• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.309-317
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• 1987

It was known that normal-haemolymph from the 3rd instar larvae of Lucillia illustris contain a lysozyme (or lysozyme-like substance) with bactericidal activity to fram positive bacteria, and the bactericidal activity of injured-haemolymph was increased significantly after injuring the body wall. To elucidate the defence mechanism of insect against the nonpathogenic bacteria, the immune-haemolymph against Escherichia coli K-12 was prepared after immunization. The bactericidal activity between injured and immune-haemolymph was compared, and it was revealed that the immune-haemolymph showed higher titer of bactericidal activity to fram positive bacteria as well as to Escherichia coli. The bactericidal substance from the immune-haemolymph was purified through a successive chromatographies on Sephacryl S-300 and CM-Sepharose CL-6B, and it was characterized as a basic protein in nature with heat stable property at acidic conditions.

• Journal of Marine Bioscience and Biotechnology
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.12-23
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• 2023

Sargassum horneri (SH), a brown macroalgae, has medicinal properties. The present study investigated the immune-enhancing effects of SH extract on peritoneal macrophages (PM). The SH significantly increased the production of tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and nitric oxide (NO) in PM. It was confirmed that SH significantly increased NO expression through the increase of iNOS protein expression, which is the up-regulation pathway. Additionally, it was determined if SH activates the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway, an upper regulatory mechanism that influences TNF-α, IL-6, and NO expression. Consequently, SH significantly increased the phosphorylation of p38, extracellular signal-regulated kinases (ERK), and c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK), all of which are MAPK pathway proteins. Moreover, the immune-enhancing effects of SH on another macrophage cell line, bone marrow-derived macrophages were investigated. It was observed that SH significantly enhanced TNF-α, IL-6, and NO production. Overall, this study demonstrates the immune-enhancing effects of SH on macrophages via activated MAPK pathway. Therefore, it suggests that SH has the potential to improve immunological activity in various macrophage cell lines and can be useful as an immune-enhancing treatment.

• Journal of Acupuncture Research
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.329-343
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• 2023

Recently, acupuncture has demonstrated extraordinary clinical results in the treatment of several categories of health conditions worldwide. The mechanisms of action of acupuncture (including immune mechanisms) have been investigated by biomedical studies over the last few decades. The immune mechanisms of representative clinical conditions and their clinical effects were thoroughly assessed, with a comprehensive investigation into the mechanisms of action of acupuncture (including immune responses) in this study. Conditions such as stroke, migraine, depression, chronic fatigue syndrome, lower back pain, hypertension, irritable bowel syndrome, sepsis, and allergic diseases were meticulously examined. This in-depth analysis aims to ensure a foundational understanding of the immune mechanisms involved in acupuncture, thereby serving as an initial step toward integrating the impact of acupuncture on the immune system.

• IMMUNE NETWORK
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.2.1-2.22
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• 2022

Targeting immune evasion via immune checkpoint pathways has changed the treatment paradigm in cancer. Since CTLA-4 antibody was first approved in 2011 for treatment of metastatic melanoma, eight immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) centered on PD-1 pathway blockade are approved and currently administered to treat 18 different types of cancers. The first part of the review focuses on the history of CTLA-4 and PD-1 discovery and the preclinical experiments that demonstrated the possibility of anti-CTLA-4 and anti-PD-1 as anti-cancer therapeutics. The approval process of clinical trials and clinical utility of ICIs are described, specifically focusing on non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), in which immunotherapies are most actively applied. Additionally, this review covers the combination therapy and novel ICIs currently under investigation in NSCLC. Although ICIs are now key pivotal cancer therapy option in clinical settings, they show inconsistent therapeutic efficacy and limited responsiveness. Thus, newly proposed action mechanism to overcome the limitations of ICIs in a near future are also discussed.

