Amino acid transporters play important roles in supplying nutrients to cells. In our current study, we investigated the expression of LAT1 and measured the amino acid uptake in ameloblast cultures to further elucidate the roles of this transporter during the differentiation of these cells. RT-PCR, observations of cell morphology, Alizaline red-S staining, and uptake analyses were performed following the experimental induction of differentiation in the cultures. LAT1 mRNA was detectable and found to gradually increase over time whereas LAT2 mRNA was not evident in the ameloblast cultures. Transcripts of 4F2hc, a cofactor of LAT1 and LAT2, were also found to be expressed in ameloblast cultures and increase with time. Amelogenin mRNA was expressed in the early stage ameloblast cultures. L-leucine uptake was observed to increase over 14 days of growth in culture. Our data suggest that LAT1 has a key role in the differentiation of ameloblasts and in providing these cells with neutral amino acids, including several essential amino acids.

Nowadays, importance of regional specific on-farm research is largely increased in order to reduce the feeding cost of cattle. For this project, three regional districts (Yeongam, Yeonggwang and Jangheung) were selected wherein the cultivation area of forage production were largely increased from 1,200 ('08) to 2,600 ㏊ ('09) in Yeongam, 1,001('08) to 1,925 ㏊ ('09) in Yeonggwang, and 1,300 ('08) to 2,820 ㏊ ('09) in Jangheung district. Among the forage species, Italian ryegrass (IRG) and forage barley were predominantly cultivated in these regions. On the other hand, rye, grassland and summer annual forages were cultivated very little in a manner of land area. The productivity of forage barley was slightly increased 21.5('06), 26.2('07), and 27.3 MT/㏊ ('08) as silage. The number of farm and cultivation area was also increased remarkably. The present research project will be conducted from 2009 to 2010. Forage production and utilization for reduction of feeding cost, and high quality of Hanwoo beef production will investigated, in a manner of cultivation of forage crops mainly IRG, forage barley, IRG+barley mixture and corn.

This study examined the effects of adding Pleurotus ostreatus, Agaricus bisporus and Flammulina velutipes on the quality characteristics of cookies and multiple purposes ofwheat powders. The water content, crude protein content, mineral content， color value and sensory evaluation of mushroom cookies and multiple purposes ofwheat powders were measured. In the case of cookies, the water content was 1.10-1.24% and crude protein content was 8.20-9.80%. General preferences， such as appearance, color, taste and texture， increased when mushroom was added to the cookies, especially flavor, which showed a much higher preference. In the studies where mushroom was added to wheat powders, the water content was 0.57-0.92% and crude protein content was 11.90-12.80%. The addition of mushroom to both of the cookies and multiple purposes of wheat powders resulted in a remarkable increase in the mineral content, especially Fe, K. In addition, an increase in the amount of added mushrooms resulted in an increase in the hunter L and a values; however, this also resulted in a decrease in the b value.

whitefly, Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) have a wide host range including cucumber, tomato, and pepper, resulting in loss of crop yield. In this study, we tested larvicidal efficacy of several on-the-market environment–friendly agricultural materials (EFAM) to select the effective products after the target pests were stabilized in indoor rearing condition. The developmental periods of two whiteflies are as follows: in the case of T. vaporariorum, egg duration is 9.6 days, and nymph is 18.9 days, and in the case of B.tabaci, egg durationis 7.4 days, and nymph is 15.2 days under 25℃ with relative humidity (RH) of 60±5% and a photoperiod of 16L : 8D. The total period of T. vaporariorum as 5 days longer than B. tabaci. Among 22 EFAMs six products showed more than 60% of insecticide efficacy for against T. vaporariorum BTVB, BTVD, BTVG, BTVL, BTVM, and BTVS. On the other hand, seven EFAM products including showed over 60% of insecticide efficacy against B. tabaci BTVD, BTVG, BTVK, BTVL, BTVM, BTVN, and BTVU. In the case of Spodptera litura previously, xxEFAMs were tesed against 2nd instar S.litura, and EFAMs were found to have more than 90% efficacy. Test of these six EFAMs against entire larval stages were performed in this study. Although some of these products showed still more than 90% of insecticidal efficacy against up to 3rd instar larvae, the efficacy of these EFAMs sharply decreased as ages increase, result is less than 60% of efficacy of the products at most. This result indicates the difficulty to control S. litura with the on-the-market EFAMs alone under economic injury level. Collectively, it is required to find more EFAMs and find alternative method to control those insect pests tested in this study.

Moths were caught by using two 22W UV black light traps per treatment during May, June, August and September in 2007 from our study sites. Our study areas of the Korea Long Term Ecological Research (KLTER) sites were Mt. Nam with two plant communities (Quercus mongolica, Pinus densiflora), Mt. Jiri with three plant communities (Q. mongolica, P. densiflora, Abies koreana), Mt. Wolak with three plant communities (Q. mongolica, P. densiflora, Q. variabilis), and Mt. Jumbong with t재 plant communities (Q. mongolica, P. densiflora). The purpose of this study was to compare the species diversity of major plant feeders, Lepidopteran species (moths) at each forest type of the regional KLTER sites. Overall, the total numbers of moth species we’ve collected from the all KLTER sites in 2007 were 670 species. For the three plant communities, Mt.Jiri (11 family, 259 species, 2372 individuals) was the highest site and Mt. Wolak (7 family, 401 species, 2243 individuals) was the next highest. For the two plant communities, Mt. Jumbong (14 family, 166 species, 1750 individuals) was highest and Mt Nam (4 family, 21 species, 142 individuals) was very few. The ordination analyses, Nonmetric multidimensional scaling (NMS) and cluster analysis, showed distinct clusters separating the assemblages of moth found at each site and each plant community of the KLTER sites (P<0.05 from MRPP). Therefore, we suggest that our sustainable monitoring will verify the distinct cluster with the forest type at each site with many replications.

