In this episode of the Epigenetics Podcast, we caught up with Sir Adrian Bird, Buchanan Professor of Genetics at the University of Edinburgh to talk about his work on CpG islands, DNA methylation, and the role of DNA methylation in human diseases.
Adrian Bird has been a pioneer in studying the CpG dinucleotide sequence. The CpG dinucleotide is distributed genome-wide and has several properties expected of a genomic signaling module. The influence of CpG signaling on prozesses like development, differentiation, and disease is hardly understood. Adrian Bird's work indicates that proteins that bind methylated CpGs recruit chromatin modifying enzymes to promote gene silencing. On the other hand, proteins that bind unmethylated CpGs lead to the formation of active, open chromatin. These results suggest that CpGs have a gobal effect on genome activity.
In neurons MeCP2 is almost as abundant as histones and is probably one of the best studied Proteins that bind to methyl-CpGs. Children who lack MeCP2 acquire serious neurological disorders, in particular Rett Syndrome. Rett Syndrome is caused by defects of a single gene, which lead to the opportunity to study its molecular mechanism, which involves MeCP2 in detail. Adrian Bird created a mouse model of Rett Syndrome which has lead to the discovery that reintroducing a functional MeCP2 gene in mice can lead to a "curation" of the symptoms.
In this interview, podcast host Stefan Dillinger and Adrian discuss CpG islands, DNA methylation, and how the discovery of MeCP2 lead to the discovery of a possible treatment of Rett Syndrome.
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Transposable Elements in Gene Regulation and Evolution (Marco Trizzino)
Hydroxymethylation Landscape in Immunecells (Marcela Sjöberg)
Single Cell Epigenomics in Neuronal Development (Tim Petros)
Oncohistones as Drivers of Pediatric Brain Tumors (Nada Jabado)
Characterization of Epigenetic States in the Oligodendrocyte Lineage (Gonçalo Castelo-Branco)
Multiple challenges of ATAC-Seq, Points to Consider (Yuan Xue)
The Effect of lncRNAs on Chromatin and Gene Regulation (John Rinn)
Epigenetic Clocks and Biomarkers of Ageing (Morgan Levine)
Epigenetic and Metabolic Regulation of Early Development (Jan Żylicz)
Multiple challenges of CUT&Tag (Cassidee McDonough, Kyle Tanguay)
The Role of Histone Dopaminylation and Serotinylation in Neuronal Plasticity (Ian Maze)
The Role of Blimp-1 in Immune-Cell Differentiation (Erna Magnúsdóttir)
Multimodal Characterization of Cellular Identity | CITE-Seq and Beyond (Peter Smibert, VP of 10X Genomics)
The Effect of Mechanotransduction on Chromatin Structure and Transcription in Stem Cells (Sara Wickström)
Single-Cell Technologies using Microfluidics (Ben Hindson, CSO of 10x Genomics)
Epigenome-based Precision Medicine (Eleni Tomazou)
Epigenetics and Epitranscriptomics in Cancer (Manel Esteller)
Enhancer-Promoter Interactions During Development (Yad Ghavi-Helm)
The Effect of Vitamin D on the Epigenome (Folami Ideraabdullah)
H3K4me3, Set-Proteins, Isw1 and their Role in Transcription (Jane Mellor)
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