• Molecular & Cellular Toxicology
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.106-113
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• 2006

Phthalate analogues are a plasticizer and solvent used in industry. Phthalates were classified in the category of "suspected" endocrine disruptors. The purpose of our study was to screen and elucidate the endocrine disrupting activity of seven phthalate analogues. E-screen assay was performed in MCF-7 human breast cancer cells with seven phthalate analogues. In this cell proliferation assay, benzyl butyl phthalate (BBP) and dibutyl phthalate (DBP) showed high estrogenic activity. Their relative proliferation efficiencies (RPE) were 109 and 106%, respectively. In vitro estrogen receptor (ER) binding assay, BBP, di-n-octyl phthalate (DOP) and dinonyl phthalate (DNP) showed weak relative binding affinity (RBA: 0.02%) compared to $17{\beta}-estradiol\;(E2)$ (RBA: 100%). In uterotrophic assay, E2 produced a significant increase, whereas four tested phthalate analogues had potential estrogenic effects in vitro did not increased in uterus weight in immature rats. From these results, we demonstrated that phthalate analogues exhibit weak estrogenic activity in vitro assays at high concentrations. Although phthalates induced an increase in MCF-7 cell proliferation by an estrogenic effect, they could not induce a uterus weight increase in vivo. From these, we may suggest that these phthalate analogues are easily metabolized to inactive forms in vivo. Further investigation in other in vitro and in vivo experimental systems might be required.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.458-463
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• 2018

The phosphorylation of JNK is known to induce insulin resistance in insulin target tissues. The inhibition of JNK-JIP1 interaction, which interferes JNK phosphorylation, becomes a potential target for drug development of type 2 diabetes. To discover the inhibitors of JNK-JIP1 interaction, we screened out 30 candidates from 4320 compound library with In Cell Interaction Trap method. The candidates were further confirmed and narrowed down to five compounds using the FRET method in a model cell. Among those five compounds, Acebutolol showed notable inhibition of JNK phosphorylation and elevation of glucose uptake in diabetic models of adipocyte and liver cell. Structural computation showed that the binding affinity of Acebutolol on the JNK-JIP1 interaction site was comparable to the known inhibitor, BI-78D3. Our results suggest that Acebutolol, an FDA-approved beta blocker for hypertension therapy, could have a new repurposed effect on type 2 diabetes elevating glucose uptake process by inhibiting JNK-JIP1 interaction.

• Archives of Pharmacal Research
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.518-523
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• 2004

An allergic reaction ensues after antigen binds to mast cell or basophil high affinity IgE receptor, Fc$\varepsilon$RI, resulting in degranulation of various inflammatory mediators that produce various allergic symptoms. In this study, i) we isolated the active component for the inhibition of mast cell degranulation from the extract of leaves of Castanea crenata and identified it as quercetin; ii) we established the total synthesis procedure of quercetin; iii) using quercetin as positive control, we excavated some lead compounds that possess inhibitory activities for mast cell degranulation by screening the chemical libraries of 1,3-oxazolidine derivatives prepared by solid phase combinatorial chemistry. Some of 1,3-oxazolidine compounds possessing acetyl and 3',4'-dichlorophenyl group displayed strong inhibitory activities on Fc$\varepsilon$RI-mediated mast cell degranulation, suggesting that they can be used as lead compounds for the development of anti-allergic agents.

• Animal cells and systems
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.81-87
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• 2003

While screening proteins that interact with DnaA protein, the initiator protein for Escherichia coil chromosomal DNA replication, we found a 52-kD sized protein which bound to DnaA protein in a salt-dependent manner. This protein was identified as trigger factor, a ribosome-associated peptidyl-prolyl- cisltrans isomerase with chaperone activity. Trigger factor was overproduced and purified to near homogeneity, and its effect on the function of DnaA protein was examined, Enhanced binding of DnaA protein to DnaA box with no apparent supershift in the gel-shift experiments suggested that trigger factor, by virtue of its chaperone activity, exerts a change on DnaA protein thus increasing its binding affinity for DnaA box.

