• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.459-469
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• 2018

Plants and microorganisms (microbes) use information from chemicals such as volatile compounds to understand their environments. Proficiency in sensing and responding to these infochemicals increases an organism's ecological competence and ability to survive in competitive environments, particularly with regard to plant-pathogen interactions. Plants and microbes acquired the ability to sense and respond to biogenic volatiles during their evolutionary history. However, these signals can only be interpreted by humans through the use of state-of the-art technologies. Newly-developed tools allow microbe-induced plant volatiles to be detected in a rapid, precise, and non-invasive manner to diagnose plant diseases. Beside disease diagnosis, volatile compounds may also be valuable in improving crop productivity in sustainable agriculture. Bacterial volatile compounds (BVCs) have potential for use as a novel plant growth stimulant or as improver of fertilizer efficiency. BVCs can also elicit plant innate immunity against insect pests and microbial pathogens. Research is needed to expand our knowledge of BVCs and to produce BVC-based formulations that can be used practically in the field. Formulation possibilities include encapsulation and sol-gel matrices, which can be used in attract and kill formulations, chemigation, and seed priming. Exploitation of biogenic volatiles will facilitate the development of smart integrated plant management systems for disease control and productivity improvement.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.54 no.1
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• pp.17-21
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• 2021

In 2020, the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has caused unprecedented disruptions to global health systems. The Korea has taken full-fledged actions against this novel infectious disease, swiftly implementing a testing-tracing-treatment strategy. New obligations have therefore been given to the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA) to devote the utmost effort towards tackling this global health crisis. Thanks to the universal national health insurance and state-of-the-art information communications technology (ICT) of the Korea, HIRA has conducted far-reaching countermeasures to detect and treat cases early, prevent the spread of COVID-19, respond quickly to surging demand for the healthcare services, and translate evidence into policy. Three main factors have enabled HIRA to undertake pandemic control preemptively and systematically: nationwide data aggregated from all healthcare providers and patients, pre-existing ICT network systems, and real-time data exchanges. HIRA has maximized the use of data and pre-existing network systems to conduct rapid and responsive measures in a centralized way, both of which have been the most critical tactics and strategies used by the Korean healthcare system. In the face of new obligations, our promise is to strive for a more responsive and resilient health system during this prolonged crisis.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.33 no.9
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• pp.746-753
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• 2023

Viral infectious diseases have been regarded as one of the greatest threats to global public health. The recent coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) is a stark reminder of the threat posed by emerging viral infections. Developing and producing appropriate and efficient vaccines and therapeutics are the only options to combat this pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need for novel vaccine platforms to control and prevent emerging viral diseases. Conventional vaccine platforms, including live-attenuated vaccine and inactivated vaccines, pose limitations in the speed of vaccine development, manufacturing capacity, and broad protection for emergency use. Interestingly, vaccination with the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidate based on the mRNA-lipid nanoparticle (LNP) platform protected against COVID-19, confirming that the nucleoside-modified candidate is a safe and effective alternative to conventional vaccines. Moreover, the prophylactic strategies against the COVID-19 pandemic have been mRNA nucleic acid-based vaccines and nanoparticle-based platforms, which are effective against SARS-CoV-2 and its variants. Overall, the novel vaccine platform has presented advantages compared with the traditional vaccine platform in the COVID-19 pandemic. This review explores the recent advancements in vaccine technologies and platforms, focusing on mRNA vaccines, digital vaccines, and nanoparticles while considering their advantages and possible drawbacks.

• Journal of Pharmacopuncture
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.165-172
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• 2021

The COVID-19, the most infectious pandemic disease arising due to SARS-CoV-2 (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2) has caused huge issues globally. In this review, we discuss the impact of COVID-19 on the immune system of the human body and the protective mechanisms of the host immune system opposing viral infections. Here, we summarize the effect of the pandemic of the novel coronavirus disease on the immune system such as sleep and Behavioral Immune System (BIS) together with consideration of researcher's observation points of view. We draw particular attention to recent up-to-date reports concerning COVID-19 drugs as well as information about the landscape document for COVID-19 vaccines released by WHO (World Health Organization), and some adverse events of COVID-19 vaccination. Additionally, can take part in the preventive appraise in opposition within this pandemic severe COVID-19 infections disease may affect some outcome in physical exercise, physical movement, healthy diets, and good nutrition are significant for supporting the immune systems and summarize AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homeopathy) Indian medicinal systems guidelines for immunity boosting procedures during COVID-19 pandemic.

• Korean Journal of Pharmacognosy
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• v.50 no.3
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• pp.191-197
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• 2019

Sepsis, an infectious disease, is a life-threatening condition that arises when the response to infection causes injury to tissues and organs. The purpose of this study was to demonstrate whether ABHC-1 and ABHC-2, two functional extracts from herbal complex, have an anti-bacterial effect against Escherchia coli in vivo, in vitro experimental model. ABHC-1 and ABHC-2 showed the antibacterial activity against the bacteria by paper disc method. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) was measured using alamar blue reagent. The MIC was shown at $60{\mu}g/ml$ from ABHC-1 and $500{\mu}g/ml$ from ABHC-2 against E. coli. We next examined the effect of ABHCs on the production of inflammatory cytokine, such as tumor necrosis $factor-{\alpha}$ ($TNF-{\alpha}$), which is related to the induction of inflammation, in RAW 264.7 cell. ABHC-1 and ABHC-2 increased $TNF-{\alpha}$ production of RAW 264.7 cell in a dose-dependent manner while two extract decreased $TNF-{\alpha}$ production in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated RAW 264.7 cell in a dose-dependent manner. At a dose of $1{\times}10^8$ E. coli. i.p., non-treated mice were succumbed, while most of mice treated with ABHC-1 were survived. Therefore, our results suggest that ABHC-1 has anti-bacterial activity and can be a novel therapeutic agent against infectious diseases.

