Epigenetics - Research Paper Example

Arthur L. Beaudet earned his bachelor’s degree at the College of the Holy Cross. He studied medicine at the Yale University School of Medicine and is currently the professor and chairman of the Department of Molecular and Human Genetics at the Baylor College of Medicine (Arthur L. Beaudet, 2012). This paper aims to provide a summary of the article, along with statements of opinion in regard to some of the aspects tackled in the research. It also seeks to discuss the impact of the article to the study of epigenetics.

Finally, it seeks to provide suggestions on how additional research in the subject matter can help in understanding the role of epigenetics on human health. According to Jiang, Bressler, and Beaudet epigenetics is the “study of stable and heritable (or potentially heritable) changes in gene expression,” which do not result to “a change in DNA sequence” (2004, p. 479). The two components of gene expression are labile regulation and epigenetic regulation. Jiang, Bressler, and Beaudet (2004) provided historical perspectives about epigenetics.

They have further discussed the role of epigenetics to studying the development of human disease. Jiang, Bressler, and Beaudet (2004) have inferred that epigenetics is crucial to the study of human disease which is manifested in genes that is susceptible to genomic imprinting. In genomic imprinting, gene activities are reversibly altered based on the gender of the parent who is transferring the genes which cause “unequal expression of paternal and maternal alleles for a diploid locus” (Jiang, Bressler, & Beaudet, p. 480). Genetic and epigenetic phenotypes (e.g. uniparental disomy, as well as imprinting defects, appear as epigenetic disease phenotypes) are produced in the event of mutations and epimutations in human imprinted genes.

In addition, chromatin structure and remodeling are also influenced by genetic disorders. Genetic