• Journal of Life Science
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.343-348
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• 2023

Acne is one of the most common skin diseases, mainly occurring in adolescence. The pathophysiology of acne involves not only hormonal, genetic and environmental factors, but also other factors including hyperseborrhea, inflammation, over-keratinization of follicular keratinocytes and overgrowth of Cutibacterium acnes (C. acnes). Cannabidiol (CBD) is known to relieve pain, stress and inflammation. Moreover, cannabis extracts containing CBD have been reported to be effective in treating acne. However, the therapeutic effect of CBD on acne remains unclear. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the effect and mechanism of CBD on lipogenesis in SEB-1 sebocytes. We treated sebocytes with CBD and found that it not only inhibited lipid synthesis, but also inhibited cell proliferation by inducing apoptosis. We then demonstrated that sterol response element-binding protein-1 (SREBP-1) mediates the inhibitory effect of CBD on lipogenesis. Furthermore, Akt and adenosine monophosphate-activated protein kinase (AMPK), upstream regulators of SREBP-1, were regulated by CBD treatment. Taken together, our studies demonstrate that CBD inhibits adipogenesis by regulating the Akt/AMPK-SREBP-1 signaling pathway, providing potential for use as a therapeutic agent for acne. Further research is needed to confirm the effect of CBD on inflammation caused by hyperkeratosis, which will increase the possibility of using CBD for acne treatment.

• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
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• v.50
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• pp.142-154
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• 2023

Plant abscission is a natural process in which plant organs or tissues undergo detachment, a strategy selected by nature for the disposal of nonessential organs and widespread dissemination of seeds and fruits. However, from an agricultural perspective, the abscission of seeds or fruits represents a major factor that reduces crop productivity and product quality. Therefore, during the crop domestication process in traditional agriculture, mutants exhibiting suppressed abscission were selected and crossbred, thereby enabling the production of modern crop varieties such as rice, tomatoes, canola, and soybeans. These crops possess a unique trait of retaining ripe fruits or seeds in contrast to disposal via abscission. During the previous century, research on quantitative trait loci along with genetic and molecular biological studies on Arabidopsis thaliana have elucidated various cell biological mechanisms, signaling pathways, and transcription regulators involved in abscission. Additionally, it has been revealed that various hormone signals, which are involved in plant growth, play crucial roles in modulating abscission activity. Researchers have developed several chemical treatments that target these hormones and signal transduction pathways to enhance crop yields. This review aimed to introduce the previously identified signal transduction pathways and pivotal regulators implicated in abscission activity. Moreover, this review will discuss the future direction of research required to investigate crop abscission mechanisms for their potential application in smart farming and other areas of agriculture, as well as areas within model systems that require extensive research.

• Childhood Kidney Diseases
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.48-56
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• 2000

Purpose: Alport SD., the most common herectitary rephriris, is a renal disease with rapid progression. Deafness, ocular abnormalities and a specific EM finding may be associated in addition to a family history. We have aralyged retrospectively. Methods: We observed 12 children with Alport syndrome who were diagnosed at Dept. of pediatrics in Kyunghee Univ., College of Medicine, from Apr. 1991 until Jun. 1999. We used four criteria for diagnosis: renal disease, family history, deafness or eye abnormalities, and a specific finding in electron microscopy Results: 2 of 12 patients had all features of the four diagnostic criteria. We could not trace an exact family history in 3 patients, and 6 patients did not exhibit deafness or eye abnormality. One could not have renal biopsy because offer chronic renal failure. Other three criteria were observed in her. The ratio of male to female observed was 1:2 respectively and the mean age of initial renal symptom was 5.6 years. 9 of 12 patients had a family history of renal disease. In the audiogram and ocular examination for 11 of 12 cases, sensorineural hearing loss was observed in 6 and ocular abnormality in 2 cases. In electron microscopic finding, irregular thickness of the capillary basement membranes with lamination of lamina densa and foot process obliteration was noted in 9 of 11 and thin basement membrane with splitting and foot process obliteration was noted in the other 2. The mean period of follow-up was 3 6/12 years. And one patient developed the chronic renal failure until now and had kidney transplantation. Conclusion: For the diagnosis of Alport syndrome, the following four diagnostic criteria are very important : renal disease, family history, deafness or eye abnormalities, and a specific finding on electron microscopy. We expect that more patients can be detected through the analysis of these characteristics.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.303-317
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• 2022