• IMMUNE NETWORK
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.1-6
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• 2008

Apoptosis signal-regulating kinase 1 (ASK1), a mitogen- activated protein kinase kinase kinase, plays pivotal roles in stress responses. In addition, ASK1 has emerged as a key regulator of immune responses elicited by pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) and endogenous danger signals. Recent studies have demonstrated that reactive oxygen species (ROS)-dependent activation of ASK1 is required for LPS-stimulated cytokine production as well as extracellular ATP-induced apoptosis in immune cells. The mechanism of ROS-dependent regulation of ASK1 activity by thioredoxin and TRAFs has been well characterized. In this review, we focus on the molecular details of the activation of ASK1 and its involvement in innate immunity.

• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
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• v.44 no.4
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• pp.420-431
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• 2016

The complement system comprises a set of essential molecules that bridge the innate and adaptive immune responses. Research has focused on how the complement system's destructive mechanism could potentially be harnessed for cancer treatment. However, cancer subverts the complement system to avoid immunosurveillance. In addition, a complement-triggered biological mechanism that contributes to cancer growth has been identified. Thus, drugs should be designed to homeostatically maintain a normal concentration of complement. This review explores three types of complement-related anti-cancer drugs: therapeutic antibodies, complement inhibitory drugs, and anti-complement regulatory drugs.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.13 no.9
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• pp.4502-4517
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• 2019

Tone Injection (TI) scheme significantly reduces the peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) of Multicarrier Modulation (MCM). However, the computational complexity of the TI scheme rises exponentially with the extra freedom constellation number. Therefore, a novel immune evolutionary mechanism-based TI scheme is proposed in this paper to reduce the computational complexity. By restraining undesirable degeneracy during the processing, this IEM scheme can dramatically increase the population fitness. Monte Carlo results show that proposed IEM-based TI scheme can achieve a significant PAPR and BER improvement with a low complexity.

• Proceedings of the Zoological Society Korea Conference
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• 1999.10b
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• pp.32-32
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• 1999

No Abstract, See Full Text

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Bioinformatics Conference
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• 2005.09a
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• pp.344-347
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• 2005

Helper T(Th) cells regulate immune response by producing various kinds of cytokines in response to antigen stimulation. The regulatory functions of Th cells are promoted by their differentiation into two distinct subsets, Th1 and Th2 cells. Th1 cells are involved in inducing cellular immune response by activating cytotoxic T cells. Th2 cells trigger B cells to produce antibodies, protective proteins used by the immune system to identify and neutralize foreign substances. Because cellular and humoral immune responses have quite different roles in protecting the host from foreign substances, Th cell differentiation is a crucial event in the immune response. The destiny of a naive Th cell is mainly controlled by cytokines such as IL-4, IL-12, and IFN-${\gamma}$. To understand the mechanism of Th cell differentiation, many mathematical models have been proposed. One of the most difficult problems in mathematical modeling is to find appropriate kinetic parameters needed to complete a model. However, it is relatively easy to get qualitative or linguistic knowledge of a model dynamics. To incorporate such knowledge into a model, we propose a novel approach, fuzzy continuous Petri nets extending traditional continuous Petri net by adding new types of places and transitions called fuzzy places and fuzzy transitions. This extension makes it possible to perform fuzzy inference with fuzzy places and fuzzy transitions acting as kinetic parameters and fuzzy inference systems between input and output places, respectively.

• Journal of Korean Traditional Oncology
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.75-84
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• 2009

Gekko has been used for several diseases including cancer in Oriental medicine and fork herbalogy. Nevertheless, its origin as herbal medicine and its efficacy and mechanism as anti-tumor drug have not yet been thoroughly reported in Korea. This study aimed to investigate anti-tumor effect of Gekko through selected articles from cqvip database in China. In vitro and In vivo, Gekko could obviously inhibit tumor growth, induce tumor cells apoptosis, reduce micro-vessel density in tumor tissue through down regulating VEGF & bFGF protein expression, promote cytotoxicity of lymphocyte. Gekko could improve survival rate, relive clinical symptoms, improve quality of life, and relieve anti-tumor treatment reaction, suggesting that Gekko might be a effective anti-tumor drug.