• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.436-439
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• 2004

Mubigangjang-Ju (MGJ) is a traditional wine, fermented extract of Cynanchum wilfordii, Angelicae gigantis and Epimedium koreanum etc. In the present study, we comparatively investigated the immune-enhancing effect of fermented extract (MGJ) and water extract (WE). Forced swimming test (FST) was performed as a model of activity test in mice and measured blood urea nitrogen (BUN), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), lactic dehydrogenase (LDH), glucose (Glc) and total protein (TP) in the serum. Each extracts were orally administered into mice, 10 ㎖/kg, once per day for 7 days using a feeding atraumatic needle. After 3 days, on FST, the immobility time was decreased in the MGJ-fed group (133.7±18.6 s) in comparison with the saline-fed group (155.8±16.6 s). After 7 days, the immobility time was significantly decreased in the MGJ-fed group (105.3±12.7 s) in comparison with the saline-fed group (171.3±8.1 s). In addition, the content of AST was significantly decreased and the contents of BUN, ALT and LDH in the blood serum was also decreased. Whereas, the content of Glc tend to increase and TP level was not changed. However, WE had no effect on all experiments. The present results suggest that fermented extract was more effective than water extract and it may be useful for the immune-enhancing agent.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.451-456
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• 2004

Based on the data from our previous studies, four new diabetic remedies were composed with the addition of Coicis Semen into Okchun-san (OCH), Commelinae Herba into Gangsim-tang (GST) , Scrophulariae Radix into Sunki-san (SKS), and Erythrinae Cortex into Yukmijihuang-hwan (YMG). The water extracts of these new remedies were treated in 3T3-L1 fibroblasts and adipocytes in order to investigate insulin-like substances and insulin sensitizers, respectively. With and without differentiation inducers, unmodified SKS (SKS-O) treatment induced 3T3-L1 fibroblasts into adipocytes more than the control. However, without inducers, YMG treatment, but not SKS, induced the differentiation more than the control among modified remedies. Without inducers, SKS, OCH as well as YMG increased the induction of differentiation from 3T3-L1 fibroblasts into adipocytes, compared to the control. The treatment of OCH and YMG with 1 ng/mL insulin increased glucose uptake much more than only insulin 1 ng/mL treatment. Thus, OCH and YMG contained increased insulin actions. In conclusions, the modified remedies, OCH and YMG, contained insulin-like substances and insulin sensitizers, and they can be improved the hypoglycemic effects.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.145-148
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• 2006

A new functional lipolytic enzyme (AT4) has recently been found from Agrobacterium tumefaciens C58 Cereon using a genome-wide approach. The enzyme has some sequence similarity to E. coli acetyl hydrolase, Emericella nidulans lipase, Moraxella sp. lipase, Acinetobacter lwoffii esterase, and Streptomyces hygroscopicus acetyl hydrolase. However, the sequence similarities are very low (less than $25\%$), suggesting that it is a new lipase/esterase enzyme. ill the present study, intact cell of the A. tumefaciens strain was shown to have lipolytic activity on a tributyrin-LB plate. The AT4 gene was then expressed at a high level in E. coli BL21 (DE3) cells and the enzyme was purified simply by Ni-NTA column chromatography. The purified enzyme showed hydrolytic activity toward p-nitrophenyl caproate, but not toward olive oil, suggesting that the AT4 enzyme was a typical esterase rather than lipase. AT4 esterase had a maximum hydrolytic activity at $45^{\circ}C$ and pH 8.0, when p-nitrophenyl caproate was used as a substrate. It was relatively stable up to $40^{\circ}C$ and at pH 5.0-9.0. Calcium ion and EDT A did not affect the activity and thermal stability of the enzyme. As for substrate specificity, AT4 enzyme could rapidly hydrolyze acetyl and butyl groups from p-nitrophenyl esters and 1-naphthyl esters. In addition, it also released acetyl residues from acetylated glucose and xylose substrates. Therefore, this new esterase enzyme might be used as a biocatalyst in acetylation and deacetylation reactions performed in the fine chemical industry.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.154-161
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• 2011

