Genome complexity: passing modifications (Introduction)

by David Turell , Tuesday, September 23, 2014, 14:38 (3502 days ago) @ David Turell

How epigenetic modifications are passed to next generations is now being found:-"After DNA replication and division, cells generally remember which of their genes should be active and which repressed—but how? A study in worms published today (September 18) in Science reveals that part of the mechanism involves divvying up modified histones—molecular tags that label active or repressed genes—between daughter chromosomes at replication. Researchers from the University of California, Santa Cruz and Indiana University, Bloomington, found that although the tags in each chromosome are reduced as a result of division, subsequent recruitment of histone-modifying enzymes reestablishes the full tag quota, thus preserving the memory of modifications for the next round of division.
 
“They show very elegantly using their system that modified histones can be inherited through multiple rounds of cell division and can be passed on . . . to the next generation,” said Shiv Grewal, an epigenetics and chromatin researcher at the National Cancer Institute who was not involved in the work. “That's quite remarkable.”"-
http://www.the-scientist.com//?articles.view/articleNo/41050/title/Heritable-Histones/-Histones are the molecules around which DNA is wrapped.