Includes bibliographical references / Proper implementation of and adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART) is significantly associated with better health and longer life in HIV-positive individuals. Consistent, adequate adherence has been shown to lead to a suppressed viral load. A low viral load delays the virus's progression and leads to better health outcomes for the individual. Adequate adherence is especially important among HIV-positive pregnant women. How well a woman adheres to her ART can not only improve her health during pregnancy but can protect the infant from HIV by preventing in utero transmission of the virus. Continuing ART protects against transmission via breastmilk later in the infant's life. While the benefits of good adherence are undeniable, the definition of adequate adherence varies widely in the literature. Taking 80 to 100% of pills as prescribed is commonly used as the threshold for adequate adherence levels. Various methods exist for measuring ART adherence, and while some are more reliable than others, there is no gold standard. This ambiguity in ART research extends to pregnant women, with even less known about HIV infected women established already on ART who then become pregnant. Changes in treatment protocols in the Western Cape and improvement of ART delivery throughout South Africa have resulted in this group of long-term users growing in size. Without more research into the barriers of ART adherence in these women, efforts to scale up treatment programs and to end mother to child transmission of HIV will ultimately fail. This dissertation is an exploration of these ideas. It begins to fill the gap in current knowledge related to ART compliance in pregnant women, and gives new insights into how specific barriers to adherence can adversely affect this specific group of established ART users.

The aim of this study has been to analyse the ways Mexican states articulates the actions of women undergoing an abortion and the effects it has on criminal sanctions specified for women. This study analyses the criminal code of Mexico City which decriminalised abortion in 2007, the criminal code of Jalisco reformed in 2009 and the criminal code of Yucatán reformed in 2009. The discrimination of women had been the major concern of International Human Rights Law as well as feminist jurisprudence. This research has attempted to problematise and highlight different aspects of discrimination taking place in Mexican law. Feminist liberal theory and radical feminism had been placed to analyse the criminal codes governing Mexican abortion law. Thus, in this thesis, the problems of women to access legal abortion had been discussed as a problem of discrimination based on sex. Therefore, this study does not touch upon tensions between the foetus and the mother but the conflict that emerges in the ways the law thinks of women.

There have been leaps in both fields of epigenetics and reproductive technology. This has culminated in the production of bi-maternal mouse offspring through a few studies utilizing direct gene mutations as functional-imprints. While these genetic interventions result in positive results, it has yet to be described, in full, what mechanisms underlie the epigenetic barriers to human gynogenesis. Between maternal and paternal imprints, differences in methylation patterns of CpG island promoters, non-coding regions, microsatellites, transposons, and histones result in differences in higher order chromatin structure, which ultimately impacts expression of certain genes. While the necessary components of a minimal paternal epigenetic program are described, programming this imprint onto m2, a hypothetical, experimentally-produced maternal genome with a paternal epigenome is still not elucidated. Sequential timing of imprint acquisition and maintenance and the numerous regulatory factors associated with them illuminate how difficult potential assisted reproductive epigenetic interventions will be. Other processes like histone-protamine exchange which also plays a crucial factor in structural regulation of imprints, as well as signaling through and after fertilization, pose logistical problems to creating a gynogenote through epigenetic means. Lastly, ethics surrounding the introduction of dangerous mutations and epialleles into the human population add another wall of caution and hesitance in exploring human gynogenesis as a reproductive technology.

