Passive Demethylation Drives DevelopmentJanuary 15, 2015Ever taken one of those online personality tests, such as those that tell you if you’ve got a passive or active personality? Well researchers at Stanford set out to perform such a test, not on themselves, but to uncover the ‘personality’ of demethylation during development. DNA can be demethylated actively through the TET enzyme family, or passively during DNA […]
Guide: Bisulfite-Converted DNA AmplificationJanuary 12, 2015Over the years, bisulfite conversion has become the most widely used method for DNA methylation analysis. It is the most convenient and effective way to map DNA methylation to individual bases. As the first step in numerous downstream analysis techniques, it is absolutely critical that the bisulfite conversion process is understood and performed well. Our […]
Webinar: A Step-by-Step Guide to ChIP-Seq Data AnalysisJanuary 12, 2015In this webinar, Dr. Xi Chen takes publicly available real ChIP-seq data sets to show you how to perform ChIP-seq routine analysis using a combination of different online tools available. This provides an opportunity for bioinformatics beginners and wet-lab biologists who do not have much experience with unix operating systems to have an idea about […]
Stem Cell Divisions Explain Variation in Cancer Risk among TissuesJanuary 11, 2015One question has intrigued cancer researchers for decades: why are some tissues more susceptible to developing cancers than others? Genetic and lifestyle factors have been frequently cited as common culprits, but they far from explain this phenomenon. In a report published in Science last week, Cristian Tomasetti and Bert Vogelstein show that the number of […]
Sperm-Derived Histone Modifications Orchestrate Human Paternal Heterochromatin FormationJanuary 11, 2015Humans have developed elaborate systems such as script, books, computers and virtual networks to ensure that knowledge is preserved throughout multiple generations. Researchers led by Ester Baart at Erasmus MC in the Netherlands wanted to understand and uncover other mechanisms – in particular those developed by cells to preserve their epigenetic knowledge over generations. Owing to […]
