Publications by authors named "Wonjoo Kim"

Status epilepticus (SE), a continuous and self-sustaining epileptic seizure lasting more than 30 min, is a neurological emergency that can cause severe brain injuries and increase the risk for the development of epilepsy. Over the past few decades, accumulating evidence has suggested the importance of brain inflammation in the pathogenesis of epilepsy. Honokiol (HNK), a pharmacological activator of sirtuin 3 (SIRT3), is a bioactive compound extracted from the bark or leaves of Magnolia plants that possesses therapeutic benefits for preventing the development of inflammatory injury.

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  • Delirium occurs in up to 50% of patients after high-risk surgeries and can negatively impact long-term health outcomes; the study aimed to use machine learning to predict this condition using sleep data from polysomnography (PSG) and questionnaires.
  • Researchers analyzed data from 912 adults who had surgeries under general anesthesia, identifying key risk factors for delirium such as medication use, surgery duration, and sleep issues like REM episodes and daytime sleepiness.
  • The machine learning model showed strong predictive capabilities, achieving an AUC of 0.84 when combining clinical and PSG data, emphasizing the importance of sleep-related factors in identifying patients at risk for delirium post-surgery.
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Juvenile myoclonic epilepsy (JME) is a common adolescent epilepsy characterized by myoclonic, generalized tonic-clonic, and sometimes absence seizures. Prognosis varies, with many patients experiencing relapse despite pharmacological treatment. Recent advances in imaging and artificial intelligence suggest that combining microstructural brain changes with traditional clinical variables can enhance potential prognostic biomarkers identification.

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USP11 is overexpressed in colorectal cancer (CRC) and breast cancer tissues compared to normal tissues, suggesting a role in promoting cell proliferation and inhibiting cell death. In this study, we observed that depleting USP11 inhibits cell proliferation and delays cell cycle progression. This depletion leads to increased p53 protein levels due to an extended half-life, resulting in elevated p21 mRNA levels in a p53-dependent manner.

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Introduction: We aimed to investigate the risk factors associated with poststroke epilepsy (PSE) among patients with different subtypes of stroke, focusing on age-related risk and time-varying effects of stroke subtypes on PSE development.

Methods: A retrospective, nationwide, population-based cohort study was conducted using Korean National Health Insurance Service-National Sample Cohort data. Patients hospitalized with newly diagnosed stroke from 2005 to 2015 were included and followed up for up to 10 years.

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  • Transient global amnesia (TGA) affects the autonomic nervous system, and this study analyzed heart rate variability (HRV) after TGA in diagnosed patients between January 2015 and May 2020.
  • The study included three groups: early (less than 1 week post-TGA), late (1-4 weeks post-TGA), and healthy controls, finding significant differences in HRV metrics such as SDNN and RMSSD between the early and late groups.
  • Over time, HRV showed an initial increase in the first week after TGA, followed by a decrease within four weeks, with negative correlations indicating that as time passed, these HRV metrics declined.
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Sirtuin3 (Sirt3) is a nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide enzyme that contributes to aging, cancer, and neurodegenerative diseases. Recent studies have reported that Sirt3 exerts anti-inflammatory effects in several neuropathophysiological disorders. As epilepsy is a common neurological disease, in the present study, we investigated the role of Sirt3 in astrocyte activation and inflammatory processes after epileptic seizures.

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Transient receptor potential vanilloid 6 (TRPV6) is a highly selective calcium-ion channel that belongs to the TRPV family. TRPV6 is widely distributed in the brain, but its role in neurological diseases such as epilepsy remains unknown. Here, we report for the first time that TRPV6 expression is upregulated in the hippocampus of a pilocarpine-induced status epilepticus model, mainly in the suprapyramidal bundle of the mossy fiber (MF) projection of the hippocampal CA3 regions.

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Telomeres are composed of tandem arrays of telomeric-repeat motifs (TRMs) and telomere-binding proteins (TBPs), which are responsible for ensuring end-protection and end-replication of chromosomes. TRMs are highly conserved owing to the sequence specificity of TBPs, although significant alterations in TRM have been observed in several taxa, except Nematoda. We used public whole-genome sequencing data sets to analyze putative TRMs of 100 nematode species and determined that three distinct branches included specific novel TRMs, suggesting that evolutionary alterations in TRMs occurred in Nematoda.

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Background: The clinical presentation of juvenile myoclonic epilepsy (JME) and epilepsy with generalized tonic-clonic seizures alone (GTCA) is similar, and MRI scans are often perceptually normal in both conditions making them challenging to differentiate.

Purpose: To develop and validate an MRI-based radiomics model to accurately diagnose JME and GTCA, as well as to classify prognostic groups.

Study Type: Retrospective.

