Chemotherapy and radiation treatments are known for deleterious effects on the ovary, which can result in prolonged recovery time before ovarian function resumes, including follicular growth after completion of these therapies. To better understand the protracted ovarian dysfunctions after chemotherapy and radiotherapy, we designed a comprehensive study to investigate the underlying mechanisms involved in chronic ovarian damage that prevent follicular development and/or to induce persistent follicle loss. Blood and ovarian samples were collected from reproductive age women, rhesus macaques, and mice after completion of chemotherapy and/or radiotherapy and from age-matched patients and animals without chemotherapy agent or radiation exposure to serve as controls.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To study the direct action and physiological role of antimüllerian hormone (AMH) in regulating ovarian follicular development and function in vivo in primates.
Design: Animals were assigned to six treatment sequences in a crossover design study. Intraovarian infusion was performed during the follicular phase of the menstrual cycle with agents including: control vehicle; recombinant human AMH (rhAMH); and neutralizing anti-human AMH antibody (AMHAb).
Anti-Müllerian hormone (Amh) is a peptide factor that is known to regulate sexual differentiation and gonadal function in mammals. Although Amh is also suggested to be associated with cognitive development and function in the postnatal brain, little is known about its expression or direct effects on neuronal activities in the hippocampus. Therefore, we assessed Amh and its receptor expression in the hippocampus of male and female mice using PCR, Western blot, and immunofluorescence staining.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe precise mechanism by which the immune system is adversely affected in cancer patients remains poorly understood, but the accumulation of immunosuppressive/protumorigenic myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) is thought to be a prominent mechanism contributing to immunologic tolerance of malignant cells in epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). To this end, we hypothesized genetic variation in MDSC pathway genes would be associated with survival after EOC diagnoses. We measured the hazard of death due to EOC within 10 years of diagnosis, overall and by invasive subtype, attributable to SNPs in 24 genes relevant in the MDSC pathway in 10,751 women diagnosed with invasive EOC.
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