• Genomics & Informatics
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.11.1-11.8
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• 2021

For the novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), predictive modeling, in the literature, uses broadly susceptible exposed infected recoverd (SEIR)/SIR, agent-based, curve-fitting models. Governments and legislative bodies rely on insights from prediction models to suggest new policies and to assess the effectiveness of enforced policies. Therefore, access to accurate outbreak prediction models is essential to obtain insights into the likely spread and consequences of infectious diseases. The objective of this study is to predict the future COVID-19 situation of Korea. Here, we employed 5 models for this analysis; SEIR, local linear regression (LLR), negative binomial (NB) regression, segment Poisson, deep-learning based long short-term memory models (LSTM) and tree based gradient boosting machine (GBM). After prediction, model performance comparison was evelauated using relative mean squared errors (RMSE) for two sets of train (January 20, 2020-December 31, 2020 and January 20, 2020-January 31, 2021) and testing data (January 1, 2021-February 28, 2021 and February 1, 2021-February 28, 2021) . Except for segmented Poisson model, the other models predicted a decline in the daily confirmed cases in the country for the coming future. RMSE values' comparison showed that LLR, GBM, SEIR, NB, and LSTM respectively, performed well in the forecasting of the pandemic situation of the country. A good understanding of the epidemic dynamics would greatly enhance the control and prevention of COVID-19 and other infectious diseases. Therefore, with increasing daily confirmed cases since this year, these results could help in the pandemic response by informing decisions about planning, resource allocation, and decision concerning social distancing policies.

• Journal of Ginseng Research
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.506-518
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• 2020

Background: Red-skin root of Asian ginseng (Panax ginseng) significantly reduces the quality and limits the production of ginseng in China. The disease has long been thought to be a noninfectious physiological disease, except one report that proved it was an infectious disease. However, the causal agents have not been successfully determined. In the present study, we were to reveal the pathogens that cause red-skin disease. Methods: Ginseng roots with red-skin root symptoms were collected from commercial fields in Northeast China. Fungi were isolated from the lesion and identified based on morphological characters along with multilocus sequence analyses on internal transcription spacer, β-tubulin (tub2), histone H3 (his3), and translation elongation factor 1α (tef-1α). Pathogens were confirmed by inoculating the isolates in ginseng roots. Results: A total of 230 isolates were obtained from 209 disease samples. These isolates were classified into 12 species, including Dactylonectria sp., D. hordeicola, Fusarium acuminatum, F. avenaceum, F. solani, F. torulosum, Ilyonectria mors-panacis, I. robusta, Rhexocercosporidium panacis, and three novel species I. changbaiensis, I. communis, and I. qitaiheensis. Among them, I. communis, I. robusta, and F. solani had the highest isolation frequencies, being 36.1%, 20.9%, and 23.9%, respectively. All these species isolated were pathogenic to ginseng roots and caused red-skin root disease under appropriate condition. Conclusion: Fungal complex is the causal agent of red-skin root in P. ginseng.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.151-158
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• 2014

Three double-stranded RNAs (dsRNAs), approximately 1.85, 1.65 and 1.27 kb in size, were detected in an isolate of Cytospora sacchari from Iran. Partial nucleotide sequence revealed a 1,284 bp segment containing one ORF that potentially encodes a 405 aa protein. This protein contains conserved motifs related to RNA dependent RNA polymerases (RdRp) that showed similarity to RdRps of partitiviruses. The results indicate that these dsRNAs represent a novel Partitivirus that we tentatively designate Cytospora sacchari partitivirus (CsPV). Treatment of the fungal strain by cyclohexamide and also hyphal tip culture had no effect on removing the putative virus. Phylogenetic analysis of putative RdRp of CsPV and other partitiviruses places CsPV as a member of the genus Partitivirus in the family Partitiviridae, and clustering with Aspergillus ochraceous virus 1.

• IMMUNE NETWORK
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.1-6
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• 2014

Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is etiologically associated with a variety of diseases including lymphoproliferative diseases, lymphomas, carcinomas, and autoimmune diseases. Humans are the only natural host of EBV and limited species of new-world monkeys can be infected with the virus in experimental conditions. Small animal models of EBV infection, required for evaluation of novel therapies and vaccines for EBV-associated diseases, have not been available. Recently the development of severely immunodeficient mouse strains enabled production of humanized mice in which human immune system components are reconstituted and express their normal functions. Humanized mice can serve as infection models for human-specific viruses such as EBV that target cells of the immune system. This review summarizes recent studies by the author's group addressing reproduction of EBV infection and pathogenesis in humanized mice.

• Korean Journal of Poultry Science
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.165-172
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• 2001

Vaccination is one of the most important and cost-effective methods of preventing infectious diseases. Over the past decade, scientific in molecular biology and immunology have improved understanding of many diseases and led to the development of novel strategies for vaccination. An ideal vaccine would induce effective immunity specific for the type of infection, have long duration, require minimal or no boosters, have safety, would not induce adverse reaction, and be easy to administer. The desire to meet these criteria has resulted in the development of vaccines that do not depend on the use of the viable disease agent. It is not the intent of this review to give an extensive review of the field of vaccinology, but rather to address characteristics of conventional and genetically engineered vaccines.