• Molecular & Cellular Toxicology
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.114-119
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• 2006

Benzo[a]pyrene is a representative ecotoxicant in marine environment and a model compound of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, which has an ability to bioaccumulate in aquatic organisms. This study aimed to identify molecular biomarkers suitable for assessing environmental pollution using a microarray technique. We examined the effects of benzo[a]pyrene on gene expressions in the rockfish, Sebastes schlegeli. We constructed the subtractive cDNA library with hepatic RNA from benzo[a]pyrene-exposed and non-exposed control fish. From the library 10,000 candidate clones were selected randomly and cDNA microarray was constructed. We determined benzo[a]pyrene-responsive genes using a high-density microarray. Statistical analysis showed that approximately 400 genes are significantly induced or reduced by benzo[a]pyrene treatment ($2\;{\mu}m$). Especially gene expression changes of 4 candidate clones among the up- or down-regulated genes were investigated in 6, 12 and 24 hr BaP-exposed fish groups. Many methods have been developed to monitor marine environmental status, which depend on quantifying the levels of the toxic components in polluted seawater or on ecological accessing, such as species diversity or richness. However, those methods could not provide information on physiological or genetic changes induced by such environmental stresses. Comparing with the conventional methods, these data will propose that benzo[a]pyrene-responsive genes can be useful for biological risk assessment of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons on marine organism at molecular level.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.13 no.8
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• pp.4051-4055
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• 2012

Functional foods include antioxidant nutrients which may protect against many human chronic diseases by combating reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the protective effect of pomegranate peel extract (PPE) on azoxymethane (AOM)-induced colon tumors in rats as an in vivo experimental model. Forty Sprague-Dawley rats (4 weeks old) were randomly divided into 4 groups containing 10 rats per group, and were treated with either AOM, PPE, or PPE plus AOM or injected with 0.9% physiological saline solution as a control. At 8 weeks of age, the rats in the AOM and PPE plus AOM groups were injected with 15 mg AOM/kg body weight, once a week for two weeks. After the last AOM injection, the rats were continuously fed ad-libitum their specific diets for another 6 weeks. At the end of the experiment (i.e. at the age of 4 months), all rats were killed and the colon tissues were examined microscopically for lesions suspected of being preneoplastic lesions or tumors as well as for biochemical measurement of oxidative stress indices. The results revealed a lower incidence of aberrant crypt foci in the PPE plus AOM administered group as compared to the AOM group. In addition, PPE blocked the AOM-induced impairment of biochemical indicators of oxidative stress in the examined colonic tissue homogenates. The results suggest that PPE can partially inhibit the development of colonic premalignant lesions in an AOM-induced colorectal carcinogenesis model, by abrogating oxidative stress and improving the redox status of colonic cells.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.13 no.8
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• pp.3815-3819
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• 2012

The CD4+CD25+ regulatory T cell (Treg) is a special kind of T cell subset. Studies have showed that Treg cells are involved in a number of physiological processes and pathologic conditions such as autoimmune diseases, transplantation tolerance and cancer. Tregs with unique capacity for immune inhibition can impair anti-tumour immunity and help tumor cells to escape from immune surveillance. The aim of our study was to investigate whether Tregs are involved in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). A BABL/C mouse with HCC in situ model was established to evaluate the Treg existence in carcinoma tissues and the changes of Tregs in spleen using flow cytometry and immunohistochemistry methods. Granzyme B expression in carcinoma tissues was analyzed by immunohistochemistry to investigate the tumor local immune status.The proportion of CD4+CD25+/CD4+ spleen lymphocytes of tumor bearing mice ($18.8%{\pm}1.26%$) was found to be significantly higher than that in normal mice ($9.99%{\pm}1.90%$) (P<0.01 ). Immunohistochemistry of spleen tissue also confirmed that there was an increase in Treg in tumor-bearing mice, while in carcinomas it showed Treg cells to be present in tumor infiltrating lymphocyte areas while Granzyme B was rarely observed. Anti-tumour immunity was suppressed, and this might be associated with the increase of Tregs. Our observations suggest that the CD4+CD25+Treg/CD4+ proportion in spleen lymphocytes can be a sensitive index to evaluate the change of Tregs in hepatocellular carcinoma mice and the Treg may be a promising therapeutic target for cancer.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.155-161
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• 2014

