Project description:The giant ciliate Stentor coeruleus is a classical model system for studying regeneration and morphogenesis at the level of a single cell. The anterior of the cell is marked by an array of cilia, known as the oral apparatus, which can be induced to shed and regenerate in a series of reproducible morphological steps, previously shown to require transcription. If a cell is cut in half, each half will regenerate an intact cell, including a new oral apparatus in the posterior half. We used RNAseq to assay the dynamic changes in Stentor’s transcriptome during regeneration, after both oral apparatus shedding and bisection, allowing us to identify distinct temporal waves of gene expression. By comparing transcriptional profiles of different regeneration events in the same species, we were able to classify regeneration genes into groups based on their potential role for regeneration in distinct cell regeneration paradigms, and provides new insight into how a single cell can coordinate complex morphogenetic pathways to regenerate missing structures.
Project description:Time series microarray analysis on the photosynthetic ciliate was conducted using an oligochip containing 15,654 genes designed from Teleaulax amphioxeia ESTs
Project description:Aging is associated with declining immunity and inflammation as well as alterations in the gut microbiome with a decrease of beneficial microbes and increase in pathogenic ones. The aim of this study was to investigate aging associated gut microbiome in relation to immunologic and metabolic profile in a non-human primate (NHP) model. 12 old (age>18 years) and 4 young (age 3-6 years) Rhesus macaques were included in this study. Immune cell subsets were characterized in PBMC by flow cytometry and plasma cytokines levels were determined by bead based multiplex cytokine analysis. Stool samples were collected by ileal loop and investigated for microbiome analysis by shotgun metagenomics. Serum, gut microbial lysate and microbe-free fecal extract were subjected to metabolomic analysis by mass-spectrometry. Our results showed that the old animals exhibited higher inflammatory biomarkers in plasma and lower CD4 T cells with altered distribution of naïve and memory T cell maturation subsets. The gut microbiome in old animals had higher abundance of Archaeal and Proteobacterial species and lower Firmicutes than the young. Significant enrichment of metabolites that contribute to inflammatory and cytotoxic pathways was observed in serum and feces of old animals compared to the young. We conclude that aging NHP undergo immunosenescence and age associated alterations in the gut microbiome that has a distinct metabolic profile.