EPIGENICS - Miasms?
Posted: Fri Nov 04, 2005 4:06 pm
Dear Colleagues
BBC2's Horizon was discussing how stressful or environmental effects cause
disease symptoms in not only the person so affected, but also in generations
that follow.
Epi = upon
Basically, the human genome exercise showed only some 30,000 genes as
opposed to the 100,000+ expected. However, they found that by epigenetics,
genes are either switched on or off.
And whether these genes are switched off in the male or female, the result
is different in the off springs.
For example when parts of Gene 15 are missing, it can cause Angleman's
syndrome (poor mental growth, but child smiles all the time and is happy) or
Prader-Willi Syndrome where the child has insatiable appetite has poor
muscle tone etc. The point is that one is caused by the gene coming through
the mother and the other through the father!
Another example, the famines in the Swedish village caused cases of diabetes
in the grandchildren.
(The isolated Swedish village for a very long time had kept records of
births and deaths and diseases and causes of death and also their harvests).
If the males at puberty or female foetuses were affected by the famine, the
their children suffered from diabetes.
In another experiment, the spraying pesticides on to a pregnant rat caused
generations of her off springs to have cancers, kidney failures etc.
Or that the people who were stressed by the 9/11 attack and were pregnant at
the time, the stresses lead to hormonal changes not only in them but also in
their babies (Again how pregnant they were at the time was important) It
would be interesting to see what happens to the babies of these babies.
This is in a way the scientific proof of MIASMS ideas of Hahnemann 200+
years ago.
For those that did not see it, here is the link, the text below is form the
site.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/program ... enes.shtml
Rgds
Soroush
Biology stands on the brink of a shift in the understanding of inheritance.
The discovery of epigenetics – hidden influences upon the genes – could
affect every aspect of our lives.
At the heart of this new field is a simple but contentious idea – that genes
have a 'memory'. That the lives of your grandparents – the air they
breathed, the food they ate, even the things they saw – can directly affect
you, decades later, despite your never experiencing these things yourself.
And that what you do in your lifetime could in turn affect your
grandchildren.
The conventional view is that DNA carries all our heritable information and
that nothing an individual does in their lifetime will be biologically
passed to their children. To many scientists, epigenetics amounts to a
heresy, calling into question the accepted view of the DNA sequence – a
cornerstone on which modern biology sits.
Epigenetics adds a whole new layer to genes beyond the DNA. It proposes a
control system of 'switches' that turn genes on or off – and suggests that
things people experience, like nutrition and stress, can control these
switches and cause heritable effects in humans.
In a remote town in northern Sweden there is evidence for this radical idea.
Lying in Överkalix's parish registries of births and deaths and its detailed
harvest records is a secret that confounds traditional scientific thinking.
Marcus Pembrey, a Professor of Clinical Genetics at the Institute of Child
Health in London, in collaboration with Swedish researcher Lars Olov Bygren,
has found evidence in these records of an environmental effect being passed
down the generations. They have shown that a famine at critical times in the
lives of the grandparents can affect the life expectancy of the
grandchildren. This is the first evidence that an environmental effect can
be inherited in humans.
In other independent groups around the world, the first hints that there is
more to inheritance than just the genes are coming to light. The mechanism
by which this extraordinary discovery can be explained is starting to be
revealed.
Professor Wolf Reik, at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, has spent years
studying this hidden ghost world. He has found that merely manipulating mice
embryos is enough to set off 'switches' that turn genes on or off.
For mothers like Stephanie Mullins, who had her first child by in vitro
fertilisation, this has profound implications. It means it is possible that
the IVF procedure caused her son Ciaran to be born with Beckwith-Wiedemann
Syndrome – a rare disorder linked to abnormal gene expression. It has been
shown that babies conceived by IVF have a three- to four-fold increased
chance of developing this condition.
And Reik's work has gone further, showing that these switches themselves can
be inherited. This means that a 'memory' of an event could be passed through
generations. A simple environmental effect could switch genes on or off –
and this change could be inherited.
His research has demonstrated that genes and the environment are not
mutually exclusive but are inextricably intertwined, one affecting the
other.
The idea that inheritance is not just about which genes you inherit but
whether these are switched on or off is a whole new frontier in biology. It
raises questions with huge implications, and means the search will be on to
find what sort of environmental effects can affect these switches.
After the tragic events of September 11th 2001, Rachel Yehuda, a
psychologist at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, studied the
effects of stress on a group of women who were inside or near the World
Trade Center and were pregnant at the time. Produced in conjunction with
Jonathan Seckl, an Edinburgh doctor, her results suggest that stress effects
can pass down generations. Meanwhile research at Washington State University
points to toxic effects – like exposure to fungicides or pesticides –
causing biological changes in rats that persist for at least four
generations.
This work is at the forefront of a paradigm shift in scientific thinking. It
will change the way the causes of disease are viewed, as well as the
importance of lifestyles and family relationships. What people do no longer
just affects themselves, but can determine the health of their children and
grandchildren in decades to come. "We are," as Marcus Pembrey says, "all
guardians of our genome."