L. lactis sk071115 has been shown to grow more actively and generate lower levels of lactate in glucose-defined medium with nitrate than in medium with Mn(IV). By adding Mn(IV) to a L. lactis culture, lactate production was relatively reduced in combination with Mn(II) production, but cell mass production levels did not increase. Both cell-free extract and intact L. lactis cells reacted electrochemically with Mn(IV) but did not react with Mn(II) upon cyclic voltammetry using neutral red (NR) as an electron mediator. A modified graphite felt cathode with NR (NR-cathode) was employed to induce electrochemical reducing equivalence for bacterial metabolism. Cell-free L. lactis extract catalyzed the reduction of Mn(IV) to Mn(II) under both control and electrochemical reduction conditions; however, the levels of Mn(II) generated under electrochemical reduction conditions were approximately 4 times those generated under control conditions. The levels of Mn(II) generated by the catalysis of L. lactis immobilized in the NR-cathode (L-NR-cathode) under electrochemical reduction conditions were more than 4 times that generated under control conditions. Mn(II) production levels were increased by approximately 2.5 and 4.5 times by the addition of citrate to the reactant under control and electrochemical reduction conditions, respectively. The cumulative Mn(II) produced from manganese ore by catalysis of the L-NR-cathode for 30 days reached levels of approximately 3,800 and 16,000 mg/l under control and electrochemical reduction conditions, respectively. In conclusion, the electrochemical reduction reaction generated by the NR-cathode activated the biochemical reduction of Mn(IV) to Mn(II) by L. lactis.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.22 no.8
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• pp.1141-1147
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• 2012

Polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) is a class of biodegradable plastics that have great potential applications in the near future. In this study, the micro-biodiversity and productivity of PHA-accumulating bacteria in activated sludge from a domestic wastewater treatment plant were investigated. A previously reported primer set and a self-designed primer set (phaCF1BO/phaCR2BO) were both used to amplify the PHA synthase (phaC) gene of isolated colonies. The new primers demonstrated higher sensitivity for phaC, and combining the PCR results of the two primer sets was able to widen the range of detected genera and raise the sensitivity to nearly 90%. Results showed that 85.3% of the identified bacteria were Gram-negative, with Ralstonia as the dominant genus, and 14.7% were Gram-positive. In addition, Zoogloea and Rhizobium contained the highest amounts of intracellular PHA. It is apparent that glucose was a better carbon source than pentone or tryptone for promoting PHA production in Micrococcus. Two different classes, class I and class II, of phaC were detected from alphaproteobacteria, betaproteobacteria, and gammaproteobacteria, indicating the wide diversity of PHA-accumulating bacteria in this particular sampling site. Simultaneous wastewater treatment and PHA production is promising by adopting the high PHA-accumulating bacteria isolated from activated sludge.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.19 no.10
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• pp.1191-1196
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• 2009

The production of Streptomyces griseus trypsin (SGT) by S. griseus IFO13350 transformed with the expression vector pWHM3-TR1R2, containing sprT encoding SGT and the two positive regulatory genes sgtR1 and sgtR2, was investigated in various media. Cultivation in Ferm-0 gave 1.4 times more trypsin activity than in C5/L medium. In addition, replacement of 2% glucose and 1% skim milk in Ferm-0 with 2% dextrin and 1% tryptone (designated Ferm-II) enhanced trypsin activity 4.1-fold. To simplify the purification process, the supernatant from the S. griseus transformant cultured in Ferm-II medium was fractionated with ammonium sulfate (25-55%), then subjected to Hitrap Benzamidine FF affinity column chromatography. The specific activity of SGT purified by one-step chromatography was 69,550 unit/mg protein and the overall purification yield was above 8%, indicating that this method is more effective than those previously reported. Purified SGT was most active at pH 8.0 and $50^{\circ}C$, and it maintained activity between pH 7.0 and 9.0 and at temperatures up to $70^{\circ}C$. These enzymatic properties are very similar to those of authentic eukaryotic trypsin purified from bovine pancreas.

• Journal of Energy Engineering
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.1-5
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• 2015

This study is to investigate the effect of torrefaction on enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocellulosic biomass for bio-ethanol production. As a pretreatment, the torrefaction of lignocellulosic biomass was conducted in temperature of $250{\sim}350^{\circ}C$ in the absence of oxygen. Tween-80, nonionic surfactant, was tested to enhance saccharification efficiency by coping with hydrophobicity resulted from torrefaction. As a result, the glucose production from enzymatic hydrolysis of biomass pretreated by torrefaction was greater than that obtained from the non-pretreated biomass. Sugar conversion was higher when the biomass was saccharified with addition of tween-80. It was found that torrefaction can be applied as a preptreatment for lignocellulosic biomass and tween-80 is needed to enhance its enzyme saccharification.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.317-325
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• 2001