The objective of this study is to weight analysis portable backpack system of infantry weapon systems for ergonomic design in manual materials handling tasks. For the product design, we analyzed the ergonomic guidelines and status of similar weapon systems by comparing the efficient operation performance provide for the basic data. Result of this study, the relationship between portability and mobility presented for schematic. In the short distance of the short biomechanical criterion, 1-2 hours in the middle of moving psychophysical criterion, 4 hour or more long-distance criterion applied for the physiological criterion for easy of trade-offs that need to be considered. This study suggests for 4 research items for infantry backpack system in manual materials handling tasks. Throughout the result of anthropometric populations, the 5%tile body weight for -0.91kg but 95%tile in 34.17kg considered to be margin for free, easy and efficient operation for the weight margin between portability and mobility in manual materials handling tasks.

• Journal of the Society of Cosmetic Scientists of Korea
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.327-334
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• 2018

Studies on seaweed-based materials have been progressing steadily day by day. In this experiment, we checked the anti-oxidant, whitening, and moisturizing activities of fermented extract from a mixture of Undariapinnatifida, Saccharina japonica, and Gloiopeltis furcate. Also, Lactobacillus sakei strains of kimchi were used as the lactic acid bacteria. The physiological status of the combined seaweed extracts was also investigated. The 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and 2,2'-azino-bis-3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid (ABTS) radical scavenging results showed that the inhibitory effects of the combined seaweed extracts were higher than the positive control. Furthermore, 3,4-dihydroxy-L-phenylalanine (L-DOPA) and Mushroom tyrosinase tests were conducted during the whitening efficacy experiment. Hence, it was confirmed that the whitening activity of fermented extracts was greater than the extracts without fermentation. HPLC analysis of fucose (an active ingredient of seaweed) was also performed and a standard method for solvent conditions was newly established. This study suggests that the composite of algae extract has potentials to be used as anti-oxidant and whitening agents in cosmetics.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.47 no.1
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• pp.1-12
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• 2014

Some blue-green algal species such as those in the genus Anabaena causing severe algal blooms can produce akinetes, resting spores, in aquatic ecosystems. Germinated akinetes staying in the sediment as "seed banks" grow into vegetative cells under favorable conditions of light intensity, nutrient, and temperature. Therefore, akinete plays an important role in forming the nuisance bloom. However, little information is available in the ecological study of akinetes compared to that of vegetative cells in Korea. This review reports ecological and physiological characteristics of akinetes, especially of the blue-green algal genus Anabaena. We also suggest the feasible area of akinetes in the freshwater ecosystems. We expect that the suggested studies associated with akinetes will contribute to further understanding the life cycle and ecology of Anabaena and other algae.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.1243-1250
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• 2003

This study was designed to elucidate the synergistic cytotoxic mechanisms of the co-treatment of adriamycin and Paljinhangahm-dan in human hepatoma malignant cancer cell line, HepG2. The combination of adriamycin and the ethanol extract of Paljinhangahm-dan synergistically augmented the cytotoxicity of Adriamycin and Paljinhangahm-dan in HepG2 cells. The cytotoxicity of two drugs was revealed as apoptosis characterized by DNA fragmentaton in agarose gel electrophoresis. The apoptotic cytotoxicity of adriamycin and Paljinhangahm-dan was accompanied by the cleavage of procaspase -3 protease and PARP. Of note, anti apoptotic Bcl2 protein was obviously decreased, but Fas was dramatically increased in HepG2 cells co-treated with Adriamycin and Paljinhangahm -dan. In addition, through 2-D gel electorphoresis, we observed that the expression levels of a lot of proteins were obviously changed by the status of drug treatments. This results suggest that the synergistic cytotoxicity of the co-treatment of adriamycin and Paljinhangahm-dan might be caused by the changes of the expression levels of a lot of proteins which play pivotal roles in cell survival or death.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.173-181
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• 2017

