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A nationwide survey of chigger mites causing scrub typhus and an investigation of epidemiologic factors for chigger mites was conducted at 16 localities in 8 provinces in Korea during autumn 2009, 2012, and 2013. A total of 233 Apodemus agrarius were captured, and all were infested with chigger mites. The chigger index was highest in Chungcheongbuk-do in 2009 (358.3) and 2012 (290.1) and Chungcheongnam-do in 2013 (294.4). The predominant chigger mite species was Leptotrombidium pallidum in the northern and central parts and L. scutellare in the southern and western parts, Korea. L. pallidum was not found in Jellanam-do and Gyeongsangnam-do and the distribution of L. scutellare had been expanded in the northern parts of Korea. The chigger index of L. pallidum was positively correlated with temperature and negatively correlated with humidity. The incidence of scrub typhus is dependent on L. scutellare index. These findings could be helpful to monitor the distribution of chigger mites and to develop a preventive measures for scrub typhus in Korea.

The study examined the seasonal pattern of larvae, nymph, and adult life stages for Haemaphysalis longicornis and the rate of infection with severe fever from the thrombocytopenia syndrome virus in ticks collected from 12 sections (Jichukdong), 14 sections (Uldaeri), and 18 sections (Howondong) in Bukhansan dullegil for April–October 2019. Haemaphysalis longicornis ticks have been considered the main vector for severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS). Haemaphysalis flava and Ixodes nipponensis were collected using the dragging and flagging method. The ratios of Haemaphysalis longicornis of the collected ticks were 91% (Jichukdong), 94% (Uldaeri), and 98% (Howondong). Monthly distributional studies of Haemaphysalis longicornis based on the developmental stage showed that the adults peaked in September while nymphs were collected more frequently from April through June. The larvae peaked in September and October. SFTS virus detection was performed using 2 × OneStep RT-PCR and nested PCR. On the other hand, no SFTS virus-specific gene was detected in 1,158 ticks of Haemaphysalis longicornis. This result provides estimates of the population densities for the life stages of Haemaphysalis longicornis and the associated disease risk in Bukhansan dullegil, where many people have visited since opening in 2010.

The ghost ant Tapinoma melanocephalum is a common household pest worldwide. The present study examined the occurrence of the species in urban homes in Korea. During the period of September 2014 to January 2016, T. melanocephalum workers were collected from 58 homes at 29 different localities using bait traps with 10% sugar solution. The species was widely distributed throughout urban homes at 29 different localities, and the indoor occurrence of T. melanocephalum was highest in Seoul (32.7%) and metropolitan areas of Gyeonggi-do (Province) (29.3%). The indoor incidence rate of T. melanocephalum peaked in September (22.8%), remained moderate from October through April, and peaked again in May (15.7%). In contrast, a low incidence was observed from June to August (7.0%). The present study provides evidence that native ants, such as T. melanocephalum, are potential indoor pests of homes in Korea throughout the year.

The seasonal pattern of larvae, nymph and adult life stages for three tick species were studied for April-October, 2014. Haemaphysalis longicornis (610), Haemaphysalis flava (296) and Ixodes nipponensis (15) were collected from Pocheon by the dragging and flagging method. H.longicornis (254), H.flava (345) and I.nipponensis (15) were collected from Cheolwon in the same way. H.longicornis adults peaked in June while nymphs were more frequently collected from April through June. In contrast, H.longicornis larvae were collected only in September and October. H.flava adults were collected in April, September, and October while nymphs were collected from April through October. The nymphs peaked in April in Pocheon while May was the peak in Cheolwon. Larvae of H.longicornis and H.flava were collected only in September and October. I.nipponensis adults and nymphs were more frequently collected in April, while the larvae were not collected during that period. Collecting ticks by the dragging and flagging method provides estimates of population densities for life stages of the selected species and the associated disease risk. These results can be used to predict seasonal population densities of ticks and the prevalence of tick-borne pathogens.

FPSO model tests of mooring line failure were carried out in the ocean basin at KRISO. The characteristics of the motions and mooring lines were investigated. The FPSO ship was moored using an internal turret and catenary mooring. The test model was 1/60 scale. The mooring lines were designed to satisfy the characteristics of the original mooring lines using the truncation method. The experiments were conducted under various environments: a safe wave, current and wind condition; single broken mooring line condition; and transient mode condition. The moment of the break was determined based on experimental test results. The results showed that the FPSO behavior and mooring line tensions were acceptable under the failure condition.

