Epigenetic Drift in Stem CellsNovember 28, 2012Living for a while in a new environment can have a big effect on how you dress, talk, and act. Just listen to Madonna’s British accent. Likewise, taking bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BM-MSCs) out of the body and into the in vitro cell-culture environment can change them—but not necessarily for the better. In order […]
Lentiviral Vectors Can Cause Epigenetic ModificationsNovember 20, 2012Stem cell programming has been buzzing the last few years and with recent work suggesting that epigenetic and ncRNA factors are manipulative enough to star in TV drama, we expect the excitement to continue. But according to a recent report, researchers may need to keep close tabs on how the very methods they use to […]
EpiGenie 5hmC Technology GuideOctober 31, 2012A couple of years ago, researchers keen to analyze 5-hmC had a couple of options, but those early approaches couldn’t quite satisfy all of their increasing demands. Fast-forward a bit and it’s a very different story. Today there’s a plethora of options, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. As a result, one of the […]
GC Content and CpG Islands Keep Chromatin Open for TranscriptionOctober 30, 2012The word “island” conjures up images of a tropical paradise with a sandy beach and a sunny sky—a nice place to hang out. In a similar way, CpG islands turn out to be nice places for Pol II to hang out without worrying about pesky nucleosomes getting in the way, according to researchers in France […]
5-hmC Sequencing on a BudgetOctober 30, 2012Whether you’re the head of a lab, household, or leading a country, budgets are a reality. Like those old jeans you can’t seem to donate, they seem to get tighter every year. So when slick, new methods surface that tackle some tough challenges like single nucleotide resolution 5-hmC profiling, researchers’ excitement is quickly tempered by […]
