• Korean Journal of Plant Resources
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.345-352
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• 1998

A Korean endemic and evergreen small tree ' Dendropanax morbifera $L_{EV}$.(Araliaceae)' is a component of evergreen forest and mainly idstributein sourthern region and islands in Korea. A local population of D. morbifera which is located between evergreen and deciduous forest within 50m x 50m quadrate was investigated to ascertain the change of population structure, emergence and growth dynamics of seedlings and saplings, and pattern of spatial distribution by the temproal and spatial expansion of population . The result of analysis of population structure by Importnace Value(IV), evergreen forest showed a high species diversity of evergreen tree species such as Cinnamomum japonicum, Machilus japonica, Neolitsea serica, Daphniphyllum macropodum, Ligustrum japonicum, and etc, in middle and under story than in upper story where Camelia japonica and Quercus acuta were dominant. And in conterminous deciduous fores, the major component of evergreen forest in this region, Camellia japonica, Quercus acuta, evergreen tree of Lauraceae and etc. were abundant in only under story. IV of D. morbifera differed from among three story. In comparative analysis of emergence and growth dynamics of D. morbifera seedlings and saplings between evergreen and deciduous forest, emergece and density of seedlings were significantly greater in evergreen than in deciduous forest, and growth of height and basal diameter of seedlings and saplings were slightly larger in evergreen than in deciduous forest. The spatial distribution patterns by Moristia's index mapping of indivuduals using a lattice method of XY axis within this population showed that seedlings(age up to 2 years) and saplings (age>2 years and height<1m) both evergreen and deciduous forest were more or less aggregated apart from mature trees, and thougth intermediate trees(height>1m and dbh<10cm) had a aggregated distribution pattern, mature trees(dbh>10cm were uniform. In conclusion , the expansion of D. morbfera population from evergreen to deciduous forest accompanied with a mumber of evergreen woody species, and also, emergence and recruitment, and growth of seedlings were greatly influenced moisture and canopy by around community structure.

• Animal Systematics, Evolution and Diversity
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.279-290
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• 2012

Plecoglossus altivelis (ayu) is an amphidromous fish widely distributed in Northeastern Asia from the East China Sea to the northern Japanese coastal waters, encompassing the Korean Peninsula within its range. The shore lines of northeastern region in Asia have severely fluctuated following glaciations in the Quaternary. In the present study, we investigate the population genetic structure and historical demographic change of P. altivelis at a population level in East Asia. Analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) based on 244 mitochondrial control region DNA sequences clearly showed that as the sampling scope extended to a larger geographic area, genetic differentiation began to become significant, particularly among Northeastern populations. A series of hierarchical AMOVA could detect the genetic relationship of three closely located islands between Korea and Japan that might have been tightly connected by the regional Tsushima current. Neutrality and mismatch distribution analyses revealed a strong signature of a recent population expansion of P. altivelis in East Asia, estimated at 126 to 391 thousand years ago during the late Pleistocene. Therefore it suggests that the present population of P. altivelis traces back to its approximate demographic change long before the last glacial maximum. This contrasts our a priori expectation that the most recent glacial event might have the most crucial effect on the present day demography of marine organisms through bottleneck and subsequent increase of effective population size in this region.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.87-102
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• 2010

The objective of this study were to examine the impact of medicaid coverage expansion policy aimed at improving access to primary care. The case-control study was conducted to compare preventable hospitalization(PH) rate in new medicaid recipients versus national health insurance(NHI) enrollees form 1996 to 2001. Rates of preventable hospitalization associated with ambulatory care sensitive conditions(ACSC) were calculated and standardized by age and sex. Multinomial logit regression model was used to control the confounding factors such as age, gender and charlson comorbidity index Annual PH rates in the new medicaid increased 1.64 times after medicaid expansion, with controling confounding factors. Meanwhile, annual PH rate in the NHI increased 1.68 times during the same period, with adjusting confounding factors. Current findings suggest that the new medicaid PH rate was less likely to rise than NHI PH rate after implementing medicaid expansion. This study is expected to provide policy-relevant evidence of medicaid expansion to include population with low income.

• Journal of Genetic Medicine
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.23-26
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• 1997

Myotonic dystrophy (DM) is caused by the expansion of CTG trinucleotide repeat near the 3' end of the gene encoding for a member of protein kinase gene family (DMPK). The normal range of the CTG repeat was determined in 178 normal individuals (141 unrelated individuals and 37 of 9 families) by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and silver staining method. And the expansion of the CTG repeats in a DM family was analyzed with Southern analysis. In normal population, the range of CTG repeat is between 5 and 34 and 19 different alleles were observed in that range, and $(CTG)_{11-14}$ alleles were predominant. 4 members of an affected family showed the 0.5-2.0 kb size expansion of CTG repeats. In this study we could predict the incidence of DM in Korea as 1 in 20,000 and we could establish the diagnostic procedure for myotonic dystrophy.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.1-18
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• 2010

This article examines social determinants of population health in OECD countries, where life years, infant mortality, and PYLL are used as proxy variables of health. The unit of analysis is a country which is the OECD affiliate. A panel regression estimation is chosen as a method, using OECD Health Data. The results are: the increasing national health expenditure affected positively to improve population health. Education was rather a significant determinant of health than income level. The government direct investment for public health did not contribute positively to enhance population health. The expansion of health care coverage was working positively for improving health, but with a time lag. The supply of doctors was a most influential determinant of health. In case of Korea, the coverage expansion of health care was the most important determinant of health. The supply of doctors was, however, not a positive factor for better health, which is different result with the case of OECD countries.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.170-176
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• 2012

