The spotted-wing drosophila (SWD), Drosophila suzukii (Diptera: Drosophilidae), originally distributed across a few Asian countries, including South Korea, has invaded North America and Europe, but is absent from Australia. In order to export the South Korean grape cultivar Campbell Early to Australia, its potential to serve as oviposition and development medium for SWD must first be determined. In this study, we determined the oviposition and development potential of SWD on Campbell Early, after elucidating the SWD life cycle and establishing an artificial diet-based mass-culturing system. An investigation of the life cycle under five temperature regimes (16, 19, 22, 25, and 28°C) showed that the durations of the egg, larval, and adult stages were shorten when temperature was increased from 16, 19, 22, 25, and 28°C, but pupal duration was shortest at 25°C and extended again at 28°C. A test of oviposition and development potential of SWD on Campbell Early grape clusters showed oviposition of 30.8 ± 6.8 eggs per cluster of injured grapes and 157.7 ± 16.2 eggs on a culture dish of artificial diet. However, in a similar experiment using uninjured grape clusters, only a single egg was deposited on the grape skin, which soon dried. In light of these results, newly harvested grapes left at vineyards during daily harvests are unlikely to serve as an oviposition and development medium for SWD, as long as the grapes remain uninjured.

We newly sequenced mitogenomes of five skippers belonging to Lepidoptera to obtain further insight into characteristics of butterfly mitogenomes and performed phylogenetic reconstruction using all available gene sequences (PCGs, rRNAs, and tRNAs) from 85 species in 19 families in eight superfamilies. The general genomic features found in the butterflies also were found in the five skippers: a high A/T composition (79.3% - 80.9%), dominant usage of TAA stop codon, similar skewness pattern in various levels, consistently long intergenic spacer sequence between tRNAGln - ND2 (64-87 bp), the ATACTAA motif betweent RNASer(UCN) and ND1, and characteristic features of the A+T-rich region (the motif ATAGA, varying length of poly-T stretch, and poly-A stretch). The start codon for COI was CGA in four skippers as typical, but Lobocla bifasciatus evidently possessed canonical ATG as start codon. Phylogenetic analyses mainly yielded the consensus superfamilial relationships ((((((Bombycoidea + Noctuoidea + Geometroidea) + Pyraloidea) + Papilionoidea) + Tortricoidea) + Yponomeutoidea) + Hepialoidea) with a high support for most nodes, confirming the validity of Macroheterocera and its sister relationship to Pyraloidea. Within Rhopalocera the familial relationships (Papilionidae + (Hesperiidae + (Pieridae + ((Lycaenidae + Riodinidae) + Nymphalidae))) were strongly supported, confirming invalidity of the superfamily Hesperioidea. On the other hand, superfamilial relationships among Noctuoidea, Geometroidea, and Bombycoidea and the familial relationships among Saturniidae, Sphingidae, and Bombycidae were dubious, requiring further representative taxon sampling.

Lepidoptera is one of the largest insect orders, but the phylogenetic relationships within this order, have yet to be completely described. One of the unresolved relationships includes the monophyly of Papilionoidea in relationship with the monotypic superfamily Hesperioidea. We newly sequenced five hesperid mitochondrial genomes (mitogenomes), representing four subfamilies: Pyrginae (Daimio tethys and Lobocla bifasciatus), Coeliadinae (Choaspes benjaminii), and Hesperiinae (Potanthus flavus), and Heteropterinae (Carterocephalus silvicola). Along with these newly sequenced hesperid genomes phylogenetic analysis was conducted with all available lepidopteran mitogenomes including three reported species of Hesperiidae that consisted of ~70 species in ten lepidopteran superfamilies. The test for the effect of optimization schemes, such as exclusion and inclusion of third codon position of 13 PCGs, other genes (22 tRNAs and two rRNAs), and with and without partitions also was performed. Majority of datasets consistently placed the monophyletic Hesperiidae the sister to ((Pieridae + Lycaenidae) + Nymphalidae), placing another true butterfly family Papilionidae as the basal lineage of this group, presenting the relationships (Papilionidae + (Hesperiidae + ((Pieridae + Lycaenidae) + Nymphalidae))). Consistent to previous result, Pyraloidea was placed as the sister to ((Bombycoidea + Geometroidea) + Noctuoidea), placing the Macrolepidoptera as non-monophyletic group.

Background: This present study was conducted to evaluate the anti-inflammatory and immune regulatory effects of Aucklandia lappa Decne (AL). Methods and Results: We measured cytotoxicity, nitric oxide (NO) content, mRNA expression (iNOS, IL-1α, IL-1β, and TNF-α), protein expression (iNOS, COX-2, and IκB-α) and phagocytic activity in RAW264.7 cells. Male BALB/c mice were fed 100 ㎎/㎏ AL (Aucklandia lappa Decneon 70% ethanol extract) and 250 ㎎/㎏ AL for 4 weeks; thereafter, we observed B/T or CD4+/CD8+ lymphocyte subpopulation change, and expression patterns of CD4+ and CD8+ lymphocytes by immunohistochemical staining in mouse splenocytes and/or thymocytes. To determine the experimental concentration of AL, cell viability was measured by MTT assay and tested at 12.5 ㎍/㎖ or less. AL inhibited the levels of NO, lymphokine production (IL-1β, and TNF-α), and mRNA (iNOS, IL-1α, IL-1β, and TNF-α) and protein (iNOS, and COX-2) expression. Additionally, the levels of IκB-α, phagocytic activity, and splenic and thymic T lymphocytes, especially TH and TC cells were significantly increased in AL administered mice. The immuno-reactive density of CD4+ and CD8+ lymphocytes was stronger in AL groups than in the normal group. AL stimulated NO, iNOS, and COX-2, and regulated IL-1α, IL-1β, TNF-α, and IκB-α in macrophages treated with LPS (lipopolysaccharide). In addition, AL increased the phagocytic activity of macrophages and the immunity of mouse T (TH, and TC) cells. Conclusions: These results suggested that AL might show anti-inflammatory activity via the suppression of various inflammatory markers and immuno-regulatory activity.

