• Clean Technology
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.37-46
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• 2024

Environmental problems caused by plastic waste have been continuously growing around the world, and plastic waste is increasing even faster after COVID-19. In particular, PP and PE account for more than half of all plastic production, and the amount of waste from these two materials is at a serious level. As a result, researchers are searching for an alternative method to plastic recycling, and plastic pyrolysis is one such alternative. In this paper, a numerical study was conducted on the pyrolysis behavior of non-condensable gas to predict the chemical reaction behavior of the pyrolysis gas. Based on gas products estimated from preceding literature, the behavior of non-condensable gas was analyzed according to temperature and residence time. Numerical analysis showed that as the temperature and residence time increased, the production of H₂ and heavy hydrocarbons increased through the conversion of the non-condensable gas, and at the same time, the CH₄ and C₆H₆ species decreased by participating in the reaction. In addition, analysis of the production rate showed that the decomposition reaction of C₂H₄ was the dominant reaction for H₂ generation. Also, it was found that more H₂ was produced by PE with higher C₂H₄ contents. As a future work, an experiment is needed to confirm how to increase the conversion rate of H₂ and carbon in plastics through the various operating conditions derived from this study's numerical analysis results.

• Korean Journal of Medicinal Crop Science
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• v.25 no.5
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• pp.315-321
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• 2017

Background: Glycyrrhiza uralensis Radix (GR) is a crude drugs used in Asian countries that has been reported to prevent the progression of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease. The present study examined whether GR and its active compounds, glycyrrhizic acid (GA) and isoliquiritigenin (IL), exerted protective effects on $H_2O_2$-induced oxidative damage in C6 glial cells. Methods and Results: We exposed C6 glial cells to hydrogen peroxide ($H_2O_2$) for 24 h and investigated the cellular response to GR and its active compounds by evaluating cell viability, reactivie oxygen species (ROS) production, and apoptosis-related protein expression. GR successfully mitigated the reduced cell viability and ROS production induced by $H_2O_2$ in C6 glial cells, IL and GA significantly increased the cell viability and decreased ROS production. In addition, IL and GA down-regulated apoptotic Baxdependent caspase-3 activation, but each compound exerted different mechanisms, i.e., IL dose-dependently decreased ROS production and, GA up-regulated anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 expression. Conclusions: These results demonstrated that GR and its active components, IL and GA, exhibit potential for use as natural neurodegenerative agents for the modulation of apoptosis in C6 glial cells.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.29 no.8
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• pp.1609-1612
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• 2008

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.30 no.8
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• pp.1244-1251
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• 2020

Phospholipase A₂ (PLA₂) from Streptomyces violaceoruber is a lipolytic enzyme used in a wide range of industrial applications including production of lysolecithins and enzymatic degumming of edible oils. We have therefore investigated expression and secretion of PLA₂ in two workhorse microbes, Pichia pastoris and Escherichia coli. The PLA₂ was produced to an activity of 0.517 ± 0.012 U/ml in the culture broth of the recombinant P. pastoris. On the other hand, recombinant E. coli BL21 star (DE3), overexpressing the authentic PLA₂ (P-PLA₂), showed activity of 17.0 ± 1.3 U/ml in the intracellular fraction and 21.7 ± 0.7 U/ml in the culture broth. The extracellular PLA2 activity obtained with the recombinant E. coli system was 3.2-fold higher than the corresponding value reached in a previous study, which employed recombinant E. coli BL21 (DE3) overexpressing codon-optimized PLA₂. Finally, we observed that the extracellular PLA₂ from the recombinant E. coli P-PLA₂ culture was able to hydrolyze 31.1 g/l of crude soybean lecithin, an industrial substrate, to a conversion yield of approximately 95%. The newly developed E. coli-based PLA₂ expression system led to extracellular production of PLA₂ to a productivity of 678 U/l·h, corresponding to 157-fold higher than that obtained with the P. pastoris-based system. This study will contribute to the extracellular production of a catalytically active PLA₂.

