• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.125-127
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• 2005

In order to improve the transformation efficiency of the Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt)-Escherichia coli (E. coli) shuttle vector, pHT3101, we intended to minimize replication origin of Bt in pHT3101. For this, two modified shuttle vectors, pHT1K and pHT261, in which 2.9 kb of replication origin of Bt were shortened to 1 kb and 261 bp, respectively as previously reported. Whereas the pHT1K could efficiently transform Bt into the antibiotic resistant, no transformants were obtained with pHT261. Furthermore, pHT1K showed higher transformation efficiency compared to that of parent vector, pHT3101. Therefore, pHT1K might be a very useful Bt-E. coli shuttle vector carrying minimal replication origin of Bt.

• Korean journal of applied entomology
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• v.16 no.2 s.31
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• pp.87-92
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• 1977

A barley virus disease has been severe in central Korea since 1963. To investigate the causal virus, examination of host ranges, transmission by insect vectors and · electron microscopy were conducted. In electron microscopy, particles identical with northern cereal mosaic virus were observed. The size of baciliform particles ranged from 300nm to 370nm in length and 57-60nm in diameter. The virus was transmitted by the small brown planthopper Laodelphax striatellus (Fallen). The latent period in the vector was seven to nineteen days, with 10 days the most prevalent. Barley, corn, wheat, rye, and oats were susceptible to the virus when inoculated by the insect vectors. It was concluded that the disease agent of the barley disease in Korea is northern cereal mosaic virus. This is the first known report of this disease in Korea.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.77-80
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• 2004

For the development of the alternative control system against the major forest pests, Beauveria spp. F-101, isolated from a dead larva of Thecodiplosis japonensis, was selected because this isolate showed high pathogenicities against T. japonensis and Acantholyda parki. Beauveria spp. F-101 had irregular clustered conidio-phores and conidia borne on a distinctive apical zigzag extension, and it showed typical characteristic of the genus, Beauveria in morphology. For molecular based-identification, the ribosomal ITS region of Beauveria spp. F-101 was amplified with ITS1 and ITS4 primers, and cloned into pGEM- T Easy vector. The amplified PCR product was 569 bp in size and completely sequenced. The similarities of the cloned ITS sequence were 99 ％ and 97％ to those of B. bassiana and B. brongniartii, respectively. In comparison to other species among the genus Beauveria, the ITS region of Beauveria spp. F-101 showed a similarity of 95％ to B. amorpha, 95％ to B. tenella, 89％ to B. vermiconia and 69％ to B. alba, respectively. In addition, in comparison to different genus, it had 95％ similarities to Cordyceps militaris and 91％ to Paecilomyces tenuipes. Accordingly, the current result suggests that Beauveria spp. F-101 was a variant of B. bassiana and it seems to be a new isolate considering sequence variation in ITS region.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.19-26
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• 2001

Transformed Spodoptera frugiperda (Sf9) cells expressing baculovirus very late factor (VLF-1) were constructed by using Autograha nuclear polyhedrosis virus (AcNPV) immediate earthy gene (ie1). Neomycin-resistance gene as a selectable marker was introduced under the control of AcNPV ie1 promoter, and Bombyx mori nuclear polyhedrosis (BmNPV-K1) vlf-1 gene was introduced under the control of the Drosophila heat shock protein gene (hspr70) promoter to yield dual expression plasmid with two independent transcription units. It was transfected into Sf9 cells and cell clones expressing vlf-1 were selected by G4l8 treatment. Genomic DNA from transformed cells was isolated and integration of AcNPV iel harboring vlf-1 was confirmed by PCR using AcNPV iel-specific primers and Southern blot analysis. The transformed cells expressing VLF-1 in an infection-independent manner expressed foreign gene product of recombinant baculovirus in the earlier stage of infection compared with control Sf9 cells. These results suggest the possible to develop highly efficient transformed insect cells for baculovirus expression vector system.