Climate change caused by increased greenhouse gas emissions can alter the natural ecosystem, including the pollination ecosystem and agricultural ecology, which are ecological interactions between potted insects and plants. Many studies have reported that populations of wild bees, including bees and wasps (BW), which are the key pollinators, have gradually declined due to climate change, leading to adverse impacts on overall biodiversity, ultimately with agribusinesses and the life cycle of flowering plants. Therefore, we could infer that the rising temperature in Korean Peninsula (South Korea) due to global warming has led to climate change and influenced the wild bee's ecosystem. In this study, we surveyed the distributional pattern of BW (Superfamily: Apoidea, Vespoidea, and Chrysidoidea) at 51 sites from 2017 (37 sites) to 2018 (14 sites) to examine the effects of climatic factors on the nationwide distribution of BW in South Korea. Previous literature has confirmed that their distribution according to forest climate zones is significantly correlated with mean and accumulative temperatures. Based on the result, we predicted the effects of future climate changes on the BW distribution that appeared throughout South Korea and the species that appeared in specific climate zones using Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs). The distributions of wild BW predicted by the SSP scenarios 2-4.5 and 5-8.5 according to the BIOMOD species distribution model revealed that common and endemic species will shift northward from the current habitat distribution by 2050 and 2100, respectively. Our study implies that climate change and its detrimental effect on the ecosystem is ongoing as the BW distribution in South Korea can change, causing the change in the ecosystem in the Korean Peninsula. Therefore, immediate efforts to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions are warranted. We hope the findings of this study can inspire further research on the effects of climate change on pollination services and serve as the reference for making agricultural policy and BW conservation strategy

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.78-83
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• 2005

Nanometric crystalline silicon (no-Si) embedded in dielectric medium has been paid attention as an efficient light emitting center for more than a decade. In nc-Si, excitonic electron-hole pairs are considered to attribute to radiative recombination. However the surface defects surrounding no-Si is one of non-radiative decay paths competing with the radiative band edge transition, ultimately which makes the emission efficiency of no-Si very poor. In order to passivate those defects - dangling bonds in the $Si:SiO_2$ interface, hydrogen is usually utilized. The luminescence yield from no-Si is dramatically enhanced by defect termination. However due to relatively high mobility of hydrogen in a matrix, hydrogen-terminated no-Si may no longer sustain the enhancement effect on subsequent thermal processes. Therefore instead of easily reversible hydrogen, phosphorus was introduced by ion implantation, expecting to have the same enhancement effect and to be more resistive against succeeding thermal treatments. Samples were Prepared by 400 keV Si implantation with doses of $1\times10^{17}\;Si/cm^2$ and by multi-energy Phosphorus implantation to make relatively uniform phosphorus concentration in the region where implanted Si ions are distributed. Crystalline silicon was precipitated by annealing at $1,100^{\circ}C$ for 2 hours in Ar environment and subsequent annealing were performed for an hour in Ar at a few temperature stages up to $1,000^{\circ}C$ to show improved thermal resistance. Experimental data such as enhancement effect of PL yield, decay time, peak shift for the phosphorus implanted nc-Si are shown, and the possible mechanisms are discussed as well.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.14 no.6 s.67
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• pp.913-919
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• 2004

Mitochondrial DNA mutations have been reported in recent years in association with sensorineural hering loss. The purpose of this study is to identify the association between the noise-induced sensorineural hearing loss and the A to G mutation at nucleotide 3243, 1555, 7445 of mitochondrial DNA. Study subjects were established by history and chart review, and audiological and clinical data were obtained. Blood was sampled from 214 normal controls, 102 noise-induced hearing loss, and 28 sensorineural hearing loss. The DNA of these individuals were extracted, and mitochondrial DNA fragments were analyzed by polymerase chain reaction. Subsequently, the coding sequence of mitochondrial DNA 3243, 1555, 7445 were sequenced, and compared to the normal sequence, and all sequence variations were analyzed by restriction enzymes. Mitochondrial DNA mutations $(3243A{\rightarrow}G,\;1555A{\rightarrow}4G,\;7445A{\rightarrow}G)$ were not detected by polymerase chain reactions in any patients with noise-induced hearing loss, sensorineural hearing loss, and normal controls. The DNA sequencing of PCR products did not revealed an A to G substitution at nucleotide 3243, 1555, 7445 of mitochondrial DNA. The noise-induced sensorineural hearing loss was not associated with mitochondrial DNA mutation $(3243A{\rightarrow}G,\;1555A{\rightarrow}4G,\;7445A{\rightarrow}G)$.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.224-236
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• 2002