• The Korean Journal of Ecology
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.107-114
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• 2004

Tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) seedlings exposed to various concentrations of $CdC1_2$ (0∼100 $\mu$M) in the nutrient solution for up to 9 days were analyzed with the seedling growth, $H_2O_2$ production, glutathione levels and activity changes of enzymes related to $H_2O_2$ removal. The growth of seedlings was inhibited with over 50 $\mu$M Cd, whereas the levels of $H_2O_2$ and glutathione were enhanced with Cd exposure level and time. Meanwhile, Cd exposure increased the activities of catalase (CAT) and glutathione reductase (GR) but decreased the activities of dehydroascorbate acid reductase (DHAR) and ascorbate peroxidase (APX) in both leaves and roots. These results suggest that the altered activities of antioxidant enzymes particularly involved in the $H_2O_2$ removal and the subsequent $H_2O$$_2$ accumulation could induce the Cd-induced phytotoxicity.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.62 no.1
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• pp.36-43
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• 2024

Fishing net waste (FNW) constitutes over half of all marine plastic waste and is a major contributor to the degradation of marine ecosystems. While current treatment options for FNW include incineration, landfilling, and mechanical recycling, these methods often result in low-value products and pollutant emissions. Importantly, FNWs, comprised of plastic polymers, can be converted into valuable resources like syngas and pyrolysis oil through pyrolysis. Thus, this study presents a process for generating high-purity hydrogen (H₂) by catalytically pyrolyzing FNW in a CO₂ environment. The proposed process comprises of three stages: First, the pretreated FNW undergoes Ni/SiO₂ catalytic pyrolysis under CO₂ conditions to produce syngas and pyrolysis oil. Second, the produced pyrolysis oil is incinerated and repurposed as an energy source for the pyrolysis reaction. Lastly, the syngas is transformed into high-purity H₂ via the Water-Gas-Shift (WGS) reaction and Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA). This study compares the results of the proposed process with those of traditional pyrolysis conducted under N₂ conditions. Simulation results show that pyrolyzing 500 kg/h of FNW produced 2.933 kmol/h of high-purity H₂ under N₂ conditions and 3.605 kmol/h of high-purity H₂ under CO₂ conditions. Furthermore, pyrolysis under CO₂ conditions improved CO production, increasing H₂ output. Additionally, the CO₂ emissions were reduced by 89.8% compared to N₂ conditions due to the capture and utilization of CO₂ released during the process. Therefore, the proposed process under CO₂ conditions can efficiently recycle FNW and generate eco-friendly hydrogen product.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.61 no.3
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• pp.412-418
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• 2023

The surge in the oil prices, increasing global population, climate change, and waste management problems are the major issues which have led to the development of biofuels from lignocellulosic wastes. Cellulosic or second generation (2G) bioethanol is produced from lignocellulosic biomass via pretreatment, hydrolysis, and fermentation. Pretreatment of lignocellulose is of considerable interest due to its influence on the technical, economic and environmental sustainability of cellulosic ethanol production. In this study, furniture waste sawdust was subjected to alkaline peroxide (H₂O₂) for the production of reducing sugars. Sawdust was pretreated at different concentrations from 1-3% H₂O₂ (v/v) loadings at a pH of 11.5 for a residence time of 15-240 min at 50, 75 and 90 ℃. Optimum pretreatment conditions, such as time of reaction, operating temperature, and concentration of H₂O₂, were varied and evaluated on the basis of the amount of total reducing sugars produced. It was found that the changes in the amount of lignin directly affected the yield of reducing sugars. A maximum of 50% reduction in the lignin composition was obtained, which yielded a maximum of 75.3% total reducing sugars yield and 3.76 g/L of glucose. At optimum pretreatment conditions of 2% H₂O₂ loading at 75 ℃ for 150 min, 3.46 g/L glucose concentration with a 69.26% total reducing sugars yield was obtained after 48 hr. of the hydrolysis process. Pretreatment resulted in lowering of crystallinity and distortion of the sawdust after the pretreatment, which was further confirmed by XRD and SEM results.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.496-502
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• 2015

