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The face holds a central role in both human and nonhuman primate social interactions, through the communication of feelings and intentions via facial expressions and by acting as a means of recognising individuals. Humans, however, also employ their faces in mate attraction and assessment, an area that has received little attention in nonhuman primates. Many researchers have proposed that human aesthetic judgments of facial attractiveness have a biological basis, and these preferences have evolved via sexual selection processes during human evolution. The use of the face in attractiveness assessments need not be limited to humans. Rather, there is good reason to suggest that this may also apply to other nonhuman primates, based on homologies in the way in which primates use their faces, and on evidence that the face is a site of sexual selection for many primate species. It was the aim of this thesis to explore whether facial traits may also play a role in judgements of attractiveness in a nonhuman primate, the rhesus macaque( Macaca mulatta), in an effort to understand whether humans are unique in utilising the face as a mechanism of mate assessment. Three factors that are reported to influence facial attractiveness in humans are facial symmetry, sexual dimorphism, and averageness. To assess whether they also play a role in nonhuman primates, a series of experiments were conducted where digital images of adult male and female rhesus macaque faces were altered for these features. Opposite-sexed images were then displayed to adult males and females in a captive setting. Eye gaze measures were utilised to assess visual preference for, and the relative importance of, these traits. These experiments yielded mixed results. Increasing facial symmetry of opposite-sexed conspecifics positively influenced the dependent gaze measures employed here. Manipulating degree of facial sexual dimorphism had little influence on the visual gaze of either sex. Facial averageness positively influenced visual preferences for opposite-sexed conspecifics among both sexes, although increasing degree of averageness did not. The last topic to be explored was facial colouration. Rhesus macaques like, various other species of anthropoid primates, possess facial displays of red secondary sexual colouration. As above, animals viewed digitally altered pale and red versions of opposite-sexed conspecifics. Although females displayed preferences for red male faces, males displayed no clear preferences based on female facial colour. This raises the possibility that male and female facial colour may serve different roles in intraspecific signaling. While it cannot be concluded that visual preferences are indeed indicative of real-life preferences, the results do indicate that animals are not indifferent to variations in conspecific facial features. The present findings have important implications regarding the evolution of facial attractiveness, as they provide the first experimental evidence suggesting that facial features may serve as a mechanism for mate selection across primate taxa and that both human and nonhuman primates may employ similar criteria to appraise facial attractiveness.

Despite years of research, an effective therapy for treatment of ischemic stroke has yet to be found. Survivors of stroke may suffer debilitating and permanent motor dysfunction for the remainder of their lives. Current treatments are limited to physical therapy and tissue plasminogen factor (tPA), a thrombolytic medication with a time- window of efficacy up to only three hours after symptom onset. Clinical studies and animal models have shown that partial recovery of motor function occurs with or without pharmacological interventions due to adaptive plasticity and reorganization in the brain. The precise mechanisms, though unclear, have become a major focus of stroke research. In the following study, we investigated inosine, a naturally occurring purine nucleoside that stimulates axonal growth, as a potential long-term stroke treatment. Following controlled cortical ischemia in the motor cortex of rhesus monkeys, recovery of dominant hand function was monitored through NHP Upper Extremity Motor Dysfunction Scale ratings for two weeks post-operation and through performance on two motor tasks, the Hand Dexterity Task (HDT) and the Digit Coordination Task (DCT). Results of cage- side assessment ratings demonstrated a trend towards greater recovery in the group treated with inosine for functional strength in the dominant hand on 12-14 days after surgery. The suggested trend is enough evidence to pursue research on the use of inosine as a therapeutic agent in post-stroke functional recovery.

Hypertension is a complex multifactorial pathology that is a major risk factor for the development of cardiovascular disease, stroke, and end stage renal disease. In the United States, hypertension affects over 1 in 3 adults and comprises an annual cost of over $58 billion in the healthcare industry. While remarkable strides in the diagnosis and treatment of hypertension have been made since the pathology was first treated in the 1960s, a remarkable 13% of patients with elevated blood pressures are classified as resistant hypertensive, where blood pressure remains uncontrolled while on three or more classes of anti-hypertensive drugs. This treatment gap suggests that researchers need to develop and utilize translational models that recapitulate the pathologies seen in patient populations. Non-human primates (NHP) are highly similar to humans in terms of physiology, circadian rhythmicity, behavior, and gene sequence and structure. Development of NHP models that spontaneously develop pathologies, like spontaneous hypertension, provide novel and vital tools to studying disease. Overall, this dissertation is a comparative analysis of the mechanisms that drive the development of spontaneous hypertension in Chlorocebus aethiops sabaeus, an Old World non-human primate, and known mediators of essential hypertension in human populations. Chapter 2 presents how hypertensive (HT) African Green Monkeys (AGMs) are older, with elevated heart rates, increased renal vascular wall/lumen ratios, and altered glomerular morphologies compared to normotensive (NT) controls. Chapter 3 describes metabolic studies performed in a large cohort of animals that identified elevated proteinuria and ion excretion in HT AGMs compared to NT animals. Chapter 4 focuses on the contribution of sympathetic nervous system to the development of hypertension in this animal model and describes the significant left ventricular hypertrophy and elevation of adrenergic receptor mRNA in HT AGMs. Chapter 5 examines how age affects hypertension and renal function in the NT and HT AGMs. Together these data provide a foundational basis for the development of spontaneous hypertension in the AGM and provide a novel translational model for the study of cardiovascular disease.

Flavin-containing monooxygenase (FMO, EC1.14.13.8) comprises a family of xenobiotic-metabolizing enzymes that catalyze the oxygenation of a wide variety of xenobiotics, most commonly nitrogen and sulfur. Mammals express five different FMOs in a species- and tissue- specific manner. FMO2, is expressed predominantly in lung and differs from other FMOs in that it can catalyze the N-oxygenation of certain primary alkylamines. From its initial discovery as an unique form of FMO in lung, FMO2 has been studied primarily using a rabbit animal model. The initial goal of this research was to characterize this protein in a primate animal model. To understand FMO2 protein structure at the molecular level, we first cloned cDNA from a monkey lung cDNA library. Monkey FMO2 is expressed predominantly in lung. The high expression levels and broad substrate specificity in monkey, suggests that FMO2 plays a role in xenobiotic metabolism in this primate model. We then established a heterologous expression system to generate FMO2 with biological functionality in vitro. FMO2 from baculovirus-mediated expression resembled monkey and rabbit microsomal FMO2 immunochemically and catalytically. The successful FMO2 expression in the baculovirus system will serve as a valid tool for structure studies of protein functional domains, as well as, the amino acids responsible for enzyme properties of chimeras. Human FMO2 encodes a truncated protein containing 471 amino acid residues, 64 amino acids shorter in its C-terminal than orthologs in other species. We characterized human FMO2 in terms of gene polymorphism (genotyped by Dr. Hines), protein levels and catalytic activity with human lung microsomes. An ethnically related polymorphism was observed, in which all Caucasians genotyped to date are homozygous for a truncated, enzymatically inactive enzyme which may not even be translated. Approximately 15% of humans of African descent are heterozygous for full-length FMO2, but the level of expression may not be sufficient to significantly effect drug metabolism in the lung. The results of truncated FMO2 produced from baculovirus expression suggest that the C-terminal of FMO2 might be responsible for enzyme stability and/or proper structure necessary to exert fully enzyme activity. We conclude that the human FMO2 possesses unique features compared to all other mammals examined to date including other primates. / Graduation date: 1999

No description available.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1963. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. 67-70).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1953. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographies.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1960. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. 66).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Wisconsin, 1967. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. 76-78).