• IMMUNE NETWORK
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.33.1-33.13
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• 2023

Vaccination against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has been acknowledged as an effective mean of preventing infection and hospitalization. However, the emergence of highly transmissible SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern (VOCs) has led to substantial increase in infections among children and adolescents. Vaccine-induced immunity and longevity have not been well defined in this population. Therefore, we aimed to analyze humoral and cellular immune responses against ancestral and SARS-CoV-2 variants after two shots of the BNT162b2 vaccine in healthy adolescents. Although vaccination induced a robust increase of spike-specific binding Abs and neutralizing Abs against the ancestral and SARS-CoV-2 variants, the neutralizing activity against the Omicron variant was significantly low. On the contrary, vaccine-induced memory CD4⁺ T cells exhibited substantial responses against both ancestral and Omicron spike proteins. Notably, CD4⁺ T cell responses against both ancestral and Omicron strains were preserved at 3 months after two shots of the BNT162b2 vaccine without waning. Polyfunctionality of vaccine-induced memory T cells was also preserved in response to Omicron spike protein. The present findings characterize the protective immunity of vaccination for adolescents in the era of continuous emergence of variants/subvariants.

• Clinical and Experimental Vaccine Research
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.249-259
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• 2023

Purpose: Since patients on hemodialysis (HD) are known to be vulnerable to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), many studies were conducted regarding the effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccine in HD patients in Western countries. Here, we assessed antibody response of HD patients for 6 months post-vaccination to identify the duration and effectiveness of the COVID-19 vaccine in the Asian population. Materials and Methods: We compared antibody response of the COVID-19 vaccine in HD patients with healthy volunteers. Patient and control groups had two doses of ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 and mRNA-1273, respectively. Immunoglobulin G (IgG) was measured before vaccination, 2 weeks after the first dose, 2 and 4 weeks, 3 and 6 months after the second dose. Neutralizing antibody was measured before vaccination and at 2 weeks, 3 and 6 months after second dose. Since the third dose was started in the middle of the study, we analyzed the effect of the third dose as well. Results: Although antibody production was weaker than the control group (n=22), the patient group (n=39) showed an increase in IgG and neutralizing antibody after two doses. And, 21/39 patients and 14/22 participants had a third dose (BNT162b2 or mRNA-1273 in the patient group, mRNA-1273 in the control group), and it did not affect antibody response in both group. Trend analysis showed IgG and neutralizing antibody did not decrease over time. Age, sex, and HD vintage did not affect antibody production in HD patients. Patients with higher body mass index displayed better seroresponse, while those on immunosuppressants showed poor seroresponse. Conclusion: Two doses of vaccination led to significant antibody response in HD patients, and the antibody did not wane until 6 months.

• Clinical and Experimental Vaccine Research
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.240-248
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• 2023

Purpose: We reported a survey-based study assessing the parental intention to vaccinate children of 5 to 7 years old against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The aim of this study is to assess factors influencing the parental intention to vaccinate their children against COVID-19. Materials and Methods: This study adopted a cross-sectional design, held at the public health center of Senen district, Jakarta, Indonesia from November 1-30, 2022. The off-line questionnaires were distributed via the school administrator to all eligible parents. Factors associated with intention to vaccinate were analyzed with the regression logistic models. Results: Of the 435 parents in this study, 215 had already vaccinated their children against COVID-19 (49.4%), and the overall intention of the participants to vaccinate was 69.7%. Factors associated with intention to vaccinate the children against COVID-19 were parental employment status, parental COVID-19 vaccine status and concern of contracting COVID-19. Parents who are employed, had completed vaccines with COVID-19 booster vaccine, and had concern of their children contracting COVID-19 were more likely to vaccinate their children (odds ratio [OR], 2.10; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.22-3.69; p=0.011; OR, 2.15; 95% CI, 1.21-3.83; p=0.013; OR, 2.40; 95% CI, 1.34-4.30; p=0.004, respectively). Concern on the vaccine's side effects was negatively associated with the willingness to vaccinate. Conclusion: This study showed that childhood COVID-19 vaccine only covered half of the population, with parental intentions for childhood COVID-19 vaccination being high, reaching almost two-thirds of the study participants. Factors influencing parental intentions were employment status, parental COVID-19 vaccine status, concerns about COVID-19 and concerns about vaccine side effects.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.20-24
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• 2024

