Cirsium setidens Nakai, a wild perennial, is widely consumed as a food and traditional medicine in Korea. In addition, diverse functionalities of C. setidens Nakai, including anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects, have been reported. However, whether or not C. setidens Nakai and its major compound, pectolinarin have high nutritional value and functional properties remains unknown. This paper investigated the proximate compositions, mineral contents, hepatoprotective activities, hepatic fat accumulation inhibitory activities, and anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant activities of C. setidens Nakai and its component parts, including of pectolinarin. The result showed that C. setidens Nakai and its major compounds have potential as a functional food material with natural antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities.Key words: Cirsium setidens Nakai, nutritional components, antioxidant activity, pectolinarin, functional material

A duplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method was developed to detect unapproved genetically modified (GM) potato (EH92-527-1) in Korea. The UDP-glucose pyrophosphorylase (UGP) gene was selected as an endogenous reference gene for potato and used to validate the specificity for 14 different crops. The primer pair EH92-F/R was designed to amplify the junction sequence between the genome and transgenic region introduced in GM potato. Its specificity was also validated using several different GM events. The detection limit of the duplex PCR method is approximately 0.05%. This duplex PCR method could be useful for monitoring cultivation of unauthorized GM potato in Korea.

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Since the first commercial GM plant, the FlavrSavr tomato, authorized in 1994, more than 140 GM plants were authorized for marketing globally. For the authorization and labelling of GM plants, the detection methods for genes introduced and proteins expressed in GM plants were developed qualitatively and quantitatively. This review presented the detection methods, conventional PCR, multiplex PCR and real-time PCR, for soybean, maize, canola and cotton as the dominant GM plants. Also, microarray assay and nanotechnology as new approaches for detection methods for GM plants were investigated.

To test applicability to the Hanwoo traceability system, twenty microsatellite markers were selected and analyzed. MSA, CERVUS, FSTAT, GENEPOP, API_CALC and PHYLIP software was employed serially to estimate heterozygosity, polymorphic information content, F-statistics, identity probability, exclusion probability and genetic distance. Eleven microsatellite markers (TGLA53, TGLA227, ETH185, TGLA122, BM4305, INRA23, ILSTS013, BMS1747, BM2113, BL1009, and ETH3) were selected based on their high heterozygosity values. Identity probability using these markers is one hundred times higher than when using