• Journal of Ecology and Environment
• /
• v.43 no.4
• /
• pp.364-375
• /
• 2019

Background: Ecologists continue to investigate the factors that potentially affect the pattern and magnitude of tree damage during catastrophic windstorms in forests. However, there still is a paucity of research on which trees are more vulnerable to direct damage by winds rather than being knocked down by the fall of another tree. We evaluated this question in a mixed hardwood-softwood forest within the Big Thicket National Preserve (BTNP) of southeast Texas, USA, which was substantially impacted by Hurricane Rita in September 2005. Results: We showed that multiple factors, including tree height, shade-tolerance, height-to-diameter ratio, and neighborhood density (i.e., pre-Rita stem distribution) significantly explained the susceptibility of trees to direct storm damage. We also found that no single factor had pervasive importance over the others and, instead, that all factors were tightly intertwined in a complex way, such that they often complemented each other, and that they contributed simultaneously to the overall susceptibility to and patterns of windstorm damage in the BTNP. Conclusions: Directly damaged trees greatly influence the forest by causing secondary damage to other trees. We propose that directly and indirectly damaged (or susceptible) trees should be considered separately when assessing or predicting the impact of windstorms on a forest ecosystem; to better predict the pathways of community structure reorganization and guide forest management and conservation practices. Forest managers are recommended to adopt a holistic view that considers and combines various components of the forest ecosystem when establishing strategies for mitigating the impact of catastrophic winds.

• Genomics & Informatics
• /
• v.12 no.4
• /
• pp.187-194
• /
• 2014

Metabolic syndrome (METS) is a disorder of energy utilization and storage and increases the risk of developing cardiovascular disease and diabetes. To identify the genetic risk factors of METS, we carried out a genome-wide association study (GWAS) for 2,657 cases and 5,917 controls in Korean populations. As a result, we could identify 2 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with genome-wide significance level p-values (< $5{\times}10^{-8}$), 8 SNPs with genome-wide suggestive p-values ($5{\times}10^{-8}{\leq}$ p < $1{\times}10^{-5}$), and 2 SNPs of more functional variants with borderline p-values ($5{\times}10^{-5}{\leq}$ p < $1{\times}10^{-4}$). On the other hand, the multiple correction criteria of conventional GWASs exclude false-positive loci, but simultaneously, they discard many true-positive loci. To reconsider the discarded true-positive loci, we attempted to include the functional variants (nonsynonymous SNPs [nsSNPs] and expression quantitative trait loci [eQTL]) among the top 5,000 SNPs based on the proportion of phenotypic variance explained by genotypic variance. In total, 159 eQTLs and 18 nsSNPs were presented in the top 5,000 SNPs. Although they should be replicated in other independent populations, 6 eQTLs and 2 nsSNP loci were located in the molecular pathways of LPL, APOA5, and CHRM2, which were the significant or suggestive loci in the METS GWAS. Conclusively, our approach using the conventional GWAS, reconsidering functional variants and pathway-based interpretation, suggests a useful method to understand the GWAS results of complex traits and can be expanded in other genomewide association studies.

• Journal of the Korea Fashion and Costume Design Association
• /
• v.16 no.2
• /
• pp.1-13
• /
• 2014

Hundertwasser's paintings have the characteristics in his works continue to emerge organical spirals, geometric pattern of squares, mysterious and gorgeous colors. This study by applying them, it has been purposed of expansion of representation outstanding artistic formative knitwear by using yarn of various textured fabrics and leather, felt, beads of the materials. The methods of this study are through the analysis of literature of Hundertwasser's paintings and art world and formative traits. It has been studied the literature of the theoretical background on general examination of knitwear and knit, felting, needle punching techniques. Conclusions from this study are as follows: The first, It could know the organic spirals and geometric square patterns and gorgeous colors of Hundertwasser's paintings are suitable as a decorative and rich motif of knitwear design. The second, It was possible unique and various texture expression of decorative patterns of Hundertwasser's paintings by expressing variety of materials of knit, felt and fabric, leather, beads. The third, It was expressed knitwear of unique texture to express Hundertwasser's image of the painting by using hand knitting, felting, needle punching, patchwork, beading of complex techniques. The forth, It was reflected well Hundertwasser's idea which was affected nature and art nouveau that all production processes are composed of handcraft techniques. It was suitable to express the naturalness of hand knit and not mechanical or artificial image. The fifth, It was analyzed lines and patterns of Hundertwasser's painting. The spiral is simultaneously constituted curve shape and area that square patterns also have devided area.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
• /
• v.22 no.10
• /
• pp.1340-1346
• /
• 2018

