Following the worldwide surge in mpox (monkeypox) in 2022, cases have persisted in Asia, including South Korea, and sexual contact is presumed as the predominant mode of transmission, with a ...discernible surge in prevalence among immunocompromised patients. Drugs such as tecovirimat can result in drug‐resistant mutations, presenting obstacles to treatment. This study aimed to ascertain the presence of tecovirimat‐related resistant mutations through genomic analysis of the monkeypox virus isolated from a reported case involving prolonged viral shedding in South Korea. Here, tecovirimat‐resistant mutations, previously identified in the B.1 clade, were observed in the B.1.3 clade, predominant in South Korea. These mutations exhibited diverse patterns across different samples from the same patient and reflected the varied distribution of viral subpopulations in different anatomical regions. The A290V and A288P mutant strains we isolated hold promise for elucidating these mechanisms, enabling a comprehensive analysis of viral pathogenesis, replication strategies, and host interactions. Our findings imply that acquired drug‐resistant mutations, may present a challenge to individual patient treatment. Moreover, they have the potential to give rise to transmitted drug‐resistant mutations, thereby imposing a burden on the public health system. Consequently, the meticulous genomic surveillance among immunocompromised patients, conducted in this research, assumes paramount importance.
A rapid outbreak of monkeypox is ongoing in non-endemic countries since May 2022. We report the first case of monkeypox in the Republic of Korea. This occurred in a 34-year-old male patient who ...traveled to Europe in June 2022. On the day of his return to the Republic of Korea (June 21, 2022), the patient presented with a genital lesion. The results of the monkeypox real-time polymerase chain reaction tests were positive in the penile ulcer, oropharyngeal and nasopharyngeal specimens. The patient subsequently developed fever and skin rash after hospital admission. Careful history taking along physical examination should be conducted in the patients who have epidemiologic risk factors for monkeypox. Moreover, appropriate specimens should be obtained from lesions and tested for the monkeypox virus.
Botulinum neurotoxin type A (BoNT/A) is the most potent protein toxin and causes fatal flaccid muscle paralysis by blocking neurotransmission. Application of BoNT/A has been extended to the fields of ...therapeutics and biodefense. Nevertheless, the global response of host immune cells to authentic BoNT/A has not been reported. Employing microarray analysis, we performed global transcriptional profiling of RAW264.7 cells, a murine alveolar macrophage cell line. We identified 70 genes that were modulated following 1 nM BoNT/A treatment. The altered genes were mainly involved in signal transduction, immunity and defense, protein metabolism and modification, neuronal activities, intracellular protein trafficking, and muscle contraction. Microarray data were validated with real-time RT-PCR for seven selected genes including tlr2, tnf, inos, ccl4, slpi, stx11, and irg1. Proinflammatory mediators such as nitric oxide (NO) and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFα) were induced in a dose-dependent manner in BoNT/A-stimulated RAW264.7 cells. Increased expression of these factors was inhibited by monoclonal anti-Toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2) and inhibitors specific to intracellular proteins such as c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK), extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK), and p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK). BoNT/A also suppressed lipopolysaccharide-induced NO and TNFα production from RAW264.7 macrophages at the transcription level by blocking activation of JNK, ERK, and p38 MAPK. As confirmed by TLR2-/- knock out experiments, these results suggest that BoNT/A induces global gene expression changes in host immune cells and that host responses to BoNT/A proceed through a TLR2-dependent pathway, which is modulated by JNK, ERK, and p38 MAPK.
We aimed to characterize the genomes of monkeypox virus isolates from the Far East, providing insights into viral transmission and evolution. Genomic analysis was conducted on 8 isolates obtained ...from patients with monkeypox virus disease in the Republic of Korea between May 2022 and early 2023. These isolates were classified into Clade IIb. Distinct lineages, including B.1.1, A.2.1, and B.1.3, were observed in 2022 and 2023 isolates, with only the B.1.3 lineage detected in six isolates of 2023. These genetic features were specific to Far East isolates (the Republic of Korea, Japan, and Taiwan), distinguishing them from the diverse lineages found in the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Oceania. In early 2023, the prevalence of the B.1.3 lineage of monkeypox virus identified in six patients with no overseas travel history is considered as an indicator of the potential initiation of local transmission in the Republic of Korea.
