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The Molecular Determinants of Cranial Skeletal Development and Evolution
(2015-10-01)
The vertebrate head and face, one of the defining features of vertebrates, is an evolutionary novelty that enabled the major radiation of Vertebrata. The emergence of the multipotent neural crest cells, often mentioned as ...
Transcriptional Control of Maternal-Fetal Immune Tolerance
(2016-05-18)
Human leukocyte antigens (HLA) are important determinants of self-nonself immune recognition. HLA-G, uniquely expressed in the placenta, is believed to be key to fetus-induced immune tolerance during pregnancy. The ...
Balancing transcriptional activity in Drosophila through protein-protein interactions on chromatin
(2016-05-09)
Chromatin plays a vital role in the implementation of gene expression programs. Several disparate groups of regulatory proteins alter chromatin state through post-translational modification of histone proteins, nucleosome ...
A Field Guide to The Limb Progenitor
(2016-05-16)
The primary goal of this thesis was to characterize the embryonic limb progenitor, a cell type that populates the early limb bud during the onset of limb morphogenesis. Two features of the limb progenitor were explored 1) ...
Transcriptional Regulation of Nodal Target Genes in Early Zebrafish Development
(2016-05-06)
Nodal signaling is one of the principal players in the process of gastrulation, during which the primary germ layers (endoderm, mesoderm, and ectoderm) are formed and organized in their proper locations. During my PhD I ...
Improving Stem Cell-Based Therapy and Developing a Novel Gene Therapy Approach for Treating Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD)
(2016-01-26)
Genetic mutations in muscle structural genes can compromise myofiber integrity, causing repeated muscle damage that ultimately exhausts muscle regenerative capacity and results in devastating degenerative conditions such ...
Metabolic Regulation of Hematopoietic Stem Cell Production and Maintenance
(2016-06-20)
Metabolic disorders are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality, with gestational diabetes impacting embryogenesis. Intriguingly, children born to diabetic mothers have a higher risk of developing childhood leukemia, ...
Genetic Basis of Natural Variation in Cellular Decision Making in Wild Yeasts
(2018-05-15)
In nature, microbes often need to decide which of many potential nutrients to consume. This decision-making process is complex, involving both intracellular constraints and the organism’s perception of the environment. ...
Intergenerational Transmission of Non-Germline RNAs in Caenorhabditis Elegans
(2018-05-13)
In the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans, double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) capable of silencing genes can be introduced anywhere in the animal and will subsequently travel throughout the body and enter most cells, including ...
Stable Heritable Germline Silencing Directs Somatic Silencing at an Endogenous Locus
(2016-11-29)
Double stranded RNA (dsRNA) introduced into C. elegans can move throughout the worm to initiate RNAi-mediated silencing in recipient cells. DsRNA movement, both within a worm and between generations, requires the conserved ...