• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.44 no.1 s.137
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• pp.43-48
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• 2006

Experimental murine models with high, intermediate and low levels of genetically based susceptibility to Leishmania major infection reproduce almost entire spectrum of clinical manifestations of the human disease. There are increasing non-comparative studies on immune responses against isolated antigens of L. major in different murine strains. The aim of the present study was to find out whether there is an antigen that can induce protective immune response in resistant and susceptible murine strains. To do that, crude antigenic extract of procyclic and metacyclic promastigotes of L. major was prepared and subjected to SDS-PAGE electrophoresis. Western-blotting was used to search for antigen(s) capable of raising high antibody level of IgG2a versus IgG1 in the sera of both infected resistant and susceptible strains. Two novel antigens from metacyclic promastigotes of L. major (140 and 152 kDa) were potentially able to induce specific dominant IgG2a responses in BALB/c and C57BU6 mice. The 2 antigens also reacted with IgG antibody of cutaneous leishmaniasis patients. We confirm that 140 and 152 kDa proteins of L. major promastigotes are inducing IgG production in mice and humans.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Plant Pathology Conference
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• 2003.10a
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• pp.83.1-83
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• 2003

Rice seedling disease is one of major problems in water-seeded rice. This disease is known to be caused by several pathogen such as Pythium, Achlya, and Fusarium species. However, seedling disease of rice in water-seeded rice in Korea is not extensively studied. Pythium species have been isolated from Seosan, Yeoju, Icheon areas using Pythium selective media and their pathogenicity was investigated. All of the Pythium isolates showed strong pathogencity causing seedling emergence reduction in water-seeded rice. Seedling emergence was reduced to 0∼9％ at 10 days after inoculation of 23 Pythium isolates compared to 60％ of noninoculated control in a growth chamber. However, Fusarium species did not cause seedling emergence reduction in water-seeded rice. In contrast, when no water added into water agar or soil, the pathogen caused seedling rot two weeks after planting. These results indicate that Pythium species is a cause of seedling disease in water-seeded cultivation areas in Korea.

• The Plant Pathology Journal
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.309-313
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• 2006

Phytophthora blight(PB), caused by Phytophthora drechsleri f. sp. cajani is the third potentially important disease of pigeonpea in the Deccan Plateau(DP) of India after wilt and sterility mosaic. In the rainy-season of 2005, an outbreak of PB was seen throughout DP. To quantify the incidence and spread of the disease, a systematic survey was conducted in the major pigeonpea growing regions of DP during the crop season 2005. Attempts were made to determine the effect of cropping systems on the PB development and identify resistant cultivars, if any, grown by farmers and on research farms. Widespread incidence of PB was recorded on improved, and or local cultivars grown in different intercropping systems. Majority of improved cultivars grown at research farms were found susceptible to PB(>10% disease incidence). Pigeonpea intercropped with groundnut, black gram and coriander had less disease incidence(${\leq}10%$). Three wilt and SM resistant pigeonpea cultivars KPL 96053, ICPL 99044, and ICPL 93179 were found resistant(<10%) to PB as well. However, their resistance to PB needs confirmation under optimum disease development environments.

• Journal of Korean Medical classics
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.289-313
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• 2007

Many of newly emerging diseases such as hypertension, stroke, diabetes, obesity, and atoptic dermatities are categorized into "Fire heat-disease(火熱病)" according to oriental medicine. It is because factors such as stress, overeating, and high fat diet are major causes of heat in the human body. Sun Yi-Kui(孫一奎), a well-known oriental medical doctor during Ming Dynasty's "Jia Jing Wan Li Nian Jian"(嘉靖萬歷年間 : A.D $1522^{\sim}1619$), established new theories on "Fire heat-disease-mechanism(火熱病機)". This study aims to investigate Dr. Sun's "Fire heat-disease-mechanism(火熱病機)"theory. For this purpose, I thoroughly examined the concepts of "Dong-Qj(動氣)", "Ming-Men(命門)", king fire(君火) and minister fire(相火) as well as pathological theory on "Fire heat(火熱)". In addition, I compared Sun's theory with those of Li Dong-yuan and Zhu dan-Xi.

• Molecules and Cells
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• v.40 no.9
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• pp.613-620
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• 2017

The most common form of senile dementia is Alzheimer's disease (AD), which is characterized by the extracellular deposition of amyloid ${\beta}-peptide$ ($A{\beta}$) plaques and the intracellular formation of neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs) in the cerebral cortex. Tau abnormalities are commonly observed in many neurodegenerative diseases including AD, Parkinson's disease, and Pick's disease. Interestingly, tau-mediated formation of NFTs in AD brains shows better correlation with cognitive impairment than $A{\beta}$ plaque accumulation; pathological tau alone is sufficient to elicit frontotemporal dementia, but it does not cause AD. A growing amount of evidence suggests that soluble $A{\beta}$ oligomers in concert with hyperphosphorylated tau (pTau) serve as the major pathogenic drivers of neurodegeneration in AD. Increased $A{\beta}$ oligomers trigger neuronal dysfunction and network alternations in learning and memory circuitry prior to clinical onset of AD, leading to cognitive decline. Furthermore, accumulated damage to mitochondria in the course of aging, which is the best-known nongenetic risk factor for AD, may collaborate with soluble $A{\beta}$ and pTau to induce synapse loss and cognitive impairment in AD. In this review, I summarize and discuss the current knowledge of the molecular and cellular biology of AD and also the mechanisms that underlie $A{\beta}-mediated$ neurodegeneration.

• Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology & Nutrition
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• v.11 no.sup1
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• pp.1-6
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• 2008

Previous infant feeding guidelines recommended a delayed introduction of solids to beyond 6 months of age to prevent atopic diseases. However, scientific evidence supporting a delayed introduction of solids for prevention of atopic diseases is scarce and inconsistent. Current evidence does not support a major role for maternal dietary restrictions during pregnancy or lactation in the prevention of atopic disease. In studies of infants at high risk of developing atopic disease, there is evidence that exclusive breastfeeding for at least 4 months compared with feeding intact cow milk protein decreases the incidence of atopic dermatitis, cow milk allergy, and wheezing in early childhood. For infants at high risk of developing atopic disease who are not breastfed exclusively for 4 to 6 months, there is modest evidence that atopic dermatitis may be delayed or prevented by the use of extensively or partially hydrolyzed formulas, compared with cow milk formula, in early childhood. There is no convincing evidence that a delayed introduction of solid foods beyond 4 to 6 months of age prevents the development of atopic disease. For infants after 4 to 6 months of age, there are insufficient data to support a protective effect of any dietary intervention for the development of atopic disease.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 2004

The year of 2003 was characterized as a cool humid year. Low temperature and frequent rains were continued during March to July, resulting in 1.6 times higher rainfalls and 32％ less sunshine period compared to the average yean Due to 2003's climatic condition, rice blast, and bacterial leaf blight occurred severely. Higher rainfalls caused severe epidemic of phytophthora disease and, in case of red-pepper, 55％ of cultivation acreage was devastated by the disease over the country. Besides, crop diseases which become severe under cool-humid conditions, such as gray mold, sclerotinia rot, downy mildew, increased significantly compared to the previous year. In fruit trees, brown spot of apple, and pear scab occurred severely causing much yield loss.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.78-83
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• 2002

Tobacco diseases have not been recorded until 1900s in Korea, where tobacco plants were introduced at early 1700s. Practical researches on the disease have been conducted since mid 1960s. Major ten tobacco diseases were mosaic caused by tobacco mosaic virus·potato virus Y·cucumber mosaic virus, bacterial wilt, hollow stalk, wild fire caused by angular leaf spot strain, black shank, brown spot, powdery mildew and fusarium wilt. But their annual occurrences were varied according to changes of tobacco varieties and their cultivating practices. As no useful chemicals, several biological tactics have been developed to control the viral or bacterial diseases that give significant economic damages on sustainable crop yield, but not practicable to field farming condition yet. Transgenic tobacco plants containing foreign disease resistant genes have been developed by current bio-technology, but not released to farmers yet. Though some disease-resistant tobacco varieties have been developed by the conventional breeding technology and currently used by farmers, their disease controlling efficacy have been diminished by occurrence of the new strain or race. Future research on tobacco diseases has been focused on technical development to produce high quality tobacco with less production cost, which leads Korean tobacco industry to keep its competence against foreign industry and decreasing overall market.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.1-5
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• 2007

Major diseases of tobacco and farmer's control practices were surveyed in the Kyeongbuk province area from 2005 to 2006. Mosaic caused by potato virus Y and bacterial wilt caused by Ralstonia solanacearum were most severe during the harvest season. Compared with the disease occurrence of ten years ago, the damage by tobacco mosaic virus reduced but bacterial wilt increased. These changes in the disease occurrences may probably be due to releasing the resistant tobacco cultivar to the mosaic virus but susceptible to the bacterial wilt pathogen. More than thirty percentage of the farmers have misused fungicides and also have applied the continuous mono-cropping system for more than ten years, and have chosen the incorrect crops for the rotation.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Inherited Metabolic disease
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.9-17
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• 2005

Homocystinuria is a metabolic disorder caused by a deficiency of cystathionine ${\beta}$-synthase (CBS). Patients with homocystinuria show clinical symptoms such as mental retardation, lens dislocation, vascular disease with life-threatening thromboembolisms and skeletal deformities. Generally, the major treatments for CBS deficiency include pharmacologic doses of pyridoxine or dietary restriction of methionine. However, there is no effective treatment for this disease up till today and gene therapy can be an attractive novel approach to treatment of the disease. We investigated whether a recombinant adeno-associated virus could be used as a CBS gene transfer vector to reduce the excessive homocysteine level in the homocystinuria mouse model. Recombinant adeno-associated virus vector encoding the human CBS gene (rAAV-hCBS), driven by EF1-a promoter, was infused into CBS-deficient mice ($CBS^{-/-}$) via intramuscular (IM) and intraperitoneal (IP) injection. IP injection was more efficient than IM injection for prolongation of lives and reduction of plasma homocysteine levels. After 2 weeks of gene transfer by IP injection, serum homocysteine level was significantly decreased in treated mice compared with the age-matched controls and the life span was extended about 1.5 times. Also, increased expression of CBS gene was observed by immunohistochemical staining in livers of treated $CBS^{-/-}$ mice and microvesicular lipid droplets was decreased in cytoplasm of liver. These results demonstrate the possibility and efficacy of gene therapy by AAV gene transfer in homocystinuria mice.