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Updated: Aug 15, 2025

Author Spotlight: RNAi Inheritance and ChIP in C. elegans
Published on: May 5, 2023
Epigenetic Inheritance: Impact for Biology and Society-recent progress, current questions and future challenges
Rodrigo G Arzate-Mejía1, Isabelle M Mansuy1
1Laboratory of Neuroepigenetics, Brain Research Institute, Faculty of Medicine, University of Zurich and Institute for Neuroscience, Department of Health Science and Technology, ETH Zürich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, Zürich CH-8057, Switzerland.
Abstract:
Epigenetic inheritance has emerged as a new research discipline that aims to study the mechanisms underlying the transmission of acquired traits across generations. Such transmission is well established in plants and invertebrates but remains not well characterized and understood in mammals. Important questions are how life experiences and environmental factors induce phenotypic changes that are passed to the offspring of exposed individuals, sometimes across several successive generations, what is the contribution of germ cells and what are the consequences for health and disease. These questions were recently discussed at the symposium Epigenetic Inheritance: Impact for Biology and Society organized every 2 years in Zürich, Switzerland. This review provides a summary of the research presented during the symposium and discusses current important questions, perspectives and challenges for the field in the future.
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