Conventional liquefied natural gas (LNG) vessels with membrane cargo containment systems have tank filling restrictions from 0.10 to 0.70 H (with H the internal tank height). The main reason for such restrictions is high sloshing loads around these filling depths. The new designs of prismatic LNG cargo tanks are proposed by increasing the lower chamfer length. Numerical sloshing analysis was used to optimize tank shape out of the several candidates. To validate the effectiveness of the modified tank, 1/50 scaled model tests were conducted. In these tests, 24 different irregular seaways were tested for both the conventional and the optimized tank and their statistical pressures were compared. Modified tank design was quite effective in reducing sloshing loads for a 0.30 H filling depth, and it did not significantly increase sloshing loads at other filling conditions. This study demonstrated the possibility of all filling operations for an LNG cargo containment system.

In this paper, a numerical analysis for an internal turret moored vessel located at a 400-m water depth is conducted. The target vessel has an internal turret that is located at the 0.2 Lpp position from the fore-side, with 3 × 4 complex mooring lines installed around the turret circumference. To investigate the motion response of the vessel and the structural reliability of the lines, model tests were conducted. The KRISO ocean basin has a water depth of 3.2 m, which represents 192m using a scaling of 1:60. In order to precisely represent the real-scale condition, equivalent mooring lines needed to be designed. Truncated mooring lines were designed to supplement the restriction of the flume's water depth and increase the reliability of the model testing. These truncated mooring lines were composed of two different chains in order to match the pre-tension, simultaneously restoring the curve and variation in the effecti ve line tension. The static similarities were compared using a static pull-out test and free decaying test, and the dynamic similarities were matched via a regular wave test and combined environments test. Consequently, the designed truncated mooring system could represent the prototype mooring system relatively well in the aspects of kinematics and dynamics.

The present study aims at suggesting the systematic approach to analyze the local drag components as the resistance performance characterized by the flow of the ship. In order to identify the local areas, the hull surface is decomposed into SVM (Station-Vertical Section Map) which consists of 20 stations along the longitudinal direction and 20 sections along the vertical direction (from the bottom to the waterline). Successively, on the SVM, the friction and pressure drag coeffi cients as the components of total drag coefficient have been an alyzed for two different hull forms of Wigley and KVLCC by using CFD.

The present study numerically investigates the interaction betw een a free-surface and flow around a circular cylinder over a m oving wall. In order to simulate the flow past the circular cylinder over a moving wall near a free-surface, this study has adopted the direct-forcing/fictitious domain (DF/FD) method with the level set method in the Cartesian coordinates. Numerical simulation i s performed for a Reynolds numbers of 100 in the range of 0.25≤g/D≤2.00 and 0.5≤h/D≤2.00, where g/D and h/D are the gaps between the cylinder and a moving wall and the cylinder and a free-surface normalized by cylinder diameter D, respectively. According to g /D andh/D, the vortex structures have been classified into three patt erns of the two-row, one-row, steady elongation. In general, bo th of g/D and h/D have the large values which mean the cylinder is far aw ay from the wall and the free-surface, two-row vortex structure formsin the wake. When g/D decreases, the two-row vortex structure g radually transfers into the one-row vortex structure. When the g/D reveals the critical value below which the flow becomes steady state, resulting in the steady elongation vortex. Keywords: Free surface(자유수면), Circular cylinder(원형 실린더), Moving wall(움직이는 벽면), Direct-forcing/fictitious domain (DF/FD)

Three-dimensional characteristics of fluid flow and heat transfer around a wavy circular cylinder having sinusoidal variation in cross sectional area along the spanwise direction are numerically investigated using the immersed boundary method. Th e three different wavelengths of π4 , 3 and π2 at the fixed wavy amplitude of 0.1 have been considered to investigate the effects of waviness especially on the forced convection heat transfer around a wavy cylinder when the Reynolds and Prandtl n umbers are 300 and 0.71, respectively. The present computational results for a wavy cylinder are compared with those for a smooth cylinder. The time- and total surface-averaged Nusselt number for a wavy cylinder with λ=π/2 is larger than that for a smooth cylinder, whereas that with λ=π/4 and π/3 is smaller than that for a smooth cylinder. However, because t he surface area exposed to heat transfer for a wavy cylinder is la rger than that for a smooth cylinder, the total heat transfer rate for a wavy cylinder with different wavelengths of

