Ginseng has been shown to promote hair growth in several recent studies. However, its effects on human hair follicles and its mechanisms of action have not been sufficiently elucidated. This study aimed to investigate the hair growthpromoting effects of red ginseng extract (RGE) and its ginsenosides. The proliferative activities of cultured human hair follicles treated with RGE and ginsenoside-Rb1 were assessed using Ki-67 immunostaining. Their effects on isolated human dermal papilla cells (hDPCs) were evaluated using cytotoxicity assays, immunoblot analysis of signaling proteins, and the determination of associated growth factors. We examined the ability of RGE and ginsenosides to protect hair matrix keratinocyte proliferation against dihydrotestosterone (DHT)-induced suppression and their effects on the expression of androgen receptor. The in vivo hair growth-promoting effect of RGE was also investigated in C57BL/6 mice. Both RGE and ginsenoside-Rb1 enhanced the proliferation of hair matrix keratinocytes. hDPCs treated with RGE or ginsenoside-Rb1 exhibited substantial cell proliferation and the associated phosphorylation of ERK and AKT. Moreover, RGE, ginsenoside-Rb1, and ginsenoside-Rg3 abrogated the DHT-induced suppression of hair matrix keratinocyte proliferation and the DHT-induced upregulation of the mRNA expression of androgen receptor in hDPCs. Murine experiments revealed that the subcutaneous injection of 3% RGE resulted in more rapid hair growth than the negative control. In conclusion, RGE and its ginsenosides may enhance hDPC proliferation, activate ERK and AKT signaling pathways in hDPCs, upregulate hair matrix keratinocyte proliferation, and inhibit the DHT-induced androgen receptor transcription. These results suggest that red ginseng may promote hair growth in humans.

We reported the synthesis of highly water-stable iron oxide nanoparticles by a simple one-pot reaction.

To overcome the ethical issues associated with performing clinical trials or obtaining patient's skin tissues, there have been many attempts to develop appropriate models to study skin physiology, such as the use of skin explants to assess the effects of laser treatment. Skin explants are produced by processing skin tissue obtained from an excision. Con taminants and subcutaneous fat tissue are removed from the tissue, which is then cultured. Such processed tissue lacks blood circulation and nerve innervation, and is difficult to be preserved over a prolonged period of time. However, due to the similarities between skin explants and live skin tissues in terms of structure and physiological factors, such explants are thought to be useful as skin models to study the effects of laser treatment. Our previous studies showed that, following exposure to actual fractional laser, skin explants have very similar histological and molecular biological changes to those seen in the initial in vivo stages. However, with time, the differences between skin explants and live skin tissues become increasingly apparent. Therefore, skin explant models may be improved, such as by optimizing the culture conditions. In our present review, we examined the usefulness and limitations of skin explants to study the effects of laser therapy based on our own previous experience and the existing literature.

Tailings wasted in mine activity, has smaller silty size than fine aggregates. When tailings included heavy metals exposed to the atmosphere, they act as contamination source of soil and streams in the area surrounding mine. worthless tailings are stacked in tailings facility built on idle land near mine and covered by liner and top soil layers. The type of most of tailings dams in domestic mines is upstream dam. Unfortunately, as upstream dam is vulnerable to earthquakes and heavy rain, it should be managed continuously to prevent tailings loss. To prevent dam failure, measurement system such as leachate rate, water level, pore pressure and vertical or horizontal movement should be installed to secure quantitative data and analyzed data to develop indicator related dam failure. However, these measurement technologies related to analysis on local slope, subsidence, strain are quite expensive so that new technologies in various field should be actively incorporated to activate tailings facilities monitoring.

A decode-and-forward two-hop relay network exploiting spatial diversity is considered. By considering transmission overheads in detail to exploit spatial diversity, an explicit expression is derived for the average transmission capacity of the relay network, which is a function of the transmission time and coding rate by the source. Some numerical examples based on analysis are provided to demonstrate performance behaviour.Introduction: We consider a decode-and-forward two-hop relay network consisting of a source, a destination and multiple relay nodes. We assume that all channels, i.e. source-relay (SR) channels and relay-destination (RD) channels, are independent and are subject to the Rayleigh block fading model. Accordingly, the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of each channel remains invariant during a fixed length in the unit of symbol time, called a slot time.To transmit information from the source to the destination, the source first selects a coding rate at the beginning of each slot time and transmits information with the selected coding rate to multiple relay nodes for a fixed symbol time duration. Then, each relay node that can successfully decode the information from the source sends one symbol to the destination for the RD channel training. To exploit spatial diversity, the destination estimates the SNR value of each relay node that sends the training symbol and selects the relay node with the best SNR value. By being notified by the destination node (i.e. the feedback process by the destination), the selected relay node then forwards the information from the source to the destination.Since our relay network exploits spatial diversity by selecting the relay node with the best SNR value, the transmission between the selected relay node and the destination should be completed within a slot time. Otherwise, the selected relay node may not remain the one with the best SNR value. However, the training and feedback processes are part of a slot time, which obviously reduces the transmission capacity of the relay network. With such transmission overheads, it is very important to select the suitable coding rate at the source and transmission time by the source in each slot time to make our relay network achieve its optimal transmission capacity. That is, if either the coding rate at the source is too high or the transmission time by the source in a slot time is too large, the amount of information that the selected relay node decodes is accordingly large and all the information from the source may not be successfully forwarded to the destination by the end of the slot time. On the other hand, if either the coding rate at the source is too low or the transmission time by the source in a slot time is too small, the amount of information that the selected relay node decodes is accordingly small, which results in a waste of network resources. In light of the above discussion, the objective of our study was to determine the best coding rate at the source and the best transmission time by the source in a slot time with...