The aim of this study was to identify the reliability and the validity of Five Organs Questionnaire (FOQ). In this study, 335 data was collected from early adulthood of A-city, D-city and C-city in South Korea from Dec. 2016 to Jan. 2017, and the collected data was analyzed with SPSS 23.0 software. The result showed that the Cronbach's ${\alpha}$ of five organs was 0.775-0.853. The reliabilities of test and retest Intra Correlation Coefficient (ICC) for the five organs were .891-.929 in pattern identification and .874-.930 in functional evaluation, respectively. Each organ was divided by two factors, and the factor loadings of Liver, Heart, Spleen, Lung and Kidney were 52.973%, 54.534%, 57.060%, 53.803%, and 46.337%, respectively. The functional evaluation of five organs was associated with self-rated health status as r was -.443 to -.583(p<.001), and quality of life as r was -.5.17 to -.716(p<.001), respectively. The test-retest diagnostic agreement was 67.2% and Kappa was 0.562. This study revealed that FOQ is a reliable and valid questionnaire.

• Korean Journal of Ichthyology
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.81-89
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• 2008

An experiment was conducted for 80 days to determine the effect of feeding and starvation on the survival, growth, gonad-somatic index (GSI), hepato-somatic index (HSI), viscera index (LSI), the morphometric changes and hematological parameter in a cultured catfish, Silurus asotus. The survival and growth of the starved group was lower than those of the fed group during the experiment. Starvation resulted in retardation of growth, which provides examples of the reduction of final body weight, growth rate of body weight, specific growth rate and condition factor, whereas the fed group continued to grow and remained in good condition. Blood analysis (cortisol, glucose, aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, red blood cell and hemoglobin) showed significant differences between the fed and starved groups at the end of the experiment. These results suggest that all nutritional parameters used for starvation and feeding in this study appear to be a useful index of nutritional status in the cultured catfish.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.15
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• pp.6429-6436
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• 2014

Poly-ADP-ribosylation (PAR) is a post-translational modification of mainly chromosomal proteins. It is known to be strongly involved in several molecular events, including nucleosome-remodelling and carcinogenesis. In this investigation, it was attempted to evaluate PAR level as a reliable biomarker for early detection of cancer in blood lymphocyte histones. PAR of isolated histone proteins was monitored in normal and dimethylnitrosamine (DMN)-exposed mice tissues using a novel ELISA-based immuno-probe assay developed in our laboratory. An inverse relationship was found between the level of PAR and period of DMN exposure in various histone proteins of blood lymphocytes and spleen cells. With the increase in the DMN exposure period, there was reduction in the PAR level of individual histones in both cases. It was also observed that the decrease in the level of PAR of histones resulted in progressive relaxation of genomic DNA, perhaps triggering activation of genes that are involved in initiation of transformation. The observed effect of carcinogen on the PAR of blood lymphocyte histones provided us with a handy tool for monitoring biochemical or physiological status of individuals exposed to carcinogens without obtaining biopsies of cancerous tissues, which involves several medical and ethical issues. Obtaining blood from any patient and separating blood lymphocytes are routine medical practices involving virtually no medical intervention, post-procedure medical care or trauma to a patient. Moreover, the immuno-probe assay is very simple, sensitive, reliable and cost-effective. Therefore, combined with the ease of preparation of blood lymphocytes and the simplicity of the technique, immuno-probe assay of PAR has the potential to be applied for mass screening of cancer. It appears to be a promising step in the ultimate goal of making cancer detection simple, sensitive and reliable in the near future.