• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.39 no.5
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• pp.237-245
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• 2017

This study was aimed at investigating effluent water quality and proposing reuse possibilities for 12 sewage treatment plants discharged more than $5,000m^3/day$ in order to recycle the sewage treatment plant effluent of Jeollabuk-do effectively. Additionally, a laboratory scale test for reprocessing water discharge was performed. Categories of reclaimed sewage water reuse were divided into 7 topics and analyzed a total of 28 items including 16 heavy metals based on water quality standard. As a results, color, BOD, TN, chloride and Electrical Conductivity (EC) exceeded reused water quality standard. In particular, color and TN exceeded in 8 and 5 sewage treatment plants, respectively. The value of chloride and EC were high in sewage treatment plants including the food and industrial wastewater. At 4 sewage treatment plants were possible to reuse without re-treatment. The laboratory scale test was conducted to SandFilter (SF)-Granular Activated Carbon (GAC)-MicroFiltraion (MF)-Reverse Osmosis (RO). Both the removal efficiencies and economic feasibility of total E. coli., color and Suspended Solid (SS) suited in case using the SF-GAC treatment method. The removal of chloride and EC had little effect in the case of SF-GAC-MF system, but RO showed over 90% of removal efficiency. After using SF-GAC process only, the concentration of $UV_{254}$ decreased sharply from 0.3651 /cm to 0.0306 /cm and it showed over 92% of removal efficiency rate. In conclusion, for the effective reuse of sewage discharged water, water quality and the surrounding terrain of treatment plants should be all taken into account. If it needed for the reprocessing, both the selection for treatment and economic combination treatment methods will have to be considered.

• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
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• v.45 no.3
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• pp.171-182
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• 2018

Papaya (Carica papaya L.) is one of the crops widely planted in tropical and subtropical areas. The papaya fruit has low calories and are plentiful in vitamins A and C and in minerals. A major problem in papaya production is a plant disease caused by the papaya ringspot virus (PRSV). The first PRSV-resistant GM papaya expressing a PRSV coat protein gene was developed by USA scientists in 1992. The first commercial GM papaya cultivars derived from the event was approved by the US government in 1997. Development of transgenic papayas has been focused on vaccine production and limited agricultural traits, including insect and pathogen resistance, long shelf life, and aluminum and herbicide tolerance. Approximately 17 countries, including the USA and China, produced transgenic papayas and/or commercialized them, which provoked studies on biosafety assessment and development of GM-detection technologies. For the biosafety assessment of potential effects on human health, effects of long-term feeding to model animals have been studied in terms of toxicity and allergenicity. Studies on environmental safety assessment include influence on soil-microbial biodiversity and transfer to soil bacteria of GM selection markers. Many countries, such as Korea, the European Union, and Japan, that have strict regulations for GM crops have serious concerns about unintended introduction of GM cultivars and food commodities using unauthorized GM crops. Transgene- and/or GM event-specific molecular markers and technologies for genomics-based detection of unauthorized GM papaya have been developed and have resulted in the robust detection of GM papayas.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.1-15
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• 2020

This study was conducted to determine whether invasive muskrats settle in the natural ecosystem of Korea. The study also aimed to provide information on the selection of target areas, basic behavioral characteristics, and habitat use-related data, all of which are essential for effective management strategy establishment and site management. To this end, a trend in international muskrat management was identified to examine the management direction according to the settlement stage. We also secured the location of 72 domestic farmers and classified five regions in Gyeonggi-do, Chungcheongnam-do, Gyeongsangbuk-do, and Sejong Special Self-governing City into regions with high potential for natural leakage to raise the need for a quick survey. We determined that muskrats successfully settled in the natural ecosystem of Korea, based on the fact that we consistently identified a muskrat habitat at the same point for three years, from 2016 to 2018, the age of the captured population was estimated to be 1.2 years, and there had been no additional make-up factors near the habitat since 2012. The muskrats that settled in Korea showed a small home range of 0.0027 ㎢ (MCP 95%) and were estimated to show regular mobility before Spring and Autumn. Also, the areas where the muskrat habitat was observed had a high level of habitat environment disturbance and their ecological and food intake characteristics reflected that disturbance. Muskrat traces were high in hydrophyte vegetation, which can be used as a hideout in open waters and where the growth of both floating leaved plants and floating plants are prevalent. Since international invasive muskrats have already settled in the domestic ecosystem and there is concern about their proliferation in the future, the government must consider a preemptive response and scientific management.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.441-448
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• 2015

