• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.32 no.11
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• pp.3893-3898
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• 2011

Cellular uptake of double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) triggers strong innate immune responses via activation of NF-${\kappa}B$ transcription factor. However, the detailed mechanism of dsDNA-mediated innate immune response remains yet to be elucidated. Here, we show that the expression of tazarotene-induced gene 3 (TIG3) is dramatically induced by dsDNA stimulation, and the siRNA-mediated down-regulation of TIG3 mRNA results in significant suppression of dsDNA-triggered cytokine expression. Because TIG3 has been previously shown to physically interact with transglutaminase (TG) 1 to activate TG activity, and TG2 has been shown to induce NF-${\kappa}B$ activity by inducing $I{\kappa}B{\alpha}$ polymerization, we tested whether TG also plays a role in dsDNA-mediated innate immune response. Pre-treatment of TG inhibitors dramatically reduces dsDNA-triggered cytokine induction. We also show that, in HeLa cells, TG2 is the major TG, and TIG3 physically interacts with TG2. Combined together, our results suggest a novel mechanism of dsDNA-triggered innate immune response which is critically dependent on TIG3 and TG2.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.37 no.4
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• pp.373-380
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• 2004

Objectives : There has been gradually increasing concern about the adverse health effects of electromagnetic radiation originating from cell phones which are widely used in modern life. Cell phone radiation may affect human health by increasing free radicals of human blood cells. This study has been designed to identify DNA damage of blood cells by electromagnetic radiation caused by cell phone use. Methods : This study investigated the health effect of acute exposure to commercially available cell phones on certain parameters such as an indicator of DNA damage for 14 healthy adult volunteers. Each volunteer during the experiment talked over the cell phone with the keypad facing the right side of the face for 4 hours. The single cell gel electrophoresis assay (Comet assay), which is very sensitive in detecting the presence of DNA strand-breaks and alkali-labile damage in individual cells, was used to assess peripheral blood cells (T-cells, B-cells, granulocytes) from volunteers before and after exposure to cell phone radiation. The parameters of Comet assay measured were Olive Tail Moment and Tail DNA %. Results : The Olive Tail Moment of B-cells and granulocytes and Tail DNA % of B-cells and granulocytes were increased by a statistically significant extent after 4-hour use of a cell phone compared with controls. Conclusion : It is concluded that cell phone radiation caused the DNA damage during the 4 hours of experimental condition. Nonetheless, this study suggested that cell phone use may increase DNA damage by electromagnetic radiation and other contributing factors.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.627-635
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• 2004

In order to distinguish the genetic polymorphism among the olive flounder (Paralichthys olivaceus) obtained from East sea of Jumunjin, aquaculture of Tongyoung and Geoje, and East sea of North Korea, the ND-4 and cytochrome b genes of olive flounder were divided into 5 regions. Each region was analyzed by degenerating gel electrophoresis scanning (DGES), and by subsequent DNA sequencing. The DGES disclosed characteristic DNA polymorphisms in ND-4-2 and ND-4-3 regions of olive flounder, which were also confirmed by the DNA sequencing. The olive flounders obtained from the different marine areas showed DNA mutations in ND-4-2 region (G390A, C402T, and A411G； GenBank： AB028664), and also showed frequent DNA mutations in ND-4-3 region (C515G, C537T, C538T, A567G, G714A, C736T, G756A, A759T, T817C, and T829G), white the cytochrome b gene showed no DNA mutation both in the DGES and DNA sequencing. These data suggest that the ND-4-2 and ND-4-3 regions are candidate loci to distinguish the origin of olive flounder, and that the DGES used in this study provided fast and reliable informations for the genetic polymorphism.