A long-term growth simulation was performed at 496 land units in the western coastal plains (WCP) of North Korea to test the potential adaptability of each land unit for growing South Korean rice cultivars. The land units for rice cultivation (CZU), each of them represented by a geographically referenced 5 by 5 km grid tell, were identified by analyzing satellite remote sensing data. Surfaces of monthly climatic normals for daily maximum and minimum temperature, precipitation number of rain days and solar radiation were generated at a 1 by 1 km interval by spatial statistical methods using observed data at 51 synoptic weather stations in North and South Korea during 1981-2000. Grid cells felling within a same CZU and, at the same time, corresponding to the satellite data- identified rice growing pixels were extracted and aggregated to make a spatially explicit climatic normals relevant to the rice growing area of the CZU. Daily weather dataset for 30 years was randomly generated from the monthly climatic normals of each CZU. Growth and development parameters of CERES-rice model suitable for 11 major South Korean cultivars were derived from long-term field observations. Eight treatments comprised of 2 transplanting dates $\times$ 2 cropping systems $\times$ 2 irrigation methods were assigned to each cultivar. Each treatment was simulated with the randomly generated 30 years' daily weather data (from planting to physiological maturity) for 496 land units in WCP to simulate the growth and yield responses to the interannual climate variation. The same model was run with the input data from the 3 major crop experiment stations in South Korea to obtain a 30 year normal performance of each cultivar, which was used as a "reference" for comparison. Results were analyzed with respect to spatial and temporal variation in yield and maturity, and used to evaluate the suitability of each land unit for growing a specific South Korean cultivar. The results may be utilized as decision aids for agrotechnology transfer to North Korea, for example, germplasm evaluation, resource allocation and crop calendar preparation.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Inherited Metabolic disease
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.18-23
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• 2016

Objective: Newborn screening leads to improved treatment and disease outcomes, but false-positive newborn screening results may impact include parental stress and anxiety, perception of child as unhealthy, parent-child relationship dysfunction, and increased infant hospitalizations. The purpose of this study was to investigate of the false positive rates and the causative factors of false positive results in Tandem Mass Spectrometry (TMS) in single center. Methods: Records were reviewed for all 18,872 subjects who were born in Cheill General Hospital, during January 1st, 2012 to December 31st, 2014. 17,292 neonates (91.62%) were tested for tandem mass screening almost in 2-5th day of life. Newborn babies whose first results were abnormal had been tested repeatedly by same methods in 7-14 day. If the results were abnormal again, further evaluation was performed. TMS analysis included data for the 43 disorders screened for using TMS broken down into three categories: fatty acid oxidation disorders, organic acidurias, and aminoacidopathies. The impact of several factors on increased false positive rates was analyzed using a multivariate analysis: time from birth to sample collection, birth weight, birth height, BMI, gender, gestational age, delivery type. Results: Males of the subjects were 8942 (51.7%), female 8350 (48.3%), the mean gestational age was $38.6{\pm}1.7$ weeks, the average birth weight $3,155.6{\pm}502.4g$, the average birth height $49.1{\pm}2.9cm$, and the average BMI $13.0{\pm}3.8(kg/m^2)$. Vaginal delivery cases were 9713 (56.2%), caesarean section 7,579 (43.8%). The average date of the inspection was $2.8{\pm}1.1$ days. 224 cases were identified as TMS positive. All the subjects were false positive (222/17,292, 1.30%) except 2 cases (1 male; benign phenylketonuria and 1 female; Short chain acyl-CoA dehydrogenase deficiency). The false positive rates were 0.61% in fatty acid oxidation disorders, 0.25% in organic acidurias, and 0.45% in aminoacidopathies. In our study, the date of inspection got late, the false positive rates got higher. Because almost the cases of late test date were in treatment in neonatal intensive care unit so their test date was affected by their medical conditions. False positive rate was higher in extreme immaturity${\leq}27$ weeks than newborns of gestational age >27 weeks [OR=6.957 (CI=1.273-38.008), p<0.025] and extremely low birth weight<1,000 g than newborns of birthweight ${\geq}1,000g$ [OR=5.616 (CI=1.134-27.820), p<0.035]. Conclusion: False positive rate of TMS was 1.30% in Cheil General Hospital. Lower gestational age and birth weight impacted on increased false positive rates. Better understanding of factors that influence the reporting of screening tests, and the ability to modify these important factors, may improve the screening process and reduce the need for retesting. of screening tests, and the ability to modify these important factors, may improve the screening process and reduce the need for retesting.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.53 no.2
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• pp.113-126
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• 2002

