Haemaphysalis longicornis는 사람과 동물에게 여러 심각한 병원체를 전달하는 주요 매개체로, 한반도에 널리 분포하고 있다. H. longicornis는 Rickettsia spp., Borrelia spp., Francisella spp., Coxiella spp., 그리고 중증열성혈소판 감소증후군 바이러스 (SFTS virus) 등을 매개하는 것으로 알려져 있다. 국내에 서식하는 H. longicornis의 미생물 군집과 관련된 연구는 많이 진행되지 않은 것으로 확인되었다. 이 연구는 한반도 내 다양한 지역에서 채집된 H. longicornis의 미생물군집 다양성을 지역별, 성장 단계 및 성별에 따라 분석하였다. 2019년 6월부터 7월까지 질병관리청 권역별기후변화매개체감시거점센터 16개 지역에서 채집한 H. longicornis의 16S rRNA 유전자 V3-V4 영역을 PCR로 증폭 후 Illumina MiSeq 플랫폼으로 시퀀싱하였다. Qiime2를 활용한 미생물 다양성 분석을 통해 총 46개의 샘플에서 1,754,418개의 non-chimeric reads를 얻었으며, 평균 126개 의 operating taxonmic unit (OTU) 을 식별하여 총 1,398개의 OTU를 확인하였다. 대부분의 지역에서 Coxiella spp.가 우점종으로 나타났으며, 특히 Coxiella endosymbiont는 가장 높은 우점도를 보이며, Coxiella burnetii와 계통 발생 학적으로 유사한 것으로 확인되었다. 이 연구를 통해 분석된 결과는 각 지역의 H. longicornis 미생물군집 데이터 베이스 구축에 활용되었으며, 이를 통해 지역별 미생물군집의 특이성을 식별할 수 있게 하였다. 이는 한반도의 H. longicornis에 의한 질병 전파 연구와 이를 통한 공중보건 개선에 기여할 것으로 기대된다.

본 연구는 국내 자생하는 진달래속(Rhododendron) 종들의 종자 휴면유형 분류 및 발아특성 구명을 목표로 하였다. 진달래속 종들의 배는 형태적휴면(MD)이 없는 완전히 발달된 직선(linear) 형태였으며, 만병초 및 꼬리진달래 종자는 탈리 시점에 이미 휴면이 없는 것으로 밝혀졌다. 반면에 털진달래 종자는 population 수준에서 부분적으로 생리적휴면(PD)을 가지고 있는 것으로 나타났다. 털진달래의 이러한 생리적휴면 (PD)은 외생 지베렐린(GA3) 1,000mg･L-1 처리를 통해 타파될 수 있었다. 그러나 4℃에서의 저온층적처리는 털진달래 종자 휴면 타파에 효과가 없는 것으로 나타났다. 종합적으로 판단 했을 때, 진달래속(Rhododendron) 종들의 적정 발아 환경조 건은 광조건･25/15℃(만병초), 암조건･20/10℃(꼬리진달래), 광 조건･25/15℃(털진달래)로 확인된다. 진달래속(Rhododendron) 에서의 종간 차이(interspecific variation)로 인해 모든 종이 종자 휴면유형 또는 발아특성에서 구별이 되었다. 본 연구는 국내 자생하는 진달래속(Rhododendron) 종들의 생리･생태 특성을 이해하는 데 이용될 수 있을 것이다.

To identify and compare the venom components and expression patterns of some bees/wasps, venom gland-specific transcriptome analyses were conducted for 14 Aculeate bees/wasps. Most of the allergens and pain-producing factors showed extremely high expression levels in social wasps, implying that social wasps have evolved to use venom to defend the colony against intruders. Acid phosphatase and tachykinin, which are known as allergens and neurotoxic peptides, were found with high frequencies in the venom glands of solitary wasps. This suggests that solitary wasps might use their venom for catching and preserving prey. In the venom glands of bumblebees, little or no transcripts of major allergens or pain producing factors were identified, implying that bumblebees venoms are relatively less toxic than those of social or solitary wasps. Taken together, the differential expression patterns of venom genes in some Aculeate bees/wasps implies that bees/wasps have unique groups of highly expressed venom components, which appear to have evolved in response to both ecological and behavioral influences.