BBC2's Horizon was discussing how stressful or environmental effects cause
disease symptoms in not only the person so affected, but also in generations
that follow.
Epi = upon
Basically, the human genome exercise showed only some 30,000 genes as
opposed to the 100,000+ expected. However, they found that by epigenetics,
genes are either switched on or off.
And whether these genes are switched off in the male or female, the result
is different in the off springs.
For example when parts of Gene 15 are missing, it can cause Angleman's
syndrome (poor mental growth, but child smiles all the time and is happy) or
Prader-Willi Syndrome where the child has insatiable appetite has poor
muscle tone etc. The point is that one is caused by the gene coming through
the mother and the other through the father!
Another example, the famines in the Swedish village caused cases of diabetes
in the grandchildren.
(The isolated Swedish village for a very long time had kept records of
births and deaths and diseases and causes of death and also their harvests).
If the males at puberty or female foetuses were affected by the famine, the
their children suffered from diabetes.
In another experiment, the spraying pesticides on to a pregnant rat caused
generations of her off springs to have cancers, kidney failures etc.
Or that the people who were stressed by the 9/11 attack and were pregnant at
the time, the stresses lead to hormonal changes not only in them but also in
their babies (Again how pregnant they were at the time was important) It
would be interesting to see what happens to the babies of these babies.
This is in a way the scientific proof of MIASMS ideas of Hahnemann 200+
years ago.
For those that did not see it, here is the link, the text below is form the
site.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/program ... enes.shtml
Rgds
Soroush
Biology stands on the brink of a shift in the understanding of inheritance.
The discovery of epigenetics – hidden influences upon the genes – could
affect every aspect of our lives.
At the heart of this new field is a simple but contentious idea – that genes
have a 'memory'. That the lives of your grandparents – the air they
breathed, the food they ate, even the things they saw – can directly affect
you, decades later, despite your never experiencing these things yourself.
And that what you do in your lifetime could in turn affect your
grandchildren.
The conventional view is that DNA carries all our heritable information and
that nothing an individual does in their lifetime will be biologically
passed to their children. To many scientists, epigenetics amounts to a
heresy, calling into question the accepted view of the DNA sequence – a
cornerstone on which modern biology sits.
Epigenetics adds a whole new layer to genes beyond the DNA. It proposes a
control system of 'switches' that turn genes on or off – and suggests that
things people experience, like nutrition and stress, can control these
switches and cause heritable effects in humans.
In a remote town in northern Sweden there is evidence for this radical idea.
Lying in Överkalix's parish registries of births and deaths and its detailed
harvest records is a secret that confounds traditional scientific thinking.
Marcus Pembrey, a Professor of Clinical Genetics at the Institute of Child
Health in London, in collaboration with Swedish researcher Lars Olov Bygren,
has found evidence in these records of an environmental effect being passed
down the generations. They have shown that a famine at critical times in the
lives of the grandparents can affect the life expectancy of the
grandchildren. This is the first evidence that an environmental effect can
be inherited in humans.
In other independent groups around the world, the first hints that there is
more to inheritance than just the genes are coming to light. The mechanism
by which this extraordinary discovery can be explained is starting to be
revealed.
Professor Wolf Reik, at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, has spent years
studying this hidden ghost world. He has found that merely manipulating mice
embryos is enough to set off 'switches' that turn genes on or off.
For mothers like Stephanie Mullins, who had her first child by in vitro
fertilisation, this has profound implications. It means it is possible that
the IVF procedure caused her son Ciaran to be born with Beckwith-Wiedemann
Syndrome – a rare disorder linked to abnormal gene expression. It has been
shown that babies conceived by IVF have a three- to four-fold increased
chance of developing this condition.
And Reik's work has gone further, showing that these switches themselves can
be inherited. This means that a 'memory' of an event could be passed through
generations. A simple environmental effect could switch genes on or off –
and this change could be inherited.
His research has demonstrated that genes and the environment are not
mutually exclusive but are inextricably intertwined, one affecting the
other.
The idea that inheritance is not just about which genes you inherit but
whether these are switched on or off is a whole new frontier in biology. It
raises questions with huge implications, and means the search will be on to
find what sort of environmental effects can affect these switches.
After the tragic events of September 11th 2001, Rachel Yehuda, a
psychologist at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, studied the
effects of stress on a group of women who were inside or near the World
Trade Center and were pregnant at the time. Produced in conjunction with
Jonathan Seckl, an Edinburgh doctor, her results suggest that stress effects
can pass down generations. Meanwhile research at Washington State University
points to toxic effects – like exposure to fungicides or pesticides –
causing biological changes in rats that persist for at least four
generations.
This work is at the forefront of a paradigm shift in scientific thinking. It
will change the way the causes of disease are viewed, as well as the
importance of lifestyles and family relationships. What people do no longer
just affects themselves, but can determine the health of their children and
grandchildren in decades to come. "We are," as Marcus Pembrey says, "all
guardians of our genome."
