• Journal of Mushroom
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.155-161
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• 2016

A recent study reported that Pleurotus ostreatus has the potential to be used as a ${\beta}-glucan-based$ cream for supportive complementary therapy of atopic dermatitis. KH054 is a new herbal prescription consisting of P. ostreatus and Panax ginseng. The effects of atopic dermatitis-induced materials on the expression of cytokine genes in human monocytes (THP-1, EoL- 1) have been examined. Some reports demonstrated that P. ginseng augments the activity of natural killer cells, which plays an important role in innate immunity against infection and tumor development. Monocyte chemotactic protein 1 (MCP-1), interleukin (IL)-6, and IL-8 have important roles in mediating the infiltration of various cells into the skin of atopic dermatitis and psoriasis. The present study investigated whether KH054 on induced IL-6, IL-8, and MCP-1 secretion by house dust mite (Dermatophagoides pteronissinus) in THP-1 (human acute monocytic leukemia) and EoL-1(Human eosinophilic leukemia) cell. D. pteronissinus functions in the pathogenesis of allergic diseases, including atopic dermatitis and asthma. The inhibitory effect of KH054 on the induction of IL-6, IL-8, and MCP-1 secretion by D. pteronissinus extract in THP-1 and EoL-1 cells was examined. KH054 potently suppressed the elevated production of IL-6 and IL-8 induced by D. pteronissinus treatment in THP-1 and EoL-1 cells. Based on the present results, KH054 may be useful for developing functional foods to treat atopic dermatitis.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.238-242
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• 2009

The effect of earthworm and dung beetle on cattle dung pat decomposition was assessed by combining quantification of earthworm density and with or without dung beetle in pats and measurements of the decomposition rate of these pats. Cattle dung decomposition rate was higher in the pots treated with both earthworm and dung beetle than in the pots with either earthworm or beetle alone. After dung beetle and earthworm activity, the growth of oat in earthworm with dung beetle treatment was similar effect with fertilizer treatment. Dung beetle was responsible for dung decomposition until 78% moisture content in the dung, earthworm was responsible for up to 30% moisture of dung, and two group were not shown any activity for decomposition less 30% moisture content of dung. Therefore dung in the different periods could be broken down by each group. The disappearance and conveyance of dung by earthworm and dung beetle was 72% of the initial dung amount. 10.2% of 72% dung was used making brood balls by dung beetle. Earthworm activity was not an impediment on making brood balls by dung beetles. The interaction of earthworm and dung beetle may have a complementary cooperation rather than competition in the same dung pat. Indeed, development of earthworm accelerate to coexist with dung beetles instead without dung beetles. From this result, maximum benefits of the effective earthworm and dung beetle can be achieved, it is needed to preserve population of earthworm and dung beetles in pasture to sustainable agricultural environment.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SD
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• v.42 no.9 s.339
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• pp.9-18
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• 2005

To make high-performance, low-power transistors beyond the technology node of 60 nm complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors(C-MOSFETs) possible, the effect of electron mobility of the thickness of strained Si grown on a relaxed SiGe/SiO2/Si was investigated from the viewpoint of mobility enhancement via two approaches. First the parameters for the inter-valley phonon scattering model were optimized. Second, theoretical calculation of the electronic states of the two-fold and four-fold valleys in the strained Si inversion layer were performed, including such characteristics as the energy band diagrams, electron populations, electron concentrations, phonon scattering rate, and phonon-limited electron mobility. The electron mobility in an silicon germanium on insulator(SGOI) n-MOSFET was observed to be about 1.5 to 1.7 times higher than that of a conventional silicon on insulator(SOI) n-MOSFET over the whole range of Si thickness in the SOI structure. This trend was good consistent with our experimental results. In Particular, it was observed that when the strained Si thickness was decreased below 10 nm, the phonon-limited electron mobility in an SGOI n-MOSFT with a Si channel thickness of less than 6 nm differed significantly from that of the conventional SOI n-MOSFET. It can be attributed this difference that some electrons in the strained SGOI n-MOSFET inversion layer tunnelled into the SiGe layer, whereas carrier confinement occurred in the conventional SOI n-MOSFET. In addition, we confirmed that in the Si thickness range of from 10 nm to 3 nm the Phonon-limited electron mobility in an SGOI n-MOSFET was governed by the inter-valley Phonon scattering rate. This result indicates that a fully depleted C-MOSFET with a channel length of less than 15 m should be fabricated on an strained Si SGOI structure in order to obtain a higher drain current.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.14
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• pp.5733-5739
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• 2014