• Animal cells and systems
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.29-36
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• 2011

Insect lysozymes are basic, cationic proteins synthesized in fat body and hemocytes in response to bacterial infections and depolymerize the bacterial cell wall. The c-type lysozyme of the insect Spodoptera litura (SLLyz) is a single polypeptide chain of 121 residues with four disulfide bridges and 17 rare codons and is approximately 15 kDa. The full-length SLLyz cDNA is 1039 bp long with a poly(A) tail, and contains an open reading frame of 426 bp long (including the termination codon), flanked by a 54 bp long 5' UTR and a 559 bp long 3' UTR. As a host for the production of high-level recombinant proteins, E. coli is used most commonly because of its low cost and short generation time. However, the soluble expression of heterologous proteins in E. coli is not trivial, especially for disulfide-bonded proteins. In order to prevent inclusion body formation, GST was selected as a fusion partner to enhance the solubility of recombinant protein, and fused to the amplified products encoding mature SLLyz. The expression vector pGEX-4T-1/rSLLyz was then transformed into E. coli BL21(DE3)pLysS for soluble expression of rSLLyz, and the soluble fusion protein was purified successfully. Inhibition zone assay demonstrated that rSLLyz showed antibacterial activity against B. megaterium. These results demonstrate that the GST fusion expression system in E. coli described in this study is efficient and inexpensive in producing a disulfide-bonded rSLLyz in soluble, active form, and suggest that the insect lysozyme is an interesting system for future structural and functional studies.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.529-539
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• 2021

The beet armyworm, Spodoptera exigua, is a serious insect pest infesting various vegetable crops. Two infectious insect viruses, baculovirus and iflavirus, are known to induce epizootics in S. exigua populations. Indeed, some laboratory colonies have appeared to be covertly infected by these viruses. Diagnostic PCR tests detected two different viruses: Spodoptera exigua multiple nucleopolyhedrosis virus (SeMNPV) and iflaviruses (SeIfV1 and SeIfV2). Viral extract from dead larvae of S. exigua could infect Sf9 cells and produce occlusion bodies (OBs). Feeding OBs to asymptomatic larvae of S. exigua caused significant viral disease. Interestingly, both SeIfV1 and SeIfV2 increased their titers at late larval stages. Sterilization of laid eggs with 1% sodium hypochloride significantly reduced SeMNPV titers and increased larval survival rate. Double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) specific to SeIfV1 or SeIfV2 significantly reduced viral titers and increased larval survival rate. To continuously feed dsRNA, a recombinant Escherichia coli HT115 expressing SeIfV1-dsRNA was constructed with an L4440 expression vector. Adding this recombinant E. coli to the artificial diet significantly reduced the SeIfV1 titer and increased larval survival. These results indicate that laboratory colony collapse of S. exigua is induced by multiple viral infections. In addition, either suppression of SeMNPV or SeIfV infection significantly increased larval survival, suggesting a cooperative pathogenicity between baculovirus and iflavirus against S. exigua.

• The Korean Journal of Pesticide Science
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.361-368
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• 2016

Japanese pine sawyer (JPS), Monochamus alternatus is a vector insect of pine wood nematode, Bersaphlenchus xylophilus in Korea and Japanese pine forest. This study was to evaluate the possibility of biological control of JPS with Korean entomopathogenic nematodes (EPNs). Korean EPNs (Heterorhabditis sp. Gyeongsan, Steinernema carpocapsae GSN1, S. glaseri Dongrae and S. longicaudum Nonsan strain) were infested bate insect, Galleria mellonella in log of dead pine tree. Result showed that, S. carpocapsae GSN1 strain has the highest pathogenicity. Heterorhabditis sp. Gyeongsan and S. carpocapsae GSN1 had infested bate insect, which located in 7.5 cm depth of pine log. EPN has pathogenicity against larva and adult of JPS. Spray application of EPNs against adult of JPS, Heterorhabditis sp. Gyeongsan strain showed higher pathogenicity than S. carpocapsae GSN1 strain. EPN infested larva of JPS was detected on bark spray treatment with S. carpocapsae GSN1 strain in dead pine log that naturally infested larva of JPS however, no EPN infested JPS was detected on soaking of pine log with suspension of S. carpocapsae GSN1 strain. Though EPN had found with low efficacy against JPS but still possible to apply to control the boring insect pest as they can control log dwelling insect.

