• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.29-32
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• 2019

Burcucumber (Sicyos angluatus) is a representative ecosystem-disturbing plant in Korea and currently widely spread throughout the country. A sclerotia-forming fungus with moderate host selectivity, Sclerotinia trifoliorum BWC98-105, was tested in the laboratory, green house and natural habitat for its pathogenicity to burcucumber. When mycelial culture fragment was inoculated to burcucumber seedlings under the green house condition, mycelial growth was observed in the following day, and then resulted in the onset of wilting from 5 days after inoculation (DAI). Its characteristic sclerotia as a sign was observed from 7 DAI, and thus plants turned into dark-brown color at the bottom of stem of burcucumber that was eventually blighted at 14 DAI. Similar visible symptoms were observed in natural habitat. Based on the results of showing typical blight symptom to burcucumber and the sign of sclerotia, we report S. trifoliorum BWC98-105 causing stem blight against burcucumber. Its globular pellet was considered of having quite potential as a bioherbicide to control burcucumber in Korea.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Agriculture
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• v.35 no.1
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• pp.1-5
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• 2016

BACKGROUND: Burcucumber(Sicyos angulatus L.) is an invasive plant species and disturbs ecosystems in Korea. The main method for prevention of burcucumber is cutting or pulling out. However, the studies accounting for the use of the by-product of burcucumber after cutting remain incomplete. Thus, the aim of this study was to investigate the applicability of burcucumber as a substitute for nitrogen fertilizer.METHODS AND RESULTS: Burcucmber plants only including stem, leaves, and petiole were collected from the Sky Park in Seoul and divided in to three categories based on the length of stem of burcucumber; 10-30 cm, 30-100 cm, and 100-200 cm. And they were input into soil with 20 kg-N/10 a. After 4 weeks aging, chemical properties of treated soils and the productivity of lettuce(Lactuca sativa L.) were examined. Both the inorganic nitrogen contents in soils and the growth of lettuce were increased with the decreases in length of burcucumber standing for young plant. And the inorganic nitrogen content and the productivity of lettuce were positively correlated(r= 0.9409).CONCLUSION: The C/N ratio of burcucumber was low, indicating fast decomposition and nitrogen supplying rate, resulting in the increase in lettuce growth. Burcucumber could be a good substitute for nitrogen organic fertilizer.

• Weed & Turfgrass Science
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.315-320
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• 2015

Burcucumber (Sicyos angulatus) is an annual invasive plant species originated from North America. This species grows by twining around tree trunks, and blocks other plants from photosynthesis. Thus, it has caused the destruction of the ecosystem and biological diversity by threatening native plants. This study was performed to find out the effect of different soil water content (20%, 13%, 10%, 3%) and various shading degrees (0%, 60%, 80%) on the growth and photosynthesis-related activity of burcucumber. In the responses of burcucumber to soil water content, plant height (PH), leaf length (LL), leaf width (LW) and photosynthetic efficiency (PE) were lower at 20% water content than 10% reflecting that burcucumber plant grow well in the less dry soil and shows poor growth under wet soil condition. In shading experiment, PH, LL, LW and PE were lower at 80% than 60% shading and in general, the growth characteristics were lowered as the shading intensity increased. The improved growth of burcucumber under highly or moderately shaded condition implies that the plant can grow well without growth retardation and can be adapted to shading condition with other tall plant species including tree. Further study on the combination effects of above factors should be conducted in future for effective ecological control of burcucumber.

• KOREAN JOURNAL OF CROP SCIENCE
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• v.48 no.1
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• pp.13-16
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• 2003

Seeds of burcucumber were treated with accelerated aging, cold-stratification, and light quality illuminated during desiccation to enhance their germination and seedling emergence. The germination was increased by aging and cold-stratification although the latter treatment showed greater effectiveness than the former one. In the combined treatment of aging 6 days at $45^{\circ}C$ and cold-stratification, the germination was promoted under longer period of cold-stratification to reach nearly 100% in 3 week cold-stratification on the ninth day from sowing. In the sequentially combined treatment of aging, cold-stratification, and light quality during 24 hour desiccation at $35^{\circ}C$, no-stratified seeds showed the highest rate in red light treatment but the lowest in far-red light. This implies that the phytochrome action run during the desiccation of imbibed seeds. The red light exposure during drying for the cold-stratified seeds after aging accelerated the germination even more than the dark treatment and germinated 100% on the next day of sowing. It is concluded that the sequential treatment of aging, cold-stratification, and red light illumination during desiccation can highly promote percentage and speed of burcucumber seed germination.