The hypopharyngeal gland (HPG) of the honeybee worker produces royal jelly (RJ) and has a developmental cycle closely related to the division of labor. In this study, we investigated to compare the HPG acini diameter of differently aged worker bees with high royal jelly producing colony (HRC) or less producing colony (LRC). Additionally, we also evaluated whether the fresh weight of the head is a reliable indicator of the developmental status of HPG. The HRC showed a significantly higher RJ production about two-times as compared with those of the LRC. We measured the HG-diameters on days 1, 3, 6, 9, 12, 15. The microscopic analysis revealed that the acini size of the HRC was significantly larger than the LRC. In addition, the acini diameter of HRC was 15% longer than the LRC on the first day after emerging. It was shown that the fastest development during 3 days which is preparing for nurse the brood. The HPG acini diameters increased in both colonies in a similar fashion until day 12 and then decreased. We also compared the fresh head weight of the experimental colonies, differences were similar to the development of HPG. Therefore, high royal jelly production may have a positive correlation between HPG acini size and the fresh head weight.

To identify the venom components and their expression patterns of some Aculeata bees/wasps, venom gland-specific transcriptome analysis was conducted. FPKM values were normalized with the average of the transcription level of reference gene (a-tubulin). Common components in both solitary and social wasp venoms include hyaluronidase, phospholipase A2, metalloendopeptidase, etc. Although it has been expected that more diverse bioactive components with the functions of prey inactivation and physiology manipulation are present in solitary wasps, the information on venom compositions of solitary wasps obtained in this study was not sufficient to generalizae this notion. Nevertheless, some neurotoxic peptides (e.g., pompilidotoxin and dendrotoxin-like peptide) and proteins (e.g., insuline-like peptide binding protein) appear to be specific to solitary wasp venom. In contrast, several proteins, such as venom allergen 5 protein, venom acid phosphatase, and various phospholipases, appear to be relatively more abundant in social wasp venom. In the venom gland trancsriptome of bumblebees, major allergens or pain producing factors were barely identified, implying that bumblebee venoms are relatively less toxic than those of social or solitary wasps.

The relationship of in vitro starch digestibility and gel strength was investigated at various concentrations (10-30%) of rice cultivars with different amylose contents (27.9, 17.9, and 5.2%). As the rice flour concentration increased, predicted glycemic index decreased, but gel strength increased regardless of amylose contents. Gel strength correlated strongly with amylose content, whereas in vitro starch digestibility was more highly affected by rice flour concentration than by amylose contents. Moreover, the impact of degree of gelatinization on in vitro starch digestibility of high amylose rice was also examined in terms of structural features and rheological properties. The digestion rate of fully gelatinized flour was 1.7 times higher than that of native flour, while the disrupted structure with a different gelatinization degree during starch digestion was visually demonstrated through the X-ray diffraction and molecular distribution analysis. The rice flour changed from an A-type to a V-type pattern and showed difference in crystalline melting. The low molecular weight distribution increased with increasing degree of gelatinization during starch digestion. The apparent viscosity also increased with degree of gelatinization. These results demonstrated that the starch digestibility of rice was more affected by concentration than by amylose content, as well as by the degree of gelatinization due to structural difference.

This study was conducted to survey the perception and preferences of customers that have dined at Korean restaurants in China and investigate the importance and performance level of quality attributes, customer satisfaction, revisit intention and recommendation intention. The survey was conducted January 31~March 1, 2016 in China. The 293 questionnaires (97.7%) were analyzed using SPSS(Ver. 23.0) and AMOS(Ver. 21.0). Results of this study are as follow: Customers that dined at a Korean restaurant in China were composed of 157 women and 136 men. Regarding the reason for preferring Korean cuisine, taste, hygiene and nutritional value of Korean food were the most significant quality factors. Regarding complaints about Korean food, Chinese people placed much emphasis on freshness of ingredients when dining out, based on the majority of complaints about ingredients that were not fresh. The main reason for leftover food were personal eating habits and that of customers revisiting food taste and nutrition. Path model among customer satisfaction, revisit intention and recommendation intention revealed the factor of menus and attributes of menu items regarding customer’s age that had an impact on customers’ satisfaction, and association with customers’ satisfaction, revisit intention and recommendation intention as well.

