshness and control personalized ingredients using supercritical processes and 3D printing technology. Supercritical fluid extraction processes (SCF) and untact 3D printing technology will replace traditional meat freshness assessment based on color change according to the degree of oxidation of myoglobin in meat. SCF processes safely and quickly remove residual blood from meat and control fat and cholesterol that may be harmful to the human body. SCF-processed, high-viscosity meats are printed remotely through repeated IoT system variable experiments in WEB-CLOUD between UTEP in Texas, USA, and Korea University in Seoul, Korea. The SCF process in this study confirmed a weight reduction of 8.5% to 22.5%, depending on the temperature, pressure, and SCF process time. Under conditions of a tip size of 1.0 × 10⁻³ m, a shear rate of 200/s, and a maximum pressing force of 170 N, a 1000 cm³ SCF-processed meat was successfully 3D printed at the other site by transmitting G-code through web. Full article

A variety of applications using miniaturized optical lenses can be found among rapidly evolving technologies. From smartphones and cameras in our daily life to augmented and virtual reality glasses for the recent trends of the untact era, miniaturization of optical lenses permits the development of many types of compact devices. Here, we highlight the importance of ultrasmall and ultrathin lens technologies based on metamaterials and metasurfaces. Focusing on hyperlenses and metalenses that can replace or be combined with the existing conventional lenses, we review the state-of-art of research trends and discuss their limitations. We also cover applications that use miniaturized imaging devices. The miniaturized imaging devices are expected to be an essential foundation for next-generation imaging techniques. Full article

The COVID-19 outbreak has restricted international travel, halting tourism globally. Thus, travel demand has shifted from international to domestic destinations. The prolonged travel restriction has changed travel trends and travelers’ behaviors, adversely affecting the tourism industry worldwide. This study attempted to understand and examine the changes in travel preferences, such as choice of destinations, activities, and transportation modes, following the COVID-19 outbreak. This study used primary survey data of 200 respondents collected in June 2020 and secondary survey data collected by the Korea Tourism Organization in 2015 and 2017. The study also examined the role of the government in supporting strategies to prepare for the post-COVID tourism landscape. The analysis showed that the pandemic has caused travelers to favor short-haul destinations where non-contact (socially distanced) travel is possible. The study also found that the distributed land strategy that can make “untact” tourism a possibility could boost the struggling tourism industry. Full article

The need for non-face-to-face online health care has emerged through the era of “untact”. However, there is a lack of standardization work and research cases on the exercise effect of immersive content. In this study, the possibility of the exercise effect of VR e-sports among e-sports cases were presented through a visual algorithm analysis. In addition, the evaluation criteria were established. The research method compares and analyzes e-sports cases and VR e-sports cases by applying existing evaluation research cases. It also sets up a new evaluation standard. As for the analysis result, the device immersion method and interaction range were set through an algorithm analysis; FOV and frame immersion were set through typification; the user recognition method and interaction method were set through the visual diagram. Then, each derived result value was quantified and a new evaluation criterion was proposed. Full article

As medical cannabis is legalized, food safety management systems, including CBD (cannabidiol), have received attention from scientific and engineering perspectives. Observations attribute CBD changes in acidic environments and high temperatures to THC (tetrahydrocannabinol). The current research focuses on employing and optimizing 3D printers, specifically material extrusion additive manufacturing processes for telemedicine applications to safely and accurately deliver CBD-infused food. Soft meat is prepared by supercritical CO₂ (SC-CO₂) process and simultaneously infused with hemp oil for food printing. This study personalized the amount of CBD-infused food and analyzed its operating parameters based on a theoretical Hagen-Poiseuille equation and pressure drop. Head speed, direction change within a given time, pressure drops at tip or piston, the constant mass-flux in PTE (piston type extrusion), Vizo design (VD) with aesthetic elements, and head travel distance have been optimized. Between the University of Texas at El Paso in Texas, USA, and the Korea University in Seoul, Korea, repeated IoT system variable experiments through the web-cloud were limited to less than 1 min, including print time. The telemedicine system was first tried and successfully performed using CBD-infused foods. During this process, images, G-code, video, and text, including medical descriptions, were provided simultaneously with CBD-infused food. Full article