There have been researches on game continuance intention based on consumer behaviour theory of management science. Such macro access of computer game analysis might be insufficient to draw valuable results due to complex subsystem structure of recent computer games. In this paper, we choose 'Blade and Soul' game that was first published in 2012 and has been within top 20 MMORPG in Korea but known as a 'long time users' only game'among game players recently. Three user groups - long loyalty, concentrated, casual - are classified based on their play history and play time per day of Blade and Soul. The first survey with 222 subjects revealed that the real strength of the game was not the combat - Dungeon, Arena, Battleground competition - but very cohesive game community Blade and Soul has. Thus, we conduct another survey on the game community issues among 148 long time users (over 3 years playing history) and analyze their traits and behaviour patterns.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
• /
• v.27 no.1
• /
• pp.59-67
• /
• 2011

A bacterial strain CH-67 which exhibits antagonism towards several plant pathogenic fungi such as Botrytis cinerea, Fulvia fulva, Rhizoctonia solani, Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, Colletotrichum sp. and Phytophthora sp. was isolated from forest soil by a chitin-baiting method. This strain was identified as Burkholderia cepacia complex (Bcc) and belonging to genomovar IX (Burkholderia pyrrocinia) by colony morphology, biochemical traits and molecular method like 16S rRNA and recA gene analysis. This strain was used to develop a bio-fungicide for the control of tomato leaf mold caused by Fulvia fulva. Various formulations of B. pyrrocinia CH-67 were prepared using fermentation cultures of the bacterium in rice oil medium. The result of pot experiments led to selection of the wettable powder formulation CH67-C containing modified starch as the best formulation for the control of tomato leaf mold. CH67-C, at 100-fold dilution, showed a control value of 85% against tomato leaf mold. Its disease control efficacy was not significantly different from that of the chemical fungicide triflumidazole. B. pyrrocinia CH-67 was also effective in controlling damping-off caused by Rhizoctonia solani PY-1 in crisphead lettuce and tomato plants. CH67-C formulation was recognized as a cell-free formulation since B. pyrrocinia CH-67 was all lethal during formulation process. This study provides an effective biocontrol formulation of biofungicide using B. pyrrocinia CH-67 to control tomato leaf mold and damping-off crisphead lettuce and tomato.

• Plant Breeding and Biotechnology
• /
• v.6 no.4
• /
• pp.354-362
• /
• 2018

Maize has high food and industrial value, whereas has difficulties in research because of their complex and huge size genome. Nested association mapping (NAM) was constructed to better understand maize genetics. However, most studies were conducted using the reference genome B73, and only a few studies were conducted on tropical maize. Ki3, one of the founder lines of the NAM population, is a tropical maize. We analyzed the genetic characteristics of Ki3 by using RNA sequencing and bioinformatics tools for various genetic studies. As results, a total of 30,526 genes were expressed, and expression profile were constructed. A total of 1,558 genes were differentially expressed in response to drought stress, and 513 contigs of them come from de novo assemblies. In addition, high-density polymorphisms including 464,930 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), 21,872 multiple nucleotide polymorphisms (MNPs) and 93,313 insertions and deletions (InDels) were found compared to reference genome. Among them, 15.0 % of polymorphisms (87,838) were passed non-synonymous test which could alter amino acid sequences. The variants have 66,550 SNPs, 5,853 MNPs, and 14,801 InDels, also proportion of homozygous type was higher than heterozygous. These variants were found in a total of 15,643 genes. Of these genes, 637 genes were found as differentially expressed genes (DEGs) under drought stress. Our results provide a genome-wide analysis of differentially expressed genes and information of variants on expressed genes of tropical maize under drought stress. Further characterization of these changes in genetic regulation and genetic traits will be of great value for improvement of maize genetics.

• Proceedings of The Korean Society of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology Conference
• /
• 2015.08a
• /
• pp.18-28
• /
• 2015

Apple is cultivated under various climatic conditions in many parts of the world. Better understanding of how climate, genotype, soil, and management factors interact to determine crop productivity will improve our ability to optimize crop selection, management strategies, and resource use efficiencies. We developed and applied a physiology-based apple canopy model to evaluate how climatic factors and crop phenotypes interact to determine biomass accumulation, radiation use efficiency (RUE), and water use efficiency (WUE) at multiple production sites between western and eastern states of the US including WA, CA, NY, WV, and PA. Our results indicate that solar radiation is a dominant factor limiting biomass production in the eastern states while VPD is the primary factor governing crop water use across eastern and western states during the peak growing season. Crop RUE and WUE were strongly correlated in the western states but not in the eastern states while VPD showed highly negative correlation with both RUE and WUE across all locations. The RUE improved with increasing fraction of diffuse radiation ($f_{df}$) and the $RUE-f_{df}$ relationships revealed distinctive responses between western and eastern states. Overall, the eastern locations exhibited slightly higher RUE and WUE than the western locations. However, overall productivity and total water use were greater in the western states. A clear decline of productivity with increasing temperature and afternoon VPD past an optimum was predicted in the western locations but this pattern was less clear in the eastern locations. We also discuss potential phenotypes with specific physiological and morphological traits that are differentially suitable for western and eastern locations. Our results provide plausible, spatially explicit explanations and insights to disentangle the complex relationships between crop productivity, resource use efficiencies, phenotype, and climate drivers in apple grown in the US.