Koreans have sedentary lifestyles and use under-floor heating called Ondol as home heating systems. Sick Building Syndrome (SBS) caused by VOCs released from flooring material has been of significant interest in residential apartments. In this study, we measured exposure to VOCs by having test subjects breathe under conditions of high surface temperature. The results showed that the emission level of VOCs was high at 40oC in the early stage of the experiment. However, 20 days after the experiment began, the emission level was reduced by 0.9-4 times in each product at 40oC. The exposure to VOCs released from floor coverings was measured by taking into account the average respiratory rate, weight, and activity hour of test subjects and presuming that people are exposed to VOCs all the time while staying indoors. The level of emission from FJR of low-cost PVC floor coverings was the highest among the tested coverings, but the exposure to VOCs emission from the covering was relatively low at 0.025 mg/kg/day at 40oC. The amount of toluene detected from this experiment was the highest among VOCs emitted from floor coverings. The hazard quotient (HQ) of toluene detected in this test was over 20 times smaller than the risk characterization level of 0.1. It was, therefore, estimated that the emission of toluene from the floor surface would not be critically harmful to residents.

Spatial- and temporal-specific expression patterns are primarily regulated at the transcriptional level by the promoter. Therefore, it is important to determine the binding motifs of transcription factors to understand the networks associated with embryogenesis. Here, we used a protein-binding microarray (PBM) to determine the binding motif of OsSMF1, which is a basic leucine zipper transcription factor that is involved in the regulation of rice seed maturation. OsSMF1 (previously called RISBZ1) is known to interact with GCN4 motifs (TGA(G/C)TCA) to regulate seed storage proteins (SSPs). In addition, OsSMF1 (also known as OsbZIP58) functions as a key regulator of starch synthesis in the rice seed. Quadruple 9-mer-based PBM (Q9-PBM) and electrophoretic mobility shift assay (EMSA) experiments revealed that OsSMF1 binds to the ACGT (CCACGT(C/G)), GCN4 (TGA(G/C)TCA), and GCN4-like (GGATGAC) motifs with Kd values of 0.3353 μM, 0.6458 μM, and 1.117 μM, respectively. We also identified 60 putative OsSMF1 target genes using a combination of data from expression microarrays and RiceArrayNet (RAN) analysis. Of these OsSMF1 target genes, 20, 22, and 17 genes contained ACGT, GCN4, and GCN4-like motifs within the 2-kb promoter region, respectively. In addition to known target genes, we also identified 35 potential OsSMF1 target genes that have not been previously described in immature seeds. We also confirmed that OsSMF1 directly regulates Os03g0168500 (thioredoxin-related protein), RPBF, NAC6, and two hypothetical proteins (Os12g0621600 and Os11g0582400) in vivo. This study suggests that OsSMF1 functions in a wide range of seed development processes with specific binding affinities for three DNA binding motifs

With the development of next generation sequencing (NGS) technology, the variation of sequences represented as SNP between cultivars becomes available at genome level. The major domestic cultivars with high yield have been developed by breeding of indica and japonica, it is important to localize the region of origin according to the genotype for further characterization of unique features of cultivars. For the localization of SNP at genome level, the paired end sequences of 6 major domestic rice cultivars, Ilmi, Ilpoom, Sulgaeng, Baekjinju1ho, Hwayoung and Woongwang were compared against Japonica and Indica Rice Genomes as reference genomes. The genomic DNAs were prepared from callus tissues and paired-end of the fragments were sequenced with NGS Sequencer, Illumina HISeq2000. About 50x coverage of paired-end sequences were trimmed according to the quality of the sequences, and errors were corrected with statistical analysis of kmers of 15. The trim-corrected sequences were mapped and variants were analyzed against reference genomes. The overall change rate of Ilmi against Nipponbare IRGSP 1.0 and Indica BGI 93-11 reference genomes were 0.92 base/1kb (1/1,079 base) and 8.09 base/1kb (1 base/123 bases), respectively. Among 6 cultivars, overall rate of Baekjinju1ho showed the lowest overall change rate of 0,53 base/1kb, and Hwayoung showed highest frequency of 0.92 base/1kb. Compared to high level in the range of change rate of 7.0-9.3 base/1kb against indica, domestic cultivars showed lower range of change rate 0.2-3.3 base/1kb with unique local high peak against japonica genome depend on the chromosomes. Compared to assembly of genome sequences, the variation of nucleotides compared to reference sequences is much faster and simple to characterize the genotype. The types of variation and the effect on functional categories will be presented.