Over the past four years, as the COVID-19 pandemic has struck the world, cold chain of COVID-19 vaccination has become a hot topic. In order to overcome the pandemic situation, it is necessary to establish a cold chain that maintains a low-temperature environment below approximately 203K (-70℃), which is the appropriate storage temperature for vaccines, from vaccine suppliers to local hospitals. Usually, cryocoolers are used to maintain low temperatures, but it is difficult for small-scale local distribution to have cryocooler due to budget and power supply issues. Accordingly, in this paper, a cryogenic TSU (Thermal storage unit) system for vaccination cold chain is designed that can maintain low temperatures below -70℃C for a long time without using a cryocooler. The performance of the TSU system according to the energy storage material for using as TSU is experimentally evaluated. In the experiments, four types of cold storage materials were used: 20% DMSO aqueous solution, 30% DMSO aqueous solution, paraffin wax, and tofu. Prior to the experiment, the specific heat of the cold storage materials at low temperature were measured. Through this, the thermal diffusivity of the materials was calculated, and paraffin wax had the lowest value. As a result of the TSU system's low-temperature maintenance test, paraffin wax showed the best low-temperature maintenance performance. And it recorded a low-temperature maintenance time that was about 24% longer than other materials. As a result of analyzing the temperature trend by location within the TSU system, it was observed that heat intrusion from the outside was not well transmitted to the low temperature area due to the low thermal conductivity of paraffin wax. Therefore, in the TSU system for vaccine storage, it was experimentally verified that the lower the thermal diffusivity of the cold storage material, the better low temperature maintenance performance.

• Journal of Internet Computing and Services
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.79-90
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• 2014

User authentication based on ID and PW has been widely used. As the Internet has become a growing part of people' lives, input times of ID/PW have been increased for a variety of services. People have already learned enough to perform the authentication procedure and have entered ID/PW while ones are unconscious. This is referred to as the adaptive unconscious, a set of mental processes incoming information and producing judgements and behaviors without our conscious awareness and within a second. Most people have joined up for various websites with a small number of IDs/PWs, because they relied on their memory for managing IDs/PWs. Human memory decays with the passing of time and knowledges in human memory tend to interfere with each other. For that reason, there is the potential for people to enter an invalid ID/PW. Therefore, these characteristics above mentioned regarding of user authentication with ID/PW can lead to human vulnerabilities: people use a few PWs for various websites, manage IDs/PWs depending on their memory, and enter ID/PW unconsciously. Based on the vulnerability of human factors, a variety of information leakage attacks such as phishing and pharming attacks have been increasing exponentially. In the past, information leakage attacks exploited vulnerabilities of hardware, operating system, software and so on. However, most of current attacks tend to exploit the vulnerabilities of the human factors. These attacks based on the vulnerability of the human factor are called social-engineering attacks. Recently, malicious social-engineering technique such as phishing and pharming attacks is one of the biggest security problems. Phishing is an attack of attempting to obtain valuable information such as ID/PW and pharming is an attack intended to steal personal data by redirecting a website's traffic to a fraudulent copy of a legitimate website. Screens of fraudulent copies used for both phishing and pharming attacks are almost identical to those of legitimate websites, and even the pharming can include the deceptive URL address. Therefore, without the supports of prevention and detection techniques such as vaccines and reputation system, it is difficult for users to determine intuitively whether the site is the phishing and pharming sites or legitimate site. The previous researches in terms of phishing and pharming attacks have mainly studied on technical solutions. In this paper, we focus on human behaviour when users are confronted by phishing and pharming attacks without knowing them. We conducted an attack experiment in order to find out how many IDs/PWs are leaked from pharming and phishing attack. We firstly configured the experimental settings in the same condition of phishing and pharming attacks and build a phishing site for the experiment. We then recruited 64 voluntary participants and asked them to log in our experimental site. For each participant, we conducted a questionnaire survey with regard to the experiment. Through the attack experiment and survey, we observed whether their password are leaked out when logging in the experimental phishing site, and how many different passwords are leaked among the total number of passwords of each participant. Consequently, we found out that most participants unconsciously logged in the site and the ID/PW management dependent on human memory caused the leakage of multiple passwords. The user should actively utilize repudiation systems and the service provider with online site should support prevention techniques that the user can intuitively determined whether the site is phishing.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.234-240
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• 2009

