• Pediatric Infection and Vaccine
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.194-200
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• 2015

Purpose: Urinary tract infection (UTI) is a common bacterial infection in children and Escherichia coli is a predominant pathogen. The purpose of this study is to evaluate phylogenetic groups and virulence factors of E. coli causing UTI in children in Korea. Methods: From October 2010 to April 2013, urinary E. coli strains were isolated from the 33 pediatric patients of UTI. Multiplex polymerase chain reactions were performed to evaluate the phylogenetic groups and 5 virulence factor genes (fimH, sfa, papA, hylA, and cnf1) of E. coli. Distribution of molecular characteristics of E. coli was analyzed by clinical diagnosis and accompanying vesicoureteral reflux (VUR). Results: Most (84.8%) uropathogenic E. coli were belonged to phylogenetics group B2 and the others (15.2%) were belonged to group D. The virulence factors were distributed as: fimH (100%), sfa (100%), hylA (63.6%), cnfI (63.6%), and papA (36.4%). According to clinical diagnosis, phylogenetic distribution of E. coli strain was 92.3% of B2 and 7.7% of D in acute pyelonephritis and 57.1% of B2 and 42.9% of D in cystitis. Distribution of virulence factors was similar in both groups. In patients with acute pyelonephritis, phylogenetic distribution was similar in VUR and non-VUR group, but proportion of papA genes were lower in VUR group than that of non-VUR group (43.8% vs. 20.0%, P=0.399). Conclusions: This study provides current epidemiologic molecular data of E. coli causing pediatric UTI in Korea and will be a fundamental for understanding the pathogenesis of pediatric UTI.

• Korean Journal of Plant Taxonomy
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.353-360
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• 2011

The sequence data of the plastid DNA (trnL-F IGS, trnL intron, and trnH-psbA) and nuclear DNA (RNApol2_i23) markers were utilized to study phylogenetic relationships among the taxa in the Polygonatum odoratum complex (Ruscaceae). European P. odoratum individuals form a clade with a high bootstrap value, which is a sister to the clade of Korean P. odoratum var. odoratum, P. odoratum var. pluriflorum and P. robustum. The formation of the clade with P. odoratum var. odoratum, P. robustum, and one accession of P. odoratum var. pluriflorum indicates geological speciation in isolated populations in the islands following dispersal events from the mainlands. All data sets form two major clades, which are congruent with the subgroups divided by the basic chromosome numbers (x = 9 and x = 10). Although it is not easy to test the hypothesis of the decrease in the basic chromosome number due to scatter taxon sampling in this study, the molecular data strongly suggested that aneuploidy plays an important role in lineage diversification in the genus Polygonatum. The cytological data was not strongly supported by the cpDNA sequences. Further investigations of the cytological, morphological, and geographical characteristics with comprehensive sampling are desired to understand the evolution and lineage diversification in the genus.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.45 no.4
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• pp.368-376
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• 2009

A red pigment-producing bacterial strain was isolated from sediment sample of the East China Sea. The isolate was identified by analysis based on 16S rDNA sequence and morphological, physiological properties, biochemical characteristics and fatty acid composition. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rDNA sequence showed that isolate represent a phyletic lineage within the genus Zooshikella, and this strain was most closely related to Zooshikella ganghwensis KCTC $12044^T$ (AY130994) (99.79%). The strain was Gram-negative, aerobic and required NaCl at 0.5~8.0% for growth. The predominant cellular fatty acids were saturated and monounsaturated straight-chain fatty acids. Consequently, this strain was identified as a member of the genus Zooshikella and designated as Zooshikella sp. JE-34. The pigment showed characteristics similar to prodigiosin, a well-known red pigment previously detected in Serratia marcescens. The antimicrobial activity of Zooshikella sp. JE-34 bacterial pigment was tested against 18 microorganisms, which were fish and human pathogens. The Zooshikella sp. JE-34 red pigment showed high antimicrobial activity against Streptococcus iniae, S. parauberis, S. mutans, Staphylococcus aureus, and Propionibacterium acnes.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.55 no.3
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• pp.212-220
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• 2022

An estuary is a water ecosystem with a high abundance of the species diversity, due to a variety of complex physicochemical factors of the area where freshwater and ocean mixed. The identification of Corbicula species in the estuary environments is difficult because of various morphological characteristics. In this study, we provide taxonomic information on Corbicula species with taxonomic difficulties using morphological and genetic analysis. This study was conducted on clams from the Seomjin River-Gwangyang Bay, one of the major production area of marsh clam in Korea. As a result, we characterized Cytocrome C Oxidase subunit I (COI) sequences of the Corbicula. The 636 bp nucleotide sequences of COI have 98% homology among Corbicula species collected from 2 sites of Seomjin River-Gwangyang Bay. The phylogenetic analysis with 17 species of Corbicula indicated that most of the species collected from Seomjin River-Gwangyang Bay were brackish water clam (Corbicula japonica), and only one Asian clam (Corbicula fluminea). The evolutionary distance between C. japonica and C. fluminea was less than 0.003. Therefore, it was confirmed that C. japonica is phylogenetically closely related to C. fluminea. In 9 species of Cyrenidae, phylogenetic tree was classified into three lineages. These results will be used as an important data for an identification of clam species by providing genetic information for Corbicula species with a morphological diversity.

