| Abstract: | Endothelin receptor A (Ednra) signaling pathway is involved in many pathological and physiological conditions, yet the pathway and the genes regulated by the pathway remain largely unknown. Ednra mutant murine embryos are known to present with cardiovascular defects including patent ductus arteriosus, coarctation of the aortic arch, ventricular septal defects indicating issues with remodeling of the pharyngeal arch arteries, and improper development of the cardiac outflow tract among others. To elucidate the expression of specific genes involved during cardiovascular development in these mutants we first generated Ednra-/- murine embryos and performed whole mount in situ hybridization at embryonic day E9.5 and discovered altered gene activity that could explain the cardiovascular defects seen in these mutants. We also looked into the problem of cardiac neural crest cell migration using immunohistochemistry to analyze the Rho family of GTPases. We discovered that in the cardiac outflow tract neural crest cells, Endothelin receptor A signaling involves Cdc42 activity. The electronic version of this dissertation is accessible from http://hdl.handle.net/1969.1/155613 |
|---|