The ups and downs of DNA methylation: an interview with Gerd Pfeifer

Epigenomics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerd P Pfeifer
Keyword(s):  
Dna Methylation ◽  
Full Professor ◽  
Epigenetic Mechanisms ◽  
Cancer Etiology ◽  
Research Papers ◽  
Advisory Committees ◽  
Grand Rapids ◽  
The University ◽  
The City ◽  
Molecular Carcinogenesis

In this interview, Professor Gerd Pfeifer speaks with Storm Johnson, Commissioning Editor for Epigenomics, on his work to date in the field of DNA methylation. Dr. Pfeifer received a PhD degree from the University of Frankfurt, Germany. After postdoctoral work, he became a faculty member at the Beckman Research Institute of the City of Hope (Duarte, CA) in 1991. He is currently a full professor at the Van Andel Institute in Grand Rapids, MI. Dr. Pfeifer has served on several NIH advisory committees and has published over 300 research papers. Dr. Pfeifer's research interests are cancer etiology, molecular carcinogenesis and epigenetics. His expertise is in cellular and molecular biology. His lab currently works on epigenetic mechanisms of gene regulation in cancer and other diseases.

Epigenetic Mechanisms of Maternal Dietary Protein and Amino Acids Affecting Growth and Development of Offspring

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (7) ◽  
pp. 727-735 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi Wu ◽  
Zhibin Cheng ◽  
Yueyu Bai ◽  
Xi Ma
Keyword(s):  
Amino Acids ◽  
Dna Methylation ◽  
Dietary Protein ◽  
Growth And Development ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Biological Macromolecules ◽  
Epigenetic Mechanisms ◽  
Maternal Circulation ◽  
Energy Processing ◽  
Living Organisms

Nutrients can regulate metabolic activities of living organisms through epigenetic mechanisms, including DNA methylation, histone modification, and RNA regulation. Since the nutrients required for early embryos and postpartum lactation are derived in whole or in part from maternal and lactating nutrition, the maternal nutritional level affects the growth and development of fetus and creates a profound relationship between disease development and early environmental exposure in the offspring’s later life. Protein is one of the most important biological macromolecules, involved in almost every process of life, such as information transmission, energy processing and material metabolism. Maternal protein intake levels may affect the integrity of the fetal genome and alter DNA methylation and gene expression. Most amino acids are supplied to the fetus from the maternal circulation through active transport of placenta. Some amino acids, such as methionine, as dietary methyl donor, play an important role in DNA methylation and body’s one-carbon metabolism. The purpose of this review is to describe effects of maternal dietary protein and amino acid intake on fetal and neonatal growth and development through epigenetic mechanisms, with examples in humans and animals.

Epigenetics, Nutrition, Disease and Drug Development

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 386-391 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth Lundstrom
Keyword(s):  
Dna Methylation ◽  
Drug Discovery ◽  
Rna Interference ◽  
Nutritional Requirements ◽  
Signal Pathways ◽  
Disease Development ◽  
Epigenetic Mechanisms ◽  
Epigenetic Changes ◽  
Health And Disease ◽  
Novel Drug

Epigenetic mechanisms comprising of DNA methylation, histone modifications and gene silencing by RNA interference have been strongly linked to the development and progression of various diseases. These findings have triggered research on epigenetic functions and signal pathways as targets for novel drug discovery. Dietary intake has also presented significant influence on human health and disease development and nutritional modifications have proven important in prevention, but also the treatment of disease. Moreover, a strong link between nutrition and epigenetic changes has been established. Therefore, in attempts to develop novel safer and more efficacious drugs, both nutritional requirements and epigenetic mechanisms need to be addressed.

Humanist Engagements

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Howell A. Lloyd
Keyword(s):  
Educational Provision ◽  
The Third ◽  
Social Composition ◽  
Cultural Life ◽  
Law Faculty ◽  
Editorial Work ◽  
Governmental Institutions ◽  
The University ◽  
The City

Bodin arrived in Toulouse c.1550, a brief account of the economy, social composition, and governmental institutions of which opens the chapter. There follow comments on its cultural life and identification of its leading citizenry, with remarks on the treatment of alleged religious dissidents by the city itself, and especially on discordant intellectual influences at work in the University, most notably the Law Faculty and the modes of teaching there. The chapter’s second part reviews Bodin’s translation and edition of the Greek poem Cynegetica by Oppian ‘of Cilicia’, assessing the quality of his editorial work, the extent to which allegations of plagiarism levelled against him were valid, and the nature and merits of his translation. The third section recounts contemporary wrangling over educational provision in Toulouse and examines the Oratio in which Bodin argued the case for humanist-style educational provision by means of a reconstituted college there.

scholarly journals New Aspects of the Epigenetics of Pancreatic Carcinogenesis

Epigenomes ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 18
Author(s):  
Murat Toruner ◽  
Martin E. Fernandez-Zapico ◽  
Christopher L. Pin
Keyword(s):  
Pancreatic Cancer ◽  
Dna Methylation ◽  
Survival Rate ◽  
Epigenetic Mechanisms ◽  
Therapeutic Approaches ◽  
Cancer Epigenetics ◽  
Pancreatic Carcinogenesis ◽  
New Therapeutic Approaches ◽  
Environmental Events ◽  
Underlying Pathogenesis

