Seminars

Epigenetic reprogramming underpins heritable phenotypic changes in plants

Title Epigenetic reprogramming underpins heritable phenotypic changes in plants
Lecturer Dr. Jose Gutierrez-Marcos
(School of Life Sciences, The University of Warwick, UK)
Language English
Date&Time 03/22/2017 (Wed) 16:00~17:00
Venue Large Seminar Room
Detail Eukaryotes are able to effectively adapt to both long-term and short-term adverse environmental conditions through epigenetic response mechanisms. While the latter response is thought to be heritable, the precise mechanism(s) by which this occurs remains unknown. We have found that in Arabidopsis, recurrent exposure to stress directs epigenetic changes to newly identified labile genomic regions. These acquired methylation marks are associated with conditional heritable adaptive phenotypic stress responses, which gradually reset in the absence of stress. We also found that these stress responses are not transmitted equally through parental sexual lineages due to the extensive epigenetic reprogramming affecting the male germline. We thus hypothesized that this epigenetic resetting could be bypassed by asexual reproduction. Our recent work has revealed that developmental reprogramming facilitates heritable epigenetic changes that underpin a plethora of phenotypes that are stable over multiple generations.
Contact 植物発生シグナル
中島 敬二 (k-nakaji@bs.naist.jp)

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