Cannabis Use During Pregnancy and DNA Methylation of the DRD4 Gene in a Fetus

Pregnant women are cautioned to avoid drugs and alcohol during and after the birth of their child as a way to avoid manifesting disorders related to fetal development. The epigenetics of a fetus's dopamine levels are one of the many behavioral changes that affect the genes of a child in the uterus.  Cannabis sativa, otherwise known as cannabis, is a psycoactive drug that derives from a plant that is often smoked or inhaled for the relaxing effects and medicinal properties it offers. While smoking cannabis causes an increase in dopamine levels in adults, it has been questioned as the link that alters the patterns of DNA methylation of a baby in utero of pregnant women who smoke it, similar to the relationship between methylation and mothers who smoke tobacco. DNA methylation is a process that modifies DNA to protect it from being destroyed. It regulates gene expression  by inhibiting or binding the proteins involved in gene repression.  A study of 57 pregnant women who use drugs, 44 who used cannabis, was conducted to observe the changes of THE DRD4 gene of a fetus at 8 weeks of pregnancy. The dopamine receptor gene DRD4  is a protein coding gene that regulates dopamine levels and behaviors related to said dopamine levels. A SEQUENOM MassARRAY was used to measure the DNA methylation of the DRD4 gene in mothers who smoked cannabis to understand how cannabis affected the gene. The CpG sites of DNA that were tested and observed in the DRD4 gene confirmed the link between cannabis use and increased DNA methylation, but with other drugs such as tobacco, it was the complete opposite. Due to these results, there was very weak evidence as to whether or not cannabis alone fully altered the DNA methylation of the DRD4 gene in an offspring.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28448718/

How Exercise Changes Our DNA

An article appearing in The New York Times  written by Gretchen Reynolds gave an overview of a study published in Epigenetics. The study researched how exercise makes epigenetic changes mainly through a process of methylation. Scientists are aware that certain genes become more active or quieter as a result of exercise.  However, they hadn't understood how those genes know how to respond to exercise. 

A study from researchers at Karolinska Institute in Stockholm recruited 23 young and healthy men and women in order to study the epigenetic changes exercise has on DNA. The participants were asked to exercise one leg on a stationary bike for 45 minutes at a time for 5 days a week over a 3-month period. After that period, sophisticated genomic analysis was used to analyze muscle cells. It was determined that on average more than 5,000 sites on the genome of the muscle cells from the exercised leg featured new methylation patterns.

The researchers admitted that more studies have to be performed for more information on this topic but they feel the design of the study is beneficial because one individual essentially is the experimental and the control.  This helps weed out other factors that may influence epigenetic changes in muscle cells. Dr. Lindholm, a researcher form the study said, “Through endurance training-a lifestyle change that is easily available for most people and doesn't cost much money.....we can induce changes that affect how we use our genes and, through that, get healthier and more functional muscles that ultimately improve our quality of life." 

We all know exercise and diet influence our health dramatically.  It was interesting to learn that exercise changes so many aspects of our body including the expression of our DNA.  Like Dr.  Lindholm said exercise is available to most of us and I think it is so important for us to take care of our bodies; after all we only get one of them.  I know next time I am on the treadmill I will be thinking about how I am influencing the methylation patterns of my DNA.   

Honey Bees use multiple genetic patheways to fight infections.

Honey bees are essential to pollination, which means that it is extremely important for them to survive. Over the years we have had difficulty trying to keep honey bee colonies alive due to viruses, bacteria as well as parasites. Scientists have been working hard to determine a solution to the downfall of honey bee populations. Studies have shown that about 30 percent of honey bee colonies are lost over the winter, another 25 percent over the summer. The problem here is that there is not currently any type of treatments available for these bee keepers to fight these infections in their colonies. This has been up for discussion for a period of time due to the importance of these bees. A solution has to be found in order to protect these bees from further destruction of their populations.

     Scientists are working to find out which genes increase or decrease activity levels of these bees in the presence of viruses by measuring the expression of all genes in the honey bee genome, whether the virus is present or not. Their findings showed that the RNAi pathway in these bees had increased activity, which could mean that it has anti-viral properties in the immune pathway in bees.The researchers also looked for extra methylation marks which in virus infected bees could be present or not. Their finding showed that not only does the viral infections change the pattern of DNA methylation in honey bees, but its also in completely different genes then the ones in the RNAi pathway. These researchers have discovered that some of these genes are also anti-viral in humans, this has not yet before been linked in insects. These finding may not save the honey bees but it will only help further the information we have on the bees genetic background.. This information will help lead to how we can protect the populations of bees that we still have. Honey bees are important to understand and we should be doing everything we can to protect them.

Article: Honey Bees
Info: Honey Bee Pollination

Epigenetic's The New Frontier For The Fight Against Disease ?

