• Journal of Marine Life Science
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.87-92
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• 2023

Microplastic particles are ubiquitous in the environment and not standardized particles of size, shape, or type. Therefore, it is very limited to establish a risk assessment framework that accurately evaluated and manage the multi-dimension of marine environment including seawater and sediment based on toxic data. In the study, we review the characteristics and effects of marine environmental microplastic and suggest risk assessment framework (draft) based on the distribution and impact of marine environmental microplastics. Although, the characteristics of environmental microplastic are very widely but the most abundant toxic data are concentrated on unique shape and type, and there are also large gaps of test organism between laboratory-exposed organisms and resident species. Great limitations with respect to toxicity data quality also exist for traditional effect assessment methods, which in reliability of the resulting risk characterizations. However, considering the fact that the international community's movement on microplastics management is gradually strengthening and the pollution level of microplastics in marine environment is increasing, further research on environmental relevant risk assessment technique should be proposed based on the characteristics of microplastics in the marine environment.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.694-706
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• 2012

The purpose of this study was to offer the raw data for conservation and restoration of aquatic ecosystem by surveying and analysing a water quality, sediment, benthic macroinvertebrate, fish and hydrophyte in Junam reservoir. In the result of analysing the water quality, pH was 8.2~8.4, 6.0~7.5mg/${\ell}$ in COD, 10.0~10.3mg/${\ell}$ in SS, 8.3~11.5mg/${\ell}$ in DO, 0.1mg/${\ell}$ in T-P and 1.2~1.3mg/${\ell}$ in T-N. In case of the sediments, Cd was 0.47~0.52mg/kg, 7.08~7.43mg/kg in Cu, 0.22~0.32mg/kg in As, 0.02~0.03mg/kg in Hg, 6.20~7.45mg/kg in Pb, 32.80~39.70mg/kg in Ni, 513.0~543.0mg/kg in F and 137.0~140.0mg/kg in Zn. $Cr^{6+}$ was not detected. The benthic macroinvertebrates were 432 individuals including 3 phyla, 5 classes, 9 orders, 26 families, 33 genera and 39 species, and the ecological score of benthic macroinvertebrate community(ESB) was 25. The fishes were 8 families and 14 species, and the invasive alien species were 2 taxa including Micropterus salmoids and Lepomis macrochirus. The hydrophytes were 63 taxa including 28 families, 42 genera, 56 species, 1 subspecies and 6 varieties. The emergent plants were 38 taxa(60.3%), 5 taxa(7.9%) in floating-leaved plants and each 10 taxa(15.9%) in free-floating plants and submerged plants.

• Food Science of Animal Resources
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.134-140
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• 2005

This study was conducted to determine the effect of supplemented useful micro-organism on performance and meat quality of growing-finishing pigs for sixty days and broiler for six weeks. The pig and broiler were randomly allotted into 3 treatment; Control 0 (C), T1 (supplemented with $0.2\%$ Aspergillus terreus), T2 (supplemented with $0.2\%$ EM-pro). In total experimental period, feed conversion and dairy feed intake were tend to be higher in T2(2.09kg, 2.70kg) than others. But ADG (average daily gain) was tend to decreased n (0.78kg) according to supplemented of Aspergillus terreus diet These treatments were not significant difference. The chemical composition of pork were not significant difference except for crude fat Crude fat content was lower Aspergillus terreus treatments than others. The pH tenderness, WHC and heating loss were not significant difference in pork $(p>0.05)$. In chicken meat, heating loss and WHC of control was higher than that of T1 and n but shear value was higher in T1 and n. Values of juiciness, tenderness and flavor were improved with highly significant difference (p<0.05) in control (4.95, 4.85, 4.60) than T1 and n in pork. Although the meat color was not significant difference in pork but a and b values of control was higher than that of T1 and n in chicken meat (p<0.05).

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.591-606
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to develop the argumentation program to build scientific concepts on natural selection for science-gifted elementary students and to know how to implement this program. For this study, nine key concepts about natural selection such as the overproduction of offspring, limited resources, population stability, competition, variation, heredity of variation, differential survival, change of the population and speciation were selected through the literature study. The programs were developed by learning cycle instructional model. Argument writings and discourses have been collected, analyzed and compared before and after the program. Two questionnaires to compare pre and post concept change consist of multiple choice questionnaire and open-ended response question were developed and applied to 19 science-gifted elementary students. Sufficiency of the explanation and conceptual quality of the explanation were used to assess the quality of their arguments before and after the program. Discourse and visual models collected from the highest and lowest group about score improvement were compared. The scores of the gifted statistically improved significantly in multiple choice questionnaire. Students' alternative conceptions about natural selection at the beginning of the program decreased and changed scientifically after the program. Visual models drawn by the students supported the results as well. This study asserts that elementary science-gifted students are able to explain evolutionary perspectives about organism change and use the key concepts of natural selection. The study means that evolutionary perspective is possible to be reflected in elementary science curriculum for the gifted.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.53 no.2
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• pp.83-96
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• 2017

