• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.51 no.3
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• pp.363-367
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• 2013

The prevalence of Toxoplasma gondii infection in birds has epidemiological significance because birds are indeed considered as a good indicator of environmental contamination by T. gondii oocysts. In this study, the prevalence of T. gondii in 313 house sparrows in Lanzhou, northwestern China was assayed by the modified agglutination test (MAT). Antibodies to T. gondii were positive in 39 (12.46%) of 313 samples (MAT titer ${\geq}$ 1:5). Tissues of heart, brain, and lung from the 39 seropositive house sparrows were tested for T. gondii DNA, 11 of which were found to be positive for the T. gondii B1 gene by PCR amplification. These positive DNA samples were typed at 9 genetic markers, including 8 nuclear loci, i.e., SAG1, 5'- and 3'-SAG2, alternative SAG2, SAG3, GRA6, L358, PK1, c22-8 and an apicoplast locus Apico. Of them, 4 isolates were genotyped with complete data for all loci, and 2 genotypes (Type II variants; ToxoDB #3 and a new genotype) were identified. These results showed that there is a potential risk for human infection with T. gondii in this region. To our knowledge, this is the first report of T. gondii seroprevalence in house sparrows in China.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.18 no.7
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• pp.907-911
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• 2008

Radish (Raphanus sativus L.) is one of very important crop plants in the world. It is very important to determine hybrid seed quality in the production of hybrid Brassica vegetable seeds to avoid unacceptable contamination with self-inbred (sib) seeds. The allozyme for evaluating seed purity in a commercial $F_1-hybrid$ radish cultivar is demonstrated. Three hundred sixty seeds from the male and female harvest were subsequently screened for seed purity using 27 isozyme loci. Especially, F1 hybrids of radish, Per-1 ($aa{\times}bb$), Lap-1 ($aa{\times}bb$), Est-1 ($aa{\times}bb$) were presented clear hybrid bands. Est-1 locus revealed that 15 (8.3%) seeds from the female harvest and 26 (14.4%) seeds from the male harvest were sibs. It maintains higher than average level of genetic diversity compared with their correspondent parents. Shannon's index of phenotypic diversity (I) of hybrids was the highest of all accessions (R. sativus L. cv. Daepeng, R. sativus L. cv. Backza, and their hybrids). The allozyme may lead to a better insight into the hybrid seed purity.

• Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.50 no.3
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• pp.137-146
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• 2007

The substitution of fossil fuels with biofuels has been proposed by the European Union (EU) as part of a strategy to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions from road transport, increase security of energy supply and support the development of rural communities. Vegetable oils and their derivatives (especially methyl esters), commonly referred to as 'biodiesel', are prominent candidates as alternative diesel fuels. They have advanced from being purely experimental fuels to the initial stages of commercialization. They are technically competitive with or offer technical advantages compared to conventional diesel fuel. However, several problems remain including economics, combustions, some emissions, lube oil contamination, and low-temperature properties. Therefore, quality control of fuel-related properties of biodiesel is needed to obtain consistent engine performance by fuel users. The quality of the fuel is affected by the oil composition. Rapeseed oil has been targeted for fuel use because it produces an oil with a close-to-optimum set of fuel characteristics. In this paper we have reviewed past and current efforts, both by traditional seed-breeding methods and by genetic engineering, to modify rapeseed oil quality and yield.

• Molecular & Cellular Toxicology
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.246-252
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• 2008

Tumor tissue is usually contaminated by normal tissue components, which reduces the sensitivity of analysis for exploring genetic alterations. Although microdissection has been adopted to minimize the contamination of tumor DNA with normal cell components, there is a concern over the amount of microdissected DNA not enough to be applied to array-CGH reaction. To amplify the extracted DNA, several whole genome amplification (WGA) methods have been developed, but objective comparison of the array-CGH outputs using different types of WGA methods is still scarce. In this study, we compared the performance of non-amplified microdissected DNA and DNA amplified in 2 WGA methods such as degenerative oligonucleotide primed (DOP)-PCR, and multiple strand displacement amplification (MDA) using Phi 29 DNA polymerase. Genomic DNA was also used to make a comparison. We applied those 4 DNAs to whole genome BAC array to compare the false positive detection rate (FPDR) and sensitivity in detecting copy number alterations under the same hybridization condition. As a result microdissected DNA method showed the lowest FPDR and the highest sensitivity. Among WGA methods, DOP-PCR amplified DNA showed better sensitivity but similar FPDR to MDA-amplified method. These results demonstrate the advantage and applicability of microdissection for array-CGH analysis, and provide useful information for choosing amplification methods to study copy number alterations, especially based on precancerous and microscopically invaded lesions.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.303-308
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• 2011

