• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• 제55권5호
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• pp.505-512
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• 2017

Toxoplasma gondii cathepsin C proteases (TgCPC1, 2, and 3) are important for the growth and survival of T. gondii. In the present study, B-cell and T-cell epitopes of TgCPC1 were predicted using DNAstar and the Immune Epitope Database. A TgCPC1 DNA vaccine was constructed, and its ability to induce protective immune responses against toxoplasmosis in BALB/c mice was evaluated in the presence or absence of the adjuvant ${\alpha}-GalCer$. As results, TgCPC1 DNA vaccine with or without adjuvant ${\alpha}-GalCer$ showed higher levels of IgG and IgG2a in the serum, as well as IL-2 and $IFN-{\gamma}$ in the spleen compared to controls (PBS, pEGFP-C1, and ${\alpha}-GalCer$). Upon challenge infection with tachyzoites of T. gondii (RH), $pCPC1/{\alpha}-GalCer$ immunized mice showed the longest survival among all the groups. Mice vaccinated with DNA vaccine without adjuvant (pCPC1) showed better protective immunity compared to other controls (PBS, pEGFP-C1, and ${\alpha}-GalCer$). These results indicate that a DNA vaccine encoding TgCPC1 is a potential vaccine candidate against toxoplasmosis.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• 제16권12호
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• pp.4945-4948
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• 2015

Background: Adiponectin is a protein, synthesized by adipose tissue, which has a questionable role in breast cancer pathogenesis. This study focused on serum levels of adiponectin among cases and controls, and its possible association with breast cancer risk. Materials and Methods: This case-control study covered 175 diagnosed breast cancer patients with positive histopathology from Breast Clinic, surgical unit-1, Civil Hospital, Karachi and 175 healthy controls from various screening programs. Blood samples were obtained after an overnight fast and later analyzed. Results: Fasting blood glucose was significantly raised, while serum adiponectin was significantly decreased in breast cancer cases when compared to control subjects. To find the precise influence of serum adiponectin on the risk of breast cancer, subjects were divided in to quartiles based on serum levels of adiponectin. It is observed that risk of breast cancer decreased with rising quartile. Q2 (25th-50th) had the highest OR=1.76 (CI: 0.93- 3.34), Q3 (50th-75th) has OR= 0.89 (CI: 0.48-1.64), while subjects in the highest quartile Q4 (>75th) had significantly (p< 0.05) decreased risk of breast cancer having OR=0.06 (CI: 0.02-0.15), when compared to the lowest quartile. Conclusions: We demonstrated a statistically significant association of elevated serum adiponectin with decreased risk of breast cancer. This signifies a protective role of adiponectin via an intricate mechanism of masking mitogenic growth factors in breast carcinogenesis.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• 제15권7호
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• pp.3261-3265
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• 2014

Background: To evaluate serum VEGF-A levels in squamous cell carcinoma of head and neck (SCCHN) patients and relationships with response to therapy. Materials and Methods: Serum VEGF-A levels in patients (n=72) treated with radiotherapy (RT) or radio-chemotherapy (RCT) and controls (n=40) were measured by ELISA. Results: Serum VEGF-A levels of the SCCHN cases were significantly higher (p=0.001) than in healthy controls, and in patients with positive as compared to negative lymph node status (p=0.004). Similarly, patients with advanced stage (Stage III-IV) disease had more greatly elevated levels of serum VEGF-A level than their early stage (Stage I-II) counterparts (p=0.001). In contrast, there was no significant difference (p=0.57) in serum level of VEGF-A in patients with advanced T-stage (T3-4) as compared to early stage (T1-2). Similarly, patients with distant metastasis had no significant (p=0.067) elevation in serum VEGF-A level as compared to non-metastatic disease. However, the non-responder patients had significantly higher serum VEGF-A level as compared to responders (p=0.001). Conclusions: Our results suggest that the serum VEGF-A level may be a useful biomarker for the prediction of response to therapy in SCCHN.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• 제14권8호
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• pp.4815-4818
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• 2013

Background: Atrophic epithelium of cervix sampled from postmenopausal women may mimic high-grade cervical intraepithelial neoplasia in Papanicolaou-stained (Pap) smears. Ki-67 (MIB-1) protein presents on proliferating cells, and percentage of cells with positive nuclei provides a reliable tool for rapid evaluation of the growth fraction. The aim of this study was to determine the diagnostic value of protein Ki67 staining in atypical pap smears of postmenopausal women. Methods: In a case-control setting, pap smears of 75 women with an atypical pap smear (case group) and 75 with normal pap smears (controls) were obtained before and after estrogen treatment. Afterward, samples were exposed to the monoclonal antibody Ki-67 (MIB-1) and the immunohistochemically demonstrated Ki-67+ cells were compared. Results: Mean ages of cases and controls were $60.4{\pm}4.5$ and $59.9{\pm}4.3$ years respectively (P=0.50). There was one (2.7%) positive Ki-67 specimen in the case group, without any positive Ki-67 specimen in the control group (P=0.50). Conclusions: Measurement of proliferative activity index in Pap smears restrained with MIB1 is a simple, reliable, and cost-effective method for excluding negatives. This would imply that it might allow a substantial reduction of diagnostic estrogen courses and subsequent Pap smears in postmenopausal women with atypical findings.

