Your Environment May Change Your Genes

An anonymous reader writes "Recent experiments indicate that your environment alters your genes. The longer identical twins live apart, the more their "epigenomes" (genetic sequences that activate or suppress other genes) differ. This possibility could cause a radical shift in the assumptions of biological inheritance (namely that, with minor exceptions, an individual's genes do not change), and indicates the possibility of return of Larmarckian inheritance which had formerly been consigned to the dustbin of biology."

Comments

Re:Not actually genes are changed

[dannyitc]

I think it would be reasonable to assume the article was referring to DNA in somatic cells, as altered gene expression only has the capacity to change an organism in somatic cells, and thusly, would be the only type that would reasonably respond to envionmental pressures. My (somewhat educated) guess is that the gametes would remain untouched.

This really shouldn't come as a big surprise. Differential gene expression is one of the major unexplored areas of genomics, and we're just beginning to scratch the surface of how organisms as complex as humans can develop with a number of genes comparable to that of a roundworm. Changes in the environment controlling gene expression is something that's well documented in many different organisms.