Comparison of the gut microbiome of sacbrood virus-resistant and -susceptible Apis cerana from South Korea.

Honey bees are important pollinators for the conservation of the ecosystem and agricultural products and provide a variety of products important for human use, such as honey, pollen, and royal jelly. Sacbrood disease (SD) is a devastating viral disease in Apis cerana; an effective preventive measure for SD is urgently needed. In this study, the relationship between the gut microbiome of honey bees and SD was investigated by pyrosequencing. Results revealed that sacbrood virus (SBV)-resistant A. cerana strains harbour a unique acetic acid bacterium, Bombella intestini, and the lactic acid bacteria (LAB) Lactobacillus (unclassified)_uc, Bifidobacterium longum, B. catenulatum, Lactococcus lactis, and Leuconostoc mesenteroides in larvae and Hafnia alvei, B. indicum, and the LAB L. mellifer and Lactobacillus HM215046_s in adult bees. Changes in the gut microbiome due to SBV infection resulted in loss of bacteria that could affect host nutrients and inhibit honey bee pathogens, such as Gilliamella JFON_s, Gilliamella_uc, Pseudomonas putida, and L. kunkeei in A. cerana larvae and Frischella_uc, Pantoea agglomerans, Snodgrassella_uc, and B. asteroides in adult bees. These findings provide important information for the selection of probiotics for A. cerana larvae and adults to prevent pathogenic infections and keep honey bees healthy.

Superior optical properties of homogeneous liquid crystal alignment on a tin (IV) oxide surface sequentially modulated via ion beam irradiation.

We first investigated the alignment characteristics of tin (IV) oxide (SnO(2)) thin films deposited by radio-frequency (RF) magnetron sputtering. This study demonstrates that liquid crystal (LC) molecules could be aligned homogeneously by controlling the Ion Beam (IB) irradiation energy densities. We also show that the pretilt angle of the LC molecules has a close relation with the surface energy. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) indicates that a non-stoichiometric SnO(2-x) surface converted by ion beam irradiation can horizontally align the LC molecules. The measured electro-optical (EO) characteristics showed high performance, comparable with those of rubbed and ion-beam irradiated polyimide (PI) layers.

Titanium dioxide surface modification via ion-beam bombardment for vertical alignment of nematic liquid crystal.

We introduce the characteristics of the titanium dioxide (TiO(2)) inorganic film deposited by rf magnetron sputtering for liquid crystal display applications. The TiO(2) films demonstrated vertical alignment (VA) of the liquid crystals (LCs) obtained by using ion-beam (IB) bombardment. As observed by using x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, the chemical structure of the TiO(2) was changed by IB bombardment, altering the Ti-O bonding of the Ti 2p spectra to lower intensity levels. Breaking Ti-O bonding by IB bombardment created pretilt angles between the TiO(2) film and LC molecules. The better voltage-transmittance characteristics of the VA LCDs based on TiO(2) film were measured and compared with the same characteristics of polyimide film.

[A case of hepatocellular carcinoma with metastasis to gingival mucosa].

Hepatocellular carcinoma is one of the most common causes of death in Koreans. Most cases of hepatocellular carcinoma are beyond the stage of curative resection at the time of diagnosis due to extrahepatic metastasis as well as wide distribution of tumor in the liver. The lung is the most common site of extrahepatic metastasis but metastasis to gingiva is very rare in hepatocellular carcinoma. We report a case hepatocellular carcinoma with gingival metastasis in a 59 year old male patient.