• Animal cells and systems
• /
• v.6 no.2
• /
• pp.167-170
• /
• 2002

The long terminal repeats (LTRs) of human endogenous retrovirus (HERV) have been found to be coexpressed with sequences of closely located genes. It has been suggested that the LTR elements have contributed to the structural change or genetic variation of human genome connected to various diseases and evolution. We examined the HERV-W LTR elements in various cancer cells (2F7, A43l , A549, HepG2, MIA-PaCa-2, PC-3, RT4, SiHa, U-937, and UO-31). Using genomic DNA from the cancer cells, we performed PCR amplification and identified twelve new HERV-W LTR elements. Those LTR elements showed a high degree of sequence similarity (88-99％) with HERV-W LTR (AF072500). A phylogenetic tree obtained by the neighbor-joining method revealed that HERV-W LTR elements could be mainly divided into two groups through evolutionary divergence. Three HERV-W LTR elements (RT4-2, A43l-1, and UO3l-2) belonged to Group 1, whereas nine LTR elements (2F7-2, A549-1, A549-3, HepG2-3, MP2-2, PC3-1, SiHa-8, SiHa-10, and U937-1) belonged to Group 11. Taken together, our new sequence data of the HERV-W LTR elements may contribute to an understanding of tissue-specific cancer by genomic instability of LTR integration.

• Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
• /
• v.21 no.3 s.54
• /
• pp.209-218
• /
• 2006

합성화학물질들이 환경으로의 유입은 인체에는 물론 환경생태계에 많은 영향을 미치므로 이들의 유해성 검증은 매우 중요한 일이라 할 수 있다. 실제 산업체에서 사용되는 수많은 화학물질들의 유전적 손상 유발유무는 유해성검증에서 무엇보다 중요한 일이라 할 수 있다. 이에 산업체 공정과정에서 널리 사용되는 것으로 알려진 17종의 합성화학물질에 대해 마우스의 말초 혈의 망상적혈구를 이용한 in vivo 소핵시험을 수행하여, 소핵형성 유발유무를 관찰하였다. 양성대조군으로 사용된 mitomycin C는 음성대조군과 비교시 유의하게 소핵을 유발하는 반면, 비교적 마우스에서 높은 50% 치사량을 보이는 benzoyl chloride, p-toluene sulfonic acid 및 4,4'-sulfonyldianiline 등의 합성물질들을 포함한 총 17종의 물질들은 본 실험결과 통계적으로 유의하게 소핵을 유발하지 않는 것을 관찰 할 수 있었다.

• Journal of Integrative Natural Science
• /
• v.3 no.1
• /
• pp.49-53
• /
• 2010

Molecular docking is a critical event which mostly forms Van der waals complex in molecular recognition. Since the majority of developed drugs are small molecules, docking them into proteins has been a prime concern in drug discovery community. Since the binding pose space is too vast to cover completely, many search algorithms such as genetic algorithm, Monte Carlo, simulated annealing, distance geometry have been developed. Proper evaluation of the quality of binding is an essential problem. Scoring functions derived from force fields handle the ligand binding prediction with the use of potential energies and sometimes in combination with solvation and entropy contributions. Knowledge-based scoring functions are based on atom pair potentials derived from structural databases. Forces and potentials are collected from known protein-ligand complexes to get a score for their binding affinities (e.g. PME). Empirical scoring functions are derived from training sets of protein-ligand complexes with determined affinity data. Because non of any single scoring function performs generally better than others, some other approaches have been tried. Although numerous scoring functions have been developed to locate the correct binding poses, it still remains a major hurdle to derive an accurate scoring function for general targets. Recently, consensus scoring functions and target specific scoring functions have been studied to overcome the current limitations.

• Industrial Engineering and Management Systems
• /
• v.15 no.4
• /
• pp.324-334
• /
• 2016

Manufacturers and retailers are interested in how prices, promotions, discounts and other marketing variables can influence the sales and shares of the products that they produce or sell. Therefore, many models have been developed to predict the brand share. Since the customer choice models are usually used to predict the market share, here we use hybrid model of Probabilistic Neural Network and Artificial Bee colony Algorithm (PNN-ABC) that we have introduced to model consumer choice to predict brand share. The evaluation process is carried out using the same data set that we have used for modeling individual consumer choices in a retail coffee market. Then, to show good performance of this model we compare it with Artificial Neural Network with one hidden layer, Artificial Neural Network with two hidden layer, Artificial Neural Network trained with genetic algorithms (ANN-GA), and Probabilistic Neural Network. The evaluated results show that the offered model is outperforms better than other previous models, so it can be use as an effective tool for modeling consumer choice and predicting market share.

• Reproductive and Developmental Biology
• /
• v.37 no.4
• /
• pp.185-192
• /
• 2013

Many countries have implemented genetic evaluation for fertility traits in recent years. In particular, reproductive trait is a complex trait and need to require a system-level approach for identifying candidate genes related to the trait. To find the candidate gene associated with reproductive trait, we applied a weighted gene co-expression network analysis from expression value of bovine genes. We identified three co-expressed modules associated with reproductive trait from bovine microarray data. Hub genes (ZP4, FHL2 and EGR4) were determined in each module; they were topologically centered with statistically significant value in the gene co-expression network. We were able to find the highly co-expressed gene pairs with a correlation coefficient. Finally, the crucial functions of co-expressed modules were reported from functional enrichment analysis. We suggest that the network-based approach in livestock may an important method for analyzing the complex effects of candidate genes associated with economic traits like reproduction.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
• /
• v.19 no.4
• /
• pp.411-418
• /
• 2011

