Although the grasshopper Oxya chinensis sinuosa has long been used as a food in Korea, there is little data on itsfunctional effects. Thus we prepared and analyzed total RNA from the whole body of adult Escherichia coli non-immunizedand immunized Oxya chinensis sinuosa strains. Using an Illumina Hiseq sequencer, we generated a total of 66,555 pooledtranscriptome and singletons with and without Escherichia coli immunization, respectively. Then, we performed in silicoanalysis of the Oxya chinensis sinuosa transcriptome, using bioinformatics tools for screening putative antimicrobial peptides(AMPs) and 38 AMPs were finally selected and tested their antimicrobial activity of Gram positive, Gram negative bacteriaand antifungal activity with radial diffusion assay. As a result, 5 out of 38 AMPs showed the highest antimicrobial activityand antifungal activity against microbes and it also evidenced with no hemolytic activity.

An assessment was made of the toxicity of 12 insecticides, three essential oils and Bacillus thuringiensis var. israelensis (Bti) alone or in combination with the oil major constituents, (E)-anethole (AN), (E)-cinnamaldehyde (CA) and eugenol (EU), to third instars from bamboo forest collected Aedes albopictus and rice paddy field collected Anopheles sinensis resistant to various groups of insecticides. The toxicity of the test insecticides, essential oils and binary mixtures of Bti and the oil constituents (1:1 ratio) was evaluated using a direct-contact mortality bioassay. Binary mixtures of B.t.i. and CA, AN or EU were significantly more toxic against Ae. albopictus larvae (LC50, 0.0084, 0.0134 and 0.0237 mg/l) and An. sinensis larvae (0.0159, 0.0388 and 0.0541 mg/l) than either B.t.i. (1.7884 and 2.1681 mg/l) or CA (11.46 and 19.43 mg/l), AN (16.66 and 25.11 mg/l) or EU (24.60 and 32.14 mg/l) alone. Based on the co-toxicity coefficient (CC) and synergistic factor (SF), the three binary mixtures operated in a synergy pattern (CC, 140.7–368.3 and SF, 76–213 for Ae. albopictus CC, 75.1–245.3 and SF, 40–136 for An. sinensis).The binary mixtures of Bti and essential oil constituents described, particularly (E)-cinnamaldehyde, merit further study as potential mosquito larvicides for the control of malaria vector mosquito populations in light of global efforts to reduce the level of highly toxic synthetic insecticides in the aquatic environment.

A quantitative sequencing (QS) protocol that detects the frequencies of sodium channel mutations (M815I, T917I and L920F) responsible for knockdown resistance in permethrin-resistant head lice was tested as a population genotyping method. Genomic DNA fragments of the sodium channel α-subunit gene that encompass the three mutation sites were PCR-amplified from individual head lice with either resistant or susceptible genotypes, and combined together in various ratios to generate standard DNA template mixtures for QS. Following sequencing, the signal ratios between resistant and susceptible nucleotides were calculated and plotted against the corresponding resistance allele frequencies. Quadratic regression coefficients of the plots were close to 1, demonstrating that QS is highly reliable for the prediction of resistance allele frequencies. Prediction of resistance allele frequencies by QS in several globally collected lice samples including 12 Korean lice populations suggested that permethrin resistance varied substantially amongst different geographical regions. Three local populations of Korean lice were determined to have 9.8-36.7% resistance allele frequencies, indicating that an urgent resistance management is needed. QS should serve as a preliminary resistance monitoring tool for proper management strategies by allowing early resistance detection.

We have made semi-analytical studies to investigate the configurations of caustics and the probability distribution of the flux factor K for the binary microlensing including external shears. A parametric equation of critical curve is derived in a 4th order complex polynomial. We present the topological dependencies of the caustics for selected gamma parameters (0, 0.3, 0.6, 1.3, 2.0, and 2.5) and convergence terms (0., 0.4, 0.8, 1.2, 1.6, and 2.0). For the purpose of analyzing the efficiency of High Amplification Event (HAE) on each caustics, we examine the probability distribution of the flux factor by a Monte Carlo method. Changing the separation of the binary system from 0.8 to 1.3 (in normalied unit), we examine the probability distribution of the K-values in various gamma parameters. The relationship between gamma parameters, seperations and their probabilties of the flux factor K have been studied. Our results show that the relatively higher K values (K>1.5) are increased as increasing the separation of the binary system. We therfore conclude that, in the N-body microlensing, the probabilities of higher HAEs are inversely proportional to the star density as well. We also point out that the present research might be used as a preliminary step toward investigating heavy N-body microlensing simulations.

Acinetobacter baumannii is usually considered an opportunistic pathogen that it responsible for a variety of nosocomial infections, such as, pneumonia, tracheobronchitis, meningitis, endocarditis, peritonitis, skin and soft tissue infections, and urinary tract infections. However, over the years, the organism has developed substantial antimicrobial resistance, and thus, the management of infections has become more difficult. The less common infective endocarditis is one of the more serious consequences of nosocomial bacteremia. Here, we report the successful treatment of the first case of multidrug-resistant A. baumannii endocarditis in a 33-year-old patient.

Regeneration ability of plant is very important for producing transgenic plants by genetic engineering. Fifty rice cultivars and lines were screened for their regeneration ability in vitro and an attempt was made to increase shoot regeneration by substitu