We tried to analyze the HPV prevalence and HPV genotypes of sexually high-risk women living in Busan, the biggest seaport of South Korea. Six hundred sixty women engaging in high-risk occupations participated in this study. The prevalence of HPV infection and HPV genotyping were determined with $MyGene^{(R)}$ HPVDNA chip, which consisted of 16 high-risk HPV genotypes (oncogenic genotypes) and 8 low-risk HPV genotypes. The overall prevalence of HPV infection in this study population was 39.1% (258/660) and the 20's showed the highest prevalence of HPV infection (51.5%). The dominant HPV genotypes including single or multiple HPV-infected women were resulted in HPV-16 (15.9%), -53 (10.2%), -58 (7.7%), -18 (5.2%) in case of high-risk HPV genotype and HPV-70 (10.4%), -6 (4.1%), -11 (2.0%) in case of low-risk HPV genotypes. Remarkably, the proportion of women infected with high-risk HPV genotypes (62.0%) was almost four times higher than those of women infected with low-risk HPV genotypes (14.7%) and high/low-risk HPV genotypes (12.0%). Among the 258 HPV-infected women, single infection was 175, double infection 66, triple infection 12, quadruple infection 4, quintuple infection 1, respectively. Our finding suggests that the introduction and development of effective HPV vaccines should consider the current status of HPV genotypic infection in South Korean women.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Laboratory Science
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• v.47 no.4
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• pp.259-266
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• 2015

Cervical cancer is the third most common cancer among women worldwide. Cervical cancer is significantly associated with human papillomavirus (HPV) infection. The prevalence of HPV infection is influenced by geography, immune status, sexual history and genetic factors. For example, geographically, HPV prevalence varies from 1.5% to 39%. However, little is known about the relationship between HPV prevalence and age. An analysis of HPV prevalence by age will help determine when high-risk groups are exposed to HPV. Such an analysis could also demonstrate a correlation between specific HPV genotypes and age. In addition, the analysis might clarify the optimum age for using vaccines. In this study, HPV prevalence and genotype distribution among Korean and Chinese women are analyzed by age. The REBA HPV-ID$^{(R)}$ assay (YD diagnostics, Yong-in, Republic of Korea) was used for detecting HPV genotypes in uterine cervical liquid-based cytology samples from 533 women from Korea and 324 from East China (Western Shandong province. Women with severe dysplasia such as SCC (Squamous cell carcinoma) and HSIL (High-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion) groups were primarily in their 40s and 50s, whereas women with mild and moderate dysplasia (ASCUS and LSIL groups) were primarily in their 30s and 40s. Women with HPV genotype 16 and 18 infections were primarily in their 40s. The results suggest that HPV infection is associated with certain age groups in the Korean population.

• Korean Journal of Poultry Science
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.255-263
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• 2010

Inclusion body hepatitis-hydropericardium syndrome (IBH-HPS) is an acute viral disease usually found in broilers aged from 3 to 5 weeks and causes up to 75% mortality. Among the 12 serotypes of fowl adenovirus group 1, serotype-4 (FAdV-4) was identified as a primary agent of IBH-HPS and was usually isolated in IBH-HPS cases in Korea since 2007. To prevent these IBH-HPS outbreaks in Korea, we developed the FAdV-4 inactivated vaccine using Korean isolate (ADL070244) and evaluated the efficacy of this vaccine. For the efficacy test, 2-week-old specific-pathogen-free (SPF) chickens intramuscularly inoculated with 1 or 2 dose of inactivated vaccine were used and challenged with FAdV-4 through either intramuscular or oral route at 2 weeks after vaccination. The vaccine induced good seroconversion which was confirmed by agar gel precipitation (AGP) test. In addition, the vaccine could decrease the FAdV-4 detection rate and histological lesion severity such as lymphocyte infiltration and necrosis in the liver comparing with those of non-vaccination group. Based on the current results, the developed FAdV-4 inactivated vaccine in this study was effective in the terms of reduction of virus detection rate and histological lesions severity. However, it was difficult to confirm the efficacy of the vaccine clearly because of no mortality and clinical signs in the non-vaccinated group after challenge. Therefore, we need further study to develop a standard challenged model system which could clearly evaluate the efficacy of the vaccines for FAdV-4.