Pediculus humanus capitis is an ectoparasite, which causes scalp pruritus particularly among children. A total of 15,373 children including 8,018 boys and 7,355 girls from 26 primary schools and 15 kindergartens attached to the primary schools and a total of 33 children from an orphanage were examined for head lice infestation (HLI). The overall prevalence of HLI in this study was 4.1% including 3.7% of the urban areas and 4.7% of the rural areas. Head lice were found more frequently in girls than in boys with prevalence of 6.5% and 1.9%, respectively. The infestation rate by school grade was 3.2%, 4.7%, 4.2%, 5.0%, 4.9%, 3.8%, and 2.1% for kindergarten, first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth grades, respectively. The infestation rate of the children in an orphanage was 66.7%. The prevalence of HLI has decreased especially in the rural areas. However, HLI is a still health problem of kindergarteners and primary schoolchildren in Korea.

A survey to determine the geographical distribution and relative abundance of potential vectors of scrub typhus was conducted from October to November 2006 at 13 localities throughout the Republic of Korea. Apodemus agrarius accounted for 97.6% (80/82) of all rodents, while only 2 Myodes regulus (2/82) were collected. A total of 10,860 chiggers were collected from A. agrarius belonging to 4 genera and 8 species, while only Walchia fragilis (40) was collected from Myodes regulus. Leptotrombidium pallidum (8,137; 74.9%), a vector of scrub typhus, was the predominant species collected from A. agrarius followed by Leptotrombidium scutellare (2,057, 18.9%), Leptotrombidium palpale (279; 2.7%), Leptotrombidium orientale (232; 2.1%), and Leptotrombidium zetum (79; 0.7%), Neotrombicula tamiyai (58; 0.5%), Euschoengastica koreaensis (16; 0.1%), and Cheladonta ikaoensis (2; < 0.1%). L. pallidum was the predominant chigger collected at collection sites in Gangwon (100%), Gyeonggi (87.2%), Chungnam (100%), Chungbuk (100%), Jeonbuk (73.9%), Jeonnam (77.0%), and Gyeongbuk (66.1%) provinces, whereas L. scutellare was the predominant chigger collected in Gyeongnam province (77.9%) and Jeju Island (62.3%). Data suggest a correlation between chigger population abundance and human cases of scrub typhus in Korea.

The caspase-recruitment domain (CARD) is known to play an important role in apoptosis and inflammation as an essential protein-protein interaction domain. The CARD of the cytosolic pathogen receptor Nod1 was overexpressed in Escherichia coli and purified by affinity chromatography and gel filtration. The purified CARD was crystallized at 277 K using the microseeding method. X-ray diffraction data were collected to 1.9 A resolution. The crystals belong to space group P3(1) or P3(2), with unit-cell parameters a = b = 79.1, c = 80.9 A. Preliminary analysis indicates that there is one dimeric CARD molecule in the asymmetric unit.

To determine whether pathogenicAcanthamoeba culbertsonitrophozoites and lysate can induce cytopathic changes in primary-culture microglial cells, morphological changes were observed by transmission electron microscopy (TEM). In addition, the secretion of two kinds of cytokines, tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) and interleukin-1β (IL-1β), from microglial cells was observed. Trophozoites of pathogenicA. culbertsonimade contact with microglial cells and produced digipodia. TEM revealed that microglial cells cocultured with amoebic trophozoites underwent a necrotic process, accompanied by lysis of the cell membrane. TEM of microglial cells cocultured with amoebic lysate showed that the membranes of the small cytoplasmic vacuoles as well as the cell membrane were lysed. The amounts of TNF-α secreted from microglial cells cocultured withA. culbertsonitrophozoites or lysate increased at 6 h of incubation. The amounts of IL-1β secreted from microglial cells cocultured withA. culbertsonitrophozoites at 6 h of incubation was similar to those secreted from the control group, but the amounts decreased during cultivation withA. culbertsonilysate. These results suggest that pathogenicA. culbertsoniinduces the cytopathic effects in primary-culture rat microglial cells, with the effects characterized by necrosis of microglial cells and changes in levels of secretion of TNF-α and IL-1β from microglial cells.

