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Curr Top Dev Biol,
2008]
We review mechanistic and evolutionary aspects of interactions between the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans and its environment. In particular, we focus on environmental effects affecting developmental mechanisms. We describe natural and laboratory environments of C. elegans and provide an overview of the different environmental responses of this organism. We then show how two developmental processes respond to changes in the environment. First, we discuss the development of alternative juvenile stages, the dauer and non-dauer larva. This example illustrates how development responds to variation in the environment to generate complex phenotypic variation. Second, we discuss the development of the C. elegans vulva. This example illustrates how development responds to variation in the environment while generating an invariant final phenotype.
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J Biophotonics,
2009]
Femtosecond laser ablation permits non-invasive surgeries in the bulk of a sample with submicrometer resolution. We briefly review the history of optical surgery techniques and the experimental background of femtosecond laser ablation. Next, we present several clinical applications, including dental surgery and eye surgery. We then summarize research applications, encompassing cell and tissue studies, research on C. elegans, and studies in zebrafish. We conclude by discussing future trends of femtosecond laser systems and some possible application directions.
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J Biosci,
2009]
Understanding how the environment impacts development is of central interest in developmental and evolutionary biology. On the one hand, we would like to understand how the environment induces phenotypic changes (the study of phenotypic plasticity). On the other hand, we may ask how a development system maintains a stable and precise phenotypic output despite the presence of environmental variation. We study such developmental robustness to environmental variation using vulval cell fate patterning in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans as a study system. Here we review both mechanistic and evolutionary aspects of these studies, focusing on recently obtained experimental results. First, we present evidence indicating that vulval formation is under stabilizing selection. Second, we discuss quantitative data on the precision and variability in the output of the vulval developmental system in different environments and different genetic backgrounds. Third, we illustrate how environmental and genetic variation modulate the cellular and molecular processes underlying the formation of the vulva. Fourth, we discuss the evolutionary significance of environmental sensitivity of this developmental system.
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Methods Cell Biol,
1995]
This chapter has two aims. First, we describe one method, the electropharyngeogram (EPG), insufficient detail that a Caenorhabditis elegans researcher unfamiliar with electrophysiological methods could set up the apparatus and get useful results. Second, we describe more generally for researchers familiar with electrophysiological methods how they may be applied to C. elegans. We do not describe methods for electrophysiological investigation of C. elegans sperm.
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Sci Aging Knowledge Environ,
2005]
Here, we consider that most of the research concerning Caenorhabditis elegans has been laboratory focused and that only limited research has directly considered the worm''s biology relative to its natural history in the wild. We describe that, although the worm has traditionally been considered a soil nematode, we could not find it in soil but frequently recovered it from snails. Finally, we discuss how a better understanding of the natural history of C. elegans may enhance its usefulness as a model organism for studying aging and other phenomena.
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Cell,
1996]
The process of aging influences our poetry, our art, our lifestyle, and our happiness, yet we know surprisingly little about it. Genetics has taught us a great deal about gene regulation, development, and the cell cycle. Can it teach us how we age?
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Ageing Res Rev,
2011]
In this review, we describe recent advances in the field of RNA regulatory biology and relate these advances to aging science. We introduce a new term, RNA surveillance, an RNA regulatory process that is conserved in metazoans, and describe how RNA surveillance represents molecular cross-talk between two emerging RNA regulatory systems-RNA interference and RNA editing. We discuss how RNA surveillance mechanisms influence mRNA and microRNA expression and activity during lifespan. Additionally, we summarize recent data from our own laboratory linking the RNA editor, ADAR, with exceptional longevity in humans and lifespan in Caenorhabditis elegans. We present data showing that transcriptional knockdown of RNA interference restores lifespan losses in the context of RNA editing defects, further suggesting that interaction between these two systems influences lifespan. Finally, we discuss the implications of RNA surveillance for sarcopenia and muscle maintenance, as frailty is a universal feature of aging. We end with a discussion of RNA surveillance as a robust regulatory system that can change in response to environmental stressors and represents a novel axis in aging science.
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Cell,
1997]
Programmed cell death (PCD) occurs during the development of all animals that have been studied, but only recently has its molecular basis been discovered. In this review, we briefly consider some of the main events in the history of PCD in animal development. We then summarize what has been learned about the molecular mechanism of PCD and some of the intracellular proteins that control it. We next discuss the functions of PCD in development and how PCD is regulated during development by signals from other cells. Finally, we consider what the evolutionary origins of PCD may have been.
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Genetics,
1990]
It has been ten years since we published in Genetics a paper describing the isolation and genetic characterization of cell lineage mutants of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans (Horvitz and Sulston 1980). We have reviewed elsewhere what has been learned from the study of these and other mutants abnormal in the pattern of cell divisions and cell fates that characterizes C. elegans development (Horvitz 1988, 1990). Here we wish to reflect upon the days of our initial experiments, and to recall our excitement, our visions and our qualms as we elucidated the nematode cell lineage and began exploring methods for its
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J Plant Growth Regul,
2000]
Recent studies on a variety of organisms point to the ubiquity of RNA interference (RNAi) as a means to induce a gene-specific block to translation. RNAi has gained popularity in the last few years in the study of a number of problems in development. In this review, we highlight recent findings with RNAi using several different kinds of animals and fungi, and we show how these responses parallel cosuppression effects described in plants nearly a decade earlier. We then point to the efficacy of RNAi in studying minor and regulatory components of the plant cytoskeleton, and we highlight some recent studies using this approach with the water fern, Marsilea vestita.