• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.893-902
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• 2020

Propolis is a resinous substance that is collected by Apis mellifera from plant sources and is used in traditional medicine. To study the phytochemical constituents and apoptotic potential of Jordanian propolis extract against different cancer cell lines, propolis was extracted using methanol, hexane, and ethyl acetate and was fractionated using chromatographic methods. Cytotoxicity was assessed using MTT and LDH assays. The apoptotic potential was investigated using florescence microscopy, multicaspase assay, Annexin-V and dead cell assay, and cell cycle assay. The phytochemical constituents were analyzed using GC-MS. The methanol extract of propolis exhibited cytotoxic potential against all cell lines tested. The IC₅₀ values of the methanol extract were 47.4, 77.8, 91.2, and 145.0 ㎍/ml for HepG2, LoVo, MDAMB231, and MCF7 cell lines, respectively. The IC₅₀ values of the F1 fraction were 31.6 (MDAMB231), 38.9 (HepG2), 36.7 (LoVo) and 75.5 (MCF7) ㎍/ml. On further purification using thin-layer chromatography, the IC₅₀ values of the F1-3 fraction were found to be 84.31(HepG2), 79.2 (MCF7), 70.4 (LoVo), and 68.9 (MDAMB231) ㎍/ml, respectively. The anticancer potential of the F1 fraction was confirmed through the induction of apoptosis and cell cycle arrest at the G0/G1 phase. The GC-MS analysis of the F1 fraction revealed the presence of 3-methyl-4-isopropylphenol (29.44%) as a major constituent. These findings indicate the potential of propolis extract as a cancer therapy. However, further investigation is required to assess the acute and subacute toxicity of the most active fraction.

• Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.99-104
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• 1993

In order to explore the brassinosteroid-active component in Cassia tora, methanol extract of immature seeds was purified by sequences of solvent fractionation, silica gel adsorption chromatography, Sephadex LH-20 chromatography, charcoal adsorption chromatography and Bondesil chromatography. The activity of brassinosteroid was monitored by the rice inclination test and its presence could be confirmed in each purification step. The purified active components were separated by silica gel adsorption chromatography. Brassinosteroid substances in separated active fractions were identified as teasterone, castasterone, brassinolide by TLC and HPLC. Our work is probably the first report of endogenous brassinosteroid in Cassia tora. The content of brassinosteroid in Cassia tora as converted into brassinolide was $3.5{\sim}5.5\;ng/g$ fresh weight. The order of brassinosteroid contents was toward to be teasterone, castasterone, brassinolide.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.127-141
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• 2016

Electrodialysis (ED) is known to be a useful membrane process for desalination, concentration, separation, and purification in many fields. In this process, it is desirable to work at high current density in order to achieve fast desalination with the lowest possible effective membrane area. In practice, however, operating currents are restricted by the occurrence of concentration polarization phenomena. Many studies showed the occurrence of a limiting current density (LCD). The limiting current density in the electrodialysis process is an important parameter which determines the electrical resistance and the current utilization. Therefore, its reliable determination is required for designing an efficient electrodialysis plant. The purpose of this study is the development of a predictive model of the limiting current density in an electrodialysis process using response surface methodology (RSM). A two-factor central composite design (CCD) of RSM was used to analyze the effect of operation conditions (the initial salt concentration (C) and the linear flow velocity of solution to be treated (u)) on the limiting current density and to establish a regression model. All experiments were carried out on synthetic brackish water solutions using a laboratory scale electrodialysis cell. The limiting current density for each experiment was determined using the Cowan-Brown method. A suitable regression model for predicting LCD within the ranges of variables used was developed based on experimental results. The proposed mathematical quadratic model was simple. Its quality was evaluated by regression analysis and by the Analysis Of Variance, popularly known as the ANOVA.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.299-307
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• 2008

