• BMB Reports
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.264-268
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• 1998

Dopamine (DA) acts on swimming motor neurons (SMNs) of Polyorchis penicillatus as an inhibitory neurotransmitter by hyperpolarizing their membrane potentials, which results from the activation of voltagesensitive potassium channels mediated through a $D_2-type$ receptor. In addition, DA, and not the hyperpolarized membrane potential, directly decreased the input resistance of SMNs by ca. 50% from 1.42 to 0.68 $G{\Omega}$. It strongly indicates that DA can shunt other excitatory synaptic signals onto SMNs where DA usually elicited much greater responses in their neurites than soma. All these evidences suggest that DA may operate in this primitive nervous system in dual modes as an inhibitory neurotransmitter and neuromodulator as well.

• Annals of Clinical Neurophysiology
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.101-104
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• 2018

Multifocal acquired demyelinating sensory and motor (MADSAM) neuropathy is a variant of chronic acquired demyelinating polyneuropathy. A 65-year-old women presented with upper arm weakness. A nerve conduction study showed conduction blocks over intermediate segments with sparing of distal compound action potentials. Magnetic resonance imaging revealed asymmetric hypertrophy of the brachial plexus on the affected side. These findings represent important electrophysiological and radiological evidence of MADSAM neuropathy. The condition of the patient began to improve after starting intravenous immunoglobulin administration.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 2020

FK506, also known as tacrolimus, is a clinically important immunosuppressant drug and has promising therapeutic potentials owing to its antifungal, neuroprotective, and neuroregenerative activities. To generate various FK506 derivatives, the structure of FK506 has been modified by chemical methods or biosynthetic pathway engineering. Herein, we describe the mode of the antifungal action of FK506 and the structure-activity relationship of FK506 derivatives in the context of immunosuppressive and antifungal activities. In addition, we discuss the neurotrophic mechanism of FK506 known to date, along with the neurotrophic FK506 derivatives with significantly reduced immunosuppressive activity. This review suggests the possibility to generate novel FK506 derivatives as antifungal as well as neuroregenerative/neuroprotective agents.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.259-264
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• 2010

This study was designed to investigate the effects of nitric oxide on the neuronal activity of rat cerebellar Purkinje cells. Sprague-Dawley rats aged 14 to 16 days were decapitated under ether anesthesia. After treatment with pronase and thermolysin, the dissociated Purkinje cells were transferred into a chamber on an inverted microscope. Spontaneous action potentials and potassium current were recorded by standard patch-clamp techniques under current and voltage-clamp modes respectively. 15 Purkinje cells revealed excitatory responses to $20\;{\mu}M$ of sodium nitroprusside (SNP) and 4 neurons (20%) did not respond to SNP. Whole potassium currents of Purkinje cells were decreased by SNP (n=10). Whole potassium currents of Purkinje cells were also decreased by L-arginine, substrate of nitric oxide (n=10). These experimental results suggest that nitric oxide increases the neuronal activity of Purkinje cells by altering the resting membrane potential and after hyperpolarization.

• Korean Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.227-237
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to find out midaged women's crisis and ways to overcome it. Another purpose is to improve their qualities of life and to provide basic data to develop their potentials. The results are as follows: First, it shows that socio-demographic characteristics have a significant influence on midaged women's crisis. Those variables include religion, jobs, family-life cycle, income, marriage duration, age, and supporting parents. Second, the variables significantly influencing the coping behavior with the crisis include age, income, religion, marriage patterns, region, marriage duration, family-life cycle, and supporting parents. Third, as a result of this research, their negative expression of action or emotion was higher as they were getting old. The general tendency was that an emotional crisis level was low when rational coping behaviors were high. Therefore, self-esteem or social activity improvement programs should be developed for midaged women.

• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.9-15
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• 2008

Unlike robotic systems, humans excel at a variety of tasks by utilizing their intrinsic impedance, force sensation, and tactile contact clues. By examining human strategy in arm impedance control, we may be able to teach robotic manipulators human''s superior motor skills in contact tasks. This paper develops a novel method for estimating and predicting the human joint impedance using the electromyogram(EMG) signals and limb position measurements. The EMG signal is the summation of MUAPs (motor unit action potentials). Determination of the relationship between the EMG signals and joint stiffness is difficult, due to irregularities and uncertainties of the EMG signals. In this research, an artificial neural network(ANN) model was developed to model the relation between the EMG and joint stiffness. The proposed method estimates and predicts the multi joint stiffness without complex calculation and specialized apparatus. The feasibility of the developed model was confirmed by experiments and simulations.

• Annals of Clinical Neurophysiology
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.11-15
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• 2003

Backgrounds: Kennedy disease is a X-linked recessive disease characterized by bulbar symptoms, proximal muscle weakness, and gynecomastia. Methods: We analyzed clinical symptoms and performed electrodiagnostic studies on 6 patients. Results: We found following features: 1) proximal muscle weakness 2) bulbar symptoms, as dysarthria, facial and tongue atrophy 3) hyporeflexia or areflexia 4) fasciculations, predominantly on face, and proximal upper extremities 5) decreased sensory nerve action potentials(SNAPs) 6) chronic neurogenic changes in needle EMG. Conclusions: Kennedy disease is characterized by degenerative process of anterior horn cell and dorsal root ganglion without upper motor neuron dysfunction. Increased triple nucleotide CAG repeats(>38) in androgen receptor gene of Xp21 will confirm early stage of this disease.

• The Korean Journal of Physiology
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.103-111
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• 1995

Intracellular recordings were obtained from Purkinje cells in rat cerebellar slices maintained in vitro. Adding tetrodotoxin to the superfusion solution produced a typical pattern of repetitive burst firing consisting of a cluster of action potentials followed by a long hyperpolarization. TTX-induced oscillatory activity was not due to modulation of membrane potential although underlying mechanisms for maintenance of oscillatory activity were influenced by membrane voltage. The mechanism of TTX-induced oscillation was not related to the presence or amplitude of $I_h$ and could still induce the oscillatory activity after blockade of $I_h$ by cesium. The result from an experiment in which QX-314 was injected intracellularly strongly suggested that TTX-induced oscillatory firing activity was due to blockade of post-synaptic $Na^{+}$ currents intrinsic to PCs.

• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.211-220
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• 2019

Surface electromyogram (sEMG), which is a bio-electrical signal originated from action potentials of nerves and muscle fibers activated by motor neurons, has been widely used for recognizing motion intention of robotic prosthesis for amputees because it enables a device to be operated intuitively by users without any artificial and additional work. In this paper, we propose a training-free unsupervised sEMG pattern recognition algorithm. It is useful for the gesture recognition for the amputees from whom we cannot achieve motion labels for the previous supervised pattern recognition algorithms. Using the proposed algorithm, we can classify the sEMG signals for gesture recognition and the calculated threshold probability value can be used as a sensitivity parameter for pattern registration. The proposed algorithm was verified by a case study of a patient with partial-hand amputation.

• Proceedings of the PSK Conference
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• 2003.10b
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• pp.188.2-188.2
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• 2003

Large-conductance $Ca^{2+}$ activated potassium channels $(BK_{ca})$ are widely distributed and play key roles in various cell functions. In nerve cells, B $K_{ca}$ channels shorten the duration of action potentials and block $Ca^{2+}$ entry thereby repolarizing excitable cells after excitation. $(BK_{ca})$ channel opening has been postulated to confer neuroprotection during stroke and has attracted attention as a means for therapeutic intervention in asthma, hypertension, convulsion, and traumatic brain injury. (omitted)