Potassium channels, the largest group of pore proteins, selectively regulate the flow of potassium (K+) ions across cell membranes. The activity and expression of K+ channels are critical for the maintenance of normal functions in vessels and neurons, and for the regulation of cell differentiation and maturation. However, their role and expression in stem cells have been poorly understood. In this study, we isolated perivascular stem cells (PVCs) from human umbilical cords and investigated the expression patterns of big-conductance Ca2+-activated K+ (BKCa) and voltage-dependent K+ (Kv) channels using the reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. We also examined the effect of high glucose (HG, 25 mM) on expression levels of BKCa and Kv channels in PVCs. KCa1.1, KCaβ3, Kv1.3, Kv3.2, and Kv6.1 were detected in undifferentiated PVCs. In addition, HG treatment increased the amounts of BKCaβ3a, BKCaβ4, Kv1.3, Kv1.6, and Kv6.1 transcripts. These results suggested that ion channels may have important functions in the growth and differentiation of PVCs, which could be influenced by HG exposure.

This paper proposes combination of a cognitive agent architecture named Soar (State, operator, and result) and ROS (Robot Operating System), which can be a basic framework for a robot agent to interact and cope with its environment more intelligently and appropriately. The proposed Soar-ROS human-robot interaction (HRI) agent understands a set of human’s commands by voice recognition and chooses to properly react to the command according to the symbol detected by image recognition, implemented on a humanoid robot. The robotic agent is allowed to refuse to follow an inappropriate command like “go” after it has seen the symbol ‘X’ which represents that an abnormal or immoral situation has occurred. This simple but meaningful HRI task is successfully experimented on the proposed Soar-ROS platform with a small humanoid robot, which implies that extending the present hybrid platform to artificial moral agent is possible.

Purpose - In this paper, we categorize and segment the 28 national universities in South Korea and measure the degree of dissimilarity (or similarity) between pairs of ones by using dissimilarity distance matrix and cluster analysis, respectively, based on the seven quantitative evaluation of educational conditions (percentage of small-scale courses, percentage of lecture by the faculty, collection of books per student, material purchase per student, percentage of building capacity, percentage of real estate capacity and rate of accommodation) in 2015. In addition, multidimensional scaling (MDS) techniques can obtain visual representation for exploring patterns of proximities among 28 national universities based on seven attributes of educational conditions. Research design, data, and methodology - This work is carried out by the 2015 Announcement of University Information, which is provided by Ministry of Education in South Korea and utilized by multivariate analyses with CLUSTER, PROXIMITIES and ALSCAL modules in IBM SPSS 23.0. Results - We make certain that 28 national universities can be categorized into five clusters which have similar traits by applying two-stage cluster analysis. MDS is utilized to perform positioning of grouped places of cluster and 28 national universities joining every cluster. Conclusions - Both types and traits of each national university can be relatively assessed and practically utilized for each university competitiveness based on underlying results.

Purpose - In order to achieve the organizational objectives, the behavior of the employees and their collaboration with management should be taken into account. It has been shown that strategic behavior depends on a number of different factors. The aim of this article was determining the relationship between factors related to the strategic behavior. Research design, data, and methodology - Accordingly, a conceptual model was developed and tested in the form of a survey. Participants of the study were the employees working in the social Insurance company of Tehran. Data was collected using a questionnaire conducted among managers and the staff. A correlation model was used for data analysis by employing the SPSS software. Results - The findings showed there was a relationship between employees’ engagement and the strategic behavior. Conclusions - Our research has demonstrated the effect of employees’ engagement on the strategic-driven behavior, emphasizing the role of employees’ engagement in health-care service firms. Although previous service research has focused on the factors that drive employees’ performance, it seems that most of this research has been inspired by the idea of the service profit chain, focusing on the effect of employees’ satisfaction on performance.