Ginsenoside Rp1 (G-Rp1) is a novel ginseng saponin derivative with anti-tumor activity. However, the biochemical and molecular mechanisms of G-Rp1 on anti-tumor activity are not fully understood. In the present study, we report that G-Rp1 inhibits lung cancer cell proliferation, migration and adhesion in p53 wild-type A549 and p53-defi cient H1299 cells. Anti-proliferative activity of G-Rp1 in lung cancer cells is mediated by enhanced nuclear localization of cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors including $p27^{Kip1}$ and $p21^{WAF1/Cip1}$, and subsequent inhibition of pRb phosphorylation. We also show that these anti-tumor activities of G-Rp1 in both A549 and H1299 cells appear to be mediated by suppression of mitogenic signaling pathways such as ERK, Akt and $p70^{S6K}$. Taken together, these findings suggest further development and evaluation of G-Rp1 for the treatment of lung cancers with mutated p53 as well as wild-type p53.

• Journal of Genetic Medicine
• /
• v.11 no.2
• /
• pp.83-85
• /
• 2014

Dural ectasia refers to the widening or ballooning of the dural sac surrounding the spinal cord. It can affect any plane of the spinal canal, but occurs primarily in the lumbosacral region. Dural ectasia is present in 63-92% patients who have Marfan syndrome, and is related to Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, neurofibromatosis type I, and ankylosing spondylitis. The most common symptoms are low back pain, headache, weakness, numbness above and below the affected limb, and occasional rectal and genital pain. However, in most patients, dural ectasia is usually asymptomatic. We report the case of a 5-year-old boy who presented with a severe headache who had been diagnosed with Marfan syndrome. During the evaluation, magnetic resonance imaging of the lumbar and sacral spine revealed dural ectasia. To our knowledge, this is the first report on Marfan syndrome with symptomatic dural ectasia in Korea. We concluded that dural ectasia should be suspected in patients diagnosed with Marfan syndrome who have a severe headache.

• Journal of Radiation Industry
• /
• v.9 no.4
• /
• pp.181-185
• /
• 2015

Today the biosafety evaluation, a common problem of vital importance, is based on internationally proved test-systems, standards and techniques. The paradigm of biosafety includes multidisciplinary approach, a combination of physical, chemical and biological tests to monitor the environmental level of pollutants and needs to be improved by modern approaches. The genetic risk of environmental pollutions has long been studied by many researchers. In this study, used was the known sensitive plant test-system, clones of plant Tradescantia (spiderwort) able to detect gene mutations (frequency of mutational events and formation of micronuclei) in combination with chemical and, in some instances, with radiological measurements. In addition, male gametophyte generation of fruit trees was applied as bioindicators of genotoxicity. The obtained results did not show any significant increase along with wind direction. As for the male gametophyte assay, the fertility of the investigated fruit-trees near to NPP did not significantly differ from that of the control point. The influence of the NPP on the male generative system of the investigated taxa of fruit trees for the investigated year was not revealed. The system described needs to be expanded by species of interest (human) as there is a difficulty to transfer the revealed dose correlations to humans. The development of this idea includes various levels: population (epidemiological studies), individual, cellular, molecular (DNA), etc.

• Korean Journal of Breeding Science
• /
• v.42 no.4
• /
• pp.329-338
• /
• 2010

Drought, salinity and flooding are three important abiotic factors limiting soybean production worldwide. Irrigation, soil reclamation, and drainage systems are not generally available or economically feasible for soybean production. Therefore, productive soybean varieties with tolerance are a cost effective means for reducing yield losses due to these factors. Genetic variability for higher tolerance to drought, salt and flooding is important. However, only a small portion of nearly 200,000 world soybean accessions have been screened to find genotypes with tolerance for use in breeding programs. Evaluation for tolerance to drought, salinity and flooding is difficult due to lack of faster, cost effective, repeatable screening methods. Soybean strains with higher tolerance to the above stresses have been identified. Crosses with lines with drought, salt and flooding tolerance through conventional breeding has made a significant contribution to improving tolerance to abiotic stress in soybean. Molecular markers associated with tolerance to drought, salt and flooding will allow faster, reliable screening for these traits. Germplasm resources, genome sequence information and various genomic tools are available for soybean. Integration of genomic tools coupled with well-designed breeding strategies and effective uses of these resources will help to develop soybean varieties with higher tolerance to drought, salt and flooding.

• Korean Journal of Breeding Science
• /
• v.40 no.2
• /
• pp.101-105
• /
• 2008

The germplasm of 246 rice cultivars was analysed for iron and zinc contents using a Inductively Coupled Argon Plasma (ICP) at International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) Philippines. Iron contents ranged from 2.0 to 12.0, and zinc ranged from 10.0 to 33.0 (mg/kg), showing with the mean values of 4.3 and 22.8 (mg/kg), respectively. In genotypes tested, there was approximately a two-fold difference in iron and zinc concentrations, suggesting a genetic potential to increase these micronutrients in rice grain. A highly significant positive correlation ($r^2=0.503$) was found between iron and zinc contents. Iron contents decreased drastically as polishing time increased, whereas zinc decreased only slightly. In the interaction between genotype and environment on iron contents, genotype (G), environment (E), and the G ${\times}$ E interactions accounted for 69%, 5% and 26% of the sums of squares, respectively. Indicating that genotype is would be the most significant factor for the to improve iron contents of rice in rice breeding, suggesting that therefore identifying genotypes with relatively stable performance across various environments is important as staple food crops.