Publications by authors named "Cameron Dixon"

Traumatic injuries (TIs) from intimate partner violence, vehicular collisions, high-impact sports, and even mundane activities can be fatal. However, survivors of TIs can have pathophysiological disturbances post-injury, including neurodegenerative diseases, mental illness, and metabolic disorders.Reproductive issues are a known consequence of TI especially in women, however this has remained poorly understood.

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Inflammation is known to disrupt normal behavior, yet the underlying neuroimmune interactions remain elusive. Here, we investigated whether inappropriate macrophage-evoked inflammation alters CNS control of daily-life animal locomotion using a set of zebrafish mutants selected for specific macrophage dysfunction and microglia deficiency. Large-scale genetic and computational analyses revealed that NOD-like receptor nlrc3l mutants are capable of normal motility and visuomotor response, but preferentially swim less in the daytime, suggesting possible low motivation rather than physical impairment.

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Many brain pathologies are associated with liver damage, but a direct link has long remained elusive. Here, we establish a new paradigm for interrogating brain-periphery interactions by leveraging zebrafish for its unparalleled access to the intact whole animal for in vivo analysis in real time after triggering focal brain inflammation. Using traceable lipopolysaccharides (LPS), we reveal that drainage of these inflammatory macromolecules from the brain led to a strikingly robust peripheral infiltration of macrophages into the liver independent of Kupffer cells.

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FOXQ1 is a member of the forkhead-box transcription factor family that has important functions in development, cancer, aging, and many cellular processes. The role of FOXQ1 in cancer biology has raised intense interest, yet much remains poorly understood. We investigated the possible function of the two zebrafish orthologs (foxq1a and foxq1b) of human FOXQ1 in innate immune cell development and function.

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