Objectives: Monkeypox outbreaks in nonendemic countries have been reported since early May 2022. The first case of monkeypox in the Republic of Korea was confirmed in a patient who traveled to Europe ...in June 2022, and an attempt was made to isolate and identify the monkeypox virus (MPXV) from the patient’s specimens.Methods: Clinical specimens from the patient were inoculated in Vero E6 cells. The isolated virus was identified as MPXV by the observation of cytopathic effects on Vero E6 cells, transmission electron microscopy, conventional polymerase chain reaction(PCR), and sequencing of PCR products.Results: Cytopathic effects were observed in Vero E6 cells that were inoculated with skin lesion swab eluates. After multiple passages from the primary culture, orthopoxvirus morphology was observed using transmission electron microscopy. In addition, both MPXV-specific (F3L and ATI) and orthopoxvirus-specific genes (A39R, B2R, and HA) were confirmed by conventional PCR and Sanger sequencing.Conclusion: These results indicate the successful isolation and identification of MPXV from the first patient in the Republic of Korea. The isolated virus was named MPXV-ROK-P1-2022.
Anthrax and smallpox are high-risk infectious diseases, and considered as potential agents for bioterrorism. To develop an effective countermeasure for these diseases, we constructed a bivalent ...vaccine against both anthrax and smallpox by integrating a gene encoding protective antigen (PA) of Bacillus anthracis to the genome of the attenuated vaccinia virus strain, KVAC103.
Immunization with this bivalent vaccine induced antibodies against both PA and vaccinia virus in a mouse model. We also observed that the efficacy of this vaccine can be enhanced by combined immunization with immunoadjuvant-expressing KVAC103. Mouse groups co-immunized with PA-expressing KVAC103 and either interleukin-15 (IL-15) or cholera toxin subunit A (CTA1)-expressing KVAC103 showed increased anti-PA IgG titer and survival rate against B. anthracis spore challenge compared to the group immunized with PA-expressing KVAC103 alone.
We demonstrated that the attenuated smallpox vaccine KVAC103 is an available platform for a multivalent vaccine and co-immunization of immunoadjuvants can improve vaccine performance.
Protein phosphatase 2C clade A members are major signaling components in the ABA-dependent signaling cascade that regulates seed germination. To elucidate the role of
PP2CA
genes in germination of ...rice seed, we selected
OsPP2C51
, which shows highly specific expression in the embryo compared with other protein phosphatases based on microarray data. GUS histochemical assay confirmed that
OsPP2C51
is expressed in the seed embryo and that this expression pattern is unique compared with those of other
OsPP2CA
genes. Data obtained from germination assays and alpha-amylase assays of
OsPP2C51
knockout and overexpression lines suggest that
OsPP2C51
positively regulates seed germination in rice. The expression of alpha-amylase synthesizing genes was high in
OsPP2C51
overexpressing plants, suggesting that elevated levels of
OsPP2C51
might enhance gene expression related to higher rates of seed germination. Analysis of protein interactions between ABA signaling components showed that OsPP2C51 interacts with OsPYL/RCAR5 in an ABA-dependent manner. Furthermore, interactions were observed between OsPP2C51 and SAPK2, and between OsPP2C51 and OsbZIP10 and we found out that OsPP2C51 can dephosphorylates OsbZIP10. These findings suggest the existence of a new branch in ABA signaling pathway consisting of OsPYL/RCAR-OsPP2C-bZIP apart from the previously reported OsPYL/RCAR-OsPP2C-SAPK-bZIP. Overall, our result suggests that
OsPP2C51
is a positive regulator of seed germination by directly suppressing active phosphorylated
OsbZIP10
.
