Background: The PyeongChang 2018 Winter Paralympic Games (WPG) being one of the most successful Paralympic Games (PG) in modern athletic world history, hosted the largest number of elite athletes representing 49 National Paralympic Committees (NPCs). Objects: The present investigation highlighted the demographic and clinical characteristics of injured athletes and non-athletes and the physiotherapy services provided during the PyeongChang 2018 WPG. Methods: Prospective descriptive epidemiology study, in which the study group comprised of 201 participants (51 athletes and 150 non-athletes) who were admitted to and utilized the polyclinic physiotherapy service of 2018 PyeongChang WPG in Physiotherapy Department of Paralympic Village from March 1, 2018 to March 20, 2018. Results: Qualitative frequency analysis of injury type demonstrated highest number of chronic injuries (51%, n = 100) in athletes and non-athletes. Anatomical injury site analysis revealed that the spine and shoulder areas were affected with equal frequency for athletes (54.9%, n = 14), whereas for non-athletes, the frequencies of spine and shoulder area injuries were 36.7% (n = 55) and 26% (n = 39), respectively. The Pyeongchang WPG showed a high rate of athletes visiting the physiotherapy service during the pre-competition period (33.3%, n = 50), which may have led to smaller incidence rate of traumatic injury. The physiotherapy treatment service analysis demonstrated that manual therapy (35.4%, n = 230) was most commonly utilized, followed by transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation/interference current therapy (TENS/ICT), therapeutic massage and therapeutic exercise. Conclusion: We established the importance of prophylactic and preventive physiotherapy services to reduce the risk of sports injuries during WPG.

Owing to climate change and global warming, foodborne infectious diseases are becoming inevitable problems in many countries, and this is also the case in Korea. One of the causal factor of foodborne disease outbreak in the food service business(i.e. restaurant or mass feeding facilities) is inappropriate management of infected food handlers. The need for strengthening of the indications for managing infected food handlers is emphasized continuously. However, precise legal interpretations or analyzation should be done based on microbiological fundamentals before strengthening the guidelines. Therefore, this study analyzes the legal policies of Korea associated with infection control of food handlers and proposes shortcomings or supplementations to existing legal policies.

본 연구는 농수산물의 원산지 표시법에 관한 법률에 따른 음식점의 원산지 표시관리 실태를 조사하기 위해 수행되었다. 이를 위해 개인 음식점 및 프랜차이즈 업체들을 선발하여 원산지 표시관리 실태를 조 사하였으며, 원산지 관리미흡 사례를 도출하였다. 조사된 전체 표시관리 미흡 사례는 농수산물의 원산 지 표시에 관한 법률 및 농림축산식품부 고시 원산지 표시요령에 정의된 관리미흡 유형에 따라 각각 국 가명 표시오류 38.4%, 함량순서에 따른 표시오류 28.0%, 원산지 일부 미표시 11.2%, 원산지 표시판 미 게시 15.2%, 증빙서류 미보관 7.2%으로 구분되었다. 이들을 다시 프랜차이즈와 개인 음식점으로 구분 할 경우 프랜차이즈에서 개인 음식점과 구분되는 특징적인 유형별 발생비율을 보였다. 이에 따라 프랜 차이즈의 표시관리 미흡 유형별로 그 발생 원인을 탐색한 결과 프랜차이즈 운영시스템에서 기인된 몇 가지 특이적인 원인들을 도출할 수 있었다. 이를 근거로 프랜차이즈 업체의 효율적 원산지 표시관리를 위한 기초자료를 제공하고자 하였다.

Highly homogeneous and functional stem cell-derived hepatocyte-like cells (HLCs) are considered a promising option in the treatment of liver disease and the development of effective in vitro toxicity screening tool. However, the purity of cells and expression and/or activity of drug metabolizing enzymes in stem cell-derived HLCs are usually too low to be useful for clinical or in vitro applications. Here, we describe a highly optimized differentiation protocol, which produces more than 90% albumin-positive HLCs with no purification process. In addition, we show that hepatic enzyme gene expressions and activities were significantly improved by generating three-dimensional (3D) spheroidal aggregate of HLCs. The 3D differentiation method increased expressions of nuclear receptors that regulate the proper expression of key hepatic enzymes. Furthermore, a significantly increased hepatic functions such as albumin and urea secretion were observed in 3D hepatic spheroids and HLCs in the spheroid exhibited morphological and ultrastructural features of normal hepatocytes. Importantly, we show that repeated exposures to xenobiotics facilitated the functional maturation of HLC, as confirmed by increased expression of genes for drug metabolizing enzymes and transcription factors. In conclusion, the 3D culture system with repeated exposures to xenobiotics may be a new strategy for enhancing hepatic maturation of stem cell-derived HLCs as a cell source for in vitro high-throughput hepatotoxicity models.

Hepatocyte-like cells (HLCs) derived from human pluripotent stem cells have received extensive attention in the development of drug screening and toxicity testing. However, it has been reported that stem cell-derived HLCs showed hepatic functions that were too limited to be of use in drug screening and toxicity testing, possibly due to the lack of sufficient intercellular communication under conventional two-dimensional (2D) culture conditions. Therefore, a 3D differentiation system may overcome the in vitro limitation of 2D culture to produce stem cell-derived hepatocytes with mature metabolic functions. In this study, the feasibility of using a silicone-based spherofilm, specifically designed to produce spherical cell clusters, to generate uniformly sized 3D hepatic spheroids from hESCs was investigated. Hepatic spheroids generated on the spherofilm showed more homogenous size and shape than those generated in conventional low-attachment suspension culture dishes. Results of immunohistochemical analysis showed that expression of the mature hepatic marker albumin (ALB) increased over time during the hepatic maturation process. Furthermore, the 3D culture system mimicked the in vivo 3D microenvironment. Laminin, which is an important component of hepatic ECM, was expressed in hepatic spheroids. The results of immunohistochemical analysis indicated that the 3D culture environment is capable of generating an in vivo-like microenvironment. In addition, quantitative PCR analysis showed that the mature hepatic marker ALB and cytochrome P450 (CYP) enzymes CYP3A4 and CYP3A7 were expressed at higher levels in 3D culture than in 2D culture. This indicates that the 3D culture system is suitable for hepatic maturation and that our size-controlled 3D culture conditions might accelerate hepatic function. These results suggest that 3D hepatic spheroids significantly enhance metabolic maturation of hepatocytes derived from hESCs