This study was carried out to investigate effect of herbal extracts mixtures on hair growth in an alopecia model of C57BL/6 mice. There were 4 experimental groups including distilled water (DW, negative control), 25% ethanol(EtOH, vehicle control) and two herbal extract mixtures (HE-1 and HE-2). HE-1 included Polygonum and Brassica campestris extracts and HE-2 included Mulberry root and Gardenia extracts. The 6 weeks-old C57BL/6 male mice were shaved with an electric clipper and the test compounds were topically treated with 0.2 ml per mouse daily for 3 weeks. The hair re-growth was photographically determined at days 0, 4, 7, 10, 14, 17, and 21. The number of mast cells which is an important modulator of hair growth was counted in 1 cm of dorsal skin section of mice. There were no clinical signs in all experimental groups. As the results of photometric analysis, the topical application of the herbal extracts (HE-1 & 2) for 2 weeks to dorsal skin accelerated hair re-growth remarkably faster than that of DW group (p＜0.05). Activity of alkaline phosphatase (ALP) was significantly increased in EtOH group compared to DW group (p＜0.05). Both herbal extract mixtures also increased the ALP activity, but it was not significantly different from DW. Treatment of mice with HE-2 significantly increased mast cell population compared to EtOH. Taken together, these results suggest that herbal extract mixtures used in this study may have hair-growth promoting activities and can be useful for treatment for male pattern baldness or alopecia in humans.

The principal objective of this study was to assess the antioxidative activities of Petasites japonicus against oxidative stress in bovine brain tissue . Petasites japonicus is found with a relatively widespread distribution, and is cultivated as a culinary vegetable in Korea. Petasites japonicus samples were dried either by freeze-drying or by hot air-convection drying (80℃), then evaluated for their antioxidative activity by measuring 1-dipheny-1，2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radical scavenging, and by measuring thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances (TBARS) in brain homogenates subjected to Fe2+ -mediated lipids with or without the addition of botanical extract. Hot air convection-drying resulted in a slight increase in the extraction yie1d as compared with freeze-drying. However, total phenol and flavonoid contents in freeze-dried Petasites japonicas were significantly higher than those of hot air convection-drying. Freeze-drying increased the free radical scavenging activity of Petasites japonicas, leaves, and stems by 52.6, 28.6, and 248.0%, as compared with hot air convection-drying. Additionally, the IC50 values measured by TBARS in hot air convection-dried Petasites japonicas， leaves, and stems were increased by 36.0, 31.6, and 15.9%, as compared to those of freeze-drying. Although antioxidative activity was reduced slightly by heat processing in Petasites japonicas, freeze-drying for each portion of Petasites japonicus was the most appropriate for use as a functional food and pharmaceutical material.

Attacin is an antibacterial protein that is secreted by fat body cells of insect larva in response to bacterial infection. A 949 bp cDNA encoding the antibacterial protein attacin was isolated by employing annealing control primer (ACP)-based GeneFishing polymerase chain reaction (PCR) from immunized Papilio xuthus larvae. The attacin cDNAs encoded 250 amino acid residues open reading frame with 60 residues prepropeptide. The deduced amino acid sequence of P. xuthus attacin showed significant identities with other Lepidopteran attacins. The attacin transcript was detected at significant level after injection with bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS). The predicted mature attacin was expressed as soluble fusion protein efficiently in bacterial expression system. To increase productivity and solubility, attacin was translationally fused with thioredoxin (Trx) protein and expressed in E. coli cells that are highly sensitive to the mature attacin. The recombinant attacin exhibited antibacterial activity against Gram-negative bacteria.

To find some antibacterial peptides responsible for bacterial resistance, we performed differential hybridization with total cDNA probes which synthesized from normal and immunized larvae. Thirteen individual cDNA transcripts were expressed differentially in a total 1,862 random cDNA clones. One of upregulated genes is a novel member of the insect defensin-like peptide(Coprisin), a family of antibacterial peptide. Northern blot analysis showed that Coprisin was up-regulated at 4h and reached the highest point level at 16h after injection of E.coli. The deduced amino acid sequence of Coprisin was composed of 80 amino acids with predicted molecular weight of 8.6 kDa and PI of 8.72. Comparison of the deduced amino acid mature portion of Coprisin with defensin-like peptide of other insect indicated that it has 79.1% and 67.4% identity with Anomala cuprea and Allomyrina dichotoma, respectively. To find antibacterial active region of Coprisin, we synthesized four peptides corresponding to amino acid residues 1V-43N-NH2(CopN1), 5-16(CopN2), 19-30(CopN3) and 31-43(CopN4) of coprisin having amidated amino acid residues at their Cterminal. A 12-mer amidated at its C-terminus, ACALHCIALRKK-NH2 (Ala19-Lys30-NH2) was synthesized based on the deduced amino acid sequence, assumed to be an active site sequence. This peptides showed antibacterial activity against E.coli, Staphylococcus aureus, MRSA, Psedomonas syringae, and Pectobacterium carotovorium. Modified 9-mer peptide, LRCIALRKK-NH2, showed strong antibacterial activity than mellitin peptide used as a positive control against gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria. This peptide showed no haemolytic activity and quite stable at 100℃ for several hours of incubation and in a wide pH range(pH2-12). Therefore, this peptide may be a good candidate for the development of new drug with potent antibacterial activity without cytotoxicity.