Genetic diversities, population genetic structures and demographic histories of the thread-sail filefish Stephanolepis cirrhifer were investigated by nucleotide sequencing of 336 base pairs of the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) control region in 111 individuals collected from six populations in Korean coastal waters. A total of 70 haplotypes were defined by 58 variable nucleotide sites. The neighbor-joining tree of the 70 haplotypes was shallow and did not provide evidence of geographical associations. Expansion of S. cirrhifer populations began approximate 51,000 to 102,000 years before present, correlating with the period of sea level rise since the late Pleistocene glacial maximum. High levels of haplotype diversities ($0.974{\pm}0.029$ to $1.000{\pm}0.076$) and nucleotide diversities (0.014 to 0.019), and low levels of genetic differentiation among populations inferred from pairwise population FST values (-0.007 to 0.107), support an expansion of the S. cirrhifer population. Hierarchical analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) revealed weak but significant genetic structures among three groups ($F_{CT}$ = 0.028, p<0.05), and no genetic variation within groups (0.53%; $F_{SC}$ = 0.005, p = 0.23). These results may help establish appropriate fishery management strategies for stocks of S. cirrhifer and related species.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.24 no.8
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• pp.1048-1052
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• 2011

The Chinese Holstein cattle breed, an introduced breed in China, has been crossbred with native cattle breeds. We hypothesised that the Chinese Holstein local population in Beijing share haplotypes with native Asian cattle breeds, the result of a sudden population expansion in the recent past. We also hypothesised that crossbreeding and population expansion left traces that shaped the genetic makeup of the breed. Evaluation of this was performed by mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequence analysis of Chinese Holstein cattle from Beijing (n = 41) and a comparison of them with the published mtDNA sequences (n = 293) of 14 Asian breeds with an emphasis on Chinese native cattle breeds. Three shared common haplotypes between Chinese Holstein cattle and native Asian cattle were found. Moreover, a high level of haplotype diversity in Chinese Holstein cattle (h = 0.9557) and low nucleotide diversity (${\pi}$ = 0.0052) was found, indicating a past population bottleneck followed by rapid population growth. These findings are supported by the significantly negative deviation of Tajima's D (-1.82085), the star-like pattern of dominant haplotypes and the pairwise mismatch distribution analysis, which showed a unimodal pattern.

• Journal of Environmental Policy
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.1-16
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• 2003

This paper focuses on examining environmental implications embedded in recent spatial expansion of the Asian megacities as well as exploring the potentials of planning practices in addressing urban environmental problems. Regardless what underlying forces of recent metropolitan expansion are, nearly all the Asian megacities suffer serious environmental problems as these cities rapidly grow in terms of population and geographical boundaries. Furthermore, the global environmental implication of urban expansion at Asian megacities implies that there must be intense endeavor to develop more innovative policy solution in order to tackle down the worsening urban environmental problems in Asian cities at a metropolitan scale. Given the situation that there has been little attention on environmental consequence of the Asian metropolitan expansion in spatial term, this paper presents the overview on the changing nature of urban environmental problems embedded in the spatial expansion of recent metropolitan area in Asia, along with exploring possible solutions from planning practices guiding sustainable urban development in Asia.

• Animal Systematics, Evolution and Diversity
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.105-111
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• 2016

The genetic structure of marine animals that inhabit the seashore is affected by numerous factors. Of these, gene flow and natural selection during recruitment have strong influences on the genetic structure of seashore-dwelling species that have larval periods. Relative contributions of these two factors to the genetic structure of marine species would be determined mainly by the duration of larval stage. The relationship between larval period and genetic structure of population has been rarely studied in Korea. In this study, genetic variations of cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) were analyzed in two dominant species on rocky shore habitats in the Korean peninsula: periwinkle Littorina brevicula and acorn barnacle Fistulobalanus albicostatus. Both species are not strongly structured and may have experienced recent population expansion. Unlike periwinkle, however, barnacle populations have considerable genetic variation, and show a bimodal pattern of mismatch distribution. These results suggest that barnacle populations are more affected by local adaptation rather than gene flow via larval migration. The bimodal patterns of barnacle populations observed in mismatch distribution plots imply that they may have experienced secondary contact. Further studies on seashore-dwelling species are expected to be useful in understanding the evolution of the coastal ecosystem around Korean waters.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.302-313
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• 2023

Y chromosomal short tandem repeat (Y-STR) markers have been developed continuously to complement forensic DNA analyses and population genetic studies. Initially, we collected data from previously reported Korean population Y-STR haplotype studies on 1133 individuals. We then conducted a marker expansion analysis using a dataset from the Y-STR Haplotype Reference Database (YHRD), covering up to 29 Y-STRs, referred to as Ymax. Additionally, we examined the impact of rapidly mutating (RM) Y-STRs included in this expanded marker set on the discrimination capacity. We observed that marker expansions both with (0.9896), and without (0.9510), RM Y-STR improved the discrimination capacity. Subsequently, we focused on 16 individuals belonging to seven distinct groups sharing identical haplotypes. These particular haplotypes had been previously identified among 476 unrelated males using 23 Y-STR markers from the PowerPlex^® Y23 System. We expanded the marker panel up to Ymax to explore how discrimination improved with an expansion of Y-STR markers for these 16 individuals. Among the expanded markers, DYS627, which had high discriminatory power, had a high mutation rate (1.10 × 10^-2) and high gene diversity (0.83). In contrast, DYF387S1 displayed high gene diversity (0.95) but a relatively low mutation rate (2.80 × 10^-3). We propose that these findings will be valuable in the selection of suitable Y-STR markers, depending on the objectives of forensic analyses. Additionally, the presence of frequently observed Y-haplotypes in Korean population will facilitate statistical interpretation in Y-STR DNA profiling.