Polar psychrophiles which thrive under extreme conditions such as cold temperature, high salinity, and high dose ultraviolet light, emerge as novel targets for biotechnology. To prevent genetic drift and the possibility of contamination by subculturing, cryopreservation was employed for two psychrophilic microalgae, Porosira sp. (KOPRI AnM0008) and Pyramimonas sp. (KOPRI AnM0046), which have anti-freeze activities. Five cryoprotectants (dimethyl sulphoxide, ethylene glycol, glycerol, methanol and propylene glycol) showed toxicity at 20-30% (v/v). The optimal cryoprotectant concentration and equilibration time were less than 20% and 10 min, respectively. Cryopreservation was carried out in the presence of cryoprotectants either by direct freezing in liquid nitrogen ($LN_2$) or controlled freezing using a controlled rate freezer followed by storage in the $LN_2$ tank. As a result, Pyramimonas sp. (KOPRI AnM0046), a psychrophilic chlorophyta was revived. Cryopreserved Porosira sp. was not revived from either freezing protocols probably due to the silicic cell wall and its relatively large cell size. In the case of Pyramimonas sp. (KOPRI AnM0046), the controlled freezing method showed higher revival yield than the direct freezing method.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.28 no.11
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• pp.1896-1907
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• 2018

Salmonellosis is commonly associated with meat and poultry products, but an increasing number of Salmonella outbreaks have been attributed to contaminated vegetables and fruits. Enteric pathogens including Salmonella enterica spp. can colonize diverse produce and persist for a long time. Considering that fresh vegetables and fruits are usually consumed raw without heat treatments, Salmonella contamination may subsequently lead to serious human infections. In order to understand the underlying mechanism of Salmonella adaptation to produce, we investigated the transcriptomics of Salmonella in contact with green vegetables, namely cabbage and napa cabbage. Interestingly, Salmonella pathogenicity island (SPI)-1 genes, which are required for Salmonella invasion into host cells, were up-regulated upon contact with vegetables, suggesting that SPI-1 may be implicated in Salmonella colonization of plant tissues as well as animal tissues. Furthermore, Salmonella transcriptomic profiling revealed several genetic loci that showed significant changes in their expression in response to vegetables and were associated with bacterial adaptation to unfavorable niches, including STM14_0818 and STM14_0817 (speF/potE), STM14_0880 (nadA), STM14_1894 to STM14_1892 (fdnGHI), STM14_2006 (ogt), STM14_2269, and STM14_2513 to STM14_2523 (cbi operon). Here, we show that nadA was required for bacterial growth under nutrient-restricted conditions, while the other genes were required for bacterial invasion into host cells. The transcriptomes of Salmonella in contact with cabbage and napa cabbage provided insights into the comprehensive bacterial transcriptional response to produce and also suggested diverse virulence determinants relevant to Salmonella survival and adaptation.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.17 no.7
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• pp.1079-1082
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• 2007

