• The Journal of Korean Medicine
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• v.17 no.1 s.31
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• pp.234-246
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• 1996

In order to investigate the effects of api-toxin therapy on depression of immune response, mice were exposed to cold stress $(-20^{\circ}C)$) in 30 minutes twice a day and api-toxin(Bee Venom from Korea and U.S.A) therapy was treated to the Kihae $(CV_6)$ locus of human body every two days with 4 sessions of treatment for 8 days. The mice were sensitized i.v. with $5{\times}10^8$ sheep red blood cells (SRBC) on the 4th day and challenged i.d. with $2{\times}10^9$ SRBC 4 days later. Immune Response for delayed type hypersensitivity (DTH), lympocyte transformation(LTT), hemolysin titer(HL), plaque forming cells (PFC) were measured.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.425-429
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• 2003

Staphylococcus aureus is a major pathogen for cattle, causing various forms of subclinical and clinical mastitis and could be a causative agent of food poisoning, it produces various superantigenic exotoxins which have a great public health significance. A total of 72 S. aureus clinical isolates from dairy farms located in Kyunggi Province Korea were examined for the species identification by biochemical method, and for the detection of $\beta$-lactamase, enterotoxin and other exotoxins genes by PCR. The results of species identification by biochemical method agreed with those of PCR done with species specific primer STA-AU. $\beta$-lactamase is an enzyme closely associated with the resistance to antibiotic penicillin, which is an important means of treatment of mastitis, all the isolates were positive for the presence of genes encoding $\beta$-lactamase, which were reproduced in penicillin susceptibility disc assay. Six types of toxin genes, Staphylococcal enterotoxin (SE)A, SEB, SEC, SEE, toxic shock syndrome toxin (TSST-1) and exfoliative toxin A (ET A) were detected in 72 isolates by PCR associated genotypic method in this study, none of the isolates carried the genes for enterotoxin D (SED) and exfoliative toxin B (ETB). The occurrence rate of exotoxin genes rated as 12.5%, and the precision of the PCR identification results has been confirmed using the reference strains.

• 한국생물공학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2005.04a
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• pp.200-200
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• 2005

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.808-815
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• 2017

We demonstrated the quantitative detection of a toxin-producing Microcystis aeruginosa (M. aeruginosa) strain with the laboratory protocol of the NanoGene assay. The NanoGene assay was selected because its laboratory protocol is in the process of being transplanted into a portable system. The mcyD gene of M. aeruginosa was targeted and, as expected, its corresponding fluorescence signal was linearly proportional to the mcyD gene copy number. The sensitivity of the NanoGene assay for this purpose was validated using both dsDNA mcyD gene amplicons and genomic DNAs (gDNA). The limit of detection was determined to be 38 mcyD gene copies per reaction and 9 algal cells/ml water. The specificity of the assay was also demonstrated by the addition of gDNA extracted from environmental algae into the hybridization reaction. Detection of M. aeruginosa was performed in the environmental samples with environmentally relevant sensitivity (${\sim}10^5$ algal cells/ml) and specificity. As expected, M. aeruginosa were not detected in nonspecific environmental algal gDNA over the range of $2{\times}10^0$ to $2{\times}10^7$ algal cells/ml.

• Toxicological Research
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• v.17
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• pp.105-108
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• 2001

Several marine toxins with macrolide structure have been found to act on actin. One of these toxins is mycalolide B isolated from the genus Mycale. This compound belongs to macrolide antibiotics and consists of tris-oxazole with strong cytotoxic activity ($IC_{50}$: 10-50 nM for growth of L1210 murine leukemia cells). This compound was found to be an actin-depolymerizing agent with the mode of action distinct from that of the known actin inhibitor, cytochalasin D. Tolytoxin, a macrolide isolated from cyano-bacteria with similar chemical structure to mycalolide B, seems to have similar effect. Another macrolide compound, aplyronine A, showed the effects similar to those of mycalolide B. Although bistheonellide A, a dimeric macrolide, did not show a severing effect, it de polymerized F-actin and sequestered G-actin by forming 1 : 2 complex with G-actins. Swinholide A has a structure and effects similar to those of bistheonel-lide A. In conclusion, mycalolide B, tolytoxin, aplyronine A, bistheonellide A and swinholide A are the members of "actin de polymerizing macrolide" the mechanism of which is different from that of cytochalasin D.halasin D.

• BMB Reports
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.11-16
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• 1996

The present study showed that receptor-mediated activation of rabbit kidney proximal tubule cells by angiotensin II, the $Ca^{2+}$ ionophore A23187, or the protein kinase C activator phorbol myristate acetate (PMA) all stimulated phospholipase D (PLD). This was demonstrated by the increased formation of phosphatidic acid, and in the presence of 0.5% ethanol, phosphatidylethanol (PEt) accumulation. Angiotensin II leads to a rapid increase in phosphatidic acid and diacylglycerol, and phosphatidic acid formation preceeded the formation of diacylglycerol. This result suggests that some phosphatidic acid seems to be formed directly from phosphatidylcholine hydrolyzed by Pill. On the other hand, EGTA substantially attenuated angiotensin II and A23187-induced PEt formation, and when the cells were pretreated with verapamil angiotensin II-induced Pill activation was completely abolished. These results provide the evidence that calcium ion influx is essential for the agonist-induced Pill activation. In addition, staurosporine, an inhibitor of protein kinase C, strongly inhibited PMA-induced PEt formation, but was ineffective on angiotensin II-induced PEt accumulation. $GTP{\gamma}S$ also stimulates PEt formation in digitonin-permeabilized cells, but pretreatment of the cells with pertussis toxin failed to suppress angiotensin II-induced PEt formation. From these results, we conclude that in the rabbit kidney proximal tubule cells the mechanisms of angiotensin II- and PMA-induced Pill activation are different from each other and mediated via a pertussis toxin-insensitive trimeric G protein.

