Schistosomiasis afflicts 200 million people and is responsible for 200,000 deaths per year. The infection is caused by a digenean trematode in the genus Schistosoma. The parasite must cycle through both a vertebrate (human) and invertebrate (snail) host to complete the life cycle. My dissertation focuses on the genetic mechanisms...
Schistosomiasis is a neglected tropical disease caused by parasitic trematodes in the genus Schistosoma. 200 million people are infected with schistosomes. Schistosomiasis causes acute and chronic disease, and may lead to death in chronic infections. Schistosomes have a complex life cycle that requires passage through a snail intermediate host. Understanding...
Recent experimental and theoretical work has examined the possible genetic causes of senescence. These are reviewed, and four types of factors are found to be responsible for the evolution of senescence and age specific fecundity curves: 1. Age specific mortality schedules, 2.Density dependent factors, 3. Density independent factors, 4. Random...
The prototypal poxvirus vaccinia is a cytoplasmic-replicating DNA
virus which contains a large genome with the capacity to encode 200
polypeptides. Tight temporal regulation coordinates the expression of
this large number of genes throughout a relatively short replication
cycle. As a first step towards identifying and understanding the
regulatory mechanisms...
Retinoic acid (RA) exerts important effects in the processes of vertebrate development, cellular growth and differentiation, and homeostasis. However, the mechanisms of action of RA in the control of cellular and developmental processes are incompletely understood, as the retinoid target genes have not been fully characterized. The goal of these...