This study was conducted to examine the effects of Chinese perceptions of quality attributes on customer’s satisfaction, revisit intention and recommendation intention for coffee shops in Beijing, China. Subjects of this study included 200 customers who had visited a coffee shop at least once during the last year. Statistical analyses were performed using SPSS v23.0 and AMOS v21.0. In this study, the majority of customers visited a coffee shop once or twice a week with friends. Respondents preferred tall-sized warm coffee in the store. The coffee shop quality attributes of were derived from five exploratory factors identified upon analysis of 30 observational variables. It was important to maintain and strengthen the quality attributes of coffee shops in this area because IPA(Importance Performance Analysis) analysis showed that “Doing great, keep it well” part was a desirable area because it had high importance and performance. Finally, path analysis revealed that customer satisfaction was influenced by employee attitude and affected revisit intention and recommendation intention.

Today, consumers are becoming more sensitive to price since price have been an essential motivation for them to choose the electronic retail venue. Recently, it is recognized that social commerce, with higher rate of daily active users, is ahead of traditional electronic mobile commerce in Korea. One of strengths in social commerce is attractive price deals for fashion brands, which positively lead to purchase probabilities. Therefore, fashion retailers should understand consumers’ price perception and their responses toward sales promotions on the social commerce. The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of consumer price perception and choice heuristics on impulse buying behavior for sales promotion of fashion brands and to examine the moderating effect of an engagement level in the social commerce. A self-administered questionnaire was developed, and mainly included consumer price perception (e.g., price consciousness, sales proneness), choice heuristics (e.g., affect referral, price referral), engagement, impulse buying and demographics. An online survey was undertaken by a research agency. A total of 235 usable responses were obtained from Korean consumers who had purchased fashion brands from social commerce sites (e.g., Coupang, Wemakeprice, Ticketmonster, etc.) using mobile devices. Respondents represent more females (n=129, 54.9%) than males (n=106, 45.1%). They are aged from 19 to 39 years old (Means=29). Results showed that consumers’ sales proneness had a positive effect on affect referral and price referral heuristics, which positively lead to impulse buying behavior. However, consumer price consciousness had a negative effect on impulse buying at the social commerce sites. Also, the mediating effect of the engagement was significant in the relationship among sales proneness, choice heuristics, and impulse buying behavior for sales promotion of fashion brands in the social commerce sites. This study discussed marketing implications for social commerce to effectively manage promotional program in the social commerce market.

Despite many researches related with in-vitro culture of porcine spematogonial stem cells (SSCs), adherent culture system widely used has shown a limitation in the maintenance of porcine SSC self-renewal. Therefore, in order to overcome this obstacle, suspension culture, which is known to have numerous advantage over adherent culture, was applied to the culture of porcine SSCs. Porcine SSCs retrieved from neonatal testes were suspension-cultured for 5 days or 20 days, and characteristics of suspension-cultured porcine SSCs including proliferation, alkaline phosphatase (AP) activity, and self-renewal-specific gene expression were investigated and compared with those of adherent-cul-tured porcine SSCs. As the results, the suspension-cultured porcine SSCs showed entirely non-proliferative and significantly higher rate of AP-positive cells and expression of self-renewal-specific genes than the adherent-cultured porcine SSCs. In addition, long-term culture of porcine SSCs in suspension condition induced significant decrease in the yield of AP staining-positive cells on post-day 10 of culture. These results showed that suspension culture was inappropriate to culture porcine SSCs, because the culture of porcine SSCs in suspension condition didn’t stimulate proliferation and maintain AP activity of porcine SSCs, regardless of culture periods.

We analyzed molecular and enzymatic properties of three cholinesterases (ChEs; ClAChE1, ClAChE2 and ClSChE) from Cimex lectularius. The ClAChE1 and ClAChE2 were generally present as a membrane-anchored dimeric insoluble form in the brain and ganglia. In the case of ClSChE, monomeric and dimeric soluble forms were observed. To investigate enzymatic properties, three ChEs were functionally expressed using baculovirus expression system. ClAChE1 revealed a significantly higher activity than ClAChE2 to acetylthiocholine iodide (ATChI) substrate. Kinetic analysis using two choline substrates (ATChI and butyrylthiocholine iodide) demonstrated that ClAChE2 had higher catalytic efficiency but lower substrate specificity than ClAChE1. Inhibition assay was conducted by using three inhibitors (BW284C51, eserine, Iso-OMPA) and two insecticides (chlorpyrifos-methyl and carbaryl). Two ClAChEs revealed high sensitivities to BW284C51, eserine, chlorpyrifos-methyl and carbaryl, but were not sensitive to Iso-OMPA. This inhibition profile confirmed that both ClAChEs are categorized as ChEs. Interestingly, the salivary specific cholinesterase did not show any measurable activities to choline substrates, confirming its non-synaptic function in C. lectularius