Soybean seed ferritin is essential for human iron supplementation and iron deficiency anemia prevention because it contains abundant bioavailable iron and is frequently consumed in the human diet. However, it is poorly understood in regards its several properties, such as iron mineralization, subunit assembly, and protein folding. To address these issues, we decided to prepare the soybean seed ferritin complex via a recombinant DNA approach. In this paper, we report a rapid and simple Escherichia coli expression system to produce the soybean seed ferritin complex. In this system, two subunits of soybean seed ferritin, H-2 and H-1, were encoded in a single plasmid, and optimal expression was achieved by additionally coexpressing a team of molecular chaperones, trigger factor and GroEL-GroES. The His-tagged ferritin complex was purified by $Ni^{2+}$ affinity chromatography, and an intact ferritin complex was obtained following His-tagged enterokinase (His-EK) digestion. The purified ferritin complex synthesized in E. coli demonstrated some reported features of its native counterpart from soybean seed, including an apparent molecular weight, multimeric assembly, and iron uptake activity. We believe that the strategy described in this paper may be of general utility in producing other recombinant plant ferritins built up from two types of subunits.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.347-355
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• 2006

Anyang Stream including its main branch is the biggest branch stream of Han River in Korea. The geological and geomorphological characteristics were investigated to the affected area of Anyang Stream, in which rainfall characteristic was analyzed. The water quality surveyed that the analysis of water pollution used to biotic index and biological water pollution. The rainfall pattern in this area was like to that of typical Korea, but the rate of trigger and runoff during summer season(June~August) is more higher than mean of Korea. Before 2003, a dried stream is severe status, which was due to abundant runoff, but this status are improved. After 1997, water quality of stream is recovering status such as water pollution of stream steeply decreased. Especially after 2003, this trend is more quickly improved. Although, owing to the increasing of a T-N and SS at upstream wastewater were due to bad collection of industrial factories, livestock's and mans living, the water quality worsted at upstream. Water quality in total section of main stream was severely contaminated that water-quality limit is 5 with polysaprobic by water self-purification. That of main branch was 1~3limits with ${\alpha}$- and ${\beta}$-mesosaprobic in Anyang city area, But water quality in all area about another branch of Anyang stream except Anyang city area was almost under of 3 grades. Though trying of Anyang city for recover movement(completion of 2nd Sewage Treatment Plant and Water supply pipe system) on Anyang stream, water pollution states of upper branch in Anyang stream was not better than its of 2002 because it may be difference of control area on other cities.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• 2015.05a
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• pp.138-141
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• 2015

K-water operates many Water Treatment Plants(WTP) to supply clean water to people. There are automation process control equipments collecting data at each step in WTP. The data collected is big enough to 370,000Tag/min from the K-water Water Treatment Plants. In the past, this big data was not important, we focused on the operating water purification process using the data. Currently, we increased the importance of attention to take advantage of Big Data. The research about the accident reduction and efficiency improvement in WTP are ongoing by data collection and analysis. In this paper, we analyzed the flow rate, power and pressure obtained in the accident case in WTP. We researched the methods for accident prediction and reduction.

• Genomics & Informatics
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.249-255
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• 2012

In this study, fosmid cloning strategies were used to assess the microbial populations in water from the International Space Station (ISS) drinking water system (henceforth referred to as Prebiocide and Tank A water samples). The goals of this study were: to compare the sensitivity of the fosmid cloning strategy with that of traditional culture-based and 16S rRNA-based approaches and to detect the widest possible spectrum of microbial populations during the water purification process. Initially, microbes could not be cultivated, and conventional PCR failed to amplify 16S rDNA fragments from these low biomass samples. Therefore, randomly primed rolling-circle amplification was used to amplify any DNA that might be present in the samples, followed by size selection by using pulsed-field gel electrophoresis. The amplified high-molecular- weight DNA from both samples was cloned into fosmid vectors. Several hundred clones were randomly selected for sequencing, followed by Blastn/Blastx searches. Sequences encoding specific genes from Burkholderia, a species abundant in the soil and groundwater, were found in both samples. Bradyrhizobium and Mesorhizobium, which belong to rhizobia, a large community of nitrogen fixers often found in association with plant roots, were present in the Prebiocide samples. Ralstonia, which is prevalent in soils with a high heavy metal content, was detected in the Tank A samples. The detection of many unidentified sequences suggests the presence of potentially novel microbial fingerprints. The bacterial diversity detected in this pilot study using a fosmid vector approach was higher than that detected by conventional 16S rRNA gene sequencing.