UV-A light has different effects on the growth and bioactive compounds of vegetables, medicinal plants, and other crops. The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of short-term ...irradiation with UV-A light-emitting diodes (LEDs) on the growth and bioactive substances of kale (
Brassica oleracea
var. acephala). Two-week-old kale seedlings were cultivated for 3 weeks in a plant factory illuminated with LEDs (red:white:blue = 8:1:1) of 150 μmol m
−2
s
−1
photosynthetic photon flux density. Then, the plants were continuously exposed to five peak wavelengths (365, 375, 385, 395, and 405 nm) of UV-A LEDs with an energy of 30 W m
−2
in addition to the background lighting for 7 days. Treatments with 395 and 405 nm wavelengths increased most of the assessed growth characteristics and photosynthetic rates compared to the control after 7 days of treatment. The maximum quantum efficiency of photosystem II (Fv/Fm) value started to decrease after 1 day of treatment, and after 5 days, we detected an increase in the concentration of reactive oxygen species with a decrease in the wavelength of the UV-A light treatment. There were increases in the total phenolic and flavonoid contents and antioxidant levels of kale plants subjected to all of the UV-A LEDs compared with control plants after 7 days. Our observations indicated that phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL) and chalcone synthase gene expression and PAL enzyme activity were upregulated by the UV-A LED treatments, although no significant differences among treatments were detected. Collectively, our results indicate that kale biomass and bioactive compounds can be enhanced through supplementary UV-A radiation, with 405-nm LEDs having the best effects, thereby suggesting that it would be beneficial to conduct additional research on the spectral threshold between UV-A and deep-blue light.
The mechanisms of lettuce growth in plant factories under artificial light (PFALs) are well known, whereby the crop is generally used as a model in horticultural science. Deep learning has also been ...tested several times using PFALs. Despite their numerous advantages, the performance of deep learning models is commonly evaluated based only on their accuracy. Therefore, the objective of this study was to train deep neural networks and analyze the deeper abstraction of the trained models. In total, 443 images of three lettuce cultivars were used for model training, and several deep learning algorithms were compared using multivariate linear regression. Except for linear regression, all models showed adequate accuracies for the given task, and the convolutional neural network (ConvNet) model showed the highest accuracy. Based on color mapping and the distribution of the two-dimensional t-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding (t-SNE) results, ConvNet effectively perceived the differences among the lettuce cultivars under analysis. The extension of the target domain knowledge with complex models and sufficient data, similar to ConvNet with multitask learning, is possible. Therefore, deep learning algorithms should be investigated from the perspective of feature extraction.
UV-B radiation and high temperature have detrimental effects on plant physiological and biochemical processes. The use of bacterial inoculants for stress alleviation has been regarded as a ...sustainable and eco-friendly approach. Hence, this study was conducted to evaluate the ability of 1-aminocyclopropane-1-caboxylate (ACC) deaminase-producing Brevibacterium linens RS16 in enhancing stress tolerance in rice against combined UV-B radiation and heat stresses. A combination of 0.5 Wm−2 UV-B radiation and 40 °C of temperature were imposed on rice plants for 5 days. The plants imposed with combined stress had shown significantly higher ethylene emissions compared to the plants grown under normal conditions. In addition, the stress imposition had shown negative effects on the photosynthetic traits, biomass, and genetic material of rice plants. The inoculation of bacteria had shown a 26.5% and 31.8% decrease in ethylene emissions at 3 and 4 days of stress imposition compared to the non-inoculated plants. Additionally, bacterial inoculation had also enhanced plant biomass and photosynthetic traits, and had proved to be effective in restricting DNA damage under stress conditions. Taken together, the current study has shown the effective strategy of enhancing stress tolerance against the interactive effects of UV-B radiation and heat stresses by regulation of ethylene emissions through inoculating ACC deaminase-producing bacteria.
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