This study was conducted to investigate the antibacterial, antioxidant, and in vitro greenhouse gas mitigation activities of fermented Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi extract. Seven starter cultures were used, comprising four of lactic acid bacteria and three of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Ten grams of S. baicalensis Georgi powder was diluted in 90 mL autoclaved MRS broth. Each seed culture was inoculated with 3-10% (v/v) S. baicalensis Georgi MRS broth and incubated at 30℃ for 48 h. Among the starter cultures used, only Lactobacillus plantarum EJ43 could withstand the fermentation conditions. This fermentation broth was dried and extracted with ethanol to assess its antibacterial, antioxidant, and in vitro methane mitigation activities. The extract of S. baicalensis Georgi fermented by L. plantarum EJ43 (SBLp) showed higher antibacterial activity (bigger clear zone) compared to the unfermented S. baicalensis Georgi extract (SB0). SBLp also presented 1.2 folds higher antioxidant activity than SB0. During in vitro rumen fermentation, SBLp showed reduction in methane production compared to SB0 or the control. In conclusion, fermentation by L. plantarum EJ43 may enhance antibacterial and antioxidant activities of S. baicalensis Georgi and decrease enteric methane production.

Lettuce is an important annual leafy vegetable and bitterness is its potent flavor character. Lettuce germplasm differ their phenotypic characters and sesquiterpene lactones (SLs) contents which are important for consumer’s acceptance. This study was carried out to evaluate the phenotypic characters and SLs contents in one hundred lettuce germplasm in Jeonju, Korea. Twenty-three agro-morphological (16 qualitative and 7 quantitative) traits and two SLs (lactucin and lactucopicrin) contents were studied in these germplasm. Germplasm exhibited the variation in qualitative and quantitative characters. Average plant weight was 423.9 g with a range from 116.0 to 905.0 g. Lactucin content was varied from 19.7 (IT 294226) to 194.4 ㎍/g (IT 294298) with an average concentration of 84.7 ㎍/g. Lactucopicrin ranged from 82.5 (IT 300134) to 2228.6 ㎍/g (IT 294210) with an average concentration of 586.3 ㎍/g. Total SLs content was ranged from 120.1 (IT 300134) to 2286.6 (IT 294210) ㎍/g with the average concentration of 671.0 ㎍/g. Significant (p≤0.05) differences were found between crisp head and butter head germplasm for lactucin, lactucopicrin and total SLs content. Crisp head germplasm revealed the highest average lactucin (112.9 ㎍/g), lactucopicrin (734.8 ㎍/g) and total SLs content (847.7 ㎍/g). Crisp head and leafy type germplasm exhibited more total SLs content (847.7 and 744.7 ㎍/g, respectively) than cos (524.9 ㎍/g) and butter head type (519.4 ㎍/g). Principal component analyses of the quantitative traits indicated that the first principal component axis accounted more than 91% of the total variation. This study revealed the ample genetic variation in the agro-morphological traits and SLs contents to support the selection for improved lettuce varieties.

A 67-year-old man presented with painful whitish mucosal rashes on the left side of his palate at initial presentation, and subsequently, multiple, grouped erythematous vesicular eruptions developed on the left side of his face (V2-V3 distribution). In this case, the distribution pattern of oral lesions were atypical of herpes zoster infection. Attention should be paid to the possibility that such symptoms could be early signs of herpes zoster infection.

Communication, Ocean And Meteorological Satellite (COMS) Meteorological Imager (MI) images are processed for radiometric and geometric correction from raw image data. When intermediate image data are matched and compared with reference landmark images in the geometrical correction process, various techniques for edge detection can be applied. It is essential to have a precise and correct edged image in this process, since its matching with the reference is directly related to the accuracy of the ground station output images. An edge detection method based on neural networks is applied for the ground processing of MI images for obtaining sharp edges in the correct positions. The simulation results are analyzed and characterized by comparing them with the results of conventional methods, such as Sobel and Canny filters.

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) plays a vital role in economic growth of the countries. The present study analyses the impact of the FDI on economic growth of South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation countries by using the pooled data for the period 1990-2014. Neo-classical production function has been used for analysis and getting stock-to-flow estimation, Taylor series approximation has applied. Fixed Effects Model has been used to investigate the impact of FDI, domestic capital, labour and government expenditures on economic growth. It is the evident from the results that both domestic investment and FDI have been a positive effect on economic growth. The study finds that the contribution of domestic private investment is more trustworthy than the contribution of FDI. Consequently, FDI loses its attraction as an engine of growth if the adverse balance of payment consequence of the resulting profit repatriating is also taken into account. The labour has positive and significant association with GDP. The effect of government expenditure is negligible on economic growth. The findings suggest that growth strategy cannot yield the long term benefits if it neglects investments on human capital.

