• Journal of Plant Biotechnology
• /
• v.42 no.1
• /
• pp.1-5
• /
• 2015

The biological roles of glycogen synthase kinase 3 (GSK3) proteins have long been extensively explored in eukaryotic organisms including fungi, animals and plants. This gene family has evolutionary well conserved kinase domain and shares similar phosphorylation properties to their substrate proteins. However, their specific biological roles are surprisingly distinct in different organisms. GSK3s play key role in key regulating the cytoskeleton and metabolic processes in animal systems, but plant GSKs are involved in quite different processes, such as flower development, brassinosteroid signaling, abiotic stresses, and organogenesis. In particular, recent studies have reported the critical multiple functions of BIN2 and its related paralogues plant GSK3s during organogenesis via connecting hormonal or developmental programs. In this review, we outline the recent understanding in the versatile functions related in physiological and biochemical relevance, which are mediated by plant GSK3s in various cellular signaling.

• Molecules and Cells
• /
• v.21 no.3
• /
• pp.376-380
• /
• 2006

Gene expression is regulated in large part at the level of transcription under the control of sequence-specific transcriptional regulatory proteins. Therefore, the ability to affect gene expression at will using sequencespecific artificial transcription factors would provide researchers with a powerful tool for biotechnology research and drug discovery. Previously, we isolated 56 novel sequence-specific DNA-binding domains from the human genome by in vivo selection. We hypothesized that these domains might be more useful for regulating gene expression in higher eukaryotic cells than those selected in vitro using phage display. However, an unpredictable factor, termed the "context effect", is associated with the construction of novel zinc finger transcription factors--- DNA-binding proteins that bind specifically to 9-base pair target sequences. In this study, we directly selected active artificial zinc finger proteins from a zinc finger protein library. Direct in vivo selection of constituents of a zinc finger protein library may be an efficient method for isolating multi-finger DNA binding proteins while avoiding the context effect.

• Molecules and Cells
• /
• v.37 no.9
• /
• pp.644-649
• /
• 2014

The 3' ends of most eukaryotic messenger RNAs must undergo a maturation step that includes an endonuc-leolytic cleavage followed by addition of a polyadenylate tail. While this reaction is catalyzed by the action of only two enzymes it is supported by an unexpectedly large number of proteins. This complexity reflects the necessity of coordinating this process with other nuclear events, and growing evidence indicates that even more factors than previously thought are necessary to connect 3' processing to additional cellular pathways. In this review we summarize the current understanding of the molecular machinery involved in this step of mRNA maturation, focusing on new core and auxiliary proteins that connect polyadenylation to splicing, DNA damage, transcription and cancer.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
• /
• 2012.02a
• /
• pp.476-476
• /
• 2012

Although plasma is an efficient means of microbial sterilization, mechanism of plasma effect on microorganisms still needs to be clarified. In addition, a limited number of studies are available on eukaryotic microorganisms such as yeast and fungi in relation to plasma application. Thus, we investigated cellular and molecular aspects of plasma effects on a filamentous fungus, Neurospora crassa by making use of argon plasma jet at atmospheric pressure. The viability and cell morphology of N. crassa spores exposed to plasma were both significantly reduced depending on the exposure time when treated in water. The intracellular genomic DNA content was dramatically reduced in fungal tissues after a plasma treatment and the transcription factor tah-3 was found to be required for fungal tolerance to a harsh plasma environment.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
• /
• v.40 no.3
• /
• pp.226-229
• /
• 2004

Histone deacetylase (HDAC) removes acetyl group in lysine residue of histone protein, which is transferred by histone acetylase. HDAC is important in the stabilization and regulation of gene expression in eukaryotic organisms. PCR has been carried out to clone HDAC genes using cDNA library and genomic DNA as the templates from Ganoderma lucidum isolated in Korea. One 470 bp cDNA gene fragment, and 3 genomic HDAC fragments (585 bp, 589 bp, 630 bp) were amplified. When their deduced amino acid sequences were compared with other fungal HDACs, they showed 59-72％ homology.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
• /
• v.15 no.3
• /
• pp.660-664
• /
• 2005

