The anterior pituitary gland is an essential endocrine organ. The primordium of the anterior pituitary gland, Rathke's pouch, is formed by the invagination of somatic ectoderm that lines the roof of the oral cavity. It has been shown that SHH is important in pouch formation, but there is a controversy over where the source of the signal is originating from the neural or oral ectoderm. / The objective of my project was to describe the expression pattern and the role of Shh in the specification of Rathke's pouch in the chick embryo. I analyzed the expression pattern of Pitx2 and Lim3 which are two transcription factors required for pituitary development. Pitx2 was expressed throughout Rathke's pouch and the oral ectoderm during pituitary formation. Lim3 was expressed in Rathke's pouch, with stronger expression on the rostral side of the pouch. / Interfering with the SHH signalling pathway at the time of development of cells that will form the hypophyseal placode altered the expression patterns of Pitx2 and Lim3. This suggests that the SHH signal from the neural ectoderm plays a role in pituitary patterning. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.82226 |
| Date | January 2005 |
| Creators | Dufresne, Lynn |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Human Genetics.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 002207864, proquestno: AAIMR12437, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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