Rodrigo Cuervo

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Professor (Full) at University of Veracruz

Full limb regeneration is a property that seems to be restricted to urodele amphibians. Here we found that Polypterus, the most basal living ray-finned fish, regenerates its pectoral lobed fins with a remarkable accuracy. Pectoral Polypterus fins are complex, formed by a well-organized endoskeleton to which the exoskeleton rays are connected. Regen...

Rhodope placozophagus nov. spec. from the western Gulf of Mexico that actively preys on placozoans is described. This white-translucent rhodopemorph was discovered on glass slides introduced in marine aquariums as part of an assemblage of small organisms including the vorticellids, ciliates, acoela, heliozoans and high populations of placozoans, wh...

Background: Placozoa is a phylum with only one species:Trichoplax adhaerens (F. E. Schulze, 1883); recent genetic studies suggest, however,that several haplotypes inhabit tropical and subtropical waters around the world. Placozoans have been found usually close to littoral zones where mangrove forests occur. Goals: To provide the second record of...

Asexual reproduction in Trichoplax occurs mainly by binary fission and occasionally by the budding of epithelial spheres called “swarmers”. The process that leads to binary fission and the mechanisms involved in this segregation are practically unknown. Trichoplax lacks a defined shape, presenting a constantly changing outline due to its continuous...

Background: In the Lobos-Tuxpan Reef System Protected Natural Area (LTRS), Mexico, the presence of sea slugs has been documented in several scientific investigations, but the information is limited, scattered and out of date. Goals: To elaborate an updated list of species with new field data and the compilation of species previously reported in th...

Los bancos ostrícolas de Crassostrea virginica constituyen hábitats importantes ya que proveen refugio, alimento y áreas de crianza para diversos organismos acuáticos. El objetivo de este trabajo fue estudiar la composición y abundancia de la macrofauna bentónica en los bancos ostrícolas (C. virginica) de las lagunas Pueblo Viejo, Tamiahua y Tampam...

Background: Polypterus condense unique characteristics that astonished and confused naturalists since 1802 when Geoffroy St. Hilaire first described and named this fish. Polypterus was seen in that epoch as primitive amphibians or a link between fishes and amphibians. Polypteriformes have the ability to regenerate its pectoral fins with the accurac...

Diversos estudios muestran el efecto de la temperatura en la bioacumulación de contaminantes en moluscos bivalvos, pero la in uencia de esté factor en la bioacumulación de hidrocarburos (HC) en Crassostrea virginica no se ha reportado. En este trabajo se estudió el efecto de la temperatura sobre la acumulación de HC en C. virginica en condiciones c...

Asteroidea is a class of Phylum Echinodermata with great capacity for body regeneration. The genera Linckia are among the species with higher capacity to regenerate and, in contrast to most sea stars, can reproduce asexually from arm fragments without portions of the central disc. In this article, we characterized the regeneration of Linckia guildi...

Las células de Hofbauer se describieron por primera vez en 1847. Estudios posteriores ayudaron a que se supiera más de dichas células, denominadas “células errantes” y posteriormente células de Hofbauer.La función de las células de Hofbauer, consideradas macrófagas, ha sido discutida ampliamente; según algunos autores su actividad es endocrina e in...

Programmed Cell Death (PCD) is a broad term used to describe a series of events that culminate in the death of specific cells. In the embryo it occurs at predictable stages and tissues. During mouse development, PCD is a mechanism to preserve the homeostasis of the growing organism, and also is needed for the morphogenesis of a variety of structure...

The anuran amphibian Xenopus laevis can regenerate its limbs for a limited time during the larval stage, while limbs are still developing. Using this regeneration model, we evaluated the proximo-distal blastema cell identity when endogenous retinoids were increased by CYP26 inhibition or when RAR-specific agonists altered RA signaling. Simultaneous...

During the hand plate development, the processes of cell differentiation and control of cell death are relevant to ensure a correct shape of the limb. The progenitor cell pool that later will differentiate into cartilage to form the digits arises from undifferentiated mesenchymal cells beneath the apical ectodermal ridge (AER). Once these cells aba...

Bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) play a crucial role in programmed cell death (PCD), a biological process required for the sculpturing of the embryonic limbs. However, it is unknown if BMP signaling directly promotes cell death, or if it induces a molecular cascade that culminates in cell death. Given that Smad8, which encodes one component of BM...

The degree to which the appendages of diverse tetrapod species are adapted to the habitat in which they live is astonishing. In organisms such as birds, bats, crocodiles, whales, horses and humans, appendages show as many different shapes; however, when these appendages are compared at early stages of embryonic development, it is impossible to dist...

The morphological diversity of the vertebrate limb is the result of finely tuned responses to signals that emanate from organizer centers controlling the three embryonic axes that shape the limb throughout processes such as apoptosis, differential growth and cell differentiation. When the autopod begins to form, an undifferentiated group of cells s...

Vertebrate limb development is a well-studied model of apoptosis; however, little is known about the intracellular molecules involved in activating the cell death machinery. We have shown that high levels of reactive oxygen species (ROS) are present in the interdigital 'necrotic' tissue of mouse autopod, and that antioxidants can reduce cell death....

During mammalian development, a pair of shelves fuses to form the secondary palate, a process that requires the adhesion of the medial edge epithelial tissue (MEE) of each shelf and the degeneration of the resulting medial epithelial seam (MES). It has been reported that epithelial-mesenchymal transformation (EMT) occurs during shelf fusion and is...

The actual role of programmed cell death (PCD) in embryonic processes and the extrinsic signals that define the death fate in developing cells are still poorly understood. Here, we show that during secondary palate shelf fusion in the mouse, PCD appeared in the medial edge epithelia (MEE) of the anterior region only after shelf contact. Contact was...

Programmed cell death or apoptosis is an essential process during the morphogenesis of a large number of structures. Evidence obtained over the past few years indicates that, in some cases, the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) is an important event during the course of apoptosis. Using anin vitroculture system in which digit individualiz...