• BMB Reports
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• v.39 no.5
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• pp.595-606
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• 2006

Metallothioneins are a group of low molecular mass and cysteine-rich metal-binding proteins, ubiquitously found in most living organisms. They play an important role in maintaining intracellular metal homeostasis, eliminating metal toxification and protecting against intracellular oxidative damages. Analysis of complete rice genome sequences revealed eleven genes encoding putative metallothionein (OsMT), indicating that OsMTs constitute a small gene family in rice. Expression profiling revealed that each member of the OsMT gene family differs not only in sequence but also in their tissue expression patterns, suggesting that these isoforms may have different functions they perform in specific tissues. On the basis of OsMT structural and phylogenetic analysis, the OsMT family was classified as two classes and class I was subdivided into four types. Additionally, in this paper we also present a complete overview of this family, describing the gene structure, genome localization, upstream regulatory element, and exon/intron organization of each member in order to provide valuable insight into this OsMT gene family.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.876-887
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• 2015

Dicer, an ribonuclease type III type endonuclease, is the key enzyme involved in biogenesis of microRNAs (miRNAs) and small interfering RNAs (siRNAs), and thus plays a critical role in RNA interference through post transcriptional regulation of gene expression. This enzyme has not been well studied in the Indian water buffalo, an important species known for disease resistance and high milk production. In this study, the primary coding sequence (5,778 bp) of bubaline dicer (GenBank: AB969677.1) was determined and the bubaline Dicer1 biocomputationally characterized to determine the phylogenetic signature among higher eukaryotes. The evolutionary tree revealed that all the transcript variants of Dicer1 belonging to a specific species were within the same node and the sequences belonging to primates, rodents and lagomorphs, avians and reptiles formed independent clusters. The bubaline dicer1 is closely related to that of cattle and other ruminants and significantly divergent from dicer of lower species such as tapeworm, sea urchin and fruit fly. Evolutionary divergence analysis conducted using MEGA6 software indicated that dicer has undergone purifying selection over the time. Seventeen divergent sequences, representing each of the families/taxa were selected to study the specific regions of positive vis-$\grave{a}$-vis negative selection using different models like single likelihood ancestor counting, fixed effects likelihood, and random effects likelihood of Datamonkey server. Comparative analysis of the domain structure revealed that Dicer1 is conserved across mammalian species while variation both in terms of length of Dicer enzyme and presence or absence of domain is evident in the lower organisms.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.38-43
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• 2003

Phosphate is an essential material for the growth of organisms. However. since relatively small amount is required. a large amount of phosphate is abandoned in wastes and wastewater. which contaminate the ecological environment including aquatic system. Purpose of this study is to treat especially high concentrated phosphate wastewater by use of calcium precipitation method. The pH range considered was from 6 to 12 and the maximum removal of phosphate was attained at pH 12. The con-centration of phosphate was observed to decrease rapidly until a half amount of calcium ion to its equivalent for the formation of calcium phosphate precipitate was added. which resulted in the decrease of the remaining concentration of phosphate down to 0.0027 mM. The effect of fluoride ion was examined and the concentration ratio between the phosphate and fluoride ion did not have any significant influence on the removal efficiency of phosphate. The effect of pH was also investigated. With the increasing of the pH in solution, the removal rate of phosphate was increased. Also it was investigated that the effect of fluoride on the phosphate removal was not significant.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.225-236
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• 2006