• Korean Journal of Ichthyology
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.217-225
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• 2021

The family Platycephalidae is a taxonomic group of economically important demersal flathead fishes that predominantly occupy tropical or temperate estuaries and coastal environments of the Indo-Pacific oceans and the Mediterranean Sea. In this study, we for the first time analyzed the complete mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) of the flathead Platycephalus cultellatus Richardson, 1846 from Vietnam by Next Generation Sequencing method. Its mitogenome was 16,641 bp in total length, comprising 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), two ribosomal RNA genes, and 22 transfer RNA genes. The gene composition and order of the mitogenome were identical to those of typical vertebrates. The phylogenetic trees were reconstructed based on the concatenated nucleotide sequence matrix of 13 PCGs and the partial sequence of a DNA barcoding marker, cox1 in order to determine its molecular phylogenetic position among the order Scorpaeniformes. The phylogenetic result revealed that P. cultellatus formed a monophyletic group with species belonging to the same family and consistently clustered with one nominal species, P. indicus, and two Platycephalus sp. specimens. Besides, the cox1 tree confirmed the taxonomic validity of our specimen by forming a monophyletic clade with its conspecific specimens. The mitogenome of P. cultellatus analyzed in this study will contribute valuable information for further study on taxonomy and phylogeny of flatheads.

• Korean Journal of Plant Taxonomy
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• v.42 no.3
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• pp.185-196
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• 2012

Morphological and geographical examinations as well as phylogenetic analyses using ITS sequences were performed for Asparagus L. in Korea. A total of five species of Asparagus were confirmed to be distributed in South Korea. The shape of cladophylls, length of pedicels, and shape of perianth were considered to be important characteristics for the identification of Koran Asparagus species. A monophyly of each species was evident in the ITS phylogenetic trees in which multiple accessions (5 to 24, depending on species) represented each of the five Korean species. A. rigidulus Nakai, once considered conspecific to A. schoberioides Kunth, formed a distinct lineage in the ITS trees. Pedicels of A. rigidulus, which is distributed mainly in coastal areas, were about two times longer than those of A. schoberioides occurring in inland areas, suggesting that they should be treated as distinct taxa.

• Korean Journal of Plant Resources
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.96-104
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• 2012

Phylogenetic analyses were conducted to evaluate relationships of 7 taxa of Korean Carpesium including three outgroup (Inula britannica L., Inula germanica L., Rhanteriopsis lannginosa (DC.) Rauschert) by using ITS (internal transcribed spacer) sequences of nuclear ribosomal DNA. Phylogenetic studies used maximum parsimony, neighbor-joining and maximum likelihood methods analysis. The length of the ITS sequences was 731 bp, and the lengths of the ITS1, ITS2 and 5.8S regions were 284~297 bp, 264~266 bp and 164 bp, respectively. The total number of variable sites was 111 for the entire sequences, and a parsimony informative sites of 64 are valid. Base change appeared variously in ITS1 rather than in ITS2. As the result, Korean Carpesium were formed monophyletic group and C. abrotanoides situated as the most basal clade. The results show that C. macrocephalum is closely related with C. triste. C. rosulatum has the closest relationship with C. glossophyllum. C. cernuum is close to C. divaricatum. These results suggest that the ITS data used in this study could be useful for the phylogenetic analysis of Korean Carpesium.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.45 no.2
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• pp.105-111
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• 2009

Norovirus (NV) with a variety of genotypes, a member of the family Caliciviridae, causes acute nonbacterial gastroenteritis in humans. We determined the nucleotide sequence of three open reading frames (ORFs) of a NV Korean strain and characterized the genetic relationship with others. The Korean strain designated Hu/NLV/Gunpo/2006/KO was isolated from the stool specimen of a 2-year-old female suffering from gastroenteritis. By performing reverse transcription and PCR amplification, three overlapping cDNAs were synthesized and used for direct sequencing. We found that like other NVs, this strain contains three ORFs: ORF1, 5,100 bp; ORF2, 1,647 bp; ORF3, 765 bp. Of 35 NVs, ORF1 had a level of genetic diversity lower than ORF2 and ORF3, of which the C-termini of the ORF2 and ORF3 showed a relatively high degree of genetic diversity. Phylogenetic analyses indicated that the Korean strain belonged to genogroup II, with Saitama U1, Gifu'96, Mc37, and Vietnam 026 being formed a single genetic cluster. The nucleotide sequence information of three ORFs of a NV Korean isolate will be useful not only for the development of a diagnostic tool and understanding of genetic relationship, but also provide important basic information for the functional analysis of their gene products.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.24 no.2 s.62
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• pp.112-118
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• 2006

We report mitochondrial cytochrome b (cyt b) genes from greenling Hexagrammos otakii (Jordan et Starks) and spotty belly greenling, H. agrammus (Temminck et Schlegel) within Hexagrammidae, two species of aquaculture importance. Of 489 bp of the cytochrome b gene, a little variation occurred between species (96% similarity). The pairwise distance (0.0342) between greenling and spotty belly greenling in term of the Neighbor-joining method indicated that two species was close in molecular phylogenetic consideration. These findings are applicable to aquaculture, fisheries genetics and molecular phylogenetics in the genus Hexagrammos.