We have previously isolated specific RNA aptamers with high affinity against the helicase domain of hepatitis C virus (HCV) nonstructural protein 3 (NS3). The RNA aptamers competitively and efficiently inhibited the helicase activity, partially impeding HCV replicon replication in human hepatocarcinoma cells. In this study, the RNA aptamers were tested for binding to the HCV NS3 proteins in eukaryotic cells, using a yeast three-hybrid system. The aptamers were then recognized by the HCV NS3 proteins when expressed in the cells, while the antisense sequences of the aptamers were not. These results suggest that the in vitro selected RNA aptamers can also specifically bind to the target proteins in vivo. Consequently, they could be potentially utilized as anti-HCV lead compounds.

• KSBB Journal
• /
• v.13 no.6
• /
• pp.649-655
• /
• 1998

Hantaviruses are rodent hosts-borne viruses belonging to the family Bunyaviridae, and are etiologic agents for two acute diseases, i.e., Haemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome (HFRS) and Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome (HPS). There have been a lot of reports on prophylactic vaccines and diagnostics for the diseases, but most of viral antigens have been prepared by eukaryotic cell culture. Nucleocapsid proteins of Hantaviruses are known as the major viral antigens. Thereby, we prepared nucleocapsid genes of Hantaan virus and Seoul virus by RT-PCR and cloned into plasmid vectors, pET-3a and pKK223-3. Both genes were expressed in Escherichia coli with higher expression level of Seoul viral nucleocapsid protein compared to that of Hantaan in pET-3a. Hantaan viral gene was expressed much higher level in plasmid pET-3a that in pKK223-3. About 30% of expressed nucleocapsid protein was soluble and the rest was remained in insoluble fraction.

• Genomics & Informatics
• /
• v.9 no.4
• /
• pp.189-193
• /
• 2011

Simple sequence repeats (SSRs) are ubiquitous short tandem duplications found within eukaryotic genomes. Their length variability and abundance throughout the genome has led them to be widely used as molecular markers for crop-breeding programs, facilitating the use of marker-assisted selection as well as estimation of genetic population structure. Here, we report a software application, "SSR-Primer Generator " for SSR discovery, SSR-primer design, and homology-based search of in silico amplicons from a DNA sequence dataset. On submission of multiple FASTA-format DNA sequences, those analyses are batch processed in a Java runtime environment (JRE) platform, in a pipeline, and the resulting data are visualized in HTML tabular format. This application will be a useful tool for reducing the time and costs associated with the development and application of SSR markers.

• Genomics & Informatics
• /
• v.16 no.3
• /
• pp.65-70
• /
• 2018

The non-coding DNA in eukaryotic genomes encodes a language which programs chromatin accessibility, transcription factor binding, and various other activities. The objective of this short report was to determine the impact of primary DNA sequence on the epigenomic landscape across 200-base pair genomic units by integrating nine publicly available ChromHMM Browser Extensible Data files of the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) project. The nucleotide frequency profiles of nine chromatin annotations with the units of 200 bp were analyzed and integrative Markov chains were built to detect the Markov properties of the DNA sequences in some of the active chromatin states of different ChromHMM regions. Our aim was to identify the possible relationship between DNA sequences and the newly built chromatin states based on the integrated ChromHMM datasets of different cells and tissue types.

• YAKHAK HOEJI
• /
• v.32 no.6
• /
• pp.420-427
• /
• 1988

Post-translational modification of protein amino acid residues is a well known metabolic phenomenon. One such side chain modification, protein methylation, occur ubiquitously in nature, in organism ranging from prokaryotic to eukaryotic and the biological significance of protein methylation has begun to emerge. The observation that cytochrome C methylation facilitates the binding of this hemoprotein to mitochondria could be placed as the one of the examples along this line. However, the detail biological meaning of cytochrome C methylation is remained to be clarified. In the aspect of such reason this research was done. The results of this experiment were; 1) pure Euglena gracilis cytochrome C552 was isolated, 2) methylarginine and methylmethionine were not found in cytochrome C552 sequence, 3) however, Unknown Peak at 20.78min of retention time was found, and 4) this Unknown Peak was found only from Euglena cytochrome C552, so far.