06.12.06
Endocrine Disruptors and Epigenetics in an Evolutionary Perspective
Evolutionary biologist David Crews and colleague John McLachlan have published an interesting paper in the endocrine disruptor supplement in the June edition of the journal Endocrinology entitled “Epigenetics, Evolution, Endocrine Disruption, Health, and Disease.” The paper takes a closer look at some of the key research findings made in the last year in the area of epigenetics and how epigenetic modifications passed on to multiple generations may “become incorporated into the genome and subject to selection.”
- It is well known that EDCs [endocrine-disrupting chemicals], and very likely endogenous hormones, can act on a gene’s developmental mechanisms, altering phenotype expression. We are now seeing that the mechanism of these phenotypic changes is probably epigenetic; in other words, they cause mitotically heritable changes in gene function without changing the DNA sequence, i.e without mutation. In fact, EDCs do not act on genes alone but on developmental mechanisms that integrate genetic and epigenetic interactions, resulting in the phenotype. Link
Hi,
Could you, please, send me the PDF?