Jin-Young Park

While an abundance of cohort studies has suggested that greater consumption of fruits and vegetables (FVs) is associated with reduced risk of chronic diseases, current self‐report based dietary assessment tools are susceptible to biases that can reduce their accuracy in estimating dietary intakes, and consequently, the risk estimates obtained from this research. As a result, considerable attention has been directed towards the identification and validation of dietary biomarkers, which represent a more objective method for estimating FV intake and have the potential to improve the validity of future epidemiological studies concerning FV intake and its relationship with health outcomes. Several biomarkers, including urinary potassium, flavonoids, hippuric acid, serum/plasma and erythrocyte folate, serum/plasma vitamin C, and blood and skin carotenoids, appear to offer promise as FV intake biomarkers. However, many possess important limitations that have not been thoroughly explored and addressed, and continued efforts are being made to discover others that may offer further advantages in relation to the cost, ease, and invasiveness of measurement methods. Therefore, this review seeks to discuss the characteristics of a reliable FV intake biomarker, describe and detail the benefits and limitations of existing candidates, and highlight areas where further research may be required.

Resonance Raman spectroscopy (RRS) has been used as a reference method for measuring skin carotenoid levels (SCL), which indicate vegetable and fruit intake. However, RRS is not an easy-to-use method in SCL measurement due to its complicated implementation. In this study, a commercial spectrophotometer based on reflection spectroscopy (RS), which is relatively simple and inexpensive, was evaluated to confirm usability compared with RRS in measuring SCL. To investigate the agreement between RS and RRS, eighty participants were randomly assigned to a high-carotenoid diet group (21 mg/day of total carotenoids) or a control-carotenoid diet group (14 mg/day of total carotenoids) during a 6-week whole-diet intervention period and a 4-week tracking period. Strong correlations between the RS and RRS methods were observed at baseline (r = 0.944) and the entire period (r = 0.930). The rate of SCL increase was similar during the diet intervention; however, the initiation of the SCL decrease in RS was slower than in RRS during the tracking period. To confirm the agreement of RS and RRS from various perspectives, new visualization tools and indices were additionally applied and confirmed the similar response patterns of the two methods. The results indicate that the proposed RS method could be an alternative to RRS in SCL measurements.

Blood carotenoid concentration measurement is considered the gold standard for fruit and vegetable (F&V) intake estimation; however, this method is invasive and expensive. Recently, skin carotenoid status (SCS) measured by optical sensors has been evaluated as a promising parameter for F&V intake estimation. In this cross-sectional study, we aimed to validate the utility of resonance Raman spectroscopy (RRS)-assessed SCS as a biomarker of F&V intake in Korean adults. We used data from 108 participants aged 20–69 years who completed SCS measurements, blood collection and 3-d dietary recordings. Serum carotenoid concentrations were quantified using HPLC, and dietary carotenoid and F&V intakes were estimated via 3-d dietary records using a carotenoid database for common Korean foods. The correlations of the SCS with serum carotenoid concentrations, dietary carotenoid intake and F&V intake were examined to assess SCS validity. SCS was positively correlated with total serum carotenoid concentration (r = 0·52, 95 % CI = 0·36, 0·64, P < 0·001), serum β-carotene concentration (r = 0·60, 95 % CI = 0·47, 0·71, P < 0·001), total carotenoid intake (r = 0·20, 95 % CI = 0·01, 0·37, P = 0·04), β-carotene intake (r = 0·30, 95 % CI = 0·11, 0·46, P = 0·002) and F&V intake (r = 0·40, 95 % CI = 0·23, 0·55, P < 0·001). These results suggest that SCS can be a valid biomarker of F&V intake in Korean adults.

Despite consistent evidence that greater consumption of fruits and vegetables (FV) is associated with significant reductions in chronic disease morbidity and mortality, the majority of adults in the United States consume less than the amounts recommended by public health agencies. As such, there is a critical need to design and implement effective programs and policies to facilitate increases in FV consumption for the prevention of these diseases. To accomplish this, an accurate, inexpensive, and convenient method for estimating the dietary FV intake is required. A promising method for quantifying the FV intake via proxy that has gained interest in recent years is the measurement of skin carotenoid levels via spectroscopy-based devices. However, there exist certain dietary and non-dietary factors that may affect the skin carotenoid levels independently of the dietary intake of carotenoids. In order to validate the ability of this method to accurately estimate the FV intake among diverse demographics, these factors must be identified and taken into consideration. Therefore, this narrative review seeks to summarize the available research on factors that may affect the skin carotenoid levels, determine current gaps in knowledge, and provide guidance for future research efforts seeking to validate spectroscopy-measured skin carotenoid levels as a means of accurately estimating the FV intake among various populations.

본 연구는 선정된 여행 매거진의 2019년과 2020년 헤드라인의 키워드 분석을 통해서 코로나 전, 후의 여행 트렌드 변화를 살펴보는 것에 목적이 있다. 본 연구를 진행하기 위해서 빈도분석과 네트워크분석을 활용하였다. 본 연구 결과를 요약해보면 첫째, 정교화 작업을 통해서 2019년 헤드라인 892개, 키워드 1,668개와 2020년 헤드라인 797개, 키워드 1,438개를 추출하였다. 둘째, 추출된 키워드를 기반으로 빈도분석을 진행했고 ‘여행’, ‘도시’, ‘섬’ 등 주요키워드는 2개년 모두 주요 키워드로 상위에 나타났다. 2019년에는 해외 관광지나 관광명소와 헤드라인을 구성했고, 2020년에는 ‘나홀로’, ‘코로나’ 등의 키워드와 헤드라인을 구성하였다. 셋째, 네트워크분석을 통해서 연결중심성이 높은 노드를 확인하였다. 2019년에는 ‘여행’, ‘도시’가 나타났고, 2020년에는 ‘여행’, ‘제주’가 나타났다. 아이겐벡터중심성이 높은 상위 노드로 2019년에는 ‘문화’, ‘경험’, ‘모험’ 등이 나타났고, 2020년에는 ‘길’, ‘바다’, ‘산’ 등이 나타났다.

South Korea and Japan have been unwaveringly committed to a nuclear-focused energy supply system despite the contested nature of that technology and the Fukushima accident in 2011. The socio-political consequences of four nuclear-related facilities (Ulju, Gyeongju, Futaba, and Rokkasho) are explored through the lens of social peripheralisation. This framework suggests that nuclear facilities will migrate to communities that are geographically remote, economically marginal, politically powerless, culturally defensive, and environmentally degraded. Nuclear infrastructures in the four cases are imposed on peripheral regions, impairing not only the structure of local economies and political power, but also creating a discriminative structure in terms of social and environmental inequality. Peripheralisation suggests a deeper dynamic by which pro-nuclear attitudes become ‘locked in’ socially and culturally so that communities come to depend on the very processes that made them peripheral. Community dynamics, subnational struggles, and contests over local power relations may determine the future of nuclear power.