Comparing Methylomes Reveals Evolutionary SecretsSeptember 28, 2011Your mother always told you never to compare yourself with others, but in the methylation game, comparisons can reveal lots of cool info. Researchers now report that by comparing the methylomes of eight species, they found out that the placement of the H3K36me3 mark in Drosophila actually predicts where DNA methylation happens in other invertebrates. […]
Oh, the Horror! Commercial RTs Create False-Positive ncRNA DetectionSeptember 16, 2011With Halloween coming soon, we usually expect some visits from goblins, ghosts, and other creepy creatures who aren’t really what they seem. Now, researchers warn that using commercial reverse transcriptase (RT) might give you another sort of ghastly scare—you might think you’re detecting antisense non-coding RNA (ncRNA) when it isn’t even there. With so much […]
Epigenetic Instability Passes DNA Methylation Variation on to HeirsSeptember 15, 2011There are loads of things we’d hope to inherit from our parents, like intelligence, good looks or maybe even the family fortune, but we’re pretty sure altered DNA methylation wouldn’t make the list. No use worrying about that, though, since we can’t do much about it…and how often does that really happen anyway? A group […]
Podbat Let’s You Fly Through Epigenomic AnalysisSeptember 14, 2011How much would you pay to be able to analyze epigenomic data sets for multiple modifications, from various sources and different experiment types simultaneously? Before you answer, check out this new software tool, Podbat (Positioning database and analysis tool) that lets you do all of that and more…for free! When we first heard the name, […]
DNA Methylation Not So Identical in Schizophrenic TwinsSeptember 14, 2011Monozygotic (MZ), or identical, twins may seem like exact carbon copies of each other, but recent work has shown that epigenetic variation between them is common, even though they share an identical genome. Sometimes these small but significant epigenetic differences are suspected to lead to very different outcomes when it comes to psychiatric disorders like […]