Background : Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) appears to enhance the differentiation of osteoblasts and to activate the mineralization of bone. Hence, the aim of this study was to investigate the effects of ginseng complex on the remodeling of rats tibia. Methods and Results : Ginseng complex significantly increased serum IGF-1 by 58% and 34.5% than the control, respectively. Treatment with α-amylase when manufacturing these extracts remarkably increased the concentration of IGF-1 by 63% and 36% above the control, respectively. This ways that this ginseng complex, especially α-amylase treated extracts, contained a higher level of IGF-1 secretion in the ginseng complex groups. In addition, increases of 8% in femuf length were found after 12 weeks of oral administration with ginseng complex (300mg/kg). Conclusion : These results mean that ginseng complex have beneficial effects on bone effects on bone growth via IGF-1.

Background : Recently, many studies to seek for medicinal herb compounds from natural products have been attempted capable of being free from harmful side effects and reducing the economic burden. This study was conducted to investigate whether Morus alba L.(MAL) water extracts has a biological safety, and an inhibitory potential against the mutagenicity induced by cigarette smoke condensates(CSC). Methods and Results : MAL was extracted with 70% ethanol and the yield of the extract was 35.1%. The 70% ethanol MAL extract was fractionated sequentially by diethylether, chloroform, dichloromethane, and water, respectively. Crude MAL 70% ethanol extract itself and its solvent fractions did not show any mutagenic effect up to 1 mg/plate toward Salmonella typhimurium TA 98 with or without the microsomal S-9 mixture of liver metabolic activations. On the other hand, the crude MAL extract showed an inhibitory activity against the mutagenicity of CSC with S-9 mixture. Diethyl ether layer among five solvent fractions showed the highest inhibitory activity at the same dose. The inhibitory activity of diethyl ether layer was also increased dose-dependently and the inhibitory rate was about 97.1% at the concentration of 1 mg/plate. Conclusion : In this study, we concluded that all of the crude MAL 70% ethanol extract and its solvent layers are potentially safe for mutagenicity and the diethyl ether layer among the crude MAL 70% ethanol extract has an inhibitory effect against the mutagenicity of CSC.

Background : Teucrium veronicoides Maximowicz is a perennial plant affiliated to labiate. Ther e were many oil components such as methylchavicol, anethole, anisaldehyde, p-methoxycinnamal dehyde, 3-ocatanone and p-cymene. It has been used for indigestion, stomachache, vomit, diarrhe a in the chinese medicine field. Besides it used as medicine, it used increasingly as food additiv es, tea and air fresheners etc. This experiment was focused on plugs and planting date. That's why the plug plants are very useful for transplanting. It saves time and labor for farmer with well-management system. During the raised seeding time, they could has gotten plant health and maximum potential state. The planting date which would have something related to the growth of plug. Methods and Results : Plug plants raised in the greenhouse during 30 days. The interval of planting date was 10 days and five time planted in planting density of 60*30cm sized area with three repeat treatments. The first treatment was middle April. The last planting date was late May. Before planting period, the length of plant and the length of leaf were the highest at the middle April, respectively. The stem diameter was highest at late March. The number of leaf was the most in the late March and early April than other planting date. In the planting period, the length of plant was highest at early April. The stem diameter was also highest at that time. There were no differences on the length and the width of leaf. The number of leaf per plant was the most at the early May. The branches per plant and number of node per plant were the highest in middle April. In the respect of yield, early May had the highest dried yield than that of other treatments. It was 492.2kg/10a. The index of which was 122. The lowest was 317.2kg/10a in late May. Conclusion : About the characteristics on the growth and the yield of Teucrium veronicoides Maximowicz plug in accordance with the planting date, the yield of early May was the highest than that of other in this study. Therefore planting date of early May would have high possibility of optimum planting date.