• KOREAN JOURNAL OF CROP SCIENCE
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.152-155
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• 2003

Burcucumber (Sicyos angulatus L.), used as a medicinal or rootstock for cucurbitaceous crops have shown high variation in seed maturity and size. This study was carried out to determine the effect of seed maturity and size on seed germination, seedling emergence and growth of burcucumber, Seeds collected from a native site were divided into small, medium and large ones after sorted to mature and immature ones. Their germination, seedling emergence and growth were done in indoor and a green house. Mature seeds showed higher germination and seedling emergence rate than immature ones. Regardless of their maturity, medium. and small seeds showed higher germination rate than large ones. Medium and large seeds, however, had the greatest and the least seedling emergence, respectively. Seedling height, number of true leaves areas of cotyledons and true leaves except hypocotyl length were increased with increased seed size although were not affected by the maturity. Cotyledon, leaf, hypocotyl, root and their total dry weights were greater in large mature seeds than large immature ones while increased with increased seed size in both maturities.

• KOREAN JOURNAL OF CROP SCIENCE
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.169-172
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• 2003

Intact seeds of burcucumber (Sicyos angulatus L.) are not nearly germinated so that the farmers remove their arils before sowing. The study was carried out to measure the effort of aging, chilling, washing, chemical treatment, drying, and their sequential treatments on the germination of ones with arils and the seedling emergence. The seeds extruding over 1mm of their radicles and the seedlings with fully expanded cotyledons were counted daily for calculating the germination and the seedling emergence rates. Seedcoat softening using 10% NaOH solution somewhat enhanced their germination rate of the intact seeds harvested in the current year, but aging treatment done on 6 days at $45^{\circ}C$ after NaOH treatment increased the germination rate more than only NaOH treatment. A day washing after the NaOH treatment and a day chilling after the washing increasingly elevated the rates as well. Irrigation of 0.2% $\textrm{KNO}_3$ solution, moreover, showed the greatest germination rate of the priming treatments done during all the 7 day chilling. Drying the seeds after the combined treatment of chilling and priming more inclined the germination rate than nondrying ones, but red light treated during 24 hour desiccation was more effective in the germination rate increment than dark condition. The seeds done the sequential treatments of aging, NaOH, washing, combining chilling and priming and drying under red light illumination were germinated up to 80% but seedlings were emerged to 60%, lower than ones removed their arils.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Crop Science Conference
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• 2005.04a
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• pp.104-105
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• 2005

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Crop Science Conference
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• 2006.04a
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• pp.456-457
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• 2006

• Journal of Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.57 no.1
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• pp.65-72
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• 2014

Biochar (BC) from biomass pyrolysis is a carbonaceous material that has been used to remove various contaminants in the environment. The eliminatory action for burcucumber (Sicyos angulatus L.) as an invasive plant is being consistently carried out because of its harmfulness and ecosystem disturbance. In this study, burcucumber biomass was converted into BCs at different pyrolysis temperatures of 300 and $700^{\circ}C$ under a limited oxygen condition. Produced BCs were characterized and investigated to ensure its efficiency on antibiotics' removal in water. The adsorption experiment was performed using two different types of antibiotics, tetracycline (TC) and sulfamethazine (SMZ). For the BC pyrolyzed at a high temperature ($700^{\circ}C$), the values of pH, electrical conductivity, and the contents of ash and carbon increased whereas the yield, mobile matter, molar ratios of H/C and O/C, and functional groups decreased. Results showed that the efficiency of BCs on antibiotics' removal increased as pyrolysis temperature increased from 300 to $700^{\circ}C$ (38 to 99% for TC and 6 to 35% for SMZ). The reaction of ${\pi}-{\pi}$ EDA (electron-donor-acceptor) might be involved in antibiotics' adsorption to BCs. BC has potential to be a superior antibiotics' adsorbent with environmental benefit by recycling of waste/invasive biomass.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.37 no.7
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• pp.432-440
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• 2015

Biochar, a by-product from pyrolysis of biomass, is a promising option to mitigate climate change by increasing soil carbon sequestration. This material is also considered to have potential to remediate a soil with heavy metal pollution by increasing the soil's adsorptive capacity. This study conducted the assessment of two biochars considering the climate change mitigation potential and heavy metal removal capacity at the same time. Two kinds of biochars (BC_Ch, TW_Ch) were prepared by pyrolyzing the biomass of burcucumber (BC_Bm) and tea waste (TW_Bm). The soils polluted with Pb were mixed with biochars or biomass and incubated for 60 d. During the incubation, $CO_2$, $CH_4$, and $N_2O$ were regularly measured and the soil before and after incubation was analyzed for chemical and biological parameters including the acetate extractable Pb. The results showed that only the BC_Ch treatment significantly reduced the amount of Pb after 60 d incubation. During the incubation, the $CO_2$ and $N_2O$ emissions from the BC_Ch and TW_Ch were decreased by 24% and 34% compared to the BC_Bm and TW_Bm, respectively. The $CH_4$ emissions were not significantly affected by biochar treatments. We calculated the GWP considering the production of amendment materials, application to the soils, removal of Pb, and soil carbon storage. The BC_Ch treatment had the most negative value because it had the higher Pb adsorption and soil carbon sequestration. Our results imply that if we apply biochar made from burcucumber, we could expect the pollution reduction and climate change mitigation at the same time.