• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.111-120
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• 2001

Objective: To verify the expression of leptin receptor (OB-R) in oocytes and preimplantation embryos, the involvement of mitogen activated protein kinase (MAPK or Erk1/2) in the leptin signaling, and effect of leptin on the oocyte maturation in mice. Method: RT-PCR analysis of OB-R was conducted in germinal vesicle (GV)-intact and MII stage oocytes, and 1, 2, 8-cell embryos and blastocysts. Germinal vesicle breakdown (GVB), polar body extrusion, monitored in the presence or absence of leptin ($1{\mu}M$). Following the leptin treatment, temporal changes in MAPK activity were verified by immunoprecipitation and in vitro kinase assay in MII oocytes. Results: The expression of OB-R mRNA was found in GV and MII oocyte but not in the embryos. MAPK activity of the MII oocytes was significantly increased by brief incubation in the HTF supplemented with leptin ($1{\mu}M$). Priming of PD098059, a MEK inhibitor to leptin treatment attenuated the activation of MAPK by leptin in MII oocytes. Following 24 hrs of culture of the GV oocytes, leptin significant increased the GVB and 1 st polar body extrusion. Conclusion: This result suggested that functional interaction between leptin and OB-R resulted in potentiation of MAPK (Erk1/2) activity in MII oocytes through MEK activation and that leptin might be a local regulator of meiotic maturation of the mouse oocytes.

• The Journal of the Society of Korean Medicine Diagnostics
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.110-122
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• 2005

Background: The basic concept of thermographic interpretation is the thermologic equality of both side in normal person. But both sides diseases were limited diagnostic values by thermographic interpretation, and this interpretation does not apply to the case in thermal temperature of each part of body. Nevertheless, the measurement conditions are not standardized. So, for its clinical applications are extended, we think that the measurement conditions are considered the individual variations. Objectives: The purpose of this study is to examine the optimum conditions thermal temperature of the time period and region are not effected by internal and external variables. Methods: After the subjects took off their clothes, the filming were repeatedly five times made on duration of 5minutes during 20minutes. We selected nine regions around acupoints including Yin dang[印堂, HN1], Sugu[水溝, GV26], Ch’ondol[天突, CV22], Chonjung[CV17], Chung-wan[中脘, CV12], Ch’onch'u[天樞 S25], No-gung[勞宮, P8], and calculated based on the utility of R.O.I.(Region of Integer) in our system these points temperature. We measured the optimal time period and region that has little variation of thermal temperature. Results: The results shows that the optimal time period is 20minutes after undressed, and the optimal region is the region around acupoints including Sugu[水溝, GV26]. Conclusions: we obtained the measurement conditions were considered the individual variations. And also, this study offers basic sources for that the measurement conditions would be standardized. Furthermore, based on this results, we expect that clinical applications using thermography would be extended.

• Gut and Liver
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.704-713
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• 2018

Background/Aims: Gastric varices (GVs) are a major cause of upper gastrointestinal bleeding in patients with liver cirrhosis. The current treatments of choice are balloon-occluded retrograde transvenous obliteration (BRTO) and the placement of a transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS). We aimed to compare the efficacy and outcomes of these two methods for the management of GV bleeding. Methods: This retrospective study included consecutive patients who received BRTO (n=157) or TIPS (n=19) to control GV bleeding from January 2005 to December 2014 at a single tertiary hospital in Korea. The overall survival (OS), immediate bleeding control rate, rebleeding rate and complication rate were compared between patients in the BRTO and TIPS groups. Results: Patients in the BRTO group showed higher immediate bleeding control rates (p=0.059, odds ratio [OR]=4.72) and lower cumulative rebleeding rates (logrank p=0.060) than those in the TIPS group, although the difference failed to reach statistical significance. There were no significant differences in the rates of complications, including pleural effusion, aggravation of esophageal varices, portal hypertensive gastropathy, and portosystemic encephalopathy, although the rate of the progression of ascites was significantly higher in the BRTO group (p=0.02, OR=7.93). After adjusting for several confounding factors using a multivariate Cox analysis, the BRTO group had a significantly longer OS (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR]=0.44, p=0.01) and a longer rebleeding-free survival (aHR=0.34, p=0.001) than the TIPS group. Conclusions: BRTO provides better bleeding control, rebleeding-free survival, and OS than TIPS for patients with GV bleeding.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.1108-1115
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• 2016

