ArticlePLoS genetics2013
Dynamics of DNA methylation in recent human and great ape evolution.
Article in PLoS genetics, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 72 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
72 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 209 citations in OpenAlex.
- A Beginner's Guide for Using Bone in Marine Mammal Research.Integrative and comparative biology · 2026Guideline
- Risk alleles of genes with monoallelic expression are enriched in gain-of-function variants and depleted in loss-of-function variants for neurodevelopmental disorders.Molecular psychiatry · 2017Pooled it
- Epigenomic methylome landscape of promoters in vertebrate genomes.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Distinct Co-methylation Patterns in African and European Populations and Their Genetic Associations.Genomics, proteomics & bioinformatics · 2025Article
- Cost-effective solutions for high-throughput enzymatic DNA methylation sequencing.PLoS genetics · 2025Article
- Understanding the Emergence of Schizophrenia in the Light of Human Evolution: New Perspectives in Genetics.Genes, brain, and behavior · 2025Review
- Epigenetics Modulators as Therapeutics for Neurological Disorders.Current pharmaceutical design · 2025Review
- Cross-Species Comparative DNA Methylation Reveals Novel Insights into Complex Trait Genetics among Cattle, Sheep, and Goats.Molecular biology and evolution · 2024Article
- DNA methylation and transcriptome analysis reveal epigenomic differences among three macaque species.Evolutionary applications · 2024Article
- Article
- The relationship between regulatory changes in cis and trans and the evolution of gene expression in humans and chimpanzees.Genome biology · 2023Article
- Comparative analysis reveals epigenomic evolution related to species traits and genomic imprinting in mammals.Innovation (Cambridge (Mass.)) · 2023Article
- Gene expressions between obligate bamboo-eating pandas and non-herbivorous mammals reveal converged specialized bamboo diet adaptation.BMC genomics · 2023Article
- Epigenetic ageing of the prefrontal cortex and cerebellum in humans and chimpanzees.Epigenetics · 2022Article
- Article
- Methylation pattern of polymorphically imprinted nc886 is not conserved across mammalia.PloS one · 2022Article
- Current and Emerging Technologies for the Analysis of the Genome-Wide and Locus-Specific DNA Methylation Patterns.Advances in experimental medicine and biology · 2022Article
- An evolutionary perspective of DNA methylation patterns in skeletal tissues using a baboon model of osteoarthritis.Journal of orthopaedic research : official publication of the Orthopaedic Research Society · 2021Article
- Epigenomic profiling of primate lymphoblastoid cell lines reveals the evolutionary patterns of epigenetic activities in gene regulatory architectures.Nature communications · 2021Article
- Comparative analysis reveals distinctive epigenetic features of the human cerebellum.PLoS genetics · 2021Article
12 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
10 authors at 6 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
DNA methylation is an epigenetic modification involved in regulatory processes such as cell differentiation during development, X-chromosome inactivation, genomic imprinting and susceptibility to complex disease. However, the dynamics of DNA methylation changes between humans and their closest relatives are still poorly understood. We performed a comparative analysis of CpG methylation patterns between 9 humans and 23 primate samples including all species of great apes (chimpanzee, bonobo, gorilla and orangutan) using Illumina Methylation450 bead arrays. Our analysis identified ∼800 genes with significantly altered methylation patterns among the great apes, including ∼170 genes with a methylation pattern unique to human. Some of these are known to be involved in developmental and neurological features, suggesting that epigenetic changes have been frequent during recent human and primate evolution. We identified a significant positive relationship between the rate of coding variation and alterations of methylation at the promoter level, indicative of co-occurrence between evolution of protein sequence and gene regulation. In contrast, and supporting the idea that many phenotypic differences between humans and great apes are not due to amino acid differences, our analysis also identified 184 genes that are perfectly conserved at protein level between human and chimpanzee, yet show significant epigenetic differences between these two species. We conclude that epigenetic alterations are an important force during primate evolution and have been under-explored in evolutionary comparative genomics.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.