Background: Breast cancer is the most common female malignancy in the world. Beta glucan can be a hematopoietic and an immune modulator agent in cancer patients. The aim of this trial was to determine the effect of beta glucan on white blood cell counts and serum levels of IL-4 and IL-12 in women with breast cancer undergoing chemotherapy. Materials and Methods: This randomized double-blind placebo-controlled clinical trial was conducted on 30 women with breast carcinoma aged 28-65 years. The eligible participants were randomly assigned to intervention (n=15) or placebo (n=15) groups using a block randomization procedure with matching based on age, course of chemotherapy and menopause status. Patients in the intervention group received two 10-mg capsules of soluble 1-3, 1-6, D-beta glucan daily and the control group receiving placebo during 21 days, the interval between two courses of chemotherapy. White blood cells, neuthrophil, lymphocyte and monocyte counts as well as serum levels of IL-4 and IL-12 were measured at baseline and at the end of the study as primary outcomes of the study. Results: In both groups white blood cell counts decreased after 21 days of the intervention, however in the beta glucan group, WBC was less decreased non significantly than the placebo group. At the end of the study, the change in the serum level of IL-4 in the beta glucan group in comparison with the placebo group was statistically significant (p=0.001). The serum level of IL-12 in the beta glucan group statistically increased (p=0.03) and comparison between two groups at the end of the study was significant after adjusting for baseline values and covariates (p=0.007). Conclusions: The findings suggest that beta glucan can be useful as a complementary or adjuvant therapy and immunomodulary agent in breast cancer patients in combination with cancer therapies, but further studies are needed for confirmation.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.31-58
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• 1995

The Korean government achieved the universal coverage of health insurance in July 1989, and concomitantly introduced a new measure of regulated health care delivery system in using medical care. There are three reasons why the government took the new health care delivery system. Firstly, there was ample room for improving the allocative efficiency in the use of medical facilities. And the second one was to constrain the dramatic increase of medical demand under health insurance. Thirdly, and the most important reason was to alleviate the patient crowdedness in big general hospitals, particularly tertiary hospitals. There are essentially two different ways to control the use of health care : one is to cut the demand for health care, and the other to regulate behaviors of providers through the use of incentives/disincentives, demand-side approach or supply-side approach. The objective of this study is to examine whether or not medical care utilization behaviors under health insurance scheme have been changed among medical facilities such as clinic, hospital, general hospital and tertiary hospital in comparison with those before and after the introduction, particularly whether the patient crowdedness in tertiary hospitals has been alleviated or not. In order to conduct this study, the insurance claim data during the period of January 1989 and July 1992 were analyzed by focusing on diagnosis of both inpatients and outpatients, and especially the fifteen most frequent diseases in ambulatory care and the seven most frequent diseases in hospitalizatio. In addition, the same analyses were made on the changes in medical care utilization by specialty department. This was because the five departments, such as family medicine, ENT, eye, dermatology and rehabilitation, were exempted from applying the regulated health care delivery system in tertiary hospitals. The study revealed that a remarkable alleviation effect in the crowdness was noted for tertiary hospitals. This effect was most conspicuous for the most frequent mild diseases of both inpatient and outpatient care. For example, the fifteen most frequent OPD care at tertiary facilities have decreased as much as by 40%, of which 34% belonged to the cut in initial visits. Meanwhile, the proportion of those who used general hospitals and private practitioner's clinics have increased due to the shift of patients. The cases from the five special departments were also decreased, but not so much as other departments. A problem was noted that, as time passed by, the decreasing tendencies of crowdness at tertiary hospitals due to the regulated system became slightly smaller. Therefore, through complementary remedies are needed for the future implementation.

• Journal of Technology Innovation
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.61-86
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• 2015

This study provides an empirical analysis based on 2012 Korea Innovation Survey (STEPI) to investigate the relation between R&D cooperation and in-house R&D investment. The study further analyzes the effect of the R&D cooperation and in-house R&D investment on technical innovation. First, the relation between company's in-house R&D investment and R&D cooperations is estimated with the two equations using SUR models. Second, the effect of in-house R&D investment and R&D cooperation on the company's technical innovation is estimated using Probit model. This study differs from other existing R&D studies using Korean data in that empirical models are based on structural relationships among in-house R&D, R&D cooperation, and technical innovation. The results can be summarized as follows; the R&D cooperation expands the in-house R&D investment and the in-house R&D strengthen the R&D cooperation. Furthermore, In-house R&D investment increases the chances of success in innovation. As we obtain evidence of complementary relation between R&D cooperation and in-house R&D investment, it is necessary to develop environment conducive to this complementarity in order to have more efficient R&D system.

• Radiation Oncology Journal
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.83-95
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• 1987

The synergistic effect of combining radiation therapy and hyperthermia kills significantly more cells than using either modality alone. The reason for enhanced cell killing from the combined treatment is that the two modalities are complementary. For histopathological exmination, 102 rats were divided into 4 groups as hyperthermia, radiation, hyperthermia combined with radiation and normal control groups. The effect of prior irradiation (6-15 Gy of X-ray) on the response of small and large bowel of rats to $40^{\circ}C-44^{\circ}C$ (for 30 minutes) microwave (2450 MHz) hyperthermia was investigated. The musculature of the small and large intestine remained intact and the circumference of the histological sections were not significantly altered by the heated at $43^{\circ}C$ for 30 minutes. Thermal enhancement ratios of normal tissue is 1.0 Thermal enhancement ratio was not increased in combination therapy by evaluation of histopathologic changes in small and large intestine.