Lack of agricultural information for food supply and demand in Democratic People's republic Korea(DPRK) make people sometimes confused for right and timely decision for policy support. We carried out a study to estimate paddy rice yield in DPRK using MODIS NDVI reflecting rice growth and climate data. Mean of MODIS $NDVI_{max}$ in paddy rice over the country acquired and processed from 2002 to 2014 and accumulated rainfall collected from 27 weather stations in September from 2002 to 2014 were used to estimated paddy rice yield in DPRK. Coefficient of determination of the multiple regression model was 0.44 and Root Mean Square Error(RMSE) was 0.27 ton/ha. Two-way analysis of variance resulted in 3.0983 of F ratio and 0.1008 of p value. Estimated milled rice yield showed the lowest value as 2.71 ton/ha in 2007, which was consistent with RDA rice yield statistics and the highest value as 3.54 ton/ha in 2006, which was not consistent with the statistics. Scatter plot of estimated rice yield and the rice yield statistics implied that estimated rice yield was higher when the rice yield statistics was less than 3.3 ton/ha and lower when the rice yield statistics was greater than 3.3 ton/ha. Limitation of rice yield model was due to lower quality of climate and statistics data, possible cloud contamination of time-series NDVI data, and crop mask for rice paddy, and coarse spatial resolution of MODIS satellite data. Selection of representative areas for paddy rice consisting of homogeneous pixels and utilization of satellite-based weather information can improve the input parameters for rice yield model in DPRK in the future.

• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.405-410
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• 2003

Environmental stress is the major limiting factor in plant productivity. In order to evaluate the stress tolerance of potato plants, leaf discs of two potato cultivars, Atlantic and Superior, were subjected to various stress conditions of high temperature, methyl viologen, H2O2, or $H_2O$$_2$. When potato leaf discs were exposed to high temperature at 37$^{\circ}C$ for 84 hr, Atlantic plants, a cultivar with high sensitivity to heat stress, showed about 20％ higher membrane damage than Superior plants. When exposed to 2$\mu$M methyl violgen (MV), a superoxide generating non-selective herbicide, for 36 hr, Atlantic plants also showed about 38％ higher membrane damage than Superior plants, and were more susceptible up to 10$\mu$M MV concentration tested. On treatment with 0.75M NaCl, Atlantic plants also had about 45％ less chlorophyll contents in leaf discs than Superior plants. There was, however, no difference in chlorophyll content of two cultivars at higher NaCl concentrations. The effect of $H_2O$$_2$ on the two cultivars was mixed. At low $H_2O$$_2$ concentration (25 mM) , Superior plants were more susceptible to $H_2O$$_2$stress after 36 hr. However, at high $H_2O$$_2$ concentration (100 mM), Atlantic plants exhibited higher susceptibility after 36 hr. The results indicate that in vitro leaf discs reflecting the whole plants in this study will be useful for selection and characterization of elite transgenic potato plants with enhanced tolerance to environmental stress.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.333-343
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• 2015

This research aims at identifying the goshawk's possible and replaceable breeding ground by using the MaxEnt prediction model which has so far been insufficiently used in Korea, and providing evidence to expand possible protection areas for the goshawk's breeding for the future. The field research identified 10 goshawk's nests, and 23 appearance points confirmed during the 3rd round of environmental research were used for analysis. 4 geomorphic, 3 environmental, 7 distance, and 9 weather factors were used as model variables. The final environmental variables were selected through non-parametric verification between appearance and non-appearance coordinates identified by random sampling. The final predictive model (MaxEnt) was structured using 10 factors related to breeding ground and 7 factors related to appearance area selected by statistics verification. According to the results of the study, the factor that affected breeding point structure model the most was temperature seasonality, followed by distance from mixforest, density-class on the forest map and relief energy. The factor that affected appearance point structure model the most was temperature seasonality, followed by distance from rivers and ponds, distance from agricultural land and gradient. The nature of the goshawk's breeding environment and habit to breed inside forests were reflected in this modeling that targets breeding points. The northern central area which is about $189.5 km^2$(2.55 %) is expected to be suitable breeding ground. Large cities such as Cheongju and Chungju are located in the southern part of Chungcheongbuk-do whereas the northern part of Chungcheongbuk-do has evenly distributed forests and farmlands, which helps goshawks have a scope of influence and food source to breed. Appearance point modeling predicted an area of $3,071 km^2$(41.38 %) showing a wider ranging habitat than that of the breeding point modeling due to some limitations such as limited moving observation and non-consideration of seasonal changes. When targeting the breeding points, a specific predictive area can be deduced but it is difficult to check the points of nests and it is impossible to reflect the goshawk's behavioral area. On the other hand, when targeting appearance points, a wider ranging area can be covered but it is less accurate compared to predictive breeding point since simple movements and constant use status are not reflected. However, with these results, the goshawk's habitat can be predicted with reasonable accuracy. In particular, it is necessary to apply precise predictive breeding area data based on habitat modeling results when enforcing an environmental evaluation or establishing a development plan.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.349-356
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• 2015

Thanks to recent advances in next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology, diverse livestock species have been dissected at the genome-wide sequence level. As for cattle, there are currently four Korean indigenous breeds registered with the Domestic Animal Diversity Information System of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations: Hanwoo, Chikso, Heugu, and Jeju Heugu. These native genetic resources were recently whole-genome resequenced using various NGS technologies, providing enormous single nucleotide polymorphism information across the genomes. The NGS application further provided biological such that Korean native cattle are genetically distant from some cattle breeds of European origins. In addition, the NGS technology was successfully applied to detect structural variations, particularly copy number variations that were usually difficult to identify at the genome-wide level with reasonable accuracy. Despite the success, those recent studies also showed an inherent limitation in sequencing only a representative individual of each breed. To elucidate the biological implications of the sequenced data, further confirmatory studies should be followed by sequencing or validating the population of each breed. Because NGS sequencing prices have consistently dropped, various population genomic theories can now be applied to the sequencing data obtained from the population of each breed of interest. There are still few such population studies available for the Korean native cattle breeds, but this situation will soon be improved with the recent initiative for NGS sequencing of diverse native livestock resources, including the Korean native cattle breeds.