Understanding reproductive isolation and divergence is the focus of speciation research. Recent evidence suggested that some Dendroctonus ponderosae populations produced hybrids with reproductive incompatibilities, a reproductive boundary undetected by phylogeographic analyses using molecular markers. Additionally, the unique bifurcated distribution of D. ponderosae and the proposed isolation-by-distance gene flow pattern around the Great Basin Desert provided a unique opportunity to investigate the evolution of postmating (postyzygotic) isolation while also understanding phenotypic divergence along latitudinal (climatic) gradients. First, I characterized the strength, biological pattern, and geographic pattern of postzygotic isolation in D. ponderosae by crossing increasingly divergent populations in a common garden environment. There was little evidence of hybrid inviability in these crosses, yet geographically distant crosses produced sterile males, consistent with expectations under Haldane's rule. Hybrid male sterility appeared at a threshold among increasingly divergent populations, was bidirectional (reciprocal crosses were affected), and less geographically distant crosses did not show significant gender-specific decreases in fitness. Second, a separate investigation of two critical phenotypic traits (body size and development time) was conducted on intrapopulation F2 generation offspring from a common garden experiment. Genetic differences contributing to phenotypic variance were interpreted within the context of the previously described reproductive incompatibilities, gene flow patterns, and latitudinal gradients. Genetic differences in development time were striking between faster developing and more synchronized northern populations and slower developing, less synchronized southern populations. Differences in development time were not detected between populations at similar latitudes. Body size, although more variable than developmental time, generally conformed to expectations, with northern populations being smaller than southern populations. Average adult size was found to be quite different between many populations and did vary between populations at similar latitudes, yet relative sexual size dimorphism was rather consistent. There was no evidence of correspondence between phenotypic traits (body size and development time) and either reproductive boundaries or gene flow patterns. The results suggest that latitudinally imposed climatic differences are likely driving phenotypic divergence between populations.

Female Spanish x Dairy cross goats were divided into three reproductive phases--breeding season or cyclic (20), seasonal anestrus (20), and early postpartum (20). Each group of animals was further divided into three treatments--control (10), Gonadotropin Releasing Hormone (GnRH) treated (5), and pituitary Luteinizing Hormone (LH) (5). During each of the above mentioned reproductive phases, the following were measured: progesterone and LH profiles, serum LH levels following GnRH injection, pituitary LH concentration and ovarian responses following GnRH treatment. Progesterone levels indicative of luteal development were present only in the breeding season. Progesterone levels during the seasonal anestrous and postpartum periods were 0.65 ± 0.03 and 0.3 ± 0.02 ng/ml, respectively, and significantly different (P<0.01) The LH surge mechanism was operational only in breeding season does,showing LH peaks of 187.86 ± 3.95 ng/ml an average of 13.2 ± 1.47 hours after the onset of estrus. LH levels returned to 2 ng/ml by 48 hours post estrus. There was an inverse relationship between plasma progesterone and LH with mean LH levels of 1.1 ± 0.13 ng/ml during the luteal phase of the cycle. Serum LH levels during the seasonal anestrous and postpartum period were 0.71 ± 0.02 and 0.32 ± 0.02 ng/ml, respectively. These differences in tonic LH secretion were significant. Tonic LH levels (0.5 ± 0.2 ng/ml) were recorded in all does, regardless of the reproductive phase, prior to the initial injection of GnRH. Serum LH increased to 182.96 ± 54.56, 209.38 ± 41.38, and 97.84 ± 55.84 ng/ml, these peak levels were recorded at 114 ± 4, 135 ± 7, and 135 ± 11 minutes post injection in cyclic, seasonal anestrous, and postpartum does, respectively. Response to the second injection was more rapid and heightened, peaks were achieved from 27 ± 3 to 66 ± 14 minutes post injection, LH peak levels were higher than those recorded following the first injection. Postpartum animals showed reduced responses in all cases. Pituitary LH concentrations were 1711 ± 378, 2069 ± 265, and 3542 ± 398 μg LH/g tissue in the postpartum, seasonal anestrous, and cyclic animals respectively. Because of high nonspecific binding, these concentrations are considered as estimates, nevertheless, trends observed are considered to be real.

The present experiment was conducted to determine the relationship between the human menstrual cycle and gustatory hedonic response. Hedonic response was defined as the perceived pleasantness or unpleasantness of a taste stimulus. Gender differences in taste hedonic have been observed; these may be due to differences in endocrine systems. Animal taste preferences are altered when reproductive hormonal status is experimentally manipulated. Previous researchers report that human females' hedonic responses to sucrose vary systematically with phase of menstrual cycle.