• Radiation Oncology Journal
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.219-225
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• 1993

The evaluation of radiation-induced DNA double strand breaks (DSB) was made following irradiation of human lymphocytes, murine lymphocytes and EL-4 leukemia cells over a wide dose range of $^{60}Co\;{gamma}-rays.$ In lipopolysaccharide (LPS) or phytohemagglutinin (PHA)-stimulated murine lymphocytes, the slopes of the stand scission factor (SSF) revealed that lymphocytes with LPS increased DNA DSB formation by a factor of 1.432 (p<0.005). Furthermore, strand break production was relatively inefficient in the T lymphocytes compared to the B lymuhocytes. And EL-4 leukemia cells were found to form significantly more DNA DSB to a greater extent than normal lymphocytes (p<0.005). The in vitro studies of the intrinsic radiosensitivity between human lymphocytes and murine lymphocytes showed similar phasic kinetics. However, murine lymphocytes were lower in DNA DSB formation and higher in the relative radiation dose of 10 percent DNA strand breaks at 3.5 hours following ${gamma}-irradiation$ than human lymphocytes. Though it is difficult to interpret these results, these differences may be result from environmental and genetic factors. From our data, if complementary explanations for this difference will be proposed, the differences in the dose-effect relationship for the induction of DSB between humans and mice must be related to interspecies variations in the physiological condition of the peripheral blood in vitro and not to differences in the intrinsic radiation sensitivity of the lymphocytes. These results can be estimated on the basis of dose-effect correlation enabling the interpretation of clinical response and the radiobiological parameters of cytometrical assessment.

• Development and Reproduction
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.163-172
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• 2009

Some organotin compounds such as butyltins and phenyltins are known to induce impo-sex in various marine animals and are considered to be endocrine disruptors. In this study, the effect of organotins on follicular steroidogenesis in amphibians was examined using ovarian follicles of Rana dybowskii and Rana catesbeiana. Isolated follicles were cultured for 6 or 18 h in the presence and absence of frog pituitary homogenate (FPH) or various steroid precursors, and the levels of product steroids in the culture media oassay. Among the butyltin compounds, tributyltin (TBT) strongly and dose-dependently inhibited the FPH-induced synthesis of pregnenolone ($P_5$) and progesterone ($P_4$) by the follicles. TBT also strongly suppressed the conversion of cholesterol to $P_5$ and partially suppressed the conversion of $P_5$ to $P_4$. A high concentration of dibutyltin (DBT) also inhibited steroidogenesis by the follicles while monobutyltin and tetrabutyltin had negligible effects. The toxic effect of TBT or DBT was irreversible and a short time of exposure (30 min) was enough to suppress steroidogenesis. All the phenyltin compounds significantly inhibited FPH-induced $P_5$ synthesis by the follicles. The effective dose of 50% inhibition by diphenyltin was $0.04\;{\mu}M$ and those of monophenyltin and triphenyltin were $0.24\;{\mu}M$ and $0.3\;{\mu}M$, respectively. However, none of the phenyltin compounds significantly suppressed the conversion of $P_4$ to $17{\alpha}$-hydroxyprogesterone ($17{\alpha}$-OHP) (by $17{\alpha}$-hydroxylase), $17{\alpha}$-OHP to androstenedione (AD) (by $C_{17-20}$ lyase), or AD to testosterone by the follicles. Taken together, the data show that among the steroidogenic enzymes, P450scc in the follicles is the most sensitive to organotin compounds and that an amphibian follicle culture system can be a useful screening model for endocrine disruptors.

• The Journal of Korean Medicine
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.17-27
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• 2010

Objectives: Cocaine has been well known as a representative drug of abuse for its strong reinforcing effect linked to the mesolimbic reward system including dopamine, and such reinforcement leads to the addiction. Acupuncture has been used widely in eastern Asia for the treatment of various diseases including mental disorders and psychiatric problems, and is gathering more interest as one of the complementary and alternative medicines in western countries. In a previous study, we demonstrated that acupuncture at HT7 could affect dopamine release in the mesolimbic system of rats sensitized to alcohol and morphine. This study was designed to investigate whether acupuncture at HT7 could attenuate cocaine intake or not. Material & Methods: Male Sprague-Dawley rats weighing 270-300 g at the start of experiment were trained to self-administer food pellets under a fixed ratio 1 schedule. After the success of acquisition of 100 pellets within 3 h for 3 consecutive days, animals were subjected to surgery whereby Silastic tubing was implanted into right jugular vein and secured with mesh under the anesthetization using pentobarbital injection (50 mg/kg, i.p.). Following recovery, rats were trained to self-administer cocaine (0.25 mg/kg) in daily 2 h sessions under fixed ratio 1 schedule over 10 days. Each treatment was performed on the next day of each establishment of baseline. Results: Results show that acupuncture at HT7, but not at control points, reduced cocaine intake significantly. Acupuncture at HT7 decreased selectively active lever response from $63.15{\pm}3.35$ to $51.46{\pm}3.99$ corresponding $82.12{\pm}5.31%$ compared to basal level. Also, it was demonstrated that the effect of acupuncture was mainly occurred at the half period. Nevertheless, acupuncture at HT7 did not influence the food taking behavior. Conclusions: From the results of this study, it may be suggested that acupuncture at HT7, at least in part, could contribute to the treatment of cocaine abuse.