An article published in Medical News Today talks about how researchers at the University School of Medicine in St. Louis have been working with epigenetic's. They talk about how every cell in the body has an identical genome and comes from the same instruction book, but what carries out the instructions from that book are different chemical markers. These chemical markers however, are not so methodical, they vary from cell to cell and vary in severity in terms of your health when disturbed. Ting Wang and other researchers at St. Louis figured out 111 of the epigenetic markers in different types of cell tissue. They have only started to scratch the surface with this type of work since epigenetic's is a very new and up coming idea. Ting Wang says there are only 20 other articles in publication like that of his. Which is very little compared to other more researched topics. Wang and his team also made a browser called WashU that allows for faster browsing through massive amounts of genetic and molecular data which has made it much easier on many researchers. Another, interesting thing that one of Wang's researchers was working on is the methylation of certain genes to turn on and off certain expressions. She found over 18,000 regions of the human genome that respond to methylation and this could be a huge break through in diseases like cancer.

This article was very interesting because epigenetics is such a new topic in the world of genetics and has been strongly fought against in the past. Epigenetics is especially interesting to me because I am very interested in Holistic health and it is wonderful to see that modern medicine is finally starting to look at the body as a whole and understanding that what you do today can greatly affect what you do tomorrow. The methylation of certain genes is also very interesting because if we could turn certain genes on and off it would change a lot in the world. We could stop devastating things like cancer and insignificant things that affect a lot of people like hair loss.

Primary Article
Secondary Article

New Measurement of Biological Age

Researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have discovered a new model that could show how aging occurs at a genetic level. These findings could better predict how old someone actually is and any kind of disease that can come from aging itself. The researchers in this particular study focused on DNA methylation which is a life-long process where a methyl group is either added or taken away from the cytosine molecule in DNA. This either supports or suppresses gene expression and activity. "The scientist's found that an individual's 'methylome'- the entire set of human methylation markers and changes across a whole genome-predictably varies over time, providing a way to determine a person's actual biological age from just a blood sample." In younger individuals, this methylation is very distinct in some areas and then not in others. However, as aging occurs methylation gets blurrier. This blurring also does not occur at the same rate for all people, thus making it easier to determine a person's biological age.



What I found to be most interesting was that the researchers stated that forensics can use this process to determine how old an individual is just from a blood or tissue sample. One of the researchers on the team also had this to say, "The next step is to look to see whether methylation can predict specific health factors, and whether this kind of molecular diagnosis is better than existing clinical or physical markers." Overall, I feel that this new study is very promising for finding treatments for many different kinds of diseases and possibly even be able to slow down the aging process at a cellular level.

Fruit Flies May Help Us Understand the Biological Effects of Child Abuse

 

Do the genes that you were born with determine your destiny? Or does what you experience in life shape the way you live it. Nowadays, researchers are very keen to prove that what you’re born with determines how your life would be. However, according to a Science Daily article, there is a possibility that what happens after your birth may change even your genetics.

Dr. Marla Sokolowski (University of Toronto), Dr. Tom Boyce (University of British Colombia), and Dr. Gene Robinson (University of Illinois) are co-editors of a special edition of a journal called Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. This edition contains papers from many different disciplines and focuses on how the early years of an organism’s life may affect the way the organism performs as an adult.

One interesting research project focused on how food depravation affects fruit fly behavior. In this experiment, scientists found two varieties of fruit flies – one with a genetic disposition to explore for food (“rovers”), and one with a genetic disposition to stay in one place (“sitters”). When fed a sufficient diet, both fruit flies acted and reproduced as expected. However, when the fruit flies were nutritionally deprived as larvae, both types of fruit flies searched for food like rovers. In addition, rover flies reproduced as normal, while sitter flies showed a reduction in reproductive ability.

This research shows that stressors in an organism’s early years may affect not only the behavior but also the genetics of humans. Research on humans
has showed that methylation in children who experienced abuse was different than methylation in children who did not experience abuse.

Research studies on animals and humans have large implications outside of the lab. It is appropriate that the editors of the journal sought research from a wide variety of disciplines. Studies on adversity during development could drastically change the way things work in fields such as social work, education, and counseling. Hopefully, further research could be used to help children who are currently being abused as well as adult survivors of child abuse.

 

Roles in the Hive Can Change DNA

According to an article recently published on Nature, the changing of a bee's role in the hive can cause reversible changes in it's behavior associated DNA. When a honeybee is born, it is the same as all other newborn bees. However, a change soon takes place and the bee takes on a role within the hive. This role could be queen or worker. The role is not just a behavioral one, though. Epigenetic changes occur and methyl molecules are added to sections of their DNA, altering the way the gene is expressed. The bee then takes on their role for life.

Researchers performed experiments and found that bees within worker sub-divisions could change their roles, if need be. To find this, the researchers removed all of the nurse bees from the hive as the foragers went out to retrieve pollen. When the forager bees returned, they noticed the lack of nurses and about half of the foragers took on the role instead. The intriguing part, however, is that nurse bees and forager bees have very different methylation patterns. The methylation patterns of the DNA in forager bees actually switched to those of the nurse bees when they changed roles.

Scientists believe that this discovery could help us find insights on human biology. They believe that epigenetic effects may be expressed through addiction, learning and memory. I think that this finding has the potential to do great things for humans. Finding a way to reverse epigenetic marks that cause disease or physical issues in humans would be a huge in helping to find a cure for things such as cancer.