• BMB Reports
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• 제36권6호
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• pp.533-537
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• 2003

The nonsyndromic cleft lip and palate (NSCL/P) is a congenital deformity of multifactorial origin with a relatively high incidence in the oriental population. Various etiologic candidate genes have been reported with conflicting results, according to race and analysis methods. Recently, the ablation of the TGF-${\beta}3$ gene function induced cleft palates in experimental animals. Also, polymorphisms in the TGF-${\beta}3$ gene have been studied in different races; however, they have not been studied in Koreans. A novel A $\rightarrow$ G single nucleotide polymorphism (defined by the endonuclease SfaN1) was identified in intron 5 of TGF-${\beta}3$ (IVS5+104 A > G). It resulted in different genotypes, AA, AG, and GG. The objective of this study was to investigate the relationship between the SfaN1 polymorphism in TGF-${\beta}3$ and the risk of NSCL/P in the Korean population. The population of this study consisted of 28 NSCL/P patients and 41 healthy controls. The distribution of the SfaN1 genotypes was different between the cases and controls. The frequency of the G allele was significantly associated with the increased risk of NSCL/P [odds ratio (OR) = 15.92, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 6.3-41.0]. The risk for the disease increased as the G allele numbers increased (GA genotype: OR = 2.11, 95% CI = 0.38-11.68; GG genotype: OR = 110.2, 95% CI = 10.67 - 2783.29) in NSCL/P. A stratified study in patients revealed that the SfaN1 site IVS5+104A > G substitution was strongly associated with an increased risk of NSCL/P in males (p < 0.001), but not in females. In conclusion, the polymorphism of the SfaN1 site in TGF-${\beta}3$ was significantly different between the NSCL/P patients and the control. This may be a good screening marker for NSCL/P patients among Koreans.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• 제16권3호
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• pp.1033-1036
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• 2015

Background: Testosterone, a primary androgen in males, is converted into its most active form, dihydrotestosterone (DHT), by $5{\alpha}$-reductase type 2 (encoded by the SRD5A2 gene) in the prostate. DHT is necessary for prostatic growth and has five times higher binding affinity than testosterone for androgen receptors. We hypothesized that polymorphic variations in the SRD5A2 gene may affect the risk of benign prostatic hyperplasia and prostate cancer. Materials and Methods: We analyzed SRD5A2 gene polymorphisms in 217 BPH patients, 192 PCa cases, and 171 controls. Genotyping was undertaken using direct DNA sequencing. Genotype data were compared between cases and controls using a Chi square statistical tool. Results: We found that the A49T locus was monomorphic with 'AA' genotype in all subjects. At V89L locus, the presence of 'VV' showed a marginally significant correlation with increased BPH risk (p=0.047). At the $(TA)_n$ locus, longer TA repeats were found to be protective against BPH (p=0.003). However, neither of these polymoprhisms correlated with the risk of PCa. Conclusions: We conclude that A49T is monomorphic in the study population, VV marginally correlates with BPH risk, and longer $(TA)_n$ repeats are protective against BPH. None of these polymorphisms affect the risk of PCa.

• Journal of Information Processing Systems
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• 제5권1호
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• pp.33-40
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• 2009

Ever since the network-based malicious code commonly known as a 'worm' surfaced in the early part of the 1980's, its prevalence has grown more and more. The RCS (Random Constant Spreading) worm has become a dominant, malicious virus in recent computer networking circles. The worm retards the availability of an overall network by exhausting resources such as CPU capacity, network peripherals and transfer bandwidth, causing damage to an uninfected system as well as an infected system. The generation and spreading cycle of these worms progress rapidly. The existing studies to counter malicious code have studied the Microscopic Model for detecting worm generation based on some specific pattern or sign of attack, thus preventing its spread by countering the worm directly on detection. However, due to zero-day threat actualization, rapid spreading of the RCS worm and reduction of survival time, securing a security model to ensure the survivability of the network became an urgent problem that the existing solution-oriented security measures did not address. This paper analyzes the recently studied efficient dynamic network. Essentially, this paper suggests a model that dynamically controls the RCS worm using the characteristics of Power-Law and depth distribution of the delivery node, which is commonly seen in preferential growth networks. Moreover, we suggest a model that dynamically controls the spread of the worm using information about the depth distribution of delivery. We also verified via simulation that the load for each node was minimized at an optimal depth to effectively restrain the spread of the worm.