Background : DNA repair plays a crucial role in protection from cancer-causing agents. Therefore, a reduced DNA repair capacity can increase the susceptibility to lung cancer. The XPC gene contains 15 exons and encodes a 940 amino acid protein that plays a central role in DNA damage recognition of the nucleotide excision repair pathway, which is a major DNA repair mechanisim removing the bulky-helix distorting DNA lesions caused by smoking. Recently several polymorphisms in the XPC gene were identified. In addition, it is possible that these polymorphisms may affect the DNA repair capacity, which modulate cancer susceptibility. The relationship between codon 499 and 939 polymorphisms, and a poly(AT) insertion/deletion polymorphism in the XPC gene, and the lung cancer risk were investigated. Materials and Methods : The genotypes were determined using either PCR or PCR-RFLP analysis in 219 male lung cancer patients and 150 healthy males controls. Results : The frequencies of the genotypes (Val499Ala, PAT and Lys939Gln) among the cases were not significantly different from those of the controls. There was no significant associantion between these polymorphi는 and the lung cancer risk when the analyses were stratified according to age, smoking status and the pack-years of smoking. Moreover, the genotypes had no apparent relationship with any of the histological types of lung cancer. There was a linkage disequilibrium among the Val499Ala, PAT and Lys939Gln polymorphisms. The PAT polymorphism had a strong linkage disequilibrium with the Lys939Gln polymorphism (kappa value=0.87). The XPC haplotypes showed no significant association with the lung cancer risk. Conclusion : These results suggest that XPC Val499Ala, PAT and Lys939Gln polymorphisms are not major contributors to the individual lung cancer susceptibility in Koreans.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.87 no.4
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• pp.549-556
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• 1998

To develop the effective methods of flowering stimulation, Hinoki cypress (Chamaecyparis obtusa Sieh. et Zuec.) grafts growing in a seed orchard and in a clone bank in Southern Breeding Station of Cheju were applied with gibberellin treatments, and predicted the seed production potential. In the seed orchard, $GA_{4/7}$ 1.5cc was injected into the stem of drafts and sprayed whale tree crown with $GA_3$ 300ppm and $GA_{4/7}$ 300ppm. Un the other hand, in the clonal archives, drafts were given intrusion of $GA_{4/7}$ 1.5cc into the excised and open inner part of bark wind $GA_3$ 20mg and sprayed with $GA_3$ 300ppm. Additionally, grafts growing in the seed orchard were treated with gibberellins at 3 different periods of time and 3 different treatments during the growing season. The results obtained here are summarized as follows : 1. All of the applications of Gilbberellin promoted female flower formation. Among these, the treatment of intrusion of $GA_{4/7}$ 1.5cc into the excised and open inner part of bark was racist effective, followed by the spraying of $GA_3$ 300ppm. Similarly, the applications of gibberellin promoted male flower formation. 2. Regarding the time of applications, treatment on August 15 was more effective than those of August 31 and September 11 in the stimulation of female flowers. On the contrary, there was no significant difference in the number of male flowers among 3 different time treatments. 3. It was supposed that the application of the intrusion of $GA_{4/7}$ 1.5cc into the excised and open inner part of bark on August 15 showing the best effect in female flower formation can produce 22.12kg seeds per ha. 4. Considerable significant difference existed among clones for both female and male flower formations. 5. Flower formation, especially female flower formation, seemed to be partially associated with the genetic potential of individual trees.