Background : Schizonepeta tenuifolia Kitagawa is a herbaceous plant affiliated to labiate. It has many oil components which has antimicrobial activity for health with limonene, menthone, pulegon e, piperitenone, schizonepetoside A, schizonepetoside C, spatulenol. The planting area of which is com paratively small than other medicine crop as 5ha area and 15MT in the nation. The purpose of this study was to figure out the cause of characteristics on the planting life in accordance wit h the planting date used plugs. Plug plants are very useful for transplanting. It gives well-mana gement effects to the farmer such as time saving, convenience of planting, plant health, and ma ximum potential state during the raised time. Methods and Results : The number of treatment for planting date was five. Those are early May, middle May, late May, early July and middle July. The interval of the planting date was 10 days. And the raising seeding period was 30 days. During the raising seeding period, in late July treatment the length of plant and the stem diameter were the highest respectively. The number of stem was also the most in late July. In the planting period, the length of plant and the stem diameter were the highest at early May. There were no differences in the number of stem per plant. The length of ear and the width of ear were the highest at the early July. The number of ear per plant was the highest in the early May as 768.7. In the respect of yield, the weight of fresh body at early May was the highest as 587g per plant. The next higher weight of fresh body was middle May as 530.0g per plant than that of other planting date. Conclusion : The effect of planting date on the growth and the yield of Schizonepeta tenuifolia Kitagawa mainly focused to early May treatment. The earlier planting treatment was the better for planting it in this study.

Background : Senna tora L. is a herbaceous plant affiliated to legumes. It has many components good for health with emodin, chrysophanol, aloe-emodin, physicion, rhein, obtusin. It is believed to have many medicine effects, as well as to good for the eyes. This study carried to find ou t the difference of characteristics on the growth according to the planting date used plugs. Plu g plants are very useful for transplanting. It gives well-management effects to the farmer such a s time, plant health, and maximum potential state during the raised time. Methods and Results : Plug plants had 30 days in raising seeding. The planting date was five time. Fist planting date was late April. The last planting date was early July. In their raising seeding period they were taken care of in the green house. And after 30 days, they were planted on the ground in planting density of 50*40cm sized area with three repeat treatments. When the raising seeding period, the length of plant and the length of leaf were the highest at the middle May, respectively. The number of leaf per plant was highest in late May as 11. In the planting period, the length of plant was highest at early July. The lowest was the length of plant at late May. Except the stem diameter in early April, they were no differences among other treatments and the stem diameter was the highest in early April. The number of node per plant could be found the most in middle May and late April. The number of node per plant was the lowest in early July. In the respect of yield, middle May had the highest yield than that of other treatments. It was 849.0kg/10a. The lowest was 740.6kg/10a in the early May. Conclusion : About the characteristics on the growth of Senna tora L. according to the planting date, the yield of middle May was highest than that of other date in this study. The planting date of late May had also shown strong tendency of optimum planting date. Therefore middle May and late May of planting date would be optimum planting date.

Purpose - In this paper, we consider more segmented types of markets than conventional version of ones in South Korea and explore the degree of relations between these markets and the related factors with them. In this case, ten attributes of types of markets mentioned above will be considered. To be more specific, the numerical strength is evaluated and graphical approach is expressed on two-dimensional plane, if the association exists between the considered variables. Research design, data, and methodology - This work is done by the 2013 report on the commercial building lease offered by Small Businessmen Promotion Institute (May/2013~August/2013) and exploited by statistical analyses such as correspondence analysis and a chi-squared test in IBM SPSS 23.0. Results - Findings of this paper indicate that a variable Korean market, including traditional markets, are closely connected with variables administrative district, sales and occupation instead of company, age group and business duration and the detailed associations between variables can be obtained by inspecting results of correspondence analysis. Conclusions - We can understand where the status of the Korean markets stands now through this work and also government authority and local autonomy can take advantage of these findings to enhance the revitalization of Korean markets and other markets.