• Nano
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• v.13 no.10
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• pp.1850116.1-1850116.14
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• 2018

In this study, we report the mercury ions ($Hg^{2+}$) mediated phosphorus-containing carbon dots (PCDs) as a selective "off-on" fluorescence probe for glutathione (GSH), cysteine (Cys) and homocysteine (Hcys). PCDs obtained by hydrothermal reaction are sensitive to $Hg^{2+}$ ions and its fluorescence can be significantly quenched owing to the electron transfer from the lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) of PCDs to $Hg^{2+}$. Interestingly, the weak fluorescence of $Hg^{2+}$-mediated PCDs could be gradually recovered with the addition of GSH, Cys and Hcys. This can be attributed to the formation of $Hg^{2+}-S$ complex due to the super affinity of $Hg^{2+}$-sulfydryl bond. The formation of $Hg^{2+}-S$ complex extremely reduces the oxidation ability of $Hg^{2+}$ that inhibits the electron transfer from LUMO of PCDs to $Hg^{2+}$ and re-opens the native electron transition from LUMO to the highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) of PCDs. Thus, the green fluorescence of PCDs is switched on. Furthermore, the present $Hg^{2+}$-mediated PCDs assay exhibits a high selectivity for GSH, Cys and Hcy and has been successfully used to detect the total biothiols content in human urine samples.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
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• v.29 no.5
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• pp.519-526
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• 2021

In a search for effective PPAR-γ agonists, 110 clinical drugs were screened via molecular docking, and 9 drugs, including parecoxib, were selected for subsequent biological evaluation. Molecular docking of parecoxib to the ligand-binding domain of PPAR-γ showed high binding affinity and relevant binding conformation compared with the PPAR-γ ligand/antidiabetic drug rosiglitazone. Per the docking result, parecoxib showed the best PPAR-γ transactivation in Ac2F rat liver cells. Further docking simulation and a luciferase assay suggested parecoxib would be a selective (and partial) PPAR-γ agonist. PPAR-γ activation by parecoxib induced adipocyte differentiation in 3T3-L1 murine preadipocytes. Parecoxib promoted adipogenesis in a dose-dependent manner and enhanced the expression of adipogenesis transcription factors PPAR-γ, C/EBPα, and C/EBPβ. These data indicated that parecoxib might be utilized as a partial PPAR-γ agonist for drug repositioning study.

• Journal of Microbiology
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.347-353
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• 1997

We have characterized a phage library displaying random 22mer peptides which were produced as N-terminal fusions to the pIII coat protein of M13 filamentous phages. Among the sixty phages randomly picked from the library, 25 phages had the 22mer peptide inserts. The DNA sequence analysis of the 25 inserts showed the following results: first, each nucleotide was represented almost equally at each codon position except that there were some biases toward G bases at the first position of the codons. Secondly, the expected 47 sense codons were represented. The deduced amino acid sequences of the 25 inserts were analyzed to examine its diversity. Glycine and glutamate were the two most overrepresented residues above the expected value, whereas cysteine and threonine residues were underrepresented. The range of dicersity in dipeptide sequences showed that the amino acid residues were randomly distributed along the peptide insert. Acidic, basic, polar, and nonpolar amino acid residues were represented to the extent expected at most positions of the peptide inserts. The predicted isoelectric points and hydropathy indices of the 25 peptides showed that a variety of the peptide were represented in the library. These results indicate that this phage display library could be useful in fiuding ligands for a broad spectrum of receptors by affinity screening.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.378.2-378.2
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• 2016

