Abstract
Recent work has suggested that environmental chemicals, including those contained in cigarette smoke, can have adverse effects on the exposed individuals as well as their future progeny. The mechanisms underlying transmission of environmentally-induced phenotypes through the germ line are not well understood. However, a predominant process appears to be the establishment of permanent heritable epigenetic alterations, and a number of studies have implicated microRNAs in such processes. Here, we show that cigarette smoke induces specific differences in the spermatozoal microRNA content of human smokers compared with non-smokers, and that these altered microRNAs appear to predominantly mediate pathways vital for healthy sperm and normal embryo development, particularly cell death and apoptosis. microRNA-mediated perturbation of such pathways may explain how harmful phenotypes can be induced in the progeny of smokers.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 432-439 |
| Number of pages | 8 |
| Journal | Epigenetics |
| Volume | 7 |
| Issue number | 5 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - May 2012 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:database.42,45 Pathway analysis was performed on the validated This works was supported by the European Chemical Industry mRNA targets using IPA® (Ingenuity® Systems), and the vali-Council (CEFIC) (Innovative Toxicology Award to E.L.M.) dated and predicted data sets were mined for mRNAs known to and the Medical Research Council (MRC) Toxicology Unit. be involved in epigenetic modification.43,44 The authors would also like to thank Kate Dudek for printing
Keywords
- Epigenetic
- Human sperm
- Micrornas
- Smoking
- Transgenerational