• Korean journal of applied entomology
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• v.56 no.1
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• pp.19-28
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• 2017

Polydnaviruses (PDVs) are a group of double-stranded DNA viruses symbiotic to some endoparasitoid wasps. Cotesia plutellae bracovirus (CpBV) is a PDV symbiotic to an endoparasitoid wasp, C. plutellae, parasitizing young larvae of Plutella xylostella. An early expressed gene, CpBV-ELP1, plays an important role in the parasitism by suppressing host cellular immunity by its cytotoxic activity against hemocytes. This study aimed to test its oral toxicity against insect pest by expressing it in a recombinant tobacco plant. A recombinant CpBV-ELP1 protein was produced using a baculovirus expression system and secreted to cell culture medium. The cell cultured media were used to purify CpBV-ELP1 by a sequential array of purification steps: ammonium sulfate fractionation, size exclusion chromatography, and ion exchange chromatography. Purified rCpBV-ELP1 exhibited a significant cytotoxicity against Spodoptera exigua hemocytes. CpBV-ELP1 was highly toxic to the fifth instar larvae of S. exigua by injection to hemocoel. It also showed a significant oral toxicity to fifth instar larvae of S. exigua by a leaf-dipping assay. CpBV-ELP1 was cloned into pBI121 vector under CaMV 35S promoter with opaline synthase terminator. Resulting recombinant vector (pBI121-ELP1) was used to transform Agrobacterium tumefaciens LBA4404. The recombinant bacteria were then used to induce callus of a tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum Xanthi) leaves and subsequent generation (T1) plants were selected. T1 generation tobacco plants expressing CpBV-ELP1 gave significant insecticidal activities against S. exigua larvae. These results suggest that CpBV-ELP1 gene can be used to control insect pests by constructing transgenic crops.

• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.101-108
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• 2008

The Agrobacterium-mediated transformation has been successfully used method to introduce foreign genes into some monocotyledonous as well as a large number of dicotyledonous plants genome, We developed transgenic Chinese cabbage plants with insect-resistance gene, modified CryIAc, by Agrobacterium-transformation and confirmed transgene copy number by Southern blot analysis. We confirmed that twenty-nine out of 46 transgenic Chinese cabbage plants have single copy of CryIAc. To obtain the sequences information on the transferred DNA (T-DNA) integration into plant genome, we analyzed left border (LB) flanking sequences by genome walking (GW) PCR method. Out of 46 transgenic Chinese cabbage plants examined, 37 carried the vector backbone sequences. This result indicates that the transfer of the vector backbone from the binary vectors resulted mainly from inefficient termination of LB site. Analysis of T-DNA LB flanking region of 9 transgenic Chinese cabbage plants without vector backbone revealed that all LB ends were not conserved and nucleotides up to 36bp from the LB cleavage site were deleted.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.19 no.10
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• pp.1223-1229
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• 2009

To construct a new recombinant strain of Bacillus velezensis that has antifungal and insecticidal activity via the expression of the insecticidal Bacillus thuringiensis crystal protein, a B. thuringiensis expression vector (pHT1K-1Ac) was generated that contained the B. thuringiensis cry1Ac gene under the control of its endogenous promoter in a minimal E. coli-B. thuringiensis shuttle vector (pHT1K). This vector was introduced into a B. velezensis isolate that showed high antifungal activities against several plant diseases, including rice blast (Magnaporthe grisea), rice sheath blight (Rhizotonia solani), tomato gray mold (Botrytis cinerea), tomato late blight (Phytophthora infestans), and wheat leaf rust (Puccinia recondita), by electroporation. The recombinant B. velezensis strain was confirmed by PCR using cry1Ac-specific primers. Additionally, the recombinant strain produced a protein approximately 130 kDa in size and parasporal inclusion bodies similar to B. thuringiensis. The in vivo antifungal activity assay demonstrated that the activity of the recombinant B. velezensis strain was maintained at the same level as that of wild-type B. velezensis. Furthermore, it exhibited high insecticidal activity against a lepidopteran pest, Plutella xylostella, although its activity was lower than that of a recombinant B. thuringiensis strain, whereas wild-type B. velezensis strain did not show any insecticidal activity. These results suggest that this recombinant B. velezensis strain can be used to control harmful insect pests and fungal diseases simultaneously in one crop.