For heuristic purposes, the relative ratio of urease contents inside and outside cells was surveyed using nine ureB+ strains of Helicobacter pylori. the ratio of the enzyme specific activity appeared to vary greatly between the various H. pylori strains, ranging from 0.5 to 2.5. Besides the above compartment, urease was also richly found in the membrane fraction, especially in either peripheral or integral form. The urease distribution across the H. pylori membrane was significantly influenced by the ambient pH; the specific activity of external urease was highest at pH 5.5 with a narrow plateau, whereas the internal specific activity was highest within a pH range of 4.5 to 6.5 with a broad plateau. These finding strongly suggest that H. pylori urease is secretory and responded to the external pH. However, at pH 4.0 or below, no urease activity was detected in either the internal or external compartment, although an increase in the color development with 2,4,6-trinitrobenzene sulfonate (TNBS) was observed. Sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) demonstrated that these phenomena may be related to a specific proteolysis in certain proteins, including urease or ${\gamma}$-glutamyl transpeptidase. Interestingly, the effect of ammonium ions n alleviating the enzyme inactivation inside the H. pylori cells was remarkably similar to that of D-glucose. In addition, it would appear that the cation acted as a surrogate of not only $Na^+$ but also $K^+$ thereby increasing the H. pylori P-type ATPase activity. This is of great interest, as it implies that the urease action in H. pylori is indispensible at any locus.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.23 no.8
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• pp.1060-1069
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• 2013

Genome organization near cyclomaltodextrinases (CDases) was analyzed and compared for four different hyperthermophilic archaea: Thermococcus, Pyrococcus, Staphylothermus, and Thermofilum. A gene (CL1_0884) encoding a putative CDase from Thermococcus sp. CL1 (tccd) was cloned and expressed in Escherichia coli. TcCD was confirmed to be highly thermostable, with optimal activity at $85^{\circ}C$. The melting temperature of TcCD was determined to be $93^{\circ}C$ by both differential scanning calorimetry and differential scanning fluorimetry. A size-exclusion chromatography experiment showed that TcCD exists as a monomer. TcCD preferentially hydrolyzed ${\alpha}$-cyclodextrin (${\alpha}$-CD), and at the initial stage catalyzed a ring-opening reaction by cleaving one ${\alpha}$-1,4-glycosidic linkage of the CD ring to produce the corresponding single maltooligosaccharide. Furthermore, TcCD could hydrolyze branched CDs (G1-${\alpha}$-CD, G1-${\beta}$-CD, and G2-${\beta}$-CD) to yield significant amounts (45%, 40%, and 46%) of isomaltooligosaccharides (panose and $6^2$-${\alpha}$-maltosylmaltose) in addition to glucose and maltose. This enzyme is one of the most thermostable maltogenic amylases reported, and might be of potential value in the production of isomaltooligosaccharides in the food industry.

• The Korean Journal of Physiology and Pharmacology
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.375-382
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• 1999

Growing evidence indicates that enhanced generation or actions of nitric oxide (NO) are implicated in the pathogenesis of hypertension in spontaneously hypertensive rats and diabetic nephropathy in streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic rats. We investigated whether inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) expression in STZ-induced diabetic rats is responsible for the alterations of vascular reactivity. Diabetic state was confirmed 28 days after injection of STZ (i.p) in rats by measuring blood glucose. In order to evaluate whether short term (4 weeks) diabetic state is related with altered vascular reactivity caused by iNOS expression, isometric tension experiments were performed. In addition, plasma nitrite/nitrate (NOx) levels and expression of iNOS in the lung and aorta of control and STZ-treated rats were compared by using Griess reagent and Western analysis, respectively. Results indicated that STZ-treated rats increased the maximal contractile response of the aorta to phenylephrine (PE), and high $K^+,$ while the sensitivity remained unaltered. Endothelium-dependent relaxation, but not SNP-mediated relaxation, was reduced in STZ-treated rats. Plasma nitrite/nitrates are significantly increased in STZ-treated rats compared to controls. The malondialdehyde (MDA) contents of liver, serum, and aorta of diabetic rats were also significantly increased. Furthermore, nitrotyrosine, a specific foot print of peroxynitrite, was significantly increased in endothelial cells and smooth muscle layers in STZ-induced diabetic aorta. Taken together, the present findings indicate that enhanced release of NO by iNOS along with increased lipid peroxidation in diabetic conditions may be responsible, at least in part, for the augmented contractility, possibly through the modification of endothelial integrity or ecNOS activity of endothelium in STZ-diabetic rat aorta.