Several readers called my attention to a piece in the latest New Yorker. It’s by Siddhartha Mukherjee, is about epigenetics, and is called “Same but different” (subtitle: “How epigenetics can blur the line between nature and nurture”). I’m sure you know of Mukherjee, as he’s a doctor and writer, author of the renowned and Pulitzer-Prize-winning book (2011) The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer. (I haven’t read it yet, but it’s on my list.)
This piece, about new research into how genes are turned on and off—the key to how a DNA “recipe” produces an organism—is written for the intelligent layperson: you guys. I ask you to read it, because tomorrow we’ll start a discussion of it, and if you don’t read it you’ll miss all the fun.
The Emperor of All Maladies is a wonderful read.
Agreed. I read the book after my father was diagnosed with cancer and it helped me understand what was involved in its causes and treatment.
I guess it depends on what you read. I found it a somewhat pedestrian rehash of mostly familiar stuff.
What do you typically read?
I have yet to read a Pulitzer winner that wasn’t a great read.
I hope Muin Khoury at the CDC tunes in.
I got a gift description to the NYer from a friend and so got to read the article last week. It struck me as supremely good–fascinating, well-written. But then I’m an English teacher, not a biologist. Epigenetics is as remote as the pulsars to me.
Ok, I am reading it. It’s pretty interesting and beautifully written.
Very interesting. Reminds me when I got allergy tested. To my surprise I am at least mildly allergic to almost everything on the planet, but my reaction (histamine) is almost non-existent. This is one reason why anti-histamines do nothing for me. It is also, I believe, what happens with mosquitos. I used to think I never got bit, but I have evidence that suggests I still get bit, I just do not get a reaction.
I used to react badly to mosquitoes (as a child), now I hardly notice.
I used to be allergic to nothing; but as the years pass, I’m allergic to more and more things.
My wife used to get the typical little pink bump from a mosquito bite. now she gets a lump that’s often 3 inches (7.5 cm) in diameter, hard, raised, red, and hot.
Things change …
No ostensible allergies, but I acquired asthma at age 40 (WTF). I can clearly see that it is allergy induced, though, again, no direct symptoms of allergies, just asthma. Of course, altitude and cold weather play a greater role.
Things do change…
I also acquired asthma, and even at the same age!
Mine is clearly genetically linked (all males in my family get it). It is induced by allergies and also exercise 🙁 .
Mukherjee is a superb story-teller, as always.
His piece tantalizes with the prospect of epigenetics providing a way for experience to be permanently encoded into bodies; but then ends with a “we don’t really know” and “there’s very little evidence.”
Some key passages I noted:
Deepak and now the Templeton foundation will be unable to see the last sentence. It will be as if invisible to them.
It will also be invisible to creationists, especially the Discovery Institute. They are convinced that epigenetics shows that evolutionary biologists are Totally Wrong about evolutionary change (You, that process that they also think doesn’t happen).
Typo: “You” should be “You know,”
This piece may be a tie-in to his upcoming book “Gene: An intimate history.” His book on cancer was awesome. Well, I have my morning booked 🙂
Fantastic read. Was anybody else caused to think of Turner’s ideas about ritual liminality–the betwixt and between–even if just metaphorically?
I look forward to the planned conversation.
Terrific assignment (and a good read.) I look forward to tomorrow’s discussion!
I read “Emperor of all maladies” and it deserves all the acclaim it received. From Galen to modern genetics, all weaved in with personal anecdotes of his patients, the book reads like a movie.
I read the piece and suspect that PCC(E) will have a number of objections to parts of it.
I did not like the intermix of the story of the twins and the scientific information. The anecdotes tend to obfuscate things.
Yes, I have to say, I wasn’t happy about his touting of the fanfare from the epigenetics bunch. I think it was trying too hard to make a splash.
Nevertheless, a well-written article.
I finished my homework. Can’t wait for tomorrow!
For those of you who haven’t yet read Siddhartha Mukherjee’s “The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer”, please do read it. It is beautifully, clearly written
and extremely informative. I read it while my husband was undergoing treatment for cancer with chemicals and radiation, knowing full well he would not survive. Most treatments for cancer are brutal and, in many cases, unsuccessful in providing either quality or extension of life.
Off soapbox: I will gladly read this article by Siddhartha Mukherjee and look forward to the
discussion.
Unfortunately I was immediately sidetracked by the link on the New Yorker page to “The Supreme Court Gets Ready to Legalize Corruption.”
I will try to focus!
Beautiful article. The science was interesting, but what will stay with me was the comment that his mother and aunt shared the same light disdain for fate. I would like to have that.
The histone-altering proteins that comprise the “epigenome” are themselves coded for in the genome and thus also subject to the regular processes of evolution that affect “regular” structural proteins. The work with the ants is very cool, however.
Yes, I believe another similar (to the ant) example of ‘same genome, different expressions’ can be seen in cloned cats: they don’t always have the same fur coat pattern and coloration. And yet, coat pattern and coloration is at least partially heritable. So let’s say you clone a cat to get two versions of the cat an they have different coats. You then breed them and their individual coats are inherited by at least some of their kittens. Have you then passed on an epigenetic trait?
Very informative article.
Very interesting. Obviously, selection (mates, food, etc.) is for phenotypes, not genotypes, and epigenetic factors presumably dominate expression of particular phenotypes, so presumably selection pressures may have a greater impact on epigenetic inheritance than on actual genetic inheritance.
Further, since epigenetic changes occur much faster than genetic changes, so this could radically speed up the time frame of so-called macroevolutionary events. [Perhaps putting to bed the “missing link” arguments.] It certainly would make more sense than “random mutations” giving rise to new organisms.
One wonders if the Cambrian explosion was a result of the appearance of more complex epigenetic systems in organisms.
I recall the articles about the radical in Georgia who thinks humans are pig/chimp hybrids based on anatomical similarities. However, it is possible that a epigenetic factor could explain morphological similarities between distant organisms–if the morphological “information” were present in the genes–and then “turned on” by some epigenetic event.
Very cool. It would be nice to see a shift from defending the Neo-Darwinian synthesis against “Intelligent Design” toward realizing we are just beginning to understand what is going on in the process of translation from genes to proteins to cells and to organisms, and probably 90% of what we think is true will end up on a scientific junk pile in 30 years.
This bit is pretty telling however:
I may be jumping the gun, but it seems to me that the “epigenome” is just the way the histones are arranged on the chromatin. In a word, geometry. Is it more complicated than that?
I’m also wondering, somewhat off-topic but relevant to what Alan GE says, aren’t transcription factors also encoded in the DNA/genome?
Well, most of biochemistry is basically geometry, seems to me. Can the complex molecules interact in interesting ways? Which is largely driven by their structure (geometry, pretty much literally).
This is my interpretation of what I’ve read about proteins, DNA/RNAs, and other complex molecules of biologic origin. My interpretation may well be wrong.
Good point.
Dr Coyne, please delete/disregard prior comment. It’s late and I’m thinking that my insights and contributions to the discussion that might follow that rather snarky comment will not rise to the level that your readers have come to expect. I’m sorry for the inconvenience, I hope to weigh-in more thoughtfully sometime tomorrow.
Scott