• 한국식품위생안전성학회지
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• 제22권1호
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• pp.57-62
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• 2007

본 연구는 $4^{\circ}C$ 냉장 동안 potassium sorbate로 침지한 돼지고기 안심의 미생물, pH 및 관능평가를 실시하였다. $0.5{\sim}2.0%(w/w)$ potassium sorbate로 10분 동안 침지한 돼지고기 안심의 호기성 미생물과 그람음성 미생물은 대조군과 비교하여 $4^{\circ}C$ 냉장 9일 동안 유의적 감소(P < 0.05)를 보였다. 본 연구의 결과 $4^{\circ}C$ 냉장 동안 potassium sorbate의 농도가 증가하므로 서 모든 처리군에서 돼지고기 안심의 호기성 미생물과 그람음성 미생물에 대한 항 미생물 효과를 보였다. $4^{\circ}C$ 냉장 6일 동안 potassium sorbate로 침지한 돼지고기 안심의 pH가는 증가함을 보였다. $0.5{\sim}1.0%(w/w)$ potassium sorbate로 침지한 돼지고기 안심의 관능평가 결과는 신선한 대조군과 비교하여 냄새와 외관의 점수가 매우 유사함을 보였다. 본 연구의 결과 1.0% (v/w) potassium sorbate로 10분 침지한 돼지고기 안심은 관능평가 저하에 영향을 미치지 않고 $4^{\circ}C$ 냉장 동안 미생물학적 저장 안정성을 확장할 수 있다는 것을 입증하였다.

• Genomics & Informatics
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• 제17권3호
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• pp.28.1-28.9
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• 2019

Bar-code (tag) microarrays of yeast gene-deletion collections facilitate the systematic identification of genes required for growth in any condition of interest. Anti-sense strands of amplified bar-codes hybridize with ~10,000 (5,000 each for up-and down-tags) different kinds of sense-strand probes on an array. In this study, we optimized the hybridization processes of an array for fission yeast. Compared to the first version of the array (11 ㎛, 100K) consisting of three sectors with probe pairs (perfect match and mismatch), the second version (11 ㎛, 48K) could represent ~10,000 up-/ down-tags in quadruplicate along with 1,508 negative controls in quadruplicate and a single set of 1,000 unique negative controls at random dispersed positions without mismatch pairs. For PCR, the optimal annealing temperature (maximizing yield and minimizing extra bands) was 58℃ for both tags. Intriguingly, up-tags required 3× higher amounts of blocking oligonucleotides than down-tags. A 1:1 mix ratio between up- and down-tags was satisfactory. A lower temperature (25℃) was optimal for cultivation instead of a normal temperature (30℃) because of extra temperature-sensitive mutants in a subset of the deletion library. Activation of frozen pooled cells for >1 day showed better resolution of intensity than no activation. A tag intensity analysis showed that tag(s) of 4,316 of the 4,526 strains tested were represented at least once; 3,706 strains were represented by both tags, 4,072 strains by up-tags only, and 3,950 strains by down-tags only. The results indicate that this microarray will be a powerful analytical platform for elucidating currently unknown gene functions.

• 한국산학기술학회논문지
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• 제7권6호
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• pp.1277-1283
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• 2006

우리나라의 주민 소득수준 향상에 따른 토지수요는 수도권을 중심으로 꾸준히 증가할 것으로 예상되나 수도권에서의 가용토지는 한정되어 있고 토지공급 체계가 합리적이지 않아 토지수급에 문제가 제기되고 있다. 따라서 본 연구는 수도권에서의 인구변화를 기초로 주택수를 판단하여 토지수요를 예측하고 토지공급체계를 분석하여 토지 공급 개선방향을 제시하는데 목적이 있다. 연구결과 수도권에서는 2010년까지 신규 택지개발사업에 의한 주택수요량 127만호로 예측되며 이를 위해 $293km^2$ (8,855만평)의 토지수요가 있는 것으로 나타났으나 수도권에서의 토지의 용도전환이 엄격하게 제한되어 도시용 토지공급이 원활치 못한 것으로 나타났다. 따라서 수도권에서는 도시용지 공급의 중복규제 정비, 토지이용관련 규제합리화, 정부 부처간의 긴밀한 협조체제 구축, 개발용도지역과 보전용도지역의 경계조정, 농업진흥지역과 보전산지의 개념 재정립 등을 통하여 합리적인 토지공급체계 운용이 요구된다.