Seagrass meadows are considered as critical habitats for a wide variety of marine organisms in coastal and estuarine ecosystems. In many cases, studies on the spatial/temporal distribution of seagrass have depended on direct observations using SCUBA diving. As an alternative method fur studying seagrass distribution, an application of hydroacoustic technique has been assessed for mapping seagrass distribution in Dongdae Bay, on the south coast of Korea, in September 2005. Data were collected using high frequency transducer (420 kHz split-beam), which was installed with towed body system. The system was linked to DGPS to make goo-referenced data. Additionally, in situ seagrass distribution has been observed using underwater cameras and SCUBA diving at four stations in order to compare with acoustic data. Acoustic survey was conducted along 23 transects with 3-4 blot ship speed. Seagrass beds were vertically limited to depths less than 3.5m and seagrass height ranged between 55 and 90cm at the study sites. Dense seagmss beds were mainly found at the entrance of the bay and at a flat area around the center of the bay. Although the study area was a relatively small, the vertical and spatial distributions of the seagrass were highly variable with bathymetry and region. Considering dominant species, Zostera marina L., preliminary estimation of seagrass biomass with acoustic and direct sampling data was approximately $56.55g/m^2$, and total biomass of 104 tones (coefficient variation: 25.77%) was estimated at the study area. Hydroacoustic method provided valuable information to understand distribution pattern and to estimate seagrass biomass.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Soil and Groundwater Environment Conference
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• 2005.04a
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• pp.28-30
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• 2005

Because of high population diversity in soil microbial communities, it is difficult to accurately assess the capability of biodegradation of toxicant by microbes in soil and sediment. Identifying biodegradative microorganisms is an important step in designing and analyzing soil bioremediation. To remove non-important noise information, it is necessary to selectively enrich genomes of biodegradative microorganisms fromnon-biodegradative populations. For this purpose, a stable isotope probing (SIP) technique was applied in selectively harvesting the genomes of biphenyl-utilizing bacteria from soil microbial communities. Since many biphenyl-using microorganisms are responsible for aerobic PCB degradation In soil and sediments, biphenyl-utilizing bacteria were chosen as the target organisms. In soil microcosms, 13C-biphenyl was added as a selective carbon source for biphenyl users, According to $13C-CO_2$ analysis by GC-MS, 13C-biphenyl mineralization was detected after a 7-day of incubation. The heavy portion of DNA(13C-DNA) was separated from the light portion of DNA (12C-DNA) using equilibrium density gradient ultracentrifuge. Bacterial community structure in the 13C-DNAsample was analyzed by t-RFLP (terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism) method. The t-RFLP result demonstates that the use of SIP efficiently and selectively enriched the genomes of biphenyl degrading bacteria from non-degradative microbes. Furthermore, the bacterial diversity of biphenyl degrading populations was small enough for environmental genomes tools (metagenomics and DNA microarrays) to be used to detect functional (biphenyl degradation) genes from soil microbial communities, which may provide a significant progress in assessing microbial capability of PCB bioremediation in soil and groundwater.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.25 no.11
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• pp.616-621
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• 2015

Atmospheric pressure plasma is used in the biological and medical fields. Miniaturization and safety are important in the application of apply atmospheric plasma to bio devices. In this study, we made a small, pocket-sized inverter for the discharge of atmospheric plasma. We used pulse power to control the neutral gas temperature at which the, when plasma was discharged. We used direct current of 5 V of bias(voltage). The output voltage is about 1 to 2 kilo volts the frequency is about 80 kilo hertz. We analyzsed the characteristics of the atmospheric plasma using OES(Optical emission spectroscopy) and the Current-Voltage characteristic of pulse power. By calculating of the current voltage characteristics, we were able to determine that, when the duty ratio increased, the power that actually effects the plasma discharge also increased. To apply atmospheric plasma to human organisms, the temperature is the most important factor, we were able to control the temperature by modulating the pulse power duty ratio. This means we can use atmospheric plasma on the human body or in other areas of the medical field.

• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.248-255
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• 1999

Sewage sludge samples were extracted with dichlomethane by Soxhlet extraction. The extracts were analysed for the endocrine disrupting compounds (EDC), octylphenol(OP), nonylphenol (NP) and bis (2-ethylhexyl)phthalate (DOP) using GC/MS-SIM. In industrial sewage sludge (sample Z-1) the concentration of NP and DOP were respectively $1168{\mu}g/g$ and $1172{\mu}g/g$ whereas in domestic sludge (sample Z-2) the concentration were respectively $10.8{\mu}g/g$ and $80{\mu}g/g$. OP was not detected in Z-2, but detected a small amount in Z-2 of the samples. Environmental EDC have been shown to affect the fertility of range of living organisms, including humans, and the high levels of NP and DOP in industrial sewage sludge could have serious implications for the reproductive health of humans particularly if the compounds entered the human food chain through water or the ingestion of vegetables or animal products.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.55-63
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• 1985

