Word: methylation
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Dates: during 2010-2019
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...Make a Better Mouse As momentous as epigenetics sounds, the chemistry of at least one of its mechanisms is fairly simple. Darwin taught us that it takes many generations for a genome to evolve, but researchers have found that it takes only the addition of a methyl group to change an epigenome. A methyl group is a basic unit in organic chemistry: one carbon atom attached to three hydrogen atoms. When a methyl group attaches to a specific spot on a gene - a process called DNA methylation - it can change the gene's expression, turning it off or on, dampening...
...vitamins acted as methyl donors: they caused methyl groups to attach more frequently to the agouti gene in utero, thereby altering its expression. And so without altering the genomic structure of mouse DNA - simply by furnishing B vitamins - Jirtle and Waterland got agouti mothers to produce healthy brown pups that were of normal weight and not prone to diabetes...