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  • Early diagnosis and treatment of meningitis and encephalitis are critical, prompting a study to create and test an AI model for determining the causes of these conditions.
  • The study involved analyzing data from 283 patients to develop the AI model and validating it with 220 additional patients, focusing on four potential causes: autoimmunity, bacteria, virus, and tuberculosis.
  • The AI model significantly outperformed human clinicians in identifying the causes of meningitis and encephalitis, achieving high accuracy metrics, which underscores its potential for improving patient outcomes in these severe conditions.*
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Distinguishing syncope from epileptic seizures in patients with sudden loss of consciousness is important. Various blood tests have been used to indicate epileptic seizures in patients with impaired consciousness. This retrospective study aimed to predict the diagnosis of epilepsy in patients with transient loss of consciousness using the initial blood test results.

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Cyclic GMP-AMP synthase (cGAS), which recognizes double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) and activates the innate immune system, is mainly localized in the cytosol, but also shows nuclear localization. Here, we sought to determine the role of nuclear cGAS by mutating known nuclear localization signal (NLS) motifs in cGAS and assessing its functionality by monitoring phosphorylation of the downstream target, interferon regulatory factor-3 (IRF3). Interestingly, NLS2-mutated cGAS failed to promote phosphorylation of IRF3, reflecting the loss of its ability to produce cyclic GMP-AMP (cGAMP).

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Under adverse environmental conditions, nematodes arrest into dauer, an alternative developmental stage for diapause. Dauer endures unfavorable environments and interacts with host animals to access favorable environments, thus playing a critical role in survival. Here, we report that in Caenorhabditis elegans, daf-42 is essential for development into the dauer stage, as the null mutant of daf-42 exhibited a "no viable dauer" phenotype in which no viable dauers were obtained in any dauer-inducing conditions.

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Objectives: To investigate whether the association between SJLsc (sleep-corrected social jetlag) and depressive mood is significant and independent of sleep debt.

Methods: Participants from the general adult population were interviewed using structured questionnaires on sleep duration, weekday/weekend sleep schedules, and depressive mood (Patient Health Questionnaire-9). Social jetlag (SJL) was measured by SJLsc and standard SJL (SJLs).

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Neuroinflammation is one of the most common pathological outcomes in various neurological diseases. A growing body of evidence suggests that neuroinflammation plays a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of epileptic seizures. Eugenol is the major phytoconstituent of essential oils extracted from several plants and possesses protective and anticonvulsant properties.

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Objective: Interest in sleep disorders among the elderly, especially those in Korea, has increased. We aimed to describe the overall sleep status of the elderly population in Korea using survey data and to determine the risk factors concerning different aspects of sleep status.

Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional survey on 271 respondents aged 65-86 years old.

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Inflammatory responses in the brain play an etiological role in the development of epilepsy, suggesting that finding novel molecules for controlling neuroinflammation may have clinical value in developing the disease-modifying strategies for epileptogenesis. Adjudin, a multi-functional small molecule compound, has pleiotropic effects, including anti-inflammatory properties. In the present study, we aimed to investigate the effects of adjudin on pilocarpine-induced status epilepticus (SE) and its role in the regulation of reactive gliosis and neuroinflammation.

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The immune-acquired responses after vaccination vary depending on the type of vaccine and the individual. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the acquisition of immunity and the side effects, health status, and lifestyle after completion of the second dose of AZD1222. Blood samples were collected after a second dose of AZD1222.

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Background: There is limited information on the association between weekend catch-up sleep (CUS), which has beneficial effects on health, and depression. This study aimed to investigate the association between CUS and depression in adults.

Methods: We used the data of the Seventh Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 2016.

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Insomnia and depression are prevalent disorders that often co-occur. This study aimed to investigate the impact of clinically significant insomnia symptoms on the prevalence and clinical presentation of clinically significant depressive symptoms and vice versa. This study used data from the Korean Headache-Sleep Study (KHSS), a nationwide cross-sectional population-based survey regarding headache and sleep.

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Information on sex differences in the association between chronotype and depression is scarce. We aimed to investigate these differences using data from the Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey in 2016. Chronotypes were categorised based on mid-sleep time on free days corrected by sleep debt accumulated on workdays (MSFsc): early type, < mean MSFsc - 1 standard deviation (SD); intermediate type, between mean MSFsc - 1 SD and MSFsc + 1 SD; and late type, > mean MSFsc + 1 SD.

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Recent evidence has shown that the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) system plays a crucial role in several neuropathological processes. We previously reported an upregulation of VEGF-C and its receptor, VEGFR-3, in reactive astrocytes after the onset of status epilepticus (SE). However, it remains unknown, which molecules act as downstream signals following VEGFR-3 upregulation, and are involved in reactive astrogliosis after SE.

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Background: A close association has been reported between depression and migraine. However, information concerning the impacts of migraine on the clinical presentation and prevalence of depression in a population-based study is currently limited.

Methods: Data from the Korean Headache-Sleep Study, a nationwide survey about headache and sleep for adults aged 19-69 years were used.

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