Illuminating the Function of Stem Cell Therapy for Parkinson’s DiseaseJanuary 15, 2015Red light means stop and green light means go? Apparently not for a few bright researchers who have recently used a novel technique to shed light on how cell replacement therapy for Parkinson’s Disease (PD) functions. Studies suggest that therapeutic success requires the functional integration of grafted dopamine releasing (DA) neurons, but this has actually been […]
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 […]
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 […]
Uncovering Neural Differentiation Step-by-StepJanuary 9, 2015The Laetoli footprints made by humans 3.6 million years ago in Tanzania are perhaps the most famous footprints of all time. However, more recent footprints have been uncovered by the laboratories of Yechiel Elkabetz and Alexander Meissner. These epigenetic footprints represent each “step” in the process of neuronal differentiation from human embryonic stem cells (hESCs), […]
Smoking Damages the Epigenome for a LONG timeJanuary 8, 2015While we all know that smoking is bad for you, and even your baby, it seems that the effects last longer than you may think. Researchers from Imperial College London investigate and show that while there are epigenomic benefits to giving up smoking, there are also some changes that persist for what seems to be a lifetime. Previously, […]
Hi-C Captures KNOT: A Chromatin Conformation for all ChromosomesJanuary 1, 2015Putting a modern twist on the holiday spirit, researchers from the University of Zurich (Switzerland) gift a new piece of chromatin architecture that welcomes each and every chromosome to its party. And it comes from a surprisingly festive plant; Arabidopsis. On a Hi-C run surveying chromatin architecture, the touring researchers encountered a number of landmarks. At first they came across the standard sights: […]
Plotting the Path to Pluripotency Uncovers Key Role of DNA MethylationDecember 29, 2014If you’ve read our recent piece ‘Reprogramming Roadmap Reveals Fuzzy New Stem Cells‘ you’ll already know how “Project Grandiose” [1, 2], the brainchild of Andras Nagy, identified a new pluripotent state (the F-class stem cell). While the discovery of this new class is thrilling, the main purpose of this grand project was to uncover the […]
A “Grandiose” Project Provides a Fuzzy New Future for iPSC ResearchDecember 17, 2014Induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSCs) research burst on to the scene in 2006 with a paper which has since spawned thousands of studies and has proved to be a quantum leap for regenerative medicine. This reached a crescendo this year when a Japanese patient became the first recipient of retinal cells generated from iPSCs made […]