Biosensors currently suffer from severe non-specific adsorption of proteins, which causes false positive errors in detection through overestimation of the affinity value. Overcoming this technical issue motivates our research. Polyethylene glycol (PEG) is well known for its ability to reduce the adsorption of biomolecules; hence, it is widely used in various areas of medicine and other biological fields. Likewise, amine functionalized surfaces are widely used for biochemical analysis, drug delivery, medical diagnostics and high throughput screening such as biochips. As a result, many coating techniques have been introduced, one of which is plasma polymerization - a powerful coating method due to its uniformity, homogeneity, mechanical and chemical stability, and excellent adhesion to any substrate. In our previous works, we successfully fabricated plasmapolymerized PEG (PP-PEG) films [1] and amine functionalized films [2] using the plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) technique. In this research, an amine functionalized PP-PEG film was fabricated by using the plasma co-polymerization technique with PEG 200 and ethylenediamine (EDA) as co-precursors. A biocompatible amine functionalized film was surface characterized by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR). The density of the surface amine functional groups was carried out by quantitative analysis using UV-visible spectroscopy. We found through surface plasmon resonance (SPR) analysis that non-specific protein adsorption was drastically reduced on amine functionalized PP-PEG films. Our functionalized PP-PEG films show considerable potential for biotechnological applications such as biosensors.

• Korean Journal of Weed Science
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.96-106
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• 1984

Changes in weed floras and development of plant resistance to herbicides seemed to be closely related with increased and repeated use of herbicides. Herbicide use increased from 5% of the total consumption of pesticide in 1950 to 45% in 1976 in world basis. About 200 herbicides have been introduced to agriculture so as to control about 206 weed species which have been recorded important to human beings. In Korea, there was about 351 times in increased use of herbicides from 1966 to 1982. Interspecific selection by herbicide is mainly responsible for changes in weed floras and resulted in varying tolerance or susceptibility to herbicides, together with the changes of agricultural practices. The present trend toward continuous cereal cultivation throughout world will lead to type of changes in weed floras favorable to therophyte which can survive under unfavorable conditions as seeds rather than the types of geophyte which can survive unfavorable seasons as buds placed below soil surface. However, geophyte such as Sagitaria pygmaea, and Scirpus jurtcoides, and Cyperus rotundus and Cynodon dactylon in temperate warm climate become severe paddy weeds, presumably because of the removal of annual weeds by herbicides. Since differential tolerance to 2,4-D was firstly reported in Agrostis stolofera, about 30 species of weeds in 18 genera are presently known to have developed resistance to triazine herbicides. Resistance of weed biotypes to triazine herbicide is not mainly due to limited absorption and translocation or to the difference in metabolism, but is the result of biochemical changes at the site of metabolic activity, such as a loss of herbicide affinity for triazine binding site in the photosystem II complex of the chloroplast membrane. Genetical study showed that plastid resistance to triazine was wholly inherited through cytoplasmic DNA in the case of Brassica campestris. Plant tissue culture method can be utilized as an alternate mean of herbicide screening and development of resistance variants to herbicides as suggested by Chaleff and Parsons. In this purpose, one should be certain that the primary target process is operational in cell culture. Further, there are a variety of obstacles in doing this type of research, particularly development of resistance source and it's regeneration because cultured cells and whole plants represent different developmental state.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.152-159
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• 2014

The regulation of protein tyrosine phosphorylation is mediated by protein tyrosine kinases (PTKs) and protein tyrosine phosphatases (PTPs) and is essential for cellular homeostasis. Co-expression of PTKs with PTPs in Pichia pastoris was used to facilitate the expression of active PTKs by neutralizing their apparent toxicity to cells. In this study, the gene encoding phosphatase PTP1B with or without a blue fluorescent protein or peroxisomal targeting signal 1 was cloned into the expression vector pAG32 to produce four vectors. These vectors were subsequently transformed into P. pastoris GS115. The tyrosine kinases EGFR-2 and $PDGFR{\beta}$ were expressed from vector pPIC3.5K and were fused with a His-tag and green fluorescent protein at the N-terminus. The two plasmids were transformed into P. pastoris with or without PTP1B, resulting in 10 strains. The EGFR-2 and $PDGFR{\beta}$ fusion proteins were purified by $Ni^{2+}$ affinity chromatography. In the recombinant P. pastoris, the PTKs co-expressed with PTP1B exhibited higher kinase catalytic activity than did those expressing the PTKs alone. The highest activities were achieved by targeting the PTKs and PTP1B into peroxisomes. Therefore, the EGFR-2 and $PDGFR{\beta}$ fusion proteins expressed in P. pastoris may be attractive drug screening targets for anticancer therapeutics.