This study aims at helping Chinese container liners keep constant competitiveness in the heated competition Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), a mathematics-based, multi-criteria decision analysis methodology is applied in the study to the performance evaluation on the three biggest Chinese container liners: COSCON, CSCL, and Sinolines. Through the final results of AHP model, we completely learn the current situation of Chinese liners, therefore they are able to enhance the competitive advantage from modifying operation strategy and competition strategy in accordance with the shipping market.

This study is to identify the physiological traits of submergence-tolerant varieties of rice plants (Oryza sativa L.) in Yeongnam area, southeastern part of Korea, where the reduction of rice yield due to submergence is remarkably severe. In the present study, two tolerant varieties of rice plants were selected from over 30 rice varieties grown in under a 10-day period. The tolerant varieties selected from a submerged paddy field. As a control, one intolerant variety of rice plant was chosen. Of the tolerant variety Samgangbyeo, rather than Haepyungbyeo, had a lower dissolved oxygen consumption and maintained a higher dry weight than the intolerant variety. The leaf photosynthetic rates (LPS) of the two tolerant varieties were significantly higher than that of the intolerant-variety after four days of submergence treatment. These results indicate that lower dissolved oxygen consumption in a limited pool is prevented by ethylene formation in the tolerant varieties, which may be a mechanism of submergence tolerance.

Activity of senescence-induced antioxidant enzymes in the detached rice seedlings (Oryza sativa L. cv. Dongjin) was examined. The levels of ~textrmH2~textrmO2 content and peroxidase (POD) activity were gradually increased during leaf senescence, whereas catalase activity was decreased. The activity of superoxide dismutase (SOD) was increased, and ascorbate peroxidase (APX) and glutathione reductase (GR) were slightly increased until 3d and 4d of dark induced-senescence, and thereafter were decreased. The activation of all SOD isoforms showed a significant decrease after 6d and 7d. After 4d to 7d of dark senescence, there was a significant effect in enhancing the activity of APX-12 and -13 isoforms as compared with light, despite similar levels in total APX activity. GR-8 and -10 isoforms were more effective in leaf senescence at 4d to 7d, particularly with respect to dark-induced senescence. These results suggest that the metabolism of active oxygen species such as ~textrmH2~textrmO2 is dependent on various functionally interrelated antioxidant enzymes such as catalase, peroxidase, SOD, APX and GR.

In the removal of heavy metals from the mine deposit using electrokinetic processes, the effects of operation under both constant current and constant potential conditions were estimated. The results of soil pH distributions for DDW-20 V and DDW-100 ㎃ cases after the electrokinetic remediation tests were observed. In the former case, soil pH was not much changed and kept to almost constant value just little higher than initial soil pH of 3.52, except near the cathode, which was about pH 5. While in the latter case, soil pHs of anode and the cathode regions were less than pH 3 and about 6, respectively. The electroosmotic flow to the cathode increased rapidly till 10 hrs and decreased steadily and then maintained to constant rate until the end of operation at constant current condition. Electric potential gradient was continuously increased to as much as 34.375 V/cm. At the steady state, values of the apparent electric conductivity for DDW-20 V and DDW-100 ㎃ were around 40 ㎲/㎝ and 30 ㎲/㎝, respectively. In the DDW-100㎃ test, Cu, Cd, and Zn except Pb showed the tendency of moving toward the cathode. While in the DDW-20 V case, it was observed that Cu, Zn, and Pb except Cd were not moved to any directions. The results of the tests demonstrated that the electrokinetic soil remediation process could be operated better under constant current condition than constant electric potential condition.

Five constituents were isolated from the stem of Acanthopanax senticosus. Their structures were elucidated as (-)-sesamin (1), iso-fraxidin (2), 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (3), syringin (4) and acanthoside D (5) by spectral analysis. Among these compounds, 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (3) was isolated for the first time from this plant.

Embryonic stem (ES) cells proliferate extensively in the undifferentiated state and have the potential to differentiate into a variety of cell types in response to various environmental cues. The generation of functional dopaminergic neurons from ES cells is promising for cell replacement therapy to treat Parkinson's disease. We compared the in vitro differentiation potential of pluripotent human embryonic stem (hES, MB03) cells induced with basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) or retinoic acid (RA). Both types of treatment resulted in similar neural cell differentiation patterns at the terminal differentiation stage, specifically, 75% neurons and 11% glial cells. Additionally, treatment of hES cells with brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) or transforming growth factor (TGF)- during the terminal differentiation stage led to significantly increased tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) expression, compared to control (P<0.05). In contrast, no effect was observed on the rate of mature or glutamic acid decarboxylase-positive neurons. Immunostaining and HPLC analyses revealed the higher levels of TH (20.3%) and dopamine in bFGF and TGF- treated hES cells than in RA or BDNF treated hES cells. The results indicate that TGF- may be successfully used in the bFGF induction protocol to yield higher numbers of functional dopaminergic neurons from hES cells.

We have analyzed the genetic diversity of 45 squash genotypes in Cucurbita maxima, C. moschata, C. pepo and uniden-tified Cucurbita spp. (noodle-squash) with molecular markers. The 45 squash accesions showed molecular variations of 87.5% inRAPD and 74.4%

The study of this experiment is focused on labor saving of healthy rice seedling production using PSF (polypropylene spunbonded fabrics) as thermal protection material. Several factors such as different compositions of nursery soil and PSF materials were tested to produce healthy rice seedlings. The inner thermal protection material in PE film (polyethylene film) showed 0.9-1.7~circC higher than that of PSF 40-100 ~textrmgm-2 . The light transmittance-ratio also showed similar trends. It is considered that the appropriate PSF material density was 40 gm~textrmgm-2 in accordance with economic values and healthy rice seedlings. Plant height and dry weight according to various nursery soil showed the rang-es of 8.5-14.2cm and 5.5-10.0mg, respectively. In composition of nursery soil, artificial soil combined with paddy soil was effective in producing healthy seedling for rice seedling production. The total sugar content also showed the difference between PSF 40, 60 ~textrmgm-2 PE film (0.43-0.52mg FW ~textrmg-1 ) and PSF 80, 100 ~textrmgm-2 (0.28-0.35mg FW ~textrmg-1 ) and it showed the same tendency among varieties as well as various nursery soil. These results demonstrate that PSF 40 ~textrmgm-2 economically affordable, and can be recommended as thermal protection material for producing good healthy rice seedling.