• Korean Journal of Food Science and Technology
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.134-141
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• 2011

Two-hundred Bacillus cereus isolated from perilla leaf cultivation areas in Miryang, Korea were investigated for toxin genes and antibiotic susceptibility. Toxigenic patterns of isolates were identified to be 11 groups through toxin gene profiles. 21% of strains isolated from the perilla leaves had both enterotoxin and emetic toxin. Toxin genes entFM (100%), nheA (100%) and hblA, C, D (65.5%) were frequently found in the perilla leaves, whereas EM (21.0%) was less common. Most isolates were susceptible to 10 antibiotics, but they were highly resistant to penicillin (100%), ampicillin (100%), oxacillin (94.9%), amoxicillin-clavulanic acid (95.6%), cefazolin (78.2%), and rifampicin (58.0%). These results indicate that food-borne outbreak caused by B. cereus might lead to diarrhea and emetic syndromes.

• Journal of Food Hygiene and Safety
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.242-248
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• 2015

This study was performed to investigate the microbiological contamination on toothbrushes, toothbrush caps, and tooth cleaning cups in the child care centers and to evaluate the toxin genes, toxin production ability and antibiotic resistance of food-borne pathogens. The average number of total aerobic bacteria and fungi were 5.3 log CFU and 3.2 log CFU. Coliform bacteria were detected in 41 (54.7%) of 75 toothbrushes, 13 (44.8%) of 29 toothbrush caps, and 29 (44.6%) of 65 tooth cleaning cups. Salmonella spp. was not detected in all of samples but Bacillus cereus was isolated from 1 (1.3%) of 75 toothbrushes and 2 (3.1%) of 65 tooth cleaning cups. Staphylococcus aureus was detected in 1 (1.5%) of 65 tooth cleaning cups. The nheA, nheB, nheC, hblC, hblD, hblA and entFM toxin genes were possessed in B. cereus isolated from toothbrush which also produce NHE and HBL enterotoxins. S. aureus was resistant to ampicillin and penicillin, while B. cereus was resistant to ${\beta}-lactam$ antibiotics. These results indicated that the sanitary conditions of toothbrushes and tooth cleaning cups in the child care centers should be improved promptly. The UV sterilization after drying and then storage in dried condition is required to improve the sanitary condition of toothbrushes and tooth cleaning cups in the child care center.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.20 no.12
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• pp.1756-1763
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• 2010

Pasteurella multocida serogroup D strain, which produces P. multocida toxin (PMT), is a widespread and harmful pathogen of respiratory diseases such as pneumonia and progressive atrophic rhinitis (PAR) in swine. Vaccination has been considered the most desirable and effective approach for controlling the diseases caused by toxigenic P. multocida. To investigate the antigenicity and immunogenicity of partial fragments of recombinant PMT, recombinant proteins of the N-terminal (PMT-A), middle (PMT-B), C-terminal (PMT-C), and middle-C-terminal (PMT2.3) regions of PMT were successfully produced in an Escherichia coli expression system. The molecular masses of PMT-A, PMT-B, PMT-C, and PMT2.3 were ca. 53, 55, 35, and 84 kDa, respectively, purified by nickel-nitrilotriacetic acid (Ni-NTA) affinity column chromatography. All the recombinant proteins except for PMT-A showed immune responses to antisera obtained from a swine showing symptoms of PAR. Moreover, high titers of PMT-specific antibodies were raised from mice immunized with each of the recombinant proteins; however, the immunoreactivities of the antibodies to authentic PMT and heat-inactivated whole bacteria were different, respectively. In the protection study, the highest protection against homologous challenge was shown in the case of PMT2.3; relatively poor protections occurred for the other PMT fragments.

• Journal of Food Hygiene and Safety
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.143-148
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• 1998

The purpose of this study was to determine the kinetics of paralytic shellfish poison (PSP) destruction at various temperature. The toxic digestive gland homogenate of blue mussel (Mytilus edulis), PSP crude toxin, gonyautoxin group and saxitoxin group were heated at temperature ranging from 90 to $120^{\circ}C$, and then the toxicities were measured in samples heated for various time intervals. The rate constant (k) of the toxic digestive gland homogenate, PSP crude toxin, gonyautoxin group and saxitoxin group were $3.28{\times}10^{-2},\;1.20{\times}10^{-2},\;5.88{\times}10^{-2}\;and\;2.58{\times}10^{-2}\;at\;120^{\circ}C$, respectively. The decimal reduction time (D-value) of the toxic digestive gland homogenate, PSP crude toxin, gonyautoxin group and saxitoxin group were 70, 192, 39 and 89 at $120^{\circ}C$, respectively. These results indicate that PSP crude toxin is most heat-stable of 4 types of PSP toxins and PSP toxin are more heat-stable than food poisoning bacteria and spores. The retorting condition to reduce PSP toxicity below quarantine limit ($80\;\mu\textrm{g}/100\;g$ in Korea and America, 4 MU/g in Japan) could be calculated by rate constant. For example, the digestive gland homogenate having a initial toxicity of $200\;\mu\textrm{g}/100\;g$ could have toxicity below quarantine limit when heated at $90^{\circ}C$ for 129 min., $100^{\circ}C$ for 82 min., $110^{\circ}C$ for 48 min. and $120^{\circ}C$ for 28 min. These results suggest that commercial retorting condition ($115^{\circ}C$ for 70 min) in Korea is enough to reduce toxicity below quarantine limit from initial toxicity of $200\;\mu\textrm{g}/100\;g$. From these results, the quarantine limit of PSP-infested shellfish for canning can be level up to raw score of $200\;\mu\textrm{g}/100\;g$.