• Pediatric Infection and Vaccine
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.181-190
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• 2014

Purpose: This study was performed to investigate the epidemiological trend of rotavirus acute gastroenteritis (RV-AGE) in children. Methods: A retrospective review was performed in patients (1 month to 18 years of age) with acute gastroenteritis at KEPCO Medical Center from September 2004 to August 2013. Comparative analyses were performed based on periods: pre-vaccine (2004-2006) and post-vaccine (2008-2012) in all patients; 2004-2006 (period A), 2007-2009 (period B) and 2010-2012 (period C) in patients under 5 years of age. Results: Proportion of RV-AGE decreased from 25.0% (337/1,346) in pre-vaccine period to 20.8% (459/2,210) in post-vaccine period (rate ratio (RR), 0.83 [95% CI, 0.73-0.93]; P=0.0029). The median age of patients with RV-AGE in post-vaccine period (2.6 years) was significantly (P<0.0001) higher than that in pre-vaccine period (1.6 years). In patients hospitalized with AGE, proportion of RV-AGE was significantly reduced in patients 6 to 23 months old (RR, 0.62 [95% CI, 0.51-0.75]; P<0.0001). Significant decline in proportion of RV-AGE was observed in patients under 5 years of age: period A, 26.9% (308/1,144); period B, 22.7% (295/1,299); period C, 20.6% (186/902) (P =0.0007). After the introduction of rotavirus vaccine, a significant decreasing trend of RV-AGE proportion was observed in patients 6 to 11 months old (P =0.0018) and 12 to 23 months old (P =0.0152). Conclusion: Decrease in RV-AGE proportion and increase in age of patients with RV-AGE were observed after the introduction of rotavirus vaccine in this single center study. Continued and systematic surveillance is needed to assess the impact of rotavirus vaccine.

• Proceedings of the Korean Journal of Food and Nutrition Conference
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• 1997.06b
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• pp.8-10
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• 1997