Polyketide secondary metabolites share common precursor pools, acyl-CoA. Thus, the effects of engineering strategies for heterologous and native secondary metabolite production are often determined by the measurement of pikromycin in Streptomyces venezuelae. It is hard to compare the effectiveness of engineering targets among published data owing to the different pikromycin production media used from one study to the other. To determine the most important nutritional factor and establish optimal culture conditions, medium optimization of pikromycin from Streptomyces venezuelae ATCC 15439 was studied with a statistical method, Plackett-Burman design. Nine variables (glucose, sucrose, peptone, (NH₄)₂SO₄, K₂HPO₄, KH₂PO₄, NaCl, MgSO₄·7H₂O, and CaCO₃) were analyzed for their effects on a response, pikromycin. Glucose, K₂HPO₄, and CaCO₃ were determined to be the most significant factors. The path of the steepest ascent and response surface methodology about the three selected components were performed to study interactions among the three factors, and the fine-tune concentrations for maximized product yields. The significant variables and optimal concentrations were 139 g/1 sucrose, 5.29 g/l K₂HPO₄, and 0.081 g/l CaCO₃, with the maximal pikromycin yield of 35.5 mg/l. Increases of the antibiotics production by 1.45-fold, 1.3-fold, and 1.98-fold, compared with unoptimized medium and two other pikromycin production media SCM and SGGP, respectively, were achieved.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.21 no.6
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• pp.643-650
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• 2005

In order to treat leachate from aged landfill site effectively, removal of biologically recalcitrant organic matter and denitrification efficiency were evaluated through the combination of $H_2O_2/O_3$ AOP pretreatment process and UASB process. The results can be summarized as follows. In case of leachate having low COD/N ratio from aged landfill site, it is possible to increase available COD for denitrification in nitrate utilizing denitrification and nitrite utilizing denitrification both by enhancing biodegradability of recalcitrant organic matter as applying $H_2O_2/O_3$ AOP to pretreatment process. In this experiment, it is found that available COD for denitrification can be increased to 1.0 and 0.4 g/day, respectively. Comparison has been made between requiring COD and available COD for denitrification in each experimental stages. It is expected that high rate of denitrification can be achieved with leachate from young landfill site because higher amount of available COD for denotrification is present in the leachate than the amount of requiring COD for denitrification. Especially, In leachate from aged landfill site with low COD/N ratio, it can be concluded that denitrification using nitrite nitrogen can enhance overall denitrification performance efficiently because denitrification using nitrite nitrogen requires less amount of carbon source than denitrification using nitrate nitrogen. Comparing the biogas production rate and nitrogen content of biogas under the condition of same amount of nitrate and nitrite addition, biogas production and nitrogen content of biogas are increased during denitrification after $H_2O_2/O_3$ AOP pretreatment process. Therefore, it can be confirmed that COD/N ratio in the leachate is increased. Applying $H_2O_2/O_3$ AOP as pretreatment system of landfill leachate seems to have little economic benefit because it requires additional carbon source to denitrify ammonia nitrogen in leachate coming from aged landfill site. However, it is possible to apply this pretreatment process to leachate from old landfill site in view of AOP process can achieve removal of biologically recalcitrant organic matter and increase of available COD for denitrification simultaneously.

• Conservation Science in Museum
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• v.16
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• pp.138-153
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• 2015

Wooden standing Bodhisattva in the collection of the National Museum of Korea (Bon 8239) was purchased as part of the museum's Central Asian collection during the Museum of Japanese Goverment General of Korea. The wooden statue exhibiting classical characteristics of Song Dynasty Buddhist sculptures is colored on the whone. The result of condition check for exhibition in 2014, it has severely damaged, with discoloring and exfoliation in color pigment and crack of wood observed in various areas. The object was therefore treated for conservation. A series of analysis were performed also at this time to determine the production technique and the materials, including testing of the X-ray penetration depth, X-ray fluorescence analysis and wood species analysis. This revealed that the statue was made by joining several separate pieces of wood. As for color pigments, the white pigment was either chalk (CaCO₃) or gypsum(CaSO₄·2H₂O), and the green pigment was emerald green (Cu(C₂H₃O₂)₂·3Cu(AsO₂)₂). The red pigment appeared to be lead red(Pb₃O₄) and the blue pigment was ultramarine blue (3Na₂O·3Al₂O₃·6SiO₂·2Na₂S). All the pigments were repainted in later eras. The analysis, indicated that the wood was derived from a tree of the genus Populus, family Salicaceae. The wooden standing Bodhisattva was repaired and reinforced with natural materials and was brought to a stable condition necessary for display.