Hello! you have reached the official blog spot of our lab which is based at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, Department of Urology - our main area of study is prostate cancer, nutrition, and epigenetics - but we also study changes in gene expression in benign-prostatic hyperplasia - we have made this blog so as we can share thoughts about the lab, papers that are just published and anything else remotely relevant at any time, and from anywhere!
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Monday, September 19, 2011
Transgenerational Epigenetic Inheritance: yes you can inherit your mother's methylation patterns...
In a report in Science Express, the Ecker lab describes a study utilizing Arabidopsis, following 30 generations of spontaneously generated DNA methylation marks - these "marks" were meiotically stable generating "epialleles". As epialleles can significantly affect transcription, including the use of alternative promoters, they can have a major effect on phenotype. But how often does a new epiallele get generated? According to their study, epialleles are generated more frequently than genetic mutations; given that they are both meiotically and mitotically stable, understanding how these alleles are generated [and maintained] is important - if you have access to Science, click here
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