• The KIPS Transactions:PartB
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• v.14B no.6
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• pp.461-472
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• 2007

The emphasis in genome projects has Been moving towards the sequence analysis in order to extract biological "meaning"(e.g., evolutionary history of particular molecules or their functions) from the sequence. Especially. palindromic or direct repeats that appear in a sequence have a biophysical meaning and the problem is to recognize interesting patterns and configurations of words(strings of characters) over complementary alphabets. In this paper, we propose an algorithm to identify variable length palindromic pairs(longer than a threshold), where we can allow gaps(distance between words). The algorithm is called palindrome algorithm(PA) and has O(N) time complexity. A palindromic pair consists of a hairpin structure. By composing collected palindromic pairs we build n-pair palindromic patterns. In addition, we dot some of the longest pairs in a circle to represent the structure of a DNA sequence. We run the algorithm over several selected genomes and the results of E.coli K12 are presented. There existed very long palindromic pair patterns in the genomes, which hardly occur in a random sequence.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.283-290
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• 2012

In this study, we investigated the virological characteristics, HBV DNA levels and presence of mutations of "a" determinant in the HBsAg S gene in chronic hepatitis B patients with coexisting HBsAg and anti-HBs. The 18 patients who were diagnosed with chronic hepatitis B were both positive for HBsAg and anti-HBs. HBV Among them, 15 patients were DNA positive. The median of HBV DNA levels in serum was $2.18{\times}10^7$ copies/mL with the HBsAg+/anti-HBsAb+ patients. Also, 4 of 8 HBeAg negative patients had HBV DNA levels higher than $10^4$ copies/mL and the median of HBV DNA levels was $2.03{\times}10^6$ copies/mL, which were significantly high. These results showed that viral replication still existed in most of the patients of the concomitant HBsAg and anti-HBs, and even in the some HBeAg negative patients. Furthermore, mutation within the "a" determinant of HBV were found in 7 of 15 patients. The most frequent changes were located at positions aa126. In addition, one mutation observed for HBsAg only positive.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.106-110
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• 2003

Stolbur Phytoplasma was detected from Lilium Oriental hybrids showing flattened stem and flower clustering. The presence of phytoplasma was demonstrated using polymerase chain reaction（PCR) assays with phyto-plasma-universal（P1/P6）and stolbur phytoplasma-specific 16F1/R1-S primer pairs amplifying phytoplasma 16S rDNA regions. Nucleotide suquences of the phytoplasma 16S rDNA were determined. Nucleic acid extracted from lily amplified 1.5 kb DNA with a phytoplasma universal primer pair. In nested PCR, 1.1 kb PCR product was obtained using specific primer pair, indicating an isolate of stolbur phytoplasma. Nucleotide sequence of phytoplasma 16S rDNA reported in this study showed 99.5% and 99.1％ identities with two known stolbur phytoplamas (16Sr XII-A). Also, it exhibited a sequence homology of 98.0％ with phormium yellow leaf (16Sr XII-B), and 97.9％ with Australian grapevine yellows (16Sr XII-B). Meanwhile, it showed 98.1% identity with strawberry green petal phytoplama, (16Sr1-C), and 94.7 % with American aster yellows (16Sr1-B). Homology percentage of the 16S rDNA nucleotide sequence suggests that this phytoplama could be classified into the stolbur phytoplasma, subgroup A (16Sr XII-A), as a type strain stolbur.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.43 no.1
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• pp.1-6
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• 2007

We describe a multiplex PCR method that can detect and differentiate simultaneously four different kinds of DNA viruses, Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), cytomegalovirus (CMV), hepatitis B virus (HBV) and parvovirus B19 (B19). Primers for the multiplex PCR reaction were designed to amplify specific regions of the EBV (pol), CMV (pol), HBV (pol) and B19 (ns) viral genomes and used to simultaneously detect individual viruses. In order to achieve optimal sensitivity and specificity for multiplex PCR, the thermo-cycling parameters, primer sequences, and concentration of each reaction components were optimized systematically. The sensitivity of the detection method ranged between 5 and 10 copies of viral genome with a mixture of multiple primer pairs. Furthermore, this highly sensitive test showed no cross-reactivity among the four viruses. Thus, the results obtained in this study provide evidence that the assay system is a good tool for supporting the diagnosis of viral infection and contamination.

