Embryos Receive Parent-Specific Layers of Information

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in science on (#2THX)
story imageFollowing up on last week's article about offspring and mothers' previous sexual partners (in insects, anyway), new research now sheds some additional light on the multi-layered process of how a sperm and egg pass along information needed for successful reproduction.

As described in an article published in the journal PLOS Genetics:
Though one layer is the DNA code that is transferred, the new study identifies information not encoded by DNA, a so-called "epigenetic" layer of information that helps the cell interpret the genetic code.
In insects this additional "epigenetic" layer of information apparently can come from a previous mate. The question if such or similar mechanisms can also exist in higher organisms, e.g. also in humans, might be far fetched, but not that far, that it precludes a more thorough research. Clearly, there are still plenty of unknown factors in human and non-human reproduction: an area ripe for further research.

Re: Not much to debate... (Score: 0)

by Anonymous Coward on 2014-10-21 20:08 (#2TJR)

It was a response to evilviper and his or her reference to a prior thread, in which the insect story was very much positioned by one of the scientists as if it had immediate analogs to human reproduction.
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