Genes, Age, and Sex: Meet the Masters of Your MethylomeApril 21, 2016What do age, sex, environment, and genomics have in common? Well, aside from taking your mind to the wrong place, they also interact to shape your methylome. There’s no denying that genome and epigenome share many intimate associations (cue dim lighting). We’ve seen that epigenetic modification can precede mutation in cancer and evolution. Then, of […]
EZH2 Makes Distinguishing Aggressive Basal Cell Carcinoma Tumors EZerApril 21, 2016When it comes to the epigenetics of cancer, there isn’t much that’s easy when trying to understand what makes a tumor; but now a talented team from the University of Michigan has just made understating it all that much EZer. Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most common cancer in people of Caucasian descent. Most […]
Cello – An Automated Composer For Gene CircuitsApril 14, 2016A lot of the inspiration, terminology, and even scientists in synthetic biology come from electrical engineering and computer science. Hence, we talk about “gene circuits” and “cellular computing”. However, this connection to digital computing hasn’t been much more than a metaphor, at least not until Cello walked on stage. Synthetic biology has been about as […]
“There is another” – N6-mA Described as a New Form of DNA MethylationApril 9, 2016In one of modern cinema’s greatest movies, Jedi Master Yoda proclaims “No…there is another…”. He was talking about the presumed existence of only one Jedi, much as many mammalian biologists speak about 5-methylcytosine (5-mC) as being the only type of DNA methylation. In a ground breaking new study, Andrew Z. Xiao (Yale School of Medicine, […]
Redefining Cancer and Stem Cell Reprogramming: Epigenetic Modulators, Modifiers, and MediatorsApril 9, 2016Back in 2006, Andrew Feinberg & Co. brought forth a review that pioneered the concept of tumor progenitor genes, which are genes involved in stem cell reprogramming and cancer. These tumor progenitor genes are epigenetically deregulated at the earliest stage of cancer. The epigenetic variation occurs before mutations, can be seen in normal tissue surrounding […]