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Open AccessJournal ArticleDOI

Epigenetics and the placenta

TLDR
Epigenetic regulation of the placenta evolves during preimplantation development and further gestation and appears to be involved in the pathogenesis of pre-eclampsia and GTD.
Abstract
results: Epigenetic regulation of the placenta evolves during preimplantation development and further gestation. Epigenetic marks, like DNA methylation, histone modifications and non-coding RNAs, affect gene expression patterns. These expression patterns, including the important parent-of-origin-dependent gene expression resulting from genomic imprinting, play a pivotal role in proper fetal and placental development. Disturbed placental epigenetics has been demonstrated in cases of intrauterine growth retardation and small for gestational age, and also appears to be involved in the pathogenesis of pre-eclampsia and GTD. Several environmental effects have been investigated so far, e.g. ethanol, oxygen tension as well as the effect of several aspects of assisted reproduction technologies on placental epigenetics. conclusions: Studies in both animals and humans have made it increasingly clear that proper epigenetic regulation of both imprinted and non-imprinted genes is important in placental development. Its disturbance, which can be caused by various environmental factors, can lead to abnormal placental development and function with possible consequences for maternal morbidity, fetal development and disease susceptibility in later life.

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Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI

Why do singletons conceived after assisted reproduction technology have adverse perinatal outcome? Systematic review and meta-analysis

TL;DR: Subfertility is a major risk factor for adverse perinatal outcome in ART singletons, however, even in the same mother an ART singleton has a poorer outcome than the non-ART sibling; hence, factors related to the hormone stimulation and/or IVF methods per se also may play a part.
Journal ArticleDOI

Linking prenatal maternal adversity to developmental outcomes in infants: The role of epigenetic pathways

TL;DR: Evidence illustrating the association between maternal prenatal distress and both fetal and infant developmental trajectories and the potential role of epigenetic mechanisms in mediating these effects are discussed.
Journal ArticleDOI

Sex-Specific Placental Responses in Fetal Development

TL;DR: Evidence that various species, including humans, exhibit normal sex-dependent structural and functional placental differences will be examined followed by how in utero environmental changes (nutritional state, stress, and exposure to environmental chemicals) might interact with fetal sex to affect this organ.
Journal ArticleDOI

Environmental epigenetics: prospects for studying epigenetic mediation of exposure–response relationships

TL;DR: Some of the challenges in studying epigenetic mediation of pathogenesis are discussed and some unique opportunities for exploring these phenomena are described.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI

Cytosine methylation and the ecology of intragenomic parasites

TL;DR: It has become increasingly difficult to hold that reversible promoter methylation is commonly involved in developmental gene control; instead, suppression of parasitic sequence elements appears to be the primary function of cytosine methylation, with crucial secondary roles in allele-specific gene expression as seen in X inactivation and genomic imprinting.
Journal ArticleDOI

Stability and flexibility of epigenetic gene regulation in mammalian development

Wolf Reik
- 24 May 2007 - 
TL;DR: During development, cells start in a pluripotent state, from which they can differentiate into many cell types, and progressively develop a narrower potential, and their gene-expression programmes become more defined, restricted and, potentially, 'locked in'.
Journal ArticleDOI

Transposable elements: targets for early nutritional effects on epigenetic gene regulation.

TL;DR: The results show that dietary methyl supplementation of a/a dams with extra folic acid, vitamin B12, choline, and betaine alter the phenotype of their Avy/a offspring via increased CpG methylation at the AvY locus and that the epigenetic metastability which confers this lability is due to the Avy transposable element.
Journal ArticleDOI

Analysis of the mouse transcriptome based on functional annotation of 60,770 full-length cDNAs

Yasushi Okazaki, +138 more
- 05 Dec 2002 - 
TL;DR: The present work, completely supported by physical clones, provides the most comprehensive survey of a mammalian transcriptome so far, and is a valuable resource for functional genomics.
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