• Journal of Soil and Groundwater Environment
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.83-91
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• 2015

Mine soil contamination by high levels of metal ions that prevents the successful vegetation poses a serious problem. In the study presented here, we used the microbial biocatalyst of urease producing bacterium Sporosarcina pasteurii or plant extract based BioNeutro-GEM (BNG) agent. The ability of the biocatalysts to bioremediate contaminated soil from abandoned mine was examined by solid-state composting vegetation under field conditions. Treatment of mine soil with the 2 biocatalysts for 5 months resulted in pH increase and electric conductivity reduction compared to untreated control. Further analyses revealed that the microbial catalysts also promoted the root and shoot growth to the untreated control during the vegetation treatments. After the Sporosarcina pasteurii or plant extract based BNG treatment, the microbial community change was monitored by culture-independent pyrosequencing. These results demonstrate that the microbial biocatalysts could potentially be used in the soil bioremediation from mine-impacted area.

• Journal of Soil and Groundwater Environment
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.20-26
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• 2021

In this work, an indigenous microbial consortium was obtained by selectively cultivating microbes using a long-aged petroleum-contaminated soil (Kuwait) containing recalcitrant petroleum hydrocarbons. The obtained microbial consortium was able to grow on and degrade the remaining petroleum hydrocarbons which could not have been utilized by the indigenous microbes in the original Kuwait soil. The following microbial community analysis using 16S rRNA gene sequencing suggested that the enhanced degradation of the remaining recalcitrant petroleum hydrocarbons by the novel microbial consortium may have been attributed to the selected bacterial populations belonging to Bacillus, Burkholderia, Sphingobacterium, Lachnospiraceae, Prevotella, Haemophilus, Pseudomonas, and Neisseria.

• Journal of Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.59 no.4
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• pp.299-304
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• 2016

When used for amplicon sequencing, Illumina platforms produce more than hundreds of sequence artefacts, which affects operational taxonomic units based analyses such as differential abundance and network analyses. Nevertheless it has become a major tool for fecal microbial community analysis. In addition, results from sequence-based fecal microbial community analysis vary depending on conditions of samples (i.e., freshness, time of storage and quantity). We investigated if freeze-drying samples could improve quality of sequence data. Our results showed reduced number of possible artefacts while maintaining overall microbial community structure. Therefore, freeze-drying feces prior to DNA extraction is recommended for Illumina-based microbial community analysis.

• Food Science and Industry
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• v.50 no.1
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• pp.2-10
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• 2017

Human have eaten various traditional fermented foods for a numbers of million years for health benefit as well as survival. The beneficial effects of fermented foods have been resulted from complex microbial communications within the fermented foods. Therefore, the holistic approaches for individual identification and complete microbial profiling involved in their communications have been of interest to food microbiology fields. Microbiome is the ecological community of microorganisms that literally share our environments including foods as well as human body. However, due to the limitation of culture-dependent methods such as simple isolations of just culturable microorganisms, the culture-independent methods have been consistently developed, resulting in new light on the diverse non-culturable and hitherto unknown microorganisms, and even microbial communities in the fermented foods. For the culture-independent approaches, the food microbiome has been deciphered by employing various molecular analysis tools such as fluorescence in situ hybridization, quantitative PCR, and denaturing gradient gel-electrophoresis. More recently, next-generation-sequencing (NGS) platform-based microbiome analysis has been of interest, because NGS is a powerful analytical tool capable of resolving the microbiome in respect to community structures, dynamics, and activities. In this overview, the development status of analysis tools for the fermented food microbiome is covered and research trend for NGS-based food microbiome analysis is also discussed.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.49 no.2
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• pp.150-155
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• 2013

We have conducted pyrosequencing for freshwater microbial community analyses. Fourteen sites along the Yeongsan river were selected for this study, and samples were collected monthly from May to July, 2012. Total 987,380 reads were obtained from 42 samples and used for taxonomic classification and OTU distribution analysis. Our results showed that high geographical and temporal variation in the phylum level bacterial composition, suggesting that microbial community is a very sensitive parameter affected by the surrounding environments including tributaries and land use nearby. In addition, we conducted an OTU-based Microbial Source Tracking to identify sources of fecal pollution in the same region. From this study Firmicutes was found to be the most influential taxa in this region. Here, we report that the use of pyrosequencing based microbial community analysis may give an additional information on freshwater quality monitoring, in addition to the currently used water quality parameters, such as BOD and pH.

• Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.51 no.1
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• pp.8-14
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• 2018

We investigated the levels of microbial contaminants and microbial hazards during dried-laver processing. We analyzed 321 samples obtained from 18 dried-laver Pyropia spp. manufacturing facilities, including water, swab-, and processing samples as well as final products. The levels of microbial contaminants, including viable cell counts (VCC) and coliform bacteria, increased as processing progressed. The sanitary indicator bacterium, Escherichia coli, was not detected in the final products although VCC levels were high, generally exceeding 5 log CFU/g. We also investigated changes in microbial contaminants at each processing step. Both VCC and total coliform dramatically increased after 4 days of continuous processing, indicating that microbial contaminants originated, mainly, from cross contamination during processing.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.42 no.2
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• pp.139-143
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• 2009

We examined the vertical distribution of specific microbial groups and the patterns of microbial community structure within the soil profile using phospholipid fatty acid (PLFA). Samples were collected from the soil surface down to 15 cm in depth from paddy and upland fields located in Daegu, Korea. The two fields have been fertilized with only chemical fertilizers N, P, K for 33 years. Principal component analysis of the PLFA signatures indicated that the composition of the soil microbial communities changed significantly with the cultivation practices and soil depth, suggesting that cultivation practices of paddy and upland fields had more significant influence on soil microbial community than the soil depth did. The soil microbial communities changed more drastically with soil depth in upland field than in paddy field, with making thicker soil surface in paddy field in terms of soil microbial community. The ratios of cyclopropyl/monoenoic precursors and total saturated/total monounsaturated fatty acids increased with soil depth, suggesting that the deeper soil horizons are more carbon-limited and anaerobic than surface soil. The community analysis using PLFAs as biomarkers revealed that Gram-positive bacteria and actinomycetes tended to increase in proportional abundance with increasing soil depth, while the abundance of Gram-negative bacteria and fungi were highest at the soil surface and substantially lower in the subsurface.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.32 no.5
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• pp.407-413
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• 2016

Fusarium graminearum species complex (FGSC) causes Fusarium head blight in small grain cereals. To date, four species (F. graminearum, F. asiaticum, F. boothii, and F. meridionale ) belonging to FGSC frequently occur in Korean cereals. In addition, we first reported the occurrence of additional species (F. vorosii ) within FGSC, which was isolated from barley, corn, and rice in Korea. Phylogenetic analysis of the Fusarium isolates of this group using combined multigene sequences confirmed species identification. Moreover, the macroconidia produced by these isolates were morphologically similar to those of the F. vorosii holotype. Chemical analysis indicated that the F. vorosii isolates produced various trichothecenes such as nivalenol and deoxynivalenol with their acetyl derivatives along with zearalenone. Pathogenicity tests demonstrated that all of the F. vorosii isolates examined were pathogenic on barley, corn, and rice with variation in aggressiveness. This study is the first report of F. vorosii in Korean cereals, their pathogenicity towards barley and corn, and their ability to produce trichothecenes and zearalenone.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.254-263
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• 2024

Korean jang is a food made using fermented soybeans, and the typical products include gochujang (GO), doenjang (DO), cheonggukjang (CH), and ganjang (GA). In this study, 16S rRNA metagenome analysis was performed on a total of 200 types of GO, DO, CH, and GA using next-generation sequencing to analyze the microbial community of fermented soybean foods and compare taxonomic (biomarker) differences. Alpha diversity analysis showed that in the CHAO index, the species richness index tended to be significantly higher compared to the DO and GA groups (p<0.001). The results of the microbial distribution analysis of the GO, DO, CH, and GA products showed that at the order level, Bacillales was the most abundant in the GO, DO, and CH groups, but Lactobacillales was most abundant in the GA group. Linear discriminant analysis effect (LEfSe) analysis was used to identify biomarkers at the family and species levels. Leuconostocaceae, Thermoactinomycetaceae, Bacillaceae, and Enterococcaceae appeared as biomarkers at the family level, and Bacillus subtilis, Kroppenstedtia sanguinis, Bacillus licheniformis, and Tetragenococcus halophilus appeared at the species level. Permutational multivariate analysis of variance (PERMANOVA) analysis showed that there was a significant difference in the microbial community structure of the GO, DO, CH, and GA groups (p=0.001), and the microbial community structure of the GA group showed the greatest difference. This study clarified the correlation between the characteristics of Korean fermented foods and microbial community distribution, enhancing knowledge of microorganisms participating in the fermentation process. These results could be leveraged to improve the quality of fermented soybean foods.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.37 no.5
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• pp.376-386
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• 2011

Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate the microbial hazards posed by food utensils and fixtures in food service operations at selected middle and high schools located in Seoul, Korea. Methods: We collected 200 samples of utensils and fixtures including cups, spoons/chopsticks, food trays and tables from five different schools in Seoul. Target microorganisms of this study were divided into two groups: total bacterial count and total coliform as indicators of microbial contamination and Bacillus cereus and Staphylococcus aureus as pathogens of food poisoning. We used selective media to quantify microbial concentration and 16S rRNA PCR assay for qualitative analysis. In addition, intensive interviews with nutritionists were conducted and observations were made to identify factors that may affect microbial contamination. Logistic regression analysis was employed to examine the relationship between the microbial concentration and operation characteristics of each operation. Results: The level of microbial concentration in school B and C were significantly lower than in school A, D and E (p<0.05). Some samples from school A, D and E showed over 3.4 log CFU/100 $cm^2$ (total bacterial count) and 1.0 log CFU/100 $cm^2$ (total coliform), which requires immediate hygienic action. The number of customers per staff member, periodicity of hygiene education for staff and daily operation time of sterilizers were also found to be important factors related with the microbial contamination of food service operations. Conclusions: These results suggested that not only a HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) approach, but also efforts to assess internal risk factors within operations be needed to reduce the microbial contamination of food utensils and fixtures. This study is expected to provide preliminary data for assessing microbial hazards in food service operations.