• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.287-293
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• 2007

Heavy metal contamination and biological toxicity of mine drainages and sediments in abandoned mines were studied. Mine drainages had pH at a range of 2.94~7.86, and contained heavy metals at a toxic level. For coal mines, toxicity of mine drainage to Daphnia magna was attributable to acidic pH. In addition to the low pH, suspended heavy metals such as Zn and Cu contributed to toxicity of mine drainages at abandoned metalliferous mines. All mine sediments studied in this work showed biological toxicity to Chironomus riparius, having mortality at a range of 15~60%. However, its relationship with physicochemical properties including heavy metal content of the sediments was not statistically explained. Exceptionally clay ($< 2{\mu}m$ particle) content was negatively correlated with the biological toxicity for sediment samples collected at the same abandoned mines.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.89-94
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• 1998

CJ50001 is a recombinant human granulocyte colony-stimulating facto, (rHuG-CSF) that stimulates the formation of neutrophils from bone marrow stem cells. It was produced in E. colt and purified through refolding and several processes. We produced CS970125(300) using purified C150001 and additives in order to test the stability of CJ50001. When CS970125(300) was stored at 50'S for more than 1 week, high molecular weight proteins were formed and those proteins were detected by non-reducing SDS-PAGE, gel filtration HPLC, and Western blot. Those proteins showed single band at the same position of CJ50001 in reducing SDS-PAGE. These data indicated that those high molecular weight proteins were the multimers of C150001. In biological assays, iu viro and in viro, the multimers did not have biological activity and inhibitory action to that of CJ 50001. The mutimers did not induce toxicity in mice and rats in acute toxicity test. These results suggest that if Cs970125(300) containing CJ50001 is stored at 5$0^{\circ}C$, CJ50001 will be the multimers that do not have biological activity and inhibitory effect to CJ50001 and do not induce acute toxicity.

• Korean Journal of Biological Psychiatry
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.46-55
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• 1998

Any compound which disrupts the integrity of psychological aspects of performance, in particular, cognitive ability and psychomotor function analogous to the psychological behaviors of routine life, is known to be behaviorally toxic. A significant level of behavioral toxicity will interfere with patient safety and quality of life, and also may be counter-therapeutic by exacerbating the condition that the drug was prescribed for. Now, behavioral toxicity of psychotropic drugs has become one of the main growth areas of psychopharmacological research. Evaluation of the potential of drug-induced behavioral toxicity is important not only to the experimental researcher involved in human psychopharmacology, but also to the clinical practitioner treating psychiatric patients. This article attempts to describe behavioral toxicity of the three classes of psychotropic drugs - benzodiazepines, antidepressants and neuroleptics. After a brief discussion of some methodological issues arising in the investigation of behavioral toxicity, each of these drug classes is reviewed in the context of practical importance rather than purely scientific concern. The last session summarizes some suggestions for future studies on drug-induced behavioral toxicity.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.33 no.10
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• pp.3265-3268
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• 2012

Nanoparticles (NPs) are increasingly used in consumer products, which have aroused many concerns and debates regarding their fate in biological systems from a point of their safety/toxicity. Although a number of studies on the biological effects of NPs have been published, these are often complicated by the possible toxicity of conventional NPs, caused by contamination with chemical precursors or additives during their synthesis and/or purification procedures. To explicitly understand the toxicity basis of NPs, it is necessary to directly address a main problem related to their intrinsic/inherent toxicity and/or incompatibility with biological objects. The present study is designed to take advantage of a novel laser-assisted method called laser ablation to generate Ag, Au, Co, and Cu NPs in biocompatible aqueous solution, and to evaluate the toxicity of the resulting ultra-pure NPs. Our results show that the ultra-pure NPs with nascent surfaces possess moderate cytotoxicity to human cells in a cell-dependent manner.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.279-285
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• 2007

Toxicity evaluations using oxygen uptake rate (OUR) on activated sludge process were investigated. On toxicity evaluations of heavy metals, all toxicants in experiments decreased OUR with respect to the concentrations of the toxicants, while high toxicities with cyanide and mercury were observed respectively. On toxicity evaluations of composite heavy metals, composite toxicities had similar results as to the total sum of each toxicants that presents accurate toxicity evaluation using OUR. From these results, it is concluded that activated sludge is effective indicator for toxicity evaluation on wastewater of biological treatment plants.