A constructed sea stream in Yeongdo, Busan, Republic of Korea is mostly static due to the lifted stream bed and tidal characters, and receives domestic wastewater nearby, causing a consistent odor production and water quality degradation. Bioaugmentation of a microbial consortium was proposed as an effective and economical restoration technology to restore the polluted stream. The microbial consortium activated on site was augmented on a periodic basis (7~10 days) into the most polluted site (Site 2) which was chosen considering the pollution level and tidal movement. Physicochemical parameters of water qualities were monitored including pH, temperature, DO, ORP, SS, COD, T-N, and T-P. COD and microbial community analyses of the sediments were also performed. A significant reduction in SS, COD, T-N, and COD (sediment) at Site 2 occurred showing their removal rates 51%, 58% and 27% and 35%, respectively, in 13 months while T-P increased by 47%. In most of the test sites, population densities of sulfate reducing bacterial (SRB) groups (Desulfobacteraceae_uc_s, Desulfobacterales_uc_s, Desulfuromonadaceae_uc_s, Desulfuromonas_g1_uc, and Desulfobacter postgatei) and Anaerolinaeles was observed to generally decrease after the bioaugmentation while those of Gamma-proteobacteria (NOR5-6B_s and NOR5-6A_s), Bacteroidales_uc_s, and Flavobacteriales_uc_s appeared to generally increase. Aerobic microbial communities (Flavobacteriaceae_uc_s) were dominant in St. 4 that showed the highest level of DO and least level of COD. These microbial communities could be used as an indicator organism to monitor the restoration process. The alpha diversity indices (OTUs, Chao1, and Shannon) of microbial communities generally decreased after the augmentation. Fast uniFrac analysis of all the samples of different sites and dates showed that there was a similarity in the microbial community structures regardless of samples as the augmentation advanced in comparison with before- and early bioaugmentation event, indicating occurrence of changing of the indigenous microbial community structures. It was concluded that the bioaugmentation could improve the polluted water quality and simultaneously change the microbial community structures via their niche changes. This in situ remediation technology will contribute to an eco-friendly and economically cleaning up of polluted streams of brine water and freshwater.

• Horticultural Science & Technology
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.607-616
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• 2013

Light with two faces, beneficial and harmful effects is an important signal for every living cell. Optimal adaptation to light environment enhances the fitness of an organism and survival in nature. Understandings of light quality and plant growth provide with the economical guides for artificial light sources like LEDs. Compared with those under white light, the 1 week seedlings of Chinese cabbage (Brassica rapa) under monochromic red and blue light showed normal development and growth. In contrast to extremely long and etiolated hypocotyls of the seedlings under dark, those under far-red etiolated were extremely short. Based on the microarray analysis, blue light induced the vigorous development and growth and two fold changes of transcripts than red light condition. To have insight of gene products under different light qualities conditions, GO term enrichments were calculated and each gene according to their GO terms were categorized. The blue and red lights affected the expressions of genes related to biological process. Especially, the genes related to metabolic process and developmental process and plastid and chloroplast in the cellular component category were induced under blue light. This study provided the molecular biological evidence for various light qualities on the growing process of B. rapa.

• Korean Journal of Organic Agriculture
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.969-980
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• 2016

This experiment was conducted to assess changes to the chemical properties of soil and applicability in a case of rice cultivation with organic fertilizers. The investigator applied organic fertilizers to rice cultivation for five years to examine changes to the chemical properties of soil and found that the experiment group of organic fertilizers made an ongoing increase in pH, organism content, and available phosphate content annually compared with the control group with no big differences according to the amounts of organic fertilizers used. As for the yield components, there were no statistical differences in the number of spikelets and grain filling rate between the experiment group of organic fertilizers and the control group. The experiment group recorded a higher level in 1,000 seeds weight and yield than the control group. Experiment Group 4 recorded the highest level at 29.11 kg of 1,000 seeds weight. Experiment Groups 3 and 4, which used 222 kg and 267 kg per 10 a, respectively, recorded 576 kg and 572 kg of yield, respectively, which were 4.7% and 4.1% higher than 549 kg of control group, respectively. As for the quality of brown rice, there were no statistical differences in the head rice percentage between the control and experiment group, both of which were in the range of 83.2-85.7%. As for the protein content, Experiment Groups 3 and 4, both of which used a lot of organic fertilizers, were in the range of 6.9-7.1%, which was lower than 7.5% of control group. Those findings indicate that the long-term application of organic fertilizers can improve the chemical properties of soil and increase the yield more than the conventional method of fertilizer application. The findings also suggest that it will be effective to apply 222 kg of organic fertilizers or more per 10 a.

