ArticleEpigenetics
DNA methylation as a mediator of associations between the environment and chronic diseases: A scoping review on application of mediation analysis.
Article in Epigenetics. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers.
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Who cites it
17 citing papers in PubMed.
- Identification of DNA methylation signatures of smoking in women and associations with cardiovascular disease mortality.Communications biology · 2026Article
- Epigenome-wide analysis identifies DNA methylation mediators of treatment-related cardiometabolic risk in survivors of childhood cancer.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Differential blood DNA methylation loci between Native Hawaiian and White women are associated with dietary patterns and metabolic biomarkers.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Epigenetic mediation may explain intergenerational associations between maternal obesogenic lifestyle and children's birth weight: findings from the NorthPop prospective birth cohort.Clinical epigenetics · 2025Article
- Placental DNA methylation key topics: sex- and cell-type specificity, mediation, multi-omics, and biomarker discovery.Epigenomics · 2025Review
- Environmental Factor Index (EFI): A Novel Approach to Measure the Strength of Environmental Influence on DNA Methylation in Identical Twins.Epigenomes · 2024Article
- Methods for the Analysis of Multiple Epigenomic Mediators in Environmental Epidemiology.Current environmental health reports · 2024Review
- Methods for mediation analysis with high-dimensional DNA methylation data: Possible choices and comparisons.PLoS genetics · 2023Article
- Mediating effects of DNA methylation in the association between sleep quality and infertility among women of childbearing age.BMC public health · 2023Article
- Integration of methylation quantitative trait loci (mQTL) on dietary intake on DNA methylation levels: an example of n-3 PUFA and ABCA1 gene.European journal of clinical nutrition · 2023Article
- Association between the timing of childhood adversity and epigenetic patterns across childhood and adolescence: findings from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) prospective cohort.The Lancet. Child & adolescent health · 2023Article
- Associations between DNA methylation and gene regulation depend on chromatin accessibility during transgenerational plasticity.BMC biology · 2023Article
- In situ sequence-