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Europe to map the human
epigenome
DNA-modification studies get a multi-million euro boost.
The health-research division of the European Commission launches its
largest-ever project next week with a €30-million (US$41-million)
investment in understanding the human epigenome, the constellation of
DNA modifications that shape how genes are expressed.
With the project, called BLUEPRINT, Europe intends to become a major
player in the International Human Epigenome Consortium (IHEC), set up last
year to help biologists understand how the epigenome influences health
and disease.
All the cells that make up an individual originate from the same fertilized
egg and share the same genome. But during development, cells acquire
epigenetic changes — such as chemical modifications to DNA, and changes
in the shape of its tightly coiled three-dimensional structure — that affect
which genes will be active in which cells at a given time and which will be
silent.
The epigenome then remains largely stable, so that a liver, for example,
remains a liver throughout life. But small parts of the epigenome change
constantly as the cell responds to environmental changes. The epigenome
also changes in diseases, including cancer.
The importance of the epigenome in health and disease is becoming
increasingly clear. But researchers studying it have faced a big hurdle: the
lack of a reliable library of high-quality, quantitative reference epigenomes
against which new data can be compared. Little is known, even, about
how much the epigenome normally varies between individuals, or between
the different cells in an individual.
Enter BLUEPRINT, which unites 41 institutions and more than 50 principal
investigators across Europe who will contribute a further €10 million to the
project. BLUEPRINT will provide at least 100 reference epigenomes toward
the IHEC's goal of amassing 1,000 reference epigenomes by 2020.
BLUEPRINT has chosen to focus on the blood system. This should help
move discoveries quickly into the clinic, as many diagnostic tests rely on
blood samples. "Blood is also what gets stored in biobanks and used for
genome analysis," says BLUEPRINT coordinator Henk Stunnenberg at the
Nijmegen Center for Molecular Life Sciences in the Netherlands.
Beyond these conveniences, there was also a compelling biological
rationale for the choice, he says. Unlike most tissues, blood cells are
constantly renewed, so blood comprises a mix of cells at different stages
of maturity. "Blood-cell epigenomes may reveal some general rules about
how cells develop," Stunnenberg says.
BLUEPRINT will generate reference epigenomes from 60 different cell types,
taken from the blood of healthy individuals stored in the UK's national blood
bank. Each epigenome will include a full genome sequence, and
genome-wide quantitative data on the occurrence and distribution of nine
different epigenetic markers.
For comparison with healthy epigenomes, the consortium will produce
reference epigenomes for more than 60 blood-cancer cell types. It will
carry out experiments in mice to work out how much of the epigenome is
heritable. The consortium also plans to generate lower-resolution
epigenomes from two blood-cell types from 100 healthy people to provide a
first quantitative indication of natural individual variation.
"BLUEPRINT is the first big epigenome project to be specifically created in
alignment with the IHEC mission," says Peter Jones at the University of
Southern California in Los Angeles, who helped to launch the IHEC. "Blood
epigenomes are particularly exciting because we know an awful lot about
the biology of how blood stem cells differentiate, but little about the
sequence of epigenomic events involved in the processes that are going to
be relevant for disease."
Europe to map the human epigenome : Nature News
epigenome
DNA-modification studies get a multi-million euro boost.
The health-research division of the European Commission launches its
largest-ever project next week with a €30-million (US$41-million)
investment in understanding the human epigenome, the constellation of
DNA modifications that shape how genes are expressed.
With the project, called BLUEPRINT, Europe intends to become a major
player in the International Human Epigenome Consortium (IHEC), set up last
year to help biologists understand how the epigenome influences health
and disease.
All the cells that make up an individual originate from the same fertilized
egg and share the same genome. But during development, cells acquire
epigenetic changes — such as chemical modifications to DNA, and changes
in the shape of its tightly coiled three-dimensional structure — that affect
which genes will be active in which cells at a given time and which will be
silent.
The epigenome then remains largely stable, so that a liver, for example,
remains a liver throughout life. But small parts of the epigenome change
constantly as the cell responds to environmental changes. The epigenome
also changes in diseases, including cancer.
The importance of the epigenome in health and disease is becoming
increasingly clear. But researchers studying it have faced a big hurdle: the
lack of a reliable library of high-quality, quantitative reference epigenomes
against which new data can be compared. Little is known, even, about
how much the epigenome normally varies between individuals, or between
the different cells in an individual.
Enter BLUEPRINT, which unites 41 institutions and more than 50 principal
investigators across Europe who will contribute a further €10 million to the
project. BLUEPRINT will provide at least 100 reference epigenomes toward
the IHEC's goal of amassing 1,000 reference epigenomes by 2020.
BLUEPRINT has chosen to focus on the blood system. This should help
move discoveries quickly into the clinic, as many diagnostic tests rely on
blood samples. "Blood is also what gets stored in biobanks and used for
genome analysis," says BLUEPRINT coordinator Henk Stunnenberg at the
Nijmegen Center for Molecular Life Sciences in the Netherlands.
Beyond these conveniences, there was also a compelling biological
rationale for the choice, he says. Unlike most tissues, blood cells are
constantly renewed, so blood comprises a mix of cells at different stages
of maturity. "Blood-cell epigenomes may reveal some general rules about
how cells develop," Stunnenberg says.
BLUEPRINT will generate reference epigenomes from 60 different cell types,
taken from the blood of healthy individuals stored in the UK's national blood
bank. Each epigenome will include a full genome sequence, and
genome-wide quantitative data on the occurrence and distribution of nine
different epigenetic markers.
For comparison with healthy epigenomes, the consortium will produce
reference epigenomes for more than 60 blood-cancer cell types. It will
carry out experiments in mice to work out how much of the epigenome is
heritable. The consortium also plans to generate lower-resolution
epigenomes from two blood-cell types from 100 healthy people to provide a
first quantitative indication of natural individual variation.
"BLUEPRINT is the first big epigenome project to be specifically created in
alignment with the IHEC mission," says Peter Jones at the University of
Southern California in Los Angeles, who helped to launch the IHEC. "Blood
epigenomes are particularly exciting because we know an awful lot about
the biology of how blood stem cells differentiate, but little about the
sequence of epigenomic events involved in the processes that are going to
be relevant for disease."
Europe to map the human epigenome : Nature News