To clarify the correlation of the proteinase activity with pathogenicity of Clonorrhis sinensis, the proteinase activity either in excretory-secretory products (ESP) or in crude extracts of adult C. sinensis was examined. Substrate gel electrophoresis of the ESP and crude extracts revealed four distinct enzyme bands, which were differently inhibited by the specific proteinase inhibitors. The proteinase of the ESP with molecular mass of 24 kDa, was purified 23-fold with 14.5% yield by spectra gel ACA 44 gel filtration. It exhibited optimal pH at 7.5 in sodium phosphate (0.1 M). Its activity was inhibited specifically by N-ethylmaleimide (NEMI and antipain whereas potentiated 1.9 folds in the presence of 5 mM dithiothreitol (DTT). Cytotoxicity of the proteinase increased in a dose- dependent manner up to 120 ㎍/ml while reduced by NEM and antipain, indicating that cysteine proteinase was responsible for the cytotoxicity. This result shows that the 24 kDa cysteine proteinase is deeply correlated with the pathogenicity of C. sinensis infection. Key words: ChDnorchis sinenis, cysteine proteinase, cytotoxicity

Monoclonal antibodies (Mabs) were produced against crude scolex extract of T. solium metacestodes, and applied to ELISA-inhibition test for improving the specificity of serodiagnosis of human cysticercosis. Four hybridomas secreting species-specific anticysticercal Mabs (Cya-1, Cya-7, Cya-28 and Cya-31) were selected. Each Mab reacted on antigenic components of 25.5 kDa (Cya-1), 28 kDa (Cya-7), 87.5 kDa (Cya-28), and 12.5 kDa (Cya-31). IFA showed that Cya-1 was located at the calcium corpuscles, and Cya-7 at the loose connective tissue of T. solium metacestode scolex. Cya-28 and Cya-31 reacted on the tegument of the scolex. By conventional ELISA, 23 out of 28 (82.1%) cysticercosis patients were found serologically positive, but 1 out of 9 (11.1%) sparganosis cases and 6 out of 31 (19.4%) paragonimiasis cases showed false positives. By ELISA-inhibition test using species-specific anti-cysticercal Mab Cya-7, 19 out of 28 (67.9%) cysticercosis cases were found serologically positive, but there were no false positives in other parasitic infections.

ELISA-inhibition test using Paragonimus westermani specific monoclonal antibody (Mab) was investigated to improve the diagnostic specificity of paragonimiasis. By cell fusion, one hybridoma clone secreting anti-P. westermani specific Mab was selected (Pwa-14), which reacted on bands of 28 kDa, 42.5 kDa, 89 kDa and 120.5 kDa. IFA showed Pwa-14 was located at the vitelline follicles. By micro-ELISA, 100% of 22 paragonimiasis cases were found positive, but 5 of 40 clonorchiasis cases (12.5%), 3 of 26 cysticercosis cases (7.7%) showed false positive. None of 10 sparganosis patients or 28 normal controls reacted positively. On the other hand, by ELISA-inhibition test using a P. westermani specific Mab, 100% of paragonimiasis cases were found positive, and there were no positive in cysticercosis, sparganosis cases or normal controls, except 2 (5.0%) false-positive sera of 40 clonorchiasis cases. The ELISA-inhibition test using a Mab showed higher specificity in comparison with micro-ELISA for serodiagnosis of human paragonimiasis.

The enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA)-inhibition test using a Clonorchis sinensis species-specific mouse monoclonal antibody (MAb), CsHyb 0605-23, showed increased specificity over the conventional ELISA used for serodiagnosis of clonorchiasis. To characterize the corresponding antigen further, the MAb was tested against polysaccharide, protein and glycolipid fractions obtained from a crude extract of C. sinensis adult worms, using chloroform, methanol and phenol extractions. Only the polysaccharide fraction was recognized by the MAb among those fractions. Mild oxidation of the antigen with sodium periodate showed decreased reactivity against the MAb. We concluded that the antigen and antigenic determinants recognized by the MAb are carbohydrates.

A mass treatment of head louse infestation with Sumithrin powder (0.4% phenothrin) in primary school children was implemented during the period of September 1991-May 1992. The infestation rate of total 2,515 children was 38.6% in average (21.2% in boys and 57.2% in girls). The reduction rate of head louse infestation was 93.4% with a single treatment and 94.8% with double consecutive treatments with about 10 days interval, which indicated that a single treatment would be recommended for the mass treatment in the community. Long term follow-up after Sumithrin powder application for head louse control in a primary school showed that the infestation rate dropped from 33.1% before treatment to 5.4% by seven months after treatment, giving a 83.4% reduction rate.