• Biotechnology and Bioprocess Engineering:BBE
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.147-150
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• 2003

Water toxicity monitoring based on the continuous cultivation of Photobacterium phorphoreum is presented. Normally, after 10 days of operation, a dark variant, which emits no light, appears and dominates the population, resulting in a rapid decrease in bioluminescence. Therefore, to overcome this problem, a fluidized-bed reactor is used in which alginate-immobilized cells are grown and leaking cells are continuously released into the effluent Experimental results revealed that the dominance of dark variants was suppressed inside the immobilized beads, thereby mitigating the rapid loss of bioluminescence. Plus, a high dilution rate (1.2 h$\^$-1/) prevented the occurrence of other microbial contamination in the reactor The concentration and bioluminescence of the released cells were sufficient to measure the water toxicity for more than 4 weeks.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.513-518
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• 2004

Pine needle oil and Korean medicinal herbs (KMH) are known as effective therapeutic agents on various blood vessel disease. We have already reported the ameliorative effect of complex of pine needle oil and Korean medicinal herbs against hyperlipidemia. But safety and non - toxicity of pine needle oil and Korean medicinal herbs to normal animal cells have not been studied clearly. In this study, we investigated whether pine needle oil and Korean medicinal herbs show side effects on rat or not. These materials were administered to rats, and subacute toxicity was examined by measuring the hematological values, CBC differentiation, biochemical levels of blood (TP, total protein; albumin; ALP, alkaline phosphotase; AST, aspatate aminotrans- ferase; ALT, alanine aminotransferase; T-Chol., total cholesterol; T-Bil., total bilirubin) and urine analysis, suggesting that the sample have no side effects and cytotoxicity. These results indicate that the complex of pine needle oil and Korean medicinal herbs may effective non- toxic, safety therapeutic agents on hepatocytes and hyperlipidemia.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.920-925
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• 2020

In India, nanotechnology has been used in therapeutic applications for several millennia. One example of a traditional nanomedicine is Rajath Bhasma (also called calcined silver ash), which is used as an antimicrobial and for the treatment of various ailments and conditions such as memory loss, eye diseases, and dehydration. In this study, we aimed to characterize the physical composition and morphology of Rajath Bhasma and its suitability for use as a non-toxic antimicrobial agent. First, Rajath Bhasma was physically characterized via i) Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy to analyze the surface functional groups, ii) scanning electron microscopy coupled with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy to observe the morphology and elemental composition, and iii) X-ray diffraction to determine the crystalline phases. Thereafter, functional characterization was performed through toxicity screening using zebrafish embryos and through antimicrobial activity assessment against gram-positive (Staphylococcus epidermidis) and gram-negative (Escherichia coli) bacteria. Rajath Bhasma was found to harbor alkene, hydroxyl, aldehyde, and amide functional groups originating from biological components on its surface. The main component of Rajath Bhasma is silver, with particle size of 170-210 nm, and existing in the form of spherical aggregates with pure crystalline silver structures. Furthermore, Rajath Bhasma did not exert toxic effects on zebrafish embryos at concentrations below 5 ㎍/ml and exhibited effective antimicrobial activity against both gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria. The present results indicate that Rajath Bhasma is a potentially effective antimicrobial agent without toxicity when used at concentrations below 5 ㎍/ml.

• Proceedings of the Plant Resources Society of Korea Conference
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• 2021.04a
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• pp.59-59
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• 2021

Stachys sieboldii Miq. (SSM) and Acorus gramineus Soland. (AGS) have been used as traditional medicines for thousands of years in parts of Asia, including Korea, China, and Japan. Recent researches on SSM and AGS have documented a wide spectrum of therapeutic properties, including anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidative, neurodegenerative disease effects. However, the toxicity and safety of SSM and AGS, and their mixture (medicinal herber mixture, MHMIX) were not confirmed. Therefore, this study was performed to evaluate the acute toxicity and safety of SSM, AGS and MHMIX. SSM, AGS and MHMIX were orally administered at a dose of 5,000 mg/kg in ICR mice. Animals were monitored for the mortality and changes in the body weight, clinical signs and gross observation during the 14 days after dosing, upon necropsy. We also measured parameters of organ weight, clinical chemistry, and hematology. No dead and no clinical signs were found during the experiment period after administration of a single oral dose of SSM, AGS and MHMIX. There were no adverse effects on clinical signs, body weight, or organ weight and no gross pathological findings in any treatment group. Therefore, LD50 value of SSM, AGS and MHMIX may be over 5,000 mg/kg and it may have no side toxic effect to ICR mice. The results on the single-dose toxicity of SSM, AGS and MHMIX indicate that it is not possible to reach oral dose levels related to death or dose levels with any harmful side effects.

• KSBB Journal
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.183-187
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• 2001

The biological activities of wastewater and sludge taken from the wastewater treatment process of Hyangnam pharmaceutic factories in Hwaseong, Kyeonggi-Do was measured using a respirometer. Oxygen uptake rate (OUR) was used as a tool for measuring biological activity. OUR was measured for varying amounts of sludge and organic chemicals in wastewater, and its toxicity was evaluated. Maximum OUR was observed as 61, 75, and 89 mg O$_2$/L/hr when sludge was added as 3, 5, and 10% of total volume, respectively. When the concentration of organic chemicals was changed to 1,486, 337, and 164 mg COD/L, maximum OUR was 53, 13, 8 mg O$_2$/L/hr, respectively. The toxicity test results showed that there seemed that there seemed to be no observable toxic effect on microbes in pharmaceutic wastewater.