The research education seminar 'Epigenetics in disease and well-being' organized by and held at Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden earlier this year, aimed to discuss the interaction between environmental factors and epigenetic modifications and its consequences for human and animal health. A selection of presented papers is hereby presented which highlighted the mechanisms by which enviro...

The risk of developing autoimmune diseases depends on both genetic and environmental factors, with epigenetic mechanisms of regulation potentially translating environmental cues into stable modifications in gene expression. Such stable memory of a functional state has been deciphered into a number of molecular mechanisms that collectively define the epigenetic status of a cell. In recent years,...

Stressful events during adulthood are potent adverse environmental factors that can predispose individuals to psychiatric disorders, including depression; however, many individuals exposed to stressful events can adapt and function normally. While stress vulnerability may influence depression, the molecular mechanisms underlying the susceptibility and adaptation to chronic stress within the bra...

There are many things you can suggest that will help people with low vision make the most of their vision, whether they are able to benefit from magnification devices or not. If you are working at the community or at primary level, remember that these environmental modifications should never be a substitute for referral: always refer someone with low vison for an eye examination, refraction and...

In our previous paper, we presented a speaker identification system using a multi-SNR multi-band method, and reported its robustness against environmental noises. This paper describes two modifications to the system for further enhancement of its noise-robustness. Firstly, 1/f noise is employed instead of white Gaussian noise to make noisy data for training multi-SNR GMMs. Secondly, recombinati...

Neurodevelopmental disorders (NDs) are currently thought to be caused by either genetic defects or various environmental factors. Recent studies have demonstrated that congenital NDs can result not only from changes in DNA sequence in neuronal genes but also from changes to the secondary epigenomic modifications of DNA and histone proteins. Thus, epigenomic assays, as well as genomic assays, ar...

Urban air pollution is an important environmental factor that is effecting a large portion of urban dwellers in developing economies. Due to the limitations of dose and impact nature, direct measurement of negative implications of urban air pollution is difficult and WHO has developed indirect methods such as Environmental Burden of Disease. However, in this study to measure the economic costs ...

A deeper understanding of the pathomechanisms leading to stress-related psychiatric disorders is important for the development of more efficient preventive and therapeutic strategies. Epidemiological studies indicate a combined contribution of genetic and environmental factors in the risk for disease. The environment, particularly early life severe stress or trauma, can lead to lifelong molecul...

Over the past two decades, a growing interest on the research of the biological basis of human longevity has emerged, in order to clarify the intricacy of biological and environmental factors affecting (together with stochastic factors) the quality and the rate of human aging. These researches have outlined a complex scenario in which epigenetic marks, such as DNA methylation and numerous histo...

Molecular modifications to the structure of histone proteins and DNA (chromatin) play a significant role in regulating the transcription of genes without altering their nucleotide sequence. Certain epigenetic modifications to DNA are heritable in the form of genomic imprinting, whereby subsets of genes are silenced according to parent-of-origin. This form of gene regulation is primarily under m...