• BMB Reports
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.230-236
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• 2003

Hot water-soluble crude polysaccharide (HCAP-0) that was obtained from the fruits of Capsicum annuum showed potent anti-complementary activity. The activity was unchanged by pronase digestion, but decreased by periodate oxidation. The HCAP-0 was fractionated by DEAE ion-exchange chromatography to give two major fractions, HCAP-II and III. These two fractions were finally purified by gel filtration to give HCAP-IIa, HCAP-IIIa1, and IIIa2 fractions that had high anti-complementary activities. The HCAP-IIIa1 and IIIa2 consisted of homogeneous polysaccharides. The anti-complementary activities were unaffected by treatment with polymyxin B, indicating that the modes of complement activation were not due to preexisting lipopolysaccharide. The molecular weight and sugar content of HCAP-IIIa2 had potent anti-complementary activity. The highest yields were 55 kDa and 75.9%, and the molar ratio of galactose (Ara:Gal, 1.0:4.6) was higher than other sugars. The crossed immuno-electrophoresis showed that both classical and alternative pathways were activated by HCAP-IIIa2.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Crop Science Conference
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• 2017.06a
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• pp.224-224
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• 2017

In plants, cysteine(Cys) is decisive for protein and glutathione that acts as an indispensable sulfur grantor for methionine and many other sulfur containing secondary products. Cys formation is involved in the consecutive two reactions using two enzymes-serine acetyl transferase (SAT) and O-acetylserine (thiol)lyase (OASTL) and appeared in plant cytosol, chloroplast and mitochondria. OASTL is able to produce mimosine with 3-hydroxy-4-pyridone (3H4P) in lieu of $H_2S$ for Cys. In this report, we describe the first time cloning, purification and characterization of cytosolic(cy)OASTL from M. pudica and its expression in Escherichia coli and try to find out the cross link between this OASTL and the mimosine formation and to elucidate the metabolic role of cy-OASTL in M. pudica. The purified recombinant protein was 34.7 KDa. The optimum reaction pH and temperature was 6.5 and $50^{\circ}C$, respectively. The Michaelis constant (Km) and the Vmax value of the enzyme was $252{\pm}25{\mu}M$ and $57{\pm}3{\mu}M\;cysteine\;min^{-1}\;{\mu}g\;protein^{-1}$ for sulfide and $159{\pm}21{\mu}M$ and $58{\pm}2.4{\mu}M\;cysteine\;min^{-1}\;{\mu}g\;protein^{-1}$ for OAS subsequently. After cleaving the His-tag, we tried to observe cy-OASTL to form mimosine with appropriate substrate but it was not successful. It may be concluded that cy-OASTL of the present study is only Cys specific, not mimosine.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.181-191
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• 2013

The design process of ecological and environmental detention system located in the housing district of Sinjeong 3-jigu in Seoul are as follows. At stage one, a new dispersal detention was created in the neighborhood park located near the originally planned detention. From this, the amount of storage of this dispersal detention system was enlarged from $28,337m^3/d$, the initial storage amount, to $33,606m^3/d$ as the post storage amount, responsible to the amount of rainfall which happens every 100 years. In particular, the SSB (Sustainable Structured wetland Biotop) system, which was the New Excellent Technology verified by the Ministry of Environment (No. 258) was applied to enhance ecological functioning and water quality with the detention as a constructed wetland. At stage two, the treatment plans for non-point pollutant source occurred at the initial period of rain, flowing into the detention system were built for purifying the water of the retention pond at the base of the detentions, and the water-circulation system was designed at the dispersal detentions on the period of regular rainfalls. The non-point pollutant source flowing into detention site was calculated as $11,699m^3/d$ flowing down from seven small watersheds, which occurred at the initial period of rain. In particular the SSB systems improved the average efficiency of the water processing performance to BOD 60%, SS 90%, T-N 30%, T-P 60%. At stage three, the ecological network and biological diversity were strongly considered so that it brought the residents with amenity places. In particular, the dispersal detentions were successfully designed to restore the ecological habitat of endangered plant and animal species such as narrow-mouthed.