This paper will examine Russia’s policy concerning Korea’s re-unification and Moscow’s likely responses to possible results of the unification process as a major and necessary element of peace-building in Northeast Asia. Since the middle of the 19th century Russia has had a keen interest in the situation on the Korean peninsula. History repeatedly proved that any aggravation of the situation on the peninsula caused serious concerns and made Russia to take additional steps to ensure her security. So both for security reasons and for smooth development of her Far Eastern region, Russia is vitally interested in maintaining peace and stability on the Korean peninsula. Emergence of the re-unified Korea, however, is likely to create a new situation in the region and make Russia to re-evaluate her policy in Northeast Asia. It is generally accepted notion that Russia will benefit, first of all, from liquidation of a long-time hot spot right next to her Far Eastern region and from founding the re-unified Korea, which is supposedly will maintain relations of friendship, good-neighborhood and cooperation with Russia and other neighboring states. Meanwhile, at the moment, better relations between North and South Korea, along with providing Russia with more favorable conditions for development of trade and economic cooperation with both parts of Korea, would also open new opportunities for economic development of the Russian Far East and for linking Russia’s economy to globalization and integration processes in the Asia-Pacific region. So both on security and economic reasons Moscow is vitally interested in reconciliation between North and South Korea and eventual emergence of a peaceful and neutral Korea.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to review, analyze and identify the suitability of Kazakh gender policy for the changes taken place in the society with suggesting necessary changes. Research design, data, and methodology – After meticulous reviews of germane literature, the researchers applied an analytical approach which focuses on analyzing the Kazakh’s gender policy and its issuance guidelines based on the present requirement in the society. Even though the policy has introduced with astonishing prudence, present-day living trends in society require imperatively some notable modifications which protect the rights of women and minority sections of the society. Results – Through this gender policy, government has proffered required legal, financial and preferential support country’s women to participate in the management and legislation of the country. Kazakh gender policy requires upgradations which flawlessly support women in the lifestyles of the feminine community. Conclusions – In achieving gender equality in the economy as a priority area, Kazakh government monitoring persistently and closely the changing trends of women and their requirements which introduce necessary modifications to the existing gender policy of the country with the cooperation of international organization.

In this work, based on our previous calculations of spectral energy distributions for a sample of Fermi blazars (Fan et al. 2015a), we calculated the radio loudness and performed correlation analyses. Our analysis results show that radio loudness is closely anti-correlated with synchrotron peak frequency and positively correlated with gamma-ray luminosity, suggesting that the gamma-ray emissions are strongly beamed.

Background: Chrysanthemum indicum L. is used in medicine, for bee, ornamental as multivoltinism plant resources. Since ancient times, Chrysanthemum indicum L. had been widely used as drug and tea. From 2000, breeding began and the three varieties "Manhyang", "Geumhyang", Gamro" were developed so far. As demand has increased, growth traits of "Wonhyang" has been tested and fostered to report growth characteristics of "Wonhyang". Methods and Results: It is used New variety "Wonhyang" that were forstered in Gyeongsangnam-do Agricultural Research & Extension Services. After going through selection, proliferation and characteristics of CI0901, production performance test carried out in 2012~2013. As a result, it had named as "Gamkuk 4" in high quality, quantity and of strong in the disease. Local adaptability trial test carried out in 2014~2015. Conclusion: "Wonhyang" was a good growth in plant height, lengths of branches. Leaf color is light green, flower color is light yellow. Disease and pest resistance of "Wonhyang" is relatively better than "Manhyang". Since plant height is small and plant width is big, "Wonhyang" is available for medicine, food and landscaping. As a result of local adaptability trial test, Yield(131.1㎏/10a) of three region Hamyang,Hapcheon,Changnyeongis 10% higher than "Manhyang". Based on the results of this study, "Wonhyang" was to be registered for a new breed through the breed fostering council.

Background : Korean Red Ginseng has been reported to have various anti-virus, anti-tumor, anti-inflammation and immune-regulating activity. However, Korean Red Ginseng Crude Saponin (KRGCS) effect on Pulmonary inflammation has been insufficient research. We have investigated the effect of KRGCS on pulmonary inflammation in mouse model. Methods and Results : Pulmonary inflammation induced by cigarette smoke condensates (CSC) and lipopolysaccharide (LPS) in BALB/c mice. 100uL (ratio 1:1) of CSC (4mg/mL) and LPS (100ug/mL) solution instilled with intratracheal injection once per a week for 3 weeks in mice. KRGCS was also administered orally a dose of 10mg/kg and 25mg/kg for 3 weeks. KRGCS treatment groups decreased the number of inflammatory total cells in lung tissues and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) and the number of neutrophils in BALF dropped more than negative control groups. Additionally, KRGCS reduced the absolute number of CD4+ and CD8+ cells in BALF, and the number of CD11b+ Gr-1+cells in the lung and BALF. Furthermore, we found that KRGCS declined significantly the level of the cytokine chemokine (C-X-C motif)-1 (CXCL-1), Macrophage inflammatory protein-2 (MIP-2), and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) in BALF. Conclusion : These results that KRGCS has an inhibitory effects on pulmonary inflammation such as COPD, may be a candidate of effective herbal pharmaceuticals for the cure of lung diseases.