종양은 아직 그 발생 원인과 기작이 정확히 밝혀져 있지 않으므로 정확한 정의를 내리는 것은 어려우나 일반적으로 종양이란 정상 세포가 갖고 있는 세포 분열의 특이성을 상실하여 일어나는 조직의 자율적인 과잉 성장을 말한다. 이와 같은 세포의 비정상적인 증식에 의한 종양을 임상 및 병리 형태학적으로 양서 종양과 악성종양으로 분류한다. 양성 종양을 일으키는 종양 세포는 정상 세포와 비슷할 뿐 아니라 그 주변 세포들과 확실한 경계를 이루고 있으며 증식도 느리며 다른 부위로의 전이가 없다. 이에 반해 악성종양은 일반적으로 증식도 빠르고 이형의 세포로서 주변의 조직으로 확산, 전이될 뿐만 아니라 최종적으로 숙주인 개체를 사망시킨다. 악성종양은 다시 상피 조직에서 유례한 암, 비상피 조직에서 유래된 육종, 백혈구에서 유래된 백혈병 등으로 구별하지만 그의 본질은 거의 같으며 모든 악성종양은 통속적으로 암이라고 불리운다. 종양의 발생원인으로 크게 3가지로 나눌 수 있는데 화학물질, 바이러스 및 유전적 요인에 의한 것으로 알려졌다. 최초의 발암물질로 알려진 benzopyrene에 의한 발암 등 연구에 의해 화학적 발암원들은 직접 발암 물질로 작용하는 것이 아니라, 일단 체내에서 대사된 후 이들 대사 산물일 DNA 등에 작용함으로써 발암이 유도 되는 것으로 밝혀졌다. 이와 같이 화학적 변화를 거친 후에야 DNA에 영향을 미치는 것외에 다른 화학물질들은 또 다른 기작을 통해 암을 유발하는데 쥐의 피부에 benzopyrene을 한 번 처리하면 암을 유발하지 않으나 여기에 phorbol ester를 처리하면 높은 빈도로 암이 형성된다. 여기서 benzopyrene과 같이 세포의 DNA에 돌연변이를 일으키는 작용을 하는 발암물질을 발암개시제라 하고 phorbol ester처럼 그 자체로는 발암능이 없으나 발암개시제에 노출된 세포에 영향을 미쳐 발암능을 크게 강화시켜 주는 것을 발암촉진제라고 한다. 암은 세포증식 제어계에 DNA가 이상을 일으킨 현상을 말하는 데 이와 같은 DNA의 변형된 유전정보에 의해 암과 관련된 단백질을 합성하므로 이 DNA를 암유전자라 부르며 바이러스에서 유래된 것을 V-one 그리고 세포에서 유래된 것을 c-one이라 한다. 암유전자는 본래 암을 형성하기 위한 것이 아니라 증식제어 유전자로서 변이나 비정상으로 활성화 됨으로써 암을 유발시키므로 proto-oncogene이라 부른다. 또한 고등동물의 유전자 중에는 세포성장을 억제하는 유전자들이 있으며 이들은 세포의 성장 생존 분화를 조절하는 것으로 생각되고 있다. 따라서 이들 유전자는 세포의 암변형을 억제하는 기능을 가지고 있다. 이들 유전자의 이상으로 세포성장 억제기능이 상실되면 세포의 과잉 성장이 초래되면 결과적으로 암으로 유발하는 것으로 추측되고 있다. 최근의 연구에 의하면 암세포에서 암억제 유전자의 이상과 암유전자의 활성화가 함께 발견 되면서 정상세포가 암으로 변형되는 과정에는 암억제 유전자의 이상과 암유전자의 활성화가 동시에 관여한 가능성이 높은 것으로 알려져 있다. 정상 세포가 암을 유발하기 위해서는 발암의 다단계설에서와 같이 여러 단계의 변과가 필요한데 여러 가지 요인에 의해 정상세포의 염색체가 변화되어 정상세포들이 가지고 있는 세포분열의 특이성을 상실하고 증식이 빠르고 저항력이 강한 세포가 선택 되어지고 비정상 서ㅔ포으 과잉 분여러에 의해 종양이 형성되며 이어서 혈관의 신생을 촉진하는 맥관형성, 전이 등이 과정을 거쳐 신체의 다른 부위로 전이된다. 20세기 초까지는 암은 노화와 함께 자연발생적으로 일어나는 피할 수 없는 질병으로 여겨졌으며 그 치료도 조기에 발견된 암환자에게 외과적인 치료를 하는 것이 최선의 방법 이었다. 그러나 현재에는 암환자의 80% 이상이 환경적 요인에 의해 암이 발생 된다고 믿어지고 있다. 과거 치료에 중점을 둔 것에서 점차 예방의 가능성과 그 방법의 모색에 관심을 갖게 되었으며 치료적인 면에서도 외과적 수술 이외에 방사선 치료, 항암제의 투여 등 약물요법, 면역요법의 이용 이외에 더 나아가 gene theraph 및 tumor vaccines 개발에 대한 관심도 증가되고 있다. 국제암연구협회에서는 인간에게 발암이 가능한 물질의 종류를 정기적으로 발표하고 있는데 지금까지 발암 가능성이 높다고 널리 알려진 위험요인을 크게 나누어 보면 다음과 같다. 흡연, 음주, 식이요인, 호르몬 및 기타 요인으로 약물, 자외선 등을 들 수 있는데 현재까지 이들 요인에 의한 발암 기작이 완전히 규명된 것은 아니지만 이들에 의한 발암의 확률이 높다는 것은 사실이므로 이 위험요인에 노출되는 것을 방지함으로써 암발생을 예방할 수 있을 것이다. 암발생의 예방법으로는 암발생 자체를 예방하는 것과 이미 발생한 암환자를 조기 발견하고 치료하는 방법이 있을 수 있다. 현재까지의 여러 연구 결과들을 보면 유전적인 요인을 제외한 대부분의 발암 위험인자들은 개개인의 생활습관과 밀접히 관련되어 있음을 알 수 있다. 이를 바탕으로 1992년 대한 암협회에서는 '암 예방 14개 권장 사항'을 발표하여 국민 홍보활동을 하고 있는데 그 내용의 반 이상이 식생활 습관과 관련되어 있을 정도이므로 암예방에 있어서의 식품의 역할이 매우 크다 할 수 있다. 따라서 건전한 생활습관과 더불어 적절한 식품의 섭취는 암예방을 위한 기본이 될 것이다.