• KSBB Journal
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.122-130
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• 2009

Anti-angiogenic mechanism was examined for anti-obesity agents with the extract of P.radix, P.semen, S.hebra and C.furctus through anti-cell adhesion effect and western blot. Cell adhesion molecules, VCAM-1 was supressed with the order of P.radix (0.2 ppm, 125%) > P.semen (0.5 ppm, 100%) > S.hebra (5.0 ppm, 114%) > C. furctus (5.0 ppm, 111.8%), ICAM-1 was inhibited by P.radix (0.25 ppm, 130%) > P.semen (0.5 ppm, 100%) > S.hebra (5.0 ppm, 138%) > C. furctus (5.0 ppm, 66.7%), E-Selectin was also supressed P.radix (0.25 ppm, 100%) > P.semen (1.0 ppm, 128%) > S.hebra (5.0 ppm, 120%) > C. furctus (5.0 ppm, 100.7%). And signal molecules, VE-cadherin was supressed by P.radix and S.hebra, ${\beta}$-catenin was inhibited by P.radix, and Akt was supressed all these 4 kinds of natural products. These P.radix, P.semen, S.hebra and C.furctus were showed the possibility of anti-obesity agents based on anti-angiogenesis.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.22 no.9
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• pp.1152-1158
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• 2012

Development of transgenic plant increasing crop yield or disease resistance is good way to solve the world food shortage. However, the persistence of marker genes in crops leads to serious public concerns about the safety of transgenic crops. In the present paper, we developed marker-free transgenic rice inserted high molecular-weight glutenin subunit (HMW-GS) gene ($D{\times}5$) from the Korean wheat cultivar 'Jokyeong' using Agrobacterium-mediated co-transformation method. Two expression cassettes comprised of separate DNA fragments containing only the $D{\times}5$ and hygromycin resistance (HPTII) genes were introduced separately into Agrobacterium tumefaciens EHA105 strain for co-infection. Each EHA105 strain harboring $D{\times}5$ or HPTII was infected into rice calli at a 3: 1 ratio of EHA105 with $D{\times}5$ gene and EHA105 with HPTII gene expressing cassette. Then, among 66 hygromycin-resistant transformants, we obtained two transgenic lines inserted with both the $D{\times}5$ and HPTII genes into the rice genome. We reconfirmed integration of the $D{\times}5$ and HPTII genes into the rice genome by Southern blot analysis. Wheat $D{\times}5$ transcripts in $T_1$ rice seeds were examined with semi-quantitative RT-PCR. Finally, the marker-free plants containing only the $D{\times}5$ gene were successfully screened at the $T_1$ generation. These results show that a co-infection system with two expression cassettes could be an efficient strategy to generate marker-free transgenic rice plants.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.176-187
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• 2015

In this study, we hypothesized that the size of wintering crane population would change due to the climate factors. We assumed that wintering population size would differ by climate values in January, which is the coldest period in year. Especially, White-naped cranes were able to choose wintering site between Cheorwon and other alternative place where snow coverage had low influence, differing from Red crowned cranes. For this reason, we predicted the population size of White-naped cranes would fluctuate according to the extent of snow coverage in Cheorwon. Therefore we used snow coverage data based on MODIS and climate data from KMA (Korea Meteorological Administration) that are generally used. We analyzed the crane's population size in Cheorwon in January from 2002 to 2014. The temperature in the Cheorwon increased from 2002 to wintering period in 2007~ 2008 and went down, showing the lowest temperature in 2011~ 2012. With this phenomenon, warmth index showed the similar pattern with temperature. Amount of newly accumulated snow (the amount of snow that fallen from 0:01 am to 11:29 pm in a day) was low after 2002, but rapidly increased in 2010~ 2011 and 2011~ 2012. The area of snow coverage rapidly declined from 2002 to 2005~ 2006 but suddenly expanded in wintering period in 2009~ 2010 and 2010~ 2011. Wintering population size of the White-naped cranes decreased as snow coverage area increased in January and the highest correlation was found between them, compared to the other climatic factors. However, the number of individuals of Red crowned cranes had little relationship with general climate factors including snow cover range. Therefore it seems that population size of the Red crowned crane varied by factors related with habitat selection such as secure roosting site and area of foraging place, not by climatic factors. In multiple regression analysis, wintering population of White-naped cranes showed significant relationship with logarithmic value of snow cover range and its period. Therefore, it suggests that the population size of the White-naped crane was affected by snow cover range n wintering period and this was because it was hard for them to find out rice grains which are their main food items, buried in snow cover. The population size variation in White-naped cranes was caused by some individuals which left Cheorwon for Izumi where snow cover had little influence on them. The wintering population in Izumi and Cheorwon had negative correlation, implying they were mutually related.