Chromosome microdissection and the reverse FISH technique is one of the most useful methods for the identification of structurally abnormal chromosomes. In particular, the laser microbeam microdissection (LMM) method allows rapid isolation of a target chromosome or a specific region of chromosomes without damage of genetic materials and contamination. Isolated chromosomes were directly amplified by the degenerate oligonucleotide-primed polymerase chain reaction (DOP-PCR), and then the FISH probes labeled with spectrum green- or spectrum red-dUTP were generated by nick-translation. Whole chromosome painting (WCP) probes were successfully generated from only 5 copies of the chromosome. With this method, we produced 24 WCP probes for each human chromosome. We also tried to characterize a marker chromosome, which seemed to be originated from chromosome 11 on conventional banding technique. The marker chromosomes were isolated by the LMM method and analyzed by reverse FISH. We elucidated that the marker chromosome was originated from the short arm of chromosome 5 ($5p11{\to}pter$). A fully automated and computer-controlled LMM method is a very simple laboratory procedure, and enables rapid and precise characterization of various chromosome abnormalities.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.53-61
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• 1974

Pine forests existing in Hong-do island were examined as regarding such characteristics, tree form, needle length, branch diameter, bark colors, ratio of summer wood to springwood, location and number of resin canal and other measurements. Hong-do island, located the furthest west part of Korea, suports only Pinus densiflora but very few Pinus thunbergii, in fact the present authors could not find any black pine individuals at all through investigation. Checking 14 individual trees of red pine, more than age of 20, of the genetic contamination by black pine, in a certain degree, exist. Here, a very dense foliage type and a very sparse foliage type tree of red pine growing nearby was examined and the unique fact was that each of those type has only one (average number 1.3) accessory resin canal, while other trees have three as minimum or more. The present authors thought this island had not been covered by any Pinus thunbergii but by Pinus densiflora. It was thought that Pinus thunbergii stands grown along the sea-coast of Korean Peninsula are pollen donors to this island.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.47 no.4
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• pp.337-344
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• 2009

In a previous study, we reported our discovery of Acanthamoeba contamination in domestic tap water; in that study, we determined that some Acanthamoeba strains harbor endosymbiotic bacteria, via our molecular characterization by mitochondrial DNA restriction fragment length polymorphism (Mt DNA RFLP). Five (29.4%) among 17 Acanthamoeba isolates contained endosymbionts in their cytoplasm, as demonstrated via orcein staining. In order to estimate their pathogenicity, we conducted a genetic characterization of the endosymbionts in Acanthamoeba isolated from domestic tap water via 16S rDNA sequencing. The endosymbionts of Acanthamoeba sp. KA/WP3 and KA/WP4 evidenced the highest level of similarity, at 97% of the recently published 16S rDNA sequence of the bacterium, Candidatus Amoebophilus asiaticus. The endosymbionts of Acanthamoeba sp. KA/WP8 and KA/WP12 shared a 97% sequence similarity with each other, and were also highly similar to Candidatus Odyssella thessalonicensis, a member of the $\alpha$-proteobacteria. The endosymbiont of Acanthamoeba sp. KA/WP9 exhibits a high degree of similarity (85-95%) with genus Methylophilus, which is not yet known to harbor any endosymbionts. This is the first report, to the best of our knowledge, to show that Methylophilus spp. can live in the cytoplasm of Acanthamoeba.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.167-174
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• 2011

The large bumblebee $Bombus$ $terrestris$, indigenous to Europe and adjacent areas and used extensively for high-value crop pollination, has been artificially introduced to several parts of the world. Here we show the occurrence of interspecific hybridization between the bumblebee species $B.$ $hypocrita$ $sapporoensia$ and $B.$ $terrestris$ under laboratory conditions. The mating and oviposition percentages resulting from the interspecific hybridization of a $B.$ $terrestris$ queen with a $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$ male were higher than those resulting from the intraspecific mating of $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$. Furthermore, a competitive copulation experiment indicated that the mating of $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$ males with $B.$ $terrestris$ queens was 1.2-fold more frequent than the mating of these males with $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$ queens. The interspecific hybridization of a $B.$ $terrestris$ queen with a $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$ male produced either $B.$ $terrestris$ workers or the $B.$ $terrestris$ male phenotype, and the hybridization of a $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$ queen with a $B.$ $terrestris$ male produced $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$ males. Our results indicated that interspecific hybridization occurred between $B.$ $h.$ $sapporoensis$ and $B.$ $terrestris$. These results suggest that such hybridization will have a negative competitive impact and will cause genetic contamination of native bumblebees.