Effects Of Epigenetics

I conducted an intriguing research on the relationship between epigenetics and psychiatric disorders. It is known that epigenomes are affected by environmental surroundings which can cause life changing results as we age. Also, a mother’s maternal behavior inspires the stress

Identical twins who are raised in different environments turn out very different as adults. One twin grows up to be a great citizen, has a job, and pays for taxes. While, the other twin grows up and goes through different route by not paying taxes and not being a model citizen. The twins have the same original DNA and have the same traits for their genetic elements but they grew up in different environments. For species are we a product of our genes or the environment, which is known as epigenetics. Epigenetics are influenced and studied by the nature vs nature, health, aging, and parental care. The primary focus of the paper is to determine how epigenetics has an impact on health, inheritance, parental care, and childhood development.

What is Epigenetics? It is the study of heritable changes in gene expression that do not involve changes to the DNA sequence. Epigenetics is the change in phenotype without a change in genotype, which in turn affects how cells read genes. Its change can be influenced by several factors including age, the environment or lifestyle, and disease state. Epigenetic can also have damaging affects that can result in diseases like cancer. The results show that changes will occur to the function and/or regulation of these molecules, without altering their primary sequences. Epigenetics modifications are stable and passed on to future generations and they are dynamic and change in response to environmental stimuli.

To me epigenetics is the how behind each and every person’s personality. We always look for answers to questions, that are right now to incomprehensible to us but still trying to quantify them, and epigenetics is the latest answer. First we were looking at the gnome to try and answer medical questions of who and why certain people get diseases, now with that not giving us the results we want we are digging deeper into the bodies makeup trying to uncover its secrets.

The regulation of epigenetics plays a major role in development because it contains markers that control the expression

The study of epigenetics looks at how cells read genes and how genes are switched on/off by external chemical/environmental stimuli. Research into epigenetics may one day allow us to reprogram whole cells allowing for new forms of treatment for disease and a variety of different types of disorders including psychiatric.

Although not often discuessed in grade school, evolutionary mechanisms span further than simply the inheritance of “A-T-C-G” DNA nucleotides from our parents. Epigenetics is a specialized field within genetics that focuses on the evolutionary changes induced by genetic factors, such as transposons, and how they can cause an alteration of gene expression and disease. The study of the human epigenome is still relatively new, and exponentially advancing. With this being said, researchers still have questions regarding this complex evolutionary mechanism's implications in microevolution, and potentially macroevolution (Skinner, 2015).

Epigenetics is the study of changes in organisms caused by modifying the genes expression rather than alternating the genetic code itself, in other words turning specific genes on or off. Epigenetics has many effects on health and development, like the susceptibility to develop cancer cells or a better chance at becoming fat or thin. Many scientist have accepted the idea that epigenetics is inherited, but Karin Micheles, a fellow at Radcliffe institute, does not think epigenetics is totally heredity. Micheles explains that during development, epigenetic markers control the differentiation that makes a muscle cell different from a kidney cell through activated genes and then maintains that program from one generation of cell to the next, but

This perspective is contrasted by research evidence, however tests on identical twins suggest that environmental influences have a big effect on child development. Epigenetic studies have shown that “genes, though still important, have lost their privileged and prominent status, particularly as the distinction between nature and nurture disappears” (Keller, 2010). However, strong evidence is emerging to show that nature and nurture are interrelated in complex ways (Plomin, et.al,2013), and therefore they emerge together in the development of an individual

On the other hand, it is important to evaluate the potential of epigenetics as much as necessary. For example, in the case of the treatment of cancer, the impact of epigenetics is currently overestimated. Even though epigenetics can open new opportunities for the better understanding of the causes of cancer and the factors that are likely to contribute to abnormal changes in our cells, it can not and does not offer the cure for the treatment of cancer. Instead, epigenetics just gives insights into better understanding the causes.

This study is important, because when the “environment creates chemicals that work on the genetic code of our DNA” (Lecci, 2015, sec. 1.2). There has been studies that show that during prenatal, a child is vulnerable to the environmental effects that can create diseases for them later in their life. A method in which the genetic makeup has been altered is during “maternal smoking…DNA methylation changes” (Bauer, T., Trump, Ishaque, Thurmann, Gu, Bauer, M.,…Lehamann, 2016, para. 7). Genes can be altered not just by parents, but furthermore from past “environments of our ancestors” (Lecci, 2015, sec. 1.2). Epigenetics plays a role in personality, because if a child’s genes are altered, then they could be sickly or not able to connect with their parents based off their alterations to their genetic

A field called epigenetics has begun to address some of these issues. Studies have begun to show how environmental cues can stimulate epigenetic changes that could contribute to several psychiatric diseases. Systematic measurement of those changes could show how the environment influences the genetic chemistry behind many human behaviors.

Epigenetics is a field of study concerning genetic modifications due to changes in gene expression, rather than changes in the gene itself. There are countless epigenetic modifications that regulate gene expression, such as DNA Methylation or Gene Silencing, and all of these changes, if they occur in the germline, are preserved through DNA multiplication, and thus will be passed on to progeny. Moreover, these alterations can also take place in the somatic cells of the body and still be passed on to the next generation, through an interrelated alteration that takes place in the germline cells. It is this observation that has baffled scientists for generations, as it is an idea that truly lies at the heart of the “nature vs. nurture” argument.

Today, it is agreed upon that both, nature and nurture, work together to convey adaptive behaviors. Many researchers, like Champagne (2009), use the term “epigenetic” to explain the vigorous interaction among genes and the environment. Recent studies have proved that epigenetic effects are a process through which the condition of the social environment becomes rooted in at a biological level.

Epigenetics can be hereditable or environmental factors that affect the expression of genes and lead to changes in gene expression. Unlike genetics, epigenetics does not only have to do with which genes are passed down to the offspring and the DNA sequence. The environmental conditions of the offspring’s parents impact the genes in their eggs and sperms by “switching on” certain genes and “switching of” others (Dowshen). Since the genes expression of the gametes are affect, the phenotypes of the offspring will change. Even in a person’s lifetime, environmental factors such as stress, chemical exposure, and diet can continue to impact gene expression through DNA methylation. During DNA methylation, a methyl group is randomly added to a 5-carbon cytosine ring, making 5-methylcytosine and these groups inhibit transcription. (Cheriyedath). Due the fact that transcription is not possible, the expressing of the genes in that section of the DNA strand will be suppressed. The attachment of the methyl group to DNA is not determined, which means that