Cell and Developmental Biology Commons^™

Maternal Social Status, Offspring 2d:4d Ratio And Postnatal Growth, In Macaca Mulatta (Rhesus Macaques), Juan Pablo Arroyo

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Early life exposure to stressors can disrupt growth and development, resulting in long-term compromised function and increased risk for disease throughout the lifecourse. Maternal exposure to psychosocial stressors (i.e., stressors derived from social status, social inequalities, and social interactions) during pregnancy has been associated with reduced fetal growth, adverse birth outcomes, and increased morbidity for the offspring later in life. Maternal hormonal responses to stress, such as fluctuations in glucocorticoids (e.g., cortisol) and androgens (e.g., testosterone), can result in increased developmental instability, interfere with offspring growth in-utero, and may alter developmental processes of sexual dimorphism. Second digit to fourth digit …

New Mechanisms That Control Fact Histone Chaperone And Transcription-Mediated Genome Stability, Angelo Vincenzo De Vivo Diaz

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Role of deubiquitinating enzymes (DUBs) in transcription, replication and genome integrity is not one that has been extensively researched. OTU DUBs are a particular class of enzyme with very little known about them.OTUD5 is a cysteine protease in the OTU family responsible to processing lysine 48 and lysine 63 ubiquitin chains. Recently, it has been implicated in to play a role in transcription through its binding partner UBR5. OTUD5 has also been shown to interact with proteins such as PDCD5 and p53, potentially have great importance in cell fate. In this study, I describe new discovered functions for OTUD5 …

Regulation Of The Heat Shock Response And Hsf-1 Nuclear Stress Bodies In C. Elegans, Andrew Deonarine

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Heat Shock Response (HSR) is a highly conserved stress responsive molecular pathway that functions to promote appropriate protein folding in the cell. The HSR accomplishes this primarily through the use of molecular chaperones that serve to bind to misfolded or unfolded proteins to assist in stabilizing and folding proteins back to their native functional state. The master regulator of this pathway is a transcription factor known as Heat Shock Factor 1 (HSF1). HSF1 regulates molecular chaperone expression in the cell’s basal state, but can also be stress induced by diverse biotic and abiotic signals including thermal shock, oxidative stress, …

Role Of Ceramide-1 Phosphate In Regulation Of Sphingolipid And Eicosanoid Metabolism In Lung Epithelial Cells, Brittany A. Dudley

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Ceramide 1-Phosphate (C1P) is a sphingolipid metabolite which plays a large role in inflammation, cell survival and proliferation¹. C1P is known to have both pro- and anti-apoptotic roles in lung cancer cells, governed by ceramide kinase (CERK), upstream of precursor ceramide (Cer)². Previous work reveals C1P serves as the liaison between sphingolipid and eicosanoid synthesis, by decreasing the dissociation rate of group IVA cytosolic PLA₂ (cPLA_2α) from the Golgi membrane, C1P directly activates this phospholipase for downstream eicosanoid synthesis and subsequent inflammatory response³. CERK has been discovered to modulate eicosanoid synthesis, …

The Impact Of Myeloid-Mediated Co-Stimulation And Immunosuppression On The Anti-Tumor Efficacy Of Adoptive T Cell Therapy, Pasquale Patrick Innamarato

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Adoptive T cell therapy (ACT) in combination with lymphodepleting chemotherapy is an effective strategy to induce the eradication of tumors, providing long-term regression in cancer patients. However, only a minority of patients that receive ACT with tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) exhibit durable benefit. Thus, there is an urgent need to define strategies that potentiate anti-tumor activity conducted by adoptively transferred T cells. In these studies, we aimed to identify novel strategies to enhance the therapeutic efficacy of ACT. Accordingly, we describe the disparate roles of myeloid cells in the context of ACT characterized by the augmentation of TIL proliferation in …

Mechanistic And Translational Studies On Skeletal Malignancies, Jeremy Mcguire

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

New treatment strategies are desperately needed for treating skeletal malignancy. Skeletal malignancies can be either primary cancer that originated in the bone, such as osteosarcoma, or metastatic cancer that spread from another organ to the skeleton, as in the case of breast or prostate cancer. In this thesis, I will detail two projects that focus on the discovery of new treatment strategies for both primary skeletal malignancy and metastatic skeletal malignancy.

The first project focuses on the primary skeletal malignancy, osteosarcoma, a rare cancer that is commonly diagnosed in children and young adults and metastasizes to the lungs. The survival …

Biological And Proteomic Characterization Of Cornus Officinalis On Human 1.1b4 Pancreatic Β Cells: Exploring Use For T1d Interventional Application, Arielle E. Tawfik

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is an autoimmune disease resulting in the loss of pancreatic β cells and subsequent loss of insulin production. Exogenous insulin coupled with continuous glucose monitoring is the only treatment for T1D. Therefore, novel interventional therapies are needed that can inhibit the autoimmune destruction and increase β cell proliferation and function. Based on initial in vitro studies, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) extract, Cornus officinalis, may be able to serve in this function. CO has been used for 2 millennia for its glucose regulating potential and has shown efficacy in animal models but rarely studied in the context …

To Mid-Cell And Beyond: Characterizing The Roles Of Gpsb And Ypsa In Cell Division Regulation In Gram-Positive Bacteria, Robert S. Brzozowski

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The bacterial cell division protein FtsZ is a tubulin homolog that forms a ring-like structure at the site of cell division in most bacterial species. There it acts as a scaffold, aiding in the recruitment of other divisome proteins to the site of cell division. Furthermore, studies focusing on the role of FtsZ treadmilling and septal peptidoglycan synthesis implicates that FtsZ plays a direct role in the ultimate closure of the division septum. Thus, many studies in the field of bacterial cell division have focused on FtsZ in terms of its spatial and temporal regulation as well as its ability …

The Role Of Apkcs And Apkc Inhibitors In Cell Proliferation And Invasion In Breast And Ovarian Cancer, Tracess B. Smalley

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Research has demonstrated that the atypical protein kinase C-zeta (PKC-ζ) is a component of many dysregulated pathways in breast and ovarian cancer, including cellular proliferation, survival, and cell cycle upregulation. Breast and ovarian cancers affect women every day and are second and fifth leading cause of cancer death. Women who seek treatments are commonly met with invasive surgeries or chemotherapy. Protein kinase C (PKC) is a family of serine and threonine phosphorylating kinases that have been shown to modulate and transduce signaling cascades that play roles in the development and survival of cancers. Atypical PKC (aPKC), have been heavily suggested …