2009 Top Epigenetics Headlines and Insights
OK it's a little late, but 2009 was a big year for epigenetics. At EpiGenie we love following highlights in the field enough to create a website for it, so it was hard to pick our favorites in 2009. BUT if we had to, we’d probably say:
miR-101: RNA Guardian Of The Genome?
miR-101 proved it was no entry level regulator when it showed it represses EZH2 and H3K27me3. We love seeing our ncRNAs at the core of epigenetic regulation, and so do our readers, as this was one of the most read in 2009.
The First Completed DNA Methylomes Cover All the Bases
Fall 2009 was a wonderful time in San Diego. We had lots of beautiful sunshine, less traffic and tourists plus great publications like this one from a local team who sequenced the methylome at single base resolution.
RNAi Rescues DNA Methylation Defects
Small RNAs continued to show just how deep their repertoire of skills was in 2009.
Fine-Tuning mRNA Deliveries with Alternative Polyadenylation
Alternative polyadenylation is one of those cool regulatory mechanisms that we don’t read enough about. Since these tails can make a big impact in miRNA regulation, we couldn’t resist calling it out.
Gene Bodies Take the “Hot Bod” Title for 2009
Researchers really began to take note of methylation outside the promoter in 2009.
Lincd In: Large Intervening Non-Coding RNAs Expand their Networks
linc-RNAs made big headlines early in 2009 causing a flurry of interest in the research community and media groups to use clever headlines like “Missing linc,” “Lincs RNA to...,” and...well you get the point.
One Small SNP for miRNA, One Major Impact on Gene Regulation
With just a few nucleotides involved with miRNA-mRNA pairing, we don’t know why we haven’t seen more SNP studies that take close looks in UTRs, but we’re glad we found this one.
miRNA Regulatory Documentary Bonus Footage: Featuring XRN-2
The Swiss don’t stop their dedication to recycling with paper. Here a Swiss team adds another chapter to the miRNA life-cycle where miRNAs are removed from RISC allowing the whole process to start over.
Top Methods Features
Nothing gets us more amped than cool technology advances for epigenetics research. These bottleneck-busting approaches were just a few that caught our eye in 2009.
Fixing Small RNA Detection in FFPE Samples
The bulk of the world’s tumor samples have gone through the FFPE process, so anytime we see methods that lend a hand in studying epigenetics in these samples, we have to jump on it. Using LNA probes, these researchers managed to pin down miRNAs that typically go undetected post-FFPE analysis.
Move Over MeDIP: Methyl Binding Proteins Enrich Methylation Studies
We know the epigenetics research community loves the MeDIP approach, but methylation affinity reagents like methyl binding proteins (MBDs) continued to make gains with researchers in 2009 so we thought we’d call out some of the benefits of MBDs in enrichment.
Zeroing in on miRNA Targets with HITS-CLIP
Bringing miRNA and mRNAs together one cross-link at a time, the HITS-CLIP method gave us an appetizer of what’s to come in mapping miRNA-mRNA target interactions.
This Hi-Def Methylation Experience is Brought to You by Bisulfite Capture
This diplomatic research group brought bisulfite conversion, custom microarrays, and sequencing to the same lab table and delivered one of the year’s first creative combos for high resolution, high coverage methylation analysis.
Small RNA Sequencing Adds Color(Space) to miRNA Dynamics in Stem Cell Regulation
Sure this team came up with 800+ new miRNA predictions, but it was the renegade 140+ of these that caught our attention. Their biological activity and lack of conservation challenged just how important sequence conservation across species should be.
Sopping Up Regulatory Insights with miRNA Sponges
Manipulating miRNA expression at specific times and places in vivo is going to be key to furthering the community’s understanding of these regulatory kingpins. miRNA sponges might just provide the in vivo advantage so we wanted to call them out.
MBD-Sequencing: The Latest Methylation Analysis Cocktail Delivers
This was another great approach to facilitate DNAm profiling. Using methylation binding protein (MBD) to enrich for methylated regions this team was able to sequence most of the methylated genome in two sequencing lanes! Not too shabby.
ChIPing Away at Small Samples with Direct Sequencing
Helicos’ platform put its ChIPs on the table, but showed you don’t have to go “all in” with your sample. In fact, this team skipped the typical sample-sucking, library preparation steps and direct sequenced 50 pg of ChIPed DNA.
Top Conference Coverage Features
So many great conferences, so little time. If your tyrant of a boss made you stay home this year, check out some of the highlights. We’ll be doing more of these in 2010.
Roadmap Epigenomics Conference Highlights
Conference Highlights: EMBO Conference on Chromatin and Epigenetics
Highlights From Abcam Chromatin: Structure & Function Conference
Highlights from the Epigenetics 2009 Australian Scientific Conference
