• KSBB Journal
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.463-468
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• 2009

Selenium-containing peptide (Selenium peptide) was produced by autolysis of Saccharomyces cerevisiae which was cultured in inorganic selenium-supplemented medium. Selenium peptide showed antioxidant activity and protective effects on UVB irradiated human fibroblast. Minimal toxicity of selenium peptide was observed whereas selenium nitrate exhibited cell toxicity as low as $10^{-9}\;M$. Selenium peptide also increased human fibroblast growth, procollagen type I and also decreased MMP-1 (matrix metalloprotease-1). This result showed the potential of selenium peptide as a nontoxic antioxidant.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.20 no.11
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• pp.1491-1499
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• 2010

Rhizosphere microorganisms possessing phytase activity are considered important for rendering phytate-phosphorus (P) available to plants. In the present study, the Citrobacter braakii phytase gene (appA) was overexpressed in rhizobacteria possessing plant growth promoting (PGP) traits, for increasing their potential as bioinoculants. AppA was cloned under the lac promoter in the broadhost-range expression vector pBBR1MCS-2. Transformation of the recombinant construct pCBappA resulted in high constitutive phytase activity in all of the eight rhizobacterial strains belonging to genera Pantoea, Citrobacter, Enterobacter, Pseudomonas (two strains), Rhizobium (two strains), and Ensifer that were studied. Transgenic rhizobacterial strains were found to display varying levels of phytase activity, ranging from 10-folds to 538-folds higher than the corresponding control strains. The transgenic derivative of Pseudomonas fluorescens CHA0, a well-characterized plant growth promoting rhizobacterium, showed the highest expression of phytase (~8 U/mg) activity in crude extracts. Although all transformants showed high phytase activity, rhizobacteria having the ability to secrete organic acid showed significantly higher release of P from Ca-phytate in buffered minimal media. AppA overexpressing rhizobacteria showed increased P content, and dry weight (shoot) or shoot/ root ratio of mung bean (Vigna radiata) plants, to different extents, when grown in semisolid agar (SSA) medium containing Na-phytate or Ca-phytate as the P sources. This is the first report of the overexpression of phytase in rhizobacterial strains and its exploitation for plant growth enhancement.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.232-237
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• 1993

A strain of yeast which can convert starch directly to ethanol was developed by the intergeneric protoplast fusion between Schwanniomyces alluvius possessing $\alpha$ amylase as well as glucoamylase with debranching activity and FSC-14-75 which previously had been formed from a heterologous transformation and subsequent intergeneric protoplast fusion. Fusants were selected on minimal medium after protoplasts of auxotrophic mutant of S. alluvius fused with heat-treated protoplasts of FSC-14-75 in the presence of 30%(w/v) PEG and 20 mM $CaCl_2$. The fusion frequency was in the range of $10^{-6}$ order. All fusants tested were intermediate types of parental strains for carbon compound assimilation, and their cell volumes were approximately 1.1 times larger than FSC-14-75 and 1.8 times larger than S. alluvius. The fusants were unable to sporulate like FSC-14-75, while S. alluvius could sporulate. In flask scale the most promising fusant, FSCSa-R10-6, produced 7.83%(v/v) and 10.17%(v/v) ethanol from 15% and 20% of liquefied potato starch, respectively, indicating that the fermetation efficiency of each case increased 1.2 times and 1.6 times than that of FSC-14-75. The elution pattern on DEAE-cellulose chromatography showed that FSCSa-R10-6 has four distinct amylase peaks of which two peaks originated from S. alluvius and the other two from FSC-14-75. These results suggest that the enhanced fermentation efficiency of the fusant might be due to almost-complemented parental amylases.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.789-795
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• 2004

A promoter-probe shuttle vector pSK1Cat was constructed for the isolation of transcriptional signal sequences from Corynebacterium glutamicum. Besides conferring resistance to kanamycin in Escherichia coli and C. glutamicum, the vector carried a promoterless cat gene to confer resistance to chloramphenicol upon insertion of the appropriate transcriptional signals in the multiple cloning site. By utilizing the vector, a series of transcriptionally active fragments were isolated from the genome of C. glutamicum. The clones, ranging from 200 bp to 1 kb in size, were grouped into 3 classes of strong, medium, and weak, based on the chloramphenicol acetyltransferase (CAT) activity and sensitivity to the chloramphenicol of the clone-carrying C. glutamicum cells. C. glutamicum cells carrying the $P_{19}$ clone, a representative in the strong class, were able to grow on minimal agar plates containing over $40 mg/mell$ chloramphenicol, and showed CAT activity of 10 m㏖/mgㆍmin, performing slightly better than the cells carrying $P_{tac}$ , a strong E. coli promoter. Subcloning analysis of the $P_{19}$ clone identified a 180 bp intergenic fragment ($P_{180}$), which was located upstream of a gene encoding a hypothetical membrane protein. The expression conferred by $P_{180}$ was not affected by either the kinds of carbon sources or changes in temperature. These properties make the $P_{180}$ clone useful for the deregulated expression of biosynthetic genes in C. glutamicum during amino acid fermentation.

• Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.51 no.1
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• pp.42-46
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• 2018

Fetal bovine serum (FBS) is essential for cell culture and is used in the determination of infectivity titer and propagation of viruses. To clarify the effects of FBS on the propagation of viral haemorrhagic septicaemia virus (VHSV), which is a causative agent of mass mortalities of olive flounder Paralichthys olivaceus in Korea, VHSV was inoculated into an EPC (epithelioma papulosum cyprinid) cell line supplemented with MEMs (minimal essential medium) with FBS concentrations of 0%, 2%, 5%, and 10% (MEM0, MEM2, MEM5, and MEM10), respectively, and infectivity titers were compared. Cytopathic effects were observed in all experimental groups at 2 days post virus inoculation (dpi) and all cells were detached from cell culture flasks at 7 dpi. Infectivity titers increased to 3 dpi, persisted to 7 dpi, and decreased when cells were detached. The titer of VHSV in EPC cells in MEM0 was the lowest while those in the other experimental groups showed similar levels. In conclusion, 2% (v/v) of FBS was sufficient to propagate VHSV in EPC cells and the withdrawal of VHSV from cell culture flasks should be performed before cell detachment.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.897-901
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• 2008

Deep seawater (DSW; deep ocean water) is pure, rich in inorganic materials which have attracted attention for various applications. In this study we investigated the effects of the DSW upwelled from the East Sea, offshore Yang Yang (Korea) on the morphological differentiation of cultured rat hippocampal neurons, which were grown in the minimal essential medium containing 10% (v/v) fetal bovine serum and 25% (v/v) DSW with various hardness. DSW had no effect on initial morphological differentiation (17 hr post-plating). When observed on DIV3, 7, 14, and 17, low hardness (0 and 200) DSW reduced dendritic branching. However, dendritic branches within $80\;{\mu}m$ diameter from the center of soma nearly doubled in neurons grown in hardness 1,000 DSW-containing media. DSW with hardness 600 was more or less same as control groups. These results indicate that DSW with appropriate hardness ameliorates neuronal health.

• Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.44 no.4
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• pp.251-256
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• 2001

To develop biofertilizer solubilizing inorganic phosphate, a bacterium having high abilities to solubilize inorganic phosphate were isolated from cultivated soils. The strain was identified to Aeromonas hydrophila DA57, based on the physiological and biochemical properties. The optimum temperature and initial pH to solubilize insoluvle phosphate in sucrose minimal medium were $30^{\circ}C$ and pH 7.0, respectively. In these conditions phosphate solubilizing activities of the strain against three types of insoluble phosphate were quantitatively determined. It was possivle to distinguish between solubilization through release of gluconic acid and still unknown mechanism. Aemmonas hydrophila DA57 harbored a 4.5 kb cryptic plasmid.

• Food Science of Animal Resources
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.99-104
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• 2008

A lactic acid bacterium showing growth inhibitory activity against Enterobacter sakazakii was isolated from bovine intestinal tracts. From biochemical and molecular biological studies, the isolate was identified and named as Enterococcus faecium JH95. This strain was resistant to kanamycin and streptomycin at a concentration of $100{\mu}g/mL$. E. faecium JH95 had high antimicrobial activity against food-borne pathogens such as Escherichia coli O157:H7, Listeria monocytogenes, Salmonella typhimurium, Staphylococcus aureus, and Clostridium perfrigens. The culture supernatant of this strain did not have antimicrobial activity. The culture broth of this strain failed to show the antimicrobial activity by heat treatment at $100^{\circ}C$ for 5 min or by pretense treatments for 2 hr. This result suggested that the putative antimicrobial substance produced by E. faecium JH95 is likely a protein which is not secreted into culture medium.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.199-202
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• 2008

A white rot fungus Irpex lacteus produced lignin degrading enzymes, which showed degrading activity against various recalcitrant compounds. However, laccase, one of the lignin degrading enzymes, was too low to be assayed by spectrophotometry using o-tolidine as the chromogenic substrate in this fungus under various culture conditions. A laccase expression vector was constructed using a cDNA from Phlebia tremellosa with the constitutively expressed promoter of glyceraldehydes-3-phosphate dehydrogenase gene, and introduced into I. lacteus by the restriction enzyme mediated integration transformation through the protoplast-$CaCl_2$ procedure. Two transformants showed highly increased laccase activities at the early growth phase in the minimal liquid medium, and they not only degraded bisphenol A, a notorious endocrine disrupting chemical, but also removed the estrogenic activity effectively.

• Mass Spectrometry Letters
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.71-74
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• 2015

Low temperature plasma (LTP) ionization mass spectrometry (MS) is one of the widely used ambient analysis methods which allows soft-ionization and rapid analysis of samples in ambient condition with minimal or no sample preparation. One of the major advantages of LTP MS is selective analysis of low-molecular weight, volatile and low- to medium-polarity analytes in a sample. On the contrary, the selectivity for particular class of compound also implies its limitation in general analysis. One of the critical factors limiting LTP ionization efficiency is poor desorption of analytes with low volatility. In this study, a home-built LTP ionization source with Peltier heating sample stage was constructed to enhance desorption and ionization efficiencies of analytes in a sample and its performance was evaluated using standard mixture containing fatty acid ethyl esters (FAEEs). It was also used to reproduce the previous bacterial identification experiment using pattern-recognition for FAEEs. Our result indicates, however, that the bacterial differentiation from FAEE pattern recognition using LTP ionization MS still has many limitations.