No description available.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Recent genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified many common genetic variants that are associated with women’s reproductive timing characteristics including ages at menarche and at natural menopause. However, the associations of these variants with other human health related phenotypes such as blood pressure, cancer, diabetes, obesity, and body height growth have not been well studied. No published studies to our knowledge have directly assessed the genetic influence of reproductive timing related variants on the aforementioned common traits. A better understanding of pleiotropic effects of these variants is important because it will help elucidate the precise mechanisms of common traits/diseases such as hypertension which have not been fully understood so far, and give clues for developing better solutions for disease prevention and treatment. We, therefore, conducted three studies to explore genetic variant effects on blood pressure and body height growth. In the first study, we analyzed data from a local cohort of 601 healthy adolescents from Indianapolis schools. Mixed effect model analysis revealed that 11 reproductive related single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were significantly associated with blood pressure in the study subjects. In order to assess if these genetic effects extended to the adult blood pressure, we performed the second study to investigate the genetic effect on blood pressure in adults. We used the summary statistics obtained from the two large international GWAS consortia, the Blood Pressure Consortium and the ReproGen Consortium. Bivariate analyses showed that more than 100 SNPs were associated with both blood pressure and reproductive timing. As the blood pressure development is closely related to somatic growth, we conducted the third study to exam the genetic effect of reproductive-timing related variants on the linear growth from the aforementioned local cohort. We identified 8 genetic variants significantly associated with the catch-up of linear growth in the study subjects. In conclusion, these three studies collectively provided evidence in support of the pleiotropic effects of the reproductive timing variants, suggesting the common genetic basis underlying the correlated traits. Future research is needed to validate the findings. / 2 years

In 1999, a new species of minnow, Chrosomus sp. cf. saylori (Clinch dace), was discovered in the Tennessee drainage of Virginia. Chrosomus sp. cf. saylori are listed as a Federal Species of Concern and on Virginia\'s Wildlife Action Plan as Tier II- Very High Conservation Need because of potential threats from habitat degradation, high population fragmentation, and a largely unknown distribution. Consequently, a management plan for C. sp. cf. saylori is of utmost importance, but more information regarding its distribution and life history is required before such a plan can be implemented. In 2011 and 2012 I sampled 60 headwater streams in the upper Clinch River watershed, Virginia.  From this and historical data, I conclude that C. sp. cf. saylori are restricted to eight small tributaries to the Clinch River.  Multivariate analysis of habitat correlates indicated that C. sp. cf. saylori populations are found in small, high elevation streams with gravel substrate and forested watersheds.  Three species distribution models were unable to predict C. sp. cf. saylori distribution.  Morphological traits were significantly different between C. sp. cf. saylori and other Chrosomus, thereby providing an initial indication of speciation and differing niche roles. I observed a nest association with Campostoma anomalum.  Gonad weight was lower for C. sp. cf. saylori than closely-related congeners. Together, this information indicates that C. sp. cf. saylori are narrowly distributed and populations are small, fragmented, and of questionable viability.  In the future, long-term monitoring efforts and genetics analyses should be completed and additional protection measures pursued. / Master of Science

European whitefish (Coregonus lavaretus) forms reproductively isolated sub-populations with different body sizes in the lakes where northern pike (Esox lucius) exists. It has been hypothesized that the initial reproductive isolation between ecotypes arises through size-assortative mate choice or because small and large individuals arrive to the spawning grounds at different times. To test these hypotheses, I caught and measured both breeding whitefish pairs and singular whitefish on the spawning grounds over the spawning season. There was no correlation between the lengths of males and females in breeding pairs, indicating that mate selection was random with respect to body size. There were no significant differences in body length between sampling dates during the field period in November 2021, suggesting that there is no divergence in spawning time between large and small individuals. Thus, neither of the two hypotheses were supported. Interestingly, males have significantly higher amount of breeding tubercles than females according to my results, which could be a selective factor in mate selection. However, the function of the tubercles is yet poorly understood.