• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.5-9
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• 2014

Purpose - The purpose of this study was to compare and contrast the applicability and effectiveness of both teukyakmeip contracts of Korea and consignment contracts of the United State to demonstrate the effectiveness and practicability of teukyakmeip in Korea. These are popular contract agreements between large retailers and their suppliers and vendors. In recent years, teukyakmeip was critically examined and scrutinized by the politicians, the media, and the public of Korea. Consequently, this paper focusesheavily on identifying and analyzing different types of contract agreements between large retailers and their suppliers that currently exist in Korea and compares and contrasts those analyzed contract agreements with teukyakmeip. The article also comparesand contrasts teukyakmeip with the consignment agreements of the United States to identify similarities and differences. Research design, data, and methodology - This study is a descriptive study and has used personal interviews to collect and analyze the data. This study also fits the definition of the case study wherein it is entirely focused on investigating a real-life event: analyzing and examining contract agreements in the distribution industry. Both randomly selected management and vendor representatives from the three major department stores, Lotte, Hyundai, and Shinsegae, in Korea were interviewed between July and September 2013. The analysis of the consignment agreement was conducted based on existing secondary data. Results - Although the evidence of the abuse of teukyakmeip and consignment by large retailers from both countries clearly exists, the findings suggestthat both contract agreements would remain as the most relevant and effective legal contracts between large retailers and their suppliers. Based on the comparisonanalysis of teukyakmeip and consignment, both contracts indicated that suppliers are fully responsible for inventory and inventory management. If sales person is necessary for promoting special product, then suppliers are responsible for providing a sales person and their wages under both contracts. However, American department stores, those located outside urban area, tend to use their own employees to perform special product and sales promotion. The retailersare fully responsible for any interior or floor design or redesign of the retail store to accommodate the products from vendors under consignment; however, both suppliers and retailers share the cost of designing and redesigning the interior to accommodate vendors'products under teukyakmeip. Suppliers are responsible for pricing and supplying the quantity of the products under both agreements. Both contracts allow special sales commission as long as vendors agreed. Vendors use this special commissionto introduce their new products or apply market penetration strategy. Conclusions -The findings of this study showed the changing pattern of contract agreements between large retailers and their suppliers from both countries. Furthermore, this study evidently generated policy implications of teukyakmeip which recently became the major social issue in Korea and attracted many policymakers to gain political points by criticizing the teukyakmeip system and the large retailers. The findings of the study would be valuable to policy makers in making appropriate decisions and to large retailers and vendors in making beneficial agreements. The major implication of this study is that teukyakmeip and consignment agreements include very similar or almost identical characteristics, and they are popular among department stores and suppliers. The issue of abolishing teukyakmeip in Korea needs to be examined cautiously because teukyakmeip is the best one available at the moment, and the study suggests that no one benefits from abolishing this system.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.21 no.9
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• pp.1301-1309
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• 2011

The major function of adipocytes is to store fat in the form of triglycerides. One of the signaling pathways known to affect adipogenesis, i.e. fat formation, is the WNT/${\beta}$-catenin pathway which inhibits the expression and activity of key regulators of adipogenesis. The purpose of this research is to find genes among the WNT/${\beta}$-catenin pathway which regulate adipogenesis by using small interfering (si) RNA and to find the association of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the gene with serum triglyceride levels in the human population. To elucidate the effects of ${\beta}$-catenin siRNA on adipogenesis key factors, PPAR${\gamma}$ and C/EBP${\alpha}$, we performed real-time PCR and western blotting experiments for the analyses of mRNA and protein levels. It was found that the siRNA-mediated knockdown of ${\beta}$-catenin upregulates adipogenesis key factors. However, upstream regulators of the WNT/${\beta}$-catenin pathway, such as DVL2 and LRP6, had no significant effects compared to ${\beta}$-catenin. These results indicate that ${\beta}$-catenin is a candidate gene for human fat accumulation. In general, serum triglyceride level is a good indicator of fat accumulation in humans. According to statistical analyses of the association between serum triglyceride level and SNPs of ${\beta}$-catenin, -10,288 C>T SNP (rs7630377) in the promoter region was significantly associated with serum triglyceride levels (p<0.05) in 290 Korean subjects. On the other hand, serum cholesterol levels were not significantly associated with SNPs of the ${\beta}$-catenin gene. The results of this study showed that ${\beta}$-catenin is associated with fat accumulation both in vitro and in the human population.

• The Korean Journal of Pharmacology
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• v.31 no.1 s.57
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• pp.63-74
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• 1995

It has been known that, during hypoxia, the adrenal medulla is activated to release catecholamines (CA) while hypoxia also inhibits high $K^+$ -induced CA secretion in the cultured bovine adrenal chromaffin cells. The present study was attempted to examine the effect of hypoxia on CA secretion evoked by chlinergic stimulation and membrane-depolarization from the isolated perfused rat adrenal glands and also to clarify its mechanism of action. For this purpose, using the isolated rat adrenal glands, the effects of hypoxia on CA release evoked by nicotinic ($N_1$) and muscarinic ($M_1$) receptor agonists, membrane-depolarizing agent, $Ca^{++}$-channel activator, intracellular $Ca^{++}$-releaser and ACh were determined. Experiments were carried out, perfusing Krebs solution pre-equilibrated with a gas mixture of 95% N_2$ and 5% $CO_2$. Hypoxia was maintained for $3{\sim}4$ hours through the experiments. Hypoxia gradually caused a time-dependent seduction in CA secretion evoked by DMPP ($100{\mu}M$), McN-A-343 ($100{\mu}M$), ACh (5.32 mM), Bay-K-8644 ($10{\mu}M$) and high $K^+$ (56 mM) respectively. How-ever, it did not affect CA secretion evoked by cyclopiazonic acid ($10{\mu}M$). Hypoxia itself also did fail to produce any influence on spontaneous secretory response of CA. These experimental results suggest that hypoxia depresses CA release evoked by both cholinergic stimulation and membrane-depolarization from the isolated rat adrenal medulla, and that this inhibitory activity may be due to the result of the direct inhibition of $Ca^{++}$ influx into the chromaffin cells without any effect on the calcium mobilization from the intracellular store.