Now that untact services are widespread and worldwide, the number of users visiting online shopping malls has increased. For example, the recommendation systems in Netflix, Amazon, etc., have gained a lot of attention by attracting many users and have made large profit by recommending suitable products to their users. In the paper, we conduct a study to enhance recommendation accuracy using Word2Vec, widely used in natural language processing. We collect user shopping history with personal click preference information of product items as data, representing a document for natural language processing. The sequence of product item clicks is fed into the Word2Vec technology algorithm to obtain the vectors symmetrically representing all of the product items clicked by users. Training and test data have a series of vectors representing a sequence of the clicked product items as inputs and a purchased product as a target. Machine learning models recommend a product as a symmetric vector for each input and calculate the similarity among the recommended vectors and all other registered products they sell in the system to recommend multiple products as final recommendation results. We use XGBoost regressor and classifier models to recommend some products that users would like and evaluate the recommendation accuracy. A finally recommended product by the models is a vector, and the system recommends some more products by calculating the similarity as mentioned above. We evaluated the classifier model’s recommendation accuracy without Word2Vec encoding first and then with the Word2Vec technique. Meanwhile, we can represent the products with single or multiple dimensional vectors. We noted that the recommendation accuracy increases when we use multiple dimensions of Word2Vec vectors from the experiments. We also evaluated the performances when the system recommends one or multiple products. For the recommendation of multiple products (five here), a regression model has higher accuracy than a classification model in all dimensions of vectors. Full article

Metastatic features of breast cancer in the brain are considered a common pathology in female patients with late-stage breast cancer. Ca²⁺ signaling and the overexpression pattern of Ca²⁺ channels have been regarded as oncogenic markers of breast cancer. In other words, breast tumor development can be mediated by inhibiting Ca²⁺ channels. Although the therapeutic potential of inhibiting Ca²⁺ channels against breast cancer has been demonstrated, the relationship between breast cancer metastasis and Ca²⁺ channels is not yet understood. Thus, we focused on the metastatic features of breast cancer and summarized the basic mechanisms of Ca²⁺-related proteins and channels during the stages of metastatic breast cancer by evaluating Ca²⁺ signaling. In particular, we highlighted the metastasis of breast tumors to the brain. Thus, modulating Ca²⁺ channels with Ca²⁺ channel inhibitors and combined applications will advance treatment strategies for breast cancer metastasis to the brain. Full article

This study aimed to evaluate the effects of a flipped learning contact model and a flipped learning “untact” model with Korean nursing students undergoing a clinical practicum, and to examine the factors of self-directed learning readiness and self-esteem considering these learning models. The participants included 85 students. Participants were randomly allocated to two models. This study measured self-directed learning readiness, self-esteem, learner motivation, professor–student and clinical instructor–student interactions, confidence in performing core skills, participating in online activities, clinical practice stress, and the friendliness of the two models. Participants’ characteristics were analyzed using frequencies and percentages, and between-group differences regarding characteristics were analyzed using the χ² test, independent t-test, and one-way ANOVA with a Scheffe test. This study conducted independent t-tests for comparison of the between-group adjusted mean difference of the pretest and posttest scores. The influence of the dependent variables on self-directed learning readiness and self-esteem was measured using a stepwise multiple regression method. Among the two models in the practicum, the flipped-mastery contact model (FMCM) showed higher self-directed learning (SDL) readiness and professor–student interaction than those of the flipped-mastery untact model (FMUM) after the clinical practicum was completed. The three influencing factors of SDL readiness were FMCM, learner motivation, and ward friendliness, with an explanatory power of 31.6% (F = 13.96, p < 0.001). Learner motivation, professor–student interaction, and ward friendliness influenced self-esteem, with an explanatory power of 54.7% (F = 34.86, p < 0.001). Full article