• Journal of Animal Science and Technology
• /
• v.63 no.2
• /
• pp.248-261
• /
• 2021

Attributable to their major function in pathogen recognition, the use of bovine leukocyte antigens (BoLA) as disease markers in immunological traits in cattle is well established. However, limited report exists on polymorphism of the BoLA gene in zebu cattle breeds by high resolution typing methods. Thus, we used a polymerase chain reaction sequence-based typing (PCR-SBT) method to sequence exon 2 of the BoLA class II DRB3 gene from 100 animals (Boran, n = 13; Sheko, n = 20; Fogera, n = 16; Horro, n = 19), Hanwoo cattle (n = 18) and Bangladesh Red Chittagong zebu (n = 14). Out of the 59 detected alleles, 43 were already deposited under the Immuno Polymorphism Database for major histocompatibility complex (IPD-MHC) while 16 were unique to this study. Assessment of the level of genetic variability at the population and sequence levels with genetic distance in the breeds considered in this study showed that Zebu breeds had a gene diversity score greater than 0.752, nucleotide diversity score greater than 0.152, and mean number of pairwise differences higher than 14, being very comparable to those investigated for other cattle breeds. Regarding neutrality tests analyzed, we investigated that all the breeds except Hanwoo had an excess number of alleles and could be expected from a recent population expansion or genetic hitchhiking. Howbeit, the observed heterozygosity was not significantly (p < 0.05) higher than the expected heterozygosity. The Hardy Weinberg equilibrium (HWE) analysis revealed non-significant excess of heterozygote animals, indicative of plausible over-dominant selection. The pairwise FST values suggested a low genetic variation among all the breeds (FST = 0.056; p < 0.05), besides the rooting from the evolutionary or domestication history of the cattle. No detached clade was observed in the evolutionary divergence study of the BoLA-DRB3 gene, inferred from the phylogenetic tree based on the maximum likelihood model. The investigation herein indicated the clear differences in BoLA-DRB3 gene variability between African and Asian cattle breeds.

• Safety and Health at Work
• /
• v.12 no.4
• /
• pp.496-504
• /
• 2021

Background: With the increasing demand for industrial robots and the "noncontact" trend, it is an appropriate point in time to examine whether risk assessments conducted for robot operations are performed effectively to identify and eliminate the risks of injury or harm to operators. This study discusses why robot accidents resulting in harm to operators occur repetitively despite implementing control measures and proposes corrective actions for risk assessments. Methods: This study collected 369 operator-injured robot accidents in Korea over the last decade and reconstructed them into the mechanism of injury, work being undertaken, and bodily location of the injury. Then, through the techniques of Systematic Cause Analysis Technique (SCAT) and Root Cause Analysis (RCA), this study analyzed the root and direct causes of robot accidents that had occurred. Causes identified included physical hazards and complex combinations of hazards, such as psychological, organizational, and systematic errors. The requirements of risk assessments regarding robot operations were examined, and three case studies of robot-involved tasks were investigated. The three assessments presented were: camera module processing, electrical discharge machining, and a panel-flipping robot installation. Results: After conducting RCA and comparing the three assessments, it was found that two-thirds of injury-occurring from robot accidents, causative factors included psychological and personal traits of robot operators. However, there were no evaluations of the identifications of personal aspects in the three assessment cases. Conclusion: Therefore, it was concluded that personal factors of operators, which had been overlooked in risk assessments so far, need to be included in future risk assessments on robot operations.

• Nutrition Research and Practice
• /
• v.17 no.4
• /
• pp.789-802
• /
• 2023

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Habitual coffee consumption was inversely associated with type 2 diabetes (T2D) and hyperglycemia in observational studies, but the causality of the association remains uncertain. This study tested a causal association of genetically predicted coffee consumption with T2D using the Mendelian randomization (MR) method. SUBJECTS/METHODS: We used five single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) as instrumental variables (IVs) associated with habitual coffee consumption in a previous genome-wide association study among Koreans. We analyzed the associations between IVs and T2D, fasting blood glucose (FBG), 2h-postprandial glucose (2h-PG), and glycated haemoglobin (HbA1C) levels. The MR results were further evaluated by standard sensitivity tests for possible pleiotropism. RESULTS: MR analysis revealed that increased genetically predicted coffee consumption was associated with a reduced prevalence of T2D; ORs per one-unit increment of log-transformed cup per day of coffee consumption ranged from 0.75 (0.62-0.90) for the weighted mode-based method to 0.79 (0.62-0.99) for Wald ratio estimator. We also used the inverse-variance-weighted method, weighted median-based method, MR-Egger method, and MR-PRESSO method. Similarly, genetically predicted coffee consumption was inversely associated with FBG and 2h-PG levels but not with HbA1c. Sensitivity measures gave similar results without evidence of pleiotropy. CONCLUSIONS: A genetic predisposition to habitual coffee consumption was inversely associated with T2D prevalence and lower levels of FBG and 2h-PG profiles. Our study warrants further exploration.