Publications by authors named "Christopher Ochoa"
Article Synopsis
- - Ovarian cancer is often diagnosed late and frequently recurs, making it highly lethal; current treatments like surgery and chemotherapy only provide temporary remission.
- - Researchers analyzed tumor cells and their microenvironments from patients with both initial and recurrent ovarian cancer to identify new molecular targets for immunotherapy.
- - The study highlighted CD1d as a significant biomarker in the ovarian cancer microenvironment, showing its potential to be targeted by specific immune cells (iNKT cells), which could lead to new treatment strategies for recurrent cases.
Article Synopsis
- * A study focused on Scaptomyza, a genus related to Drosophila, found that herbivorous species have fewer chemosensory and detoxification genes compared to nonherbivorous species, with higher rates of gene turnover in certain families.
- * The most affected genes are related to detecting plant toxins and compounds from their ancestral diet, shedding light on the genetic basis of herbivory and identifying gene candidates relevant to dietary changes in Drosophila. *
Herbivorous insects are exceptionally diverse, accounting for a quarter of all known eukaryotic species, but the genetic basis of adaptations that enabled this dietary transition remains poorly understood. Many studies have suggested that expansions and contractions of chemosensory and detoxification gene families - genes directly mediating interactions with plant chemical defenses - underlie successful plant colonization. However, this hypothesis has been challenging to test because the origins of herbivory in many lineages are ancient (>150 million years ago [mya]), obscuring genomic evolutionary patterns.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCircadian clocks orchestrate daily rhythms in organismal physiology and behavior to promote optimal performance and fitness. In Drosophila, key pacemaker proteins PERIOD (PER) and TIMELESS (TIM) are progressively phosphorylated to perform phase-specific functions. Whereas PER phosphorylation has been extensively studied, systematic analysis of site-specific TIM phosphorylation is lacking.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEndocannabinoids (eCBs) inhibit neurotransmitter release throughout the central nervous system. Using the Ceratomandibularis muscle from the lizard Anolis carolinensis we asked whether eCBs play a similar role at the vertebrate neuromuscular junction. We report here that the CB(1) cannabinoid receptor is concentrated on motor terminals and that eCBs mediate the inhibition of neurotransmitter release induced by the activation of M(3) muscarinic acetylcholine (ACh) receptors.
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