• Korean journal of applied entomology
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.23-30
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• 1998

Restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) of a DNA has been a useful tool for analyzing genetic variation. This research was performed to establish an RFLP analytic method on the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) of the beet armyworm, Spodoptera exigua (Hiibner). To do this, total size of the mtDNA was measured and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) primers were selected. Its mitochondrial genome size was ca. 16kb. From a serial PCR test of 29 primers refered to the compilation of Simon et al. (1994), 22 primers were selected to amplify its mtDNA fragments. These primers resulted in short (300-700 bp) or long (1000-2000 bp) DNA products which represented a total or partial sequence of each of CO-I, CO-11, Cyt-B, ND-1, 12s rRNA, 16s rRNA, and some tRNAs. PCR-RFLP was performed in some variable mtDNA regions with 8 kinds of 4bp recognizing restriction enzymes. Different populations from Andong, Kyungsan, and Sunchun did not show any restriction site polymorphisms but had some length variation in certain regions of mtDNA.

• Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.125-135
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• 2012

This study was carried out to understand the correlation between phylogenetic relationships based on 18S rDNA sequences and growth by salinity of Chlorella-like species. The 18S rDNA sequences of 71 Chlorella-like species which were mainly collected from Korean waters were analyzed. The 18S rDNA sequences of Chlorella-like species were divided into three groups (group A, B and C) and group B was further divided into three subgroups (subgroup B-1, B-2 and B-3). Thirty-seven Chlorella-like species in group A grew well at high salinity (32 psu) but the other groups grew well in freshwater. The sequence identities of the species in group A and B were 97.2-99.5%, but those of 6 species in group C ("Chlorella" saccharophila), which contained group I intron sequences region were 75.0-75.4%. Two representative species of each group were cultured at different salinities (0, 16 and 32 psu) to examine the correlation between the molecular phylogenetic groups and the phenotypic characteristics on cell growth and size by different salinities. The size of cell cultured at different salinities varied according to the species of each molecular phylogenetic group. The size of "Chlorella" saccharophila in group C was bigger and more obviously elliptical rather than that of the other Chlorella-like species. Considering the results on molecular and phenotypic characteristics, the group A and B belonged to Chlorellaceae, but group C was distinctly different from them.

• The Journal of Korean Society of Virology
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.129-138
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• 1998

Bovine growth hormone (bGH) gene was expressed in an insect Spodoptera frugiperda cell line using a Baculovirus, Hyphantria cunea nuclear polyhedrosis virus (HcNPV). The bGH gene in pbGH plasmid was sequenced and amplified by PCR technique with two primers containing NcoI sites. The bGH gene consisted of 654 bp (217 amino acid residues), the 5'-untranslated region of the cloned bGH cDNA contains 56 bp, and the 3'-untranslated region contains 145 bp and two pallindromic regions. The amplified bGH gene DNA fragment (654 bp) was inserted into the NcoI site of the pHcEVII vector, which was named pHcbGH. The pHcbGH transfer vector DNA and the wild type HcNPV DNA were cotransfected into S. frugiperda cells to construct a recombinant virus. Eight recombinant viruses were selected and named HcbGH. One clone, HcbGH-4-1 showed largest plaque size, therefore the recombinant virus was further studied. The multiplication pattern of the recombinant HcbGH-4-1 was similar to that of the wild type HcNPV. The bGH gene DNA in the HcbGH-4-1 recombinant was confirmed by Southern blot hybridization. The amount of the bGH (217 amino acid residues, 21 kDa) produced in S. frugiperda cells infected with the HcbGH-4-1 recombinant was approximately 5.5 ng per ml ($10^6$ cells) by radioimmunoassay.