• Korean Journal of Poultry Science
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.275-282
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• 2010

Chicken is an important livestock as a valuable biomedical model as well as food for human, and there is a strong rationale for improving our understanding on metabolism and physiology of this organism. The first draft of chicken genome assembly was released in 2004, which enables elaboration on the linkage between genetic and metabolic traits of chicken. The objectives of this study were thus to reconstruct metabolic pathway of the chicken genome and to construct a chicken specific pathway genome database (PGDB). We developed a comprehensive genome database for chicken by integrating all the known annotations for chicken genes and proteins using a pipeline written in Perl. Based on the comprehensive genome annotations, metabolic pathways of the chicken genome were reconstructed using the PathoLogic algorithm in Pathway Tools software. We identified a total of 212 metabolic pathways, 2,709 enzymes, 71 transporters, 1,698 enzymatic reactions, 8 transport reactions, and 1,360 compounds in the current chicken genome build, Gallus_gallus-2.1. Comparative metabolic analysis with the human, mouse and cattle genomes revealed that core metabolic pathways are highly conserved in the chicken genome. It was indicated the quality of assembly and annotations of the chicken genome need to be improved and more researches are required for improving our understanding on function of genes and metabolic pathways of avian species. We conclude that the chicken PGDB is useful for studies on avian and chicken metabolism and provides a platform for comparative genomic and metabolic analysis of animal biology and biomedicine.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.59 no.1
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• pp.39-46
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• 2005

Background : Even though it has been suggested that low-colony, scotochromogen nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) are usually contaminants and not true pathogens, evidence for this hypothesis has not been provided. This study investigated the colony characteristics, organism identification, and clinical significance of low-colony scotochromogen. Methods : The laboratory cultured 6,898 respiratory clinical specimens for an examination of mycobacteria over a three-month period. A low-colony count was arbitrarily defined as ${\leq}20$ colonies. This study analyzed the recovery rate of the mycobacteria, the number of colonies and their gross characteristics, and their clinical significance. PCR-restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis was carried out to identify the NTM species. NTM pulmonary disease was defined according to the American Thoracic Society. Results : A total of 6,898 respiratory specimens for mycobacterium were cultured. Of these, 263 (3.8%) grew NTM, and 382 (5.5%) grew M. tuberculosis. Of the 263 cultured NTM specimens, 124 (47.1%) were scotochromogens. The smear-positive rate was significantly lower in these scotochromogens (4.8%) than in the non-scotochromogens (23.7%) (p<0.05). The most common isolates were M. gordonae (83/102, 81.4%) in the scotochromogens, and MAC (52/121, 43.0%) in the non-scotochromogens. Even though three out of 113 patients with a low-colony scotochromogen has been diagnosed with NTM pulmonary disease, the isolated scotochromogen was not considered to be the cause of the NTM disease but was just a contaminant. Conclusion : In this study, the most common isolate of a low-colony count scotochromogen was M. gordonae, which appeared to be contaminants and not true pathogens. Greater efforts in the quality control of a mycobacterium laboratory are needed in cases where there is a high recovery rate of low-colony count scotochromogen.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.82-92
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• 2020

Since swine wastewater contains high concentrations of nutrients and heavy metals, it deteriorates water quality when discharged. Compared to conventional methods, bioremediation can be a promising method for its treatment. Specifically, microalgae have the potential to remove these pollutants. In this study, the removal of nutrients (nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P)) and heavy metals (copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn)) from swine wastewater by Ankistrodesmus bibraianus was evaluated and the organism's optimal growth conditions were investigated. The optimal growth conditions were established at 28℃, pH 7, and light and dark cycles of 14:10 h. The removal efficiencies of N and P by a single treatment (500, 1,000, 5,000, and 10,000 mg L^-1) ranged from 22.9 to 80.6% and from 11.9 to 50.0%, respectively. The removal efficiencies of N and P in the binary treatments ranged from 16.4 to 58.3% and from 7.80 to 49.8%, respectively. The removal efficiencies of Cu and Zn by a single treatment(10, 30, and 50 mg L^-1) ranged from 15.5 to 81.5% and from 6.28 to 34.3%, respectively. Similarly, the removal efficiencies of Cu and Zn in the binary treatments ranged from 16.7 to 74.5% and from 5.58 to 27.5%, respectively. In addition, the study showed the optimal growth conditions for microalgae and the removal efficiency of nutrients (N and P) and heavy metals (Cu and Zn), which could be applied to swine wastewater. Based on the results in this study, it appears that Ankistrodesmus bibraianus could be used for the removal of nutrients and heavy metals present in swine wastewater.