Studies based on field observation and laboratory analysis of the littoral sands of beaches in Jeju Island indicate that the shores exhibit a great variation in both the beach geometry and the composition in terms of geological agents. Most of the beaches around the Island are developed in relatively small patches and discontinuous, as the result of intervening sea cliffs and rocky headlands. The sand quality and the dimensions of the beaches in the Island are relatively poor; for example, these beaches are 220~2,780m in length, 41~313m in width, and $7^{\circ}$ steepness in average foreshore slope. According to the textural parameters analysis, the beach sediments in study portion shows medium grained ($average\;1.42{\phi}$), moderately well sorted ($average\;0.65{\phi}$) and negative skewed ($average\;0.34{\phi}$), which seems to reflecting a high energy marine depositional environment. The heavy and light minerals of te beach sediments are composed of quartz, volcanic fragments, Na-Ca feldspar, olivine, augite as major constituents, along with apatite, biotite and other minor components, which originates from the adjacent geology. The content of CaO-MgO in shell fragments of the littoral sands ranged from 4.69~51.96%, suggesting that the high CaO-MgO content in some of the Island's beaches is attributable to geologic environments conducive to the growth of shell organisms and sediments migration. The provenance of the sediments studied are derived predominantly from adjacent continental shelves and/or terrigenous older river portion, Which sediments were transported mostly by rolling or bottom suspension. The depositional environments of the Jeju beaches can be divided into two types: beaches distributed in the North and the Northeastern parts of the Island are dominated by marine enviroment, whereas beaches in the Southwestern portion are characterized by terrigenous agencies.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.22 no.6
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• pp.754-762
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• 2012

Colbricon Superiore and Inferiore are two small adjacent high-mountain lakes located in the Paneveggio Natural Park (Italy) that offer the rare opportunity to study two iso-ecologic water environments differing only by area and volume in a ratio of 2:1 and 3:1, respectively. We took advantage of this setting to investigate phytoplankton dynamics, compare variability and productivity differences between the two basins, and assess size-dependent issues. The phytoplankton group of the Dinophyceae was chosen as the indicator organisms of ecological perturbation owing to their high sensitivity to environmental variations, as well as their acknowledged nature of versatile proxy to report global climatic changes. The study was conducted for over 10 years with fortnightly samplings. Results indicated that (a) the Dinophyceae communities in the smaller lake were significantly more resistant to changes exerted by the fluctuation of lakewater transparency and pH; and (b) the smaller lake sustained a consistently higher production with an average Dinophyceae density 1.73 fold higher than that of the larger lake. The coefficients of variation show that the chemical parameters in the smaller lake display higher time-related fluctuation while being spatially homogeneous and that such conditions correlate with a higher stability of the Dinophyceae assemblage. The use of this setting is also proposed as a model to test relationships between ecosystem production and physical stability.

• Korean journal of applied entomology
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• v.51 no.4
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• pp.317-323
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• 2012

Fragmented urban forests, as green islands within urban area, are the primary habitats for a vast number of different organisms inhabiting large cities. The areas of the urban forests are usually small, and hence, the proportion of the forest edge is relatively high. It is therefore expected that overall butterfly diversity may be lower than that of suburban or rural forests, and that those of grassland species, forest edge species, and generalist species with a wider niche breadth may be richer. Butterflies were surveyed weekly by the line transact method in order to characterize the butterfly community of the Hongneung Forest, a fragmented urban forest in Seoul. Butterfly richness of the study forest is much lower than those of main forests around or in Seoul. Grassland species, forest edge species, and generalist species were found to be richer, which was in agreement with the expected patterns of urban butterfly communities. Also, an endangered species, Spindasis takanonis, was observed in the Hongneung Forest, showing that urban forests play important roles for conservation of rare species.