• Korean Journal of Acupuncture
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.177-183
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• 2023

Objectives : One of the crucial combinations of acupoints for treating various disorders involves the Eight Confluent acupoints. The present study aims to investigate the selection patterns of the Eight Confluent acupoints in clinical trials and determine the most frequent pairings through network analysis. Methods : The frequencies of the Eight Confluent acupoints were extracted from the Acusynth database, which includes data from 421 clinical investigations. We examined the degree distribution, eigenvector centrality, proximity centrality, and betweenness centrality of these acupoint combinations using network analysis. Results : Data mining revealed that among the Eight Confluent acupoints, PC6 and TE5 were the most commonly applied in the treatment of 30 disorders. Additionally, we identified the most frequently co-occurring pairs of Eight Confluent acupoints by network analysis which included PC6-GV20, SP4-GV4, LU7-LI4, TE5-PC7, GB41-SP6, KI6-BL62, and SI3-BL62. Conclusions : Through the application of data mining and network analysis, we have elucidated the selection patterns and combinations of the Eight Confluent acupoints. These findings provide valuable insights that can enhance doctors' understanding of clinical database-driven Eight Confluent acupoint selection patterns.

• Journal of Pharmacopuncture
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.162-171
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• 2024

Objectives: Electroacupuncture (EA) has been demonstrated to aid stroke recovery. However, few investigations have focused on identifying the potent molecular targets of EA by comparing EA stimulation between naïve and disease models. Therefore, this study was undertaken to identify the potent molecular therapeutic mechanisms underlying EA stimulation in ischemic stroke through a comparison of mRNA sequencing data obtained from EA-treated naïve control and ischemic stroke mouse models. Methods: Using both naïve control and middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) mouse models, EA stimulation was administered at two acupoints, Baihui (GV20) and Dazhui (GV14), at a frequency of 2 Hz. Comprehensive assessments were conducted, including behavioral evaluations, RNA sequencing to identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs), functional enrichment analysis, protein-protein interaction (PPI) network analysis, and quantitative real-time PCR. Results: EA stimulation ameliorated the ischemic insult-induced motor dysfunction in mice with ischemic stroke. Comparative analysis between control vs. MCAO, control vs. control + EA, and MCAO vs. MCAO + EA revealed 4,407, 101, and 82 DEGs, respectively. Of these, 30, 7, and 1 were common across the respective groups. Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analyses revealed upregulated DEGs associated with the regulation of inflammatory immune response in the MCAO vs. MCAO + EA comparison. Conversely, downregulated DEGs in the control vs. control + EA comparison were linked to neuronal development. PPI analysis revealed major clustering related to the regulation of cytokines, such as Cxcl9, Pcp2, Ccl11, and Cxcl13, in the common DEGs of MCAO vs. MCAO + EA, with Esp8l1 identified as the only common downregulated DEG in both EA-treated naïve and ischemic models. Conclusion: These findings underscore the diverse potent mechanisms of EA stimulation between naïve and ischemic stroke mice, albeit with few overlaps. However, the potent mechanisms underlying EA treatment in ischemic stroke models were associated with the regulation of inflammatory processes involving cytokines.

• The Journal of Korean Society of Virology
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.175-182
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• 1998

We investigated the rate of hepatitis G virus infection among 50 patients who were not infected with the hepatitis C virus but showed symptoms of hepatitis. Viral RNA was extracted from the patients' sera and cDNA was synthesized and amplified by RT-PCR (reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction) using random hexamer and 5 primers (470-20-1-77F, 470-20-1-211R, 470-20-1-211R-biotin, GV57-4512MF, GV57-4657MR). The amplified PCR products were confirmed by electrochemiluminescence (ECL), liquid hybridization (LH) and Southern blotting (SB). Among the 50 PCR products, by means of ECL, we found 4 samples to be positive and 5 samples to be indeterminate. The GV45-89M probe (5'-CYCGCTGRTITGGGGTGTACfGGAAGGC-3') was end-labelled with gamma-$^{32}P$ ATP and used for liquid hybridization with the PCR products. By using liquid hybridization, we detected specific bands from 4 positive sera and also from one indeterminate serum as determined by ECL. An 1.5% agarose gel electrophoresis of the 9 PCR products which were HGV positive or indeterminate as determined by ECL showed a 160bp band from 4 positive and one indeterminate serum. The 5 PCR products proved to be positive when SB was applied with the GV45-89M probe as well as when LH was applied. LH and SB were shown to have higher sensitivity and specificity than ECL. Two cases among 5 positive cases had relatively high SGOT, SGPT, ALP values when compared with other 48 cases. In summary, we confirmed hepatitis G virus infection in 5 cases among 50 Korean patients showing symptoms of viral hepatitis.

• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.139-144
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• 2007

Hypocotyl explants of Chinese cabbage (cvs. "Jeong Sang") produced transgenic calli on callus induction medium (MS salt, B5 vitamin, 5 mg/L acetosyringone, 1 mg/L 2,4-D, 3% sucrose, 400 mg/L cefotaxime, 100 mg/L paromomycin, pH 5.8) after cocultivation with strains of Agrobacterium tumefaciens (EHA101, LBA4404, GV3101) harboring the pPTN290 containing paromomycin-resistance gene as a selectable marker, and then they transferred to root induction medium (1/2MS salt, MS vitamins, 2% sucrose, 100 mg/L paromomycin, 100 mg/L cefotaxime, pH 5.8) and shoot induction medium (MS salt, B5 vitamin, 4 mg/L $AgNO_3$, 4 mg/L 6-benzyladenine, 3 mg/L alpha-naphthaleneacetic acid, 100 mg/L paromomycin, 100 mg/L cefotaxime, 3% sucrose, pH 5.8) in order. There was a significant difference in the frequency of transgenic calli depending on Agrobacterium strains. In particular, the highest frequency (6.1%) of transgenic calli was obtained from the hypocotyls cocultivated with EHA101 strains. Also, the frequency (%) of transgenic root and plants from each transgenic callus clone were obtained with 60.7% and 38.2% in EHA101, with 8.3% and 0% in LBA4404, with 20.5% and 85.7% in GV3101 strains, respectively. They were grown to maturity in a greenhouse and normally produced $T_2$ seeds. GUS histochemical assay for progeny ($T_2$) revealed that the transgenes was expressed in the plant genome, and progeny analysis from 7 independent transgenic events demonstrated that the transformants transmitted the transgene as a single or multiple functional locus.

• Journal of Animal Reproduction and Biotechnology
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.35-39
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• 2019

This study aimed to recover the ovarian function through in vitro culture of preantral follicles from aged mice. First, we isolated the preantral follicles from ovaries of sixty-seven-week old B6D2F1 mice with decreased fecundity to know how many follicles were present in them, which was 6 preantral follicles including 2 primary, 2 early secondary and late secondary follicles from 8 aged mice. It was confirmed that a few follicles (~2) were present in aged mice through histological analysis compared to adult mice as control. The 9 days of in vitro culture of preantal follicles showed in vitro growth and induced maturation after treatment with hCG (2.5 IU/mL) and EGF (5 ng/mL). Cumulus cells in the cumulus-oocyte complexes (COCs) were removed using hyaluronidase and oocytes at the germinal vesicle (GV) and GV breakdown (GVBD) were obtained from preantral follicle culture of aged mice in vitro. In conclusion, these observations demonstrated that there still were a few preantral follicles in the ovaries of 67 week-old mice, which we were able to culture in vitro and oocytes were obtained from them. This study proposed an in vitro culture system using preantral follicle as a therapeutic strategy for fertility preservation in humans for assisted reproductive medicine.

• Journal of Food Hygiene and Safety
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.71-76
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• 2018

Norovirus is a leading cause of sporadic pathogenic non-bacterial gastroenteritis worldwide. For the detection of norovirus, reverse transcription real-time PCR (RT qPCR) has quickly become a major tool due to its sensitivity and specificity. However, accurate viral RNA extraction methods are essential for RT qPCR analysis. TRIzol reagents are used to extract RNA from biological materials and are therefore widely used for norovirus RNA extraction. In this study, the yield of viral RNA extraction using TRIzol from genogroup II (GII) among the human norovirus genogroup I (GI) and GII, and murine norovirus (GV) depended on the pH of the virus sample solution. The yield of RNA extraction was higher at the alkaline pH than in the acidic region compared with the Ct (threshold cycle) value of the real-time PCR. From the results of this study, it was found that the pH condition is very important for the quantitative analysis of norovirus by extracting GII RNA using TRIzol.