Pancreatic cancer remains among the deadliest forms of cancer with a 5 year survival rate less than 10%. With increasing numbers being observed, there is an urgent need to elucidate the pathogenesis of pancreatic cancer. While both contribute to disease progression, neither genetic nor environmental factors completely explain susceptibility or pathogenesis. Defining the links between genetic and environmental events represents an opportunity to understand the pathogenesis of pancreatic cancer. Epigenetics, the study of mitotically heritable changes in genome function without a change in nucleotide sequence, is an emerging field of research in pancreatic cancer. The main epigenetic mechanisms include DNA methylation, histone modifications and RNA interference, all of which are altered by changes to the environment. Epigenetic mechanisms are being investigated to clarify the underlying pathogenesis of pancreatic cancer including an increasing number of studies examining the role as possible diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers. These mechanisms also provide targets for promising new therapeutic approaches for this devastating malignancy.

Ellen Gleditsch: Duty and responsibility in a research and teaching career, 1916-1946

2005 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 131-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANNETTE LYKKNES ◽  
LISE KVITTINGEN ◽  
ANNE KRISTINE BØØRRESEN
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Work ◽  
Atomic Weight ◽  
Associate Professor ◽  
Full Professor ◽  
Research And Teaching ◽  
Grant Applications ◽  
Network Building ◽  
Ellen Gleditsch ◽  
University Of Oslo ◽  
The University

ABSTRACT Ellen Gleditsch (1879-1968) became Norway's first authority of radioactivity and the country's second female professor. After several years in international centers of radiochemistry, Gleditsch returned to Norway, becoming associate professor and later full professor of chemistry. Between 1916 and 1946 Gleditsch tried to establish a laboratory of radiochemistry at the University of Oslo, a career which included network building, grant applications, travels abroad, committee work, research, teaching, supervision, popularization, and war resistance work. Establishing a new field was demanding; only under her student, Alexis Pappas, was her field institutionalized at Oslo. This paper presents Gleditsch's everyday life at the Chemistry Department, with emphasis on her formation of a research and teaching laboratory of radiochemistry. Her main scientific work during this period is presented and discussed, including atomic weight determination of chlorine, age calculations in minerals, the hunt for actinium's ancestor and investigations on 40K.

The Theatrical Memory of Space: from Piscator and Brecht to Belgrade

2005 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 358-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Silvija Jestrovic
Keyword(s):  
Postdoctoral Fellow ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Cultural Spaces ◽  
Theatre Studies ◽  
The University ◽  
The City

In this article, Silvija Jestrovic introduces the notion of spatial inter-performativity to discuss theatre's relationship to actual political and cultural spaces. Focusing on the Berlin of the 1920s in performances of Brecht and Piscator, then on a street procession of the Générik Vapeur troupe that took place in Belgrade in 1994, she examines how theatrical and political spaces refer to and transform one another. Silvija Jestrovic was a SSHRC postdoctoral fellow at York University in Toronto, and has recently taken up an appointment in the School of Theatre Studies at the University of Warwick. She is currently working on a book-length project entitled Avant-Garde and the City.

scholarly journals Epigenetic Modifications During Sex Change Repress Gonadotropin Stimulation of Cyp19a1a in a Teleost Ricefield Eel (Monopterus albus)

Endocrinology ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 154 (8) ◽  
pp. 2881-2890 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yang Zhang ◽  
Shen Zhang ◽  
Zhixin Liu ◽  
Lihong Zhang ◽  
Weimin Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Dna Methylation ◽  
Binding Protein ◽  
Sex Change ◽  
Gonadal Development ◽  
Proximal Region ◽  
Histone Deacetylation ◽  
Epigenetic Mechanisms ◽  
Gonadal Differentiation ◽  
Stimulation Of

Abstract In vertebrates, cytochrome P450 aromatase, encoded by cyp19a1, converts androgens to estrogens and plays important roles in gonadal differentiation and development. The present study examines whether epigenetic mechanisms are involved in cyp19a1a expression and subsequent gonadal development in the hermaphroditic ricefield eel. The expression of the ricefield eel cyp19a1a was stimulated by gonadotropin via the cAMP pathway in the ovary but not the ovotestis or testis. The CpG within the cAMP response element (CRE) of the cyp19a1a promoter was hypermethylated in the ovotestis and testis compared with the ovary. The methylation levels of CpG sites around CRE in the distal region (region II) and around steroidogenic factor 1/adrenal 4 binding protein sites and TATA box in the proximal region (region I) were inversely correlated with cyp19a1a expression during the natural sex change from female to male. In vitro DNA methylation decreased the basal and forskolin-induced activities of cyp19a1a promoter. Chromatin immunoprecipitation assays indicated that histone 3 (Lys9) in both regions I and II of the cyp19a1a promoter were deacetylated and trimethylated in the testis, and in contrast to the ovary, phosphorylated CRE-binding protein failed to bind to these regions. Lastly, the DNA methylation inhibitor 5-aza-2′-deoxycytidine reversed the natural sex change of ricefield eels. These results suggested that epigenetic mechanisms involving DNA methylation and histone deacetylation and methylation may abrogate the stimulation of cyp19a1a by gonadotropins in a male-specific fashion. This may be a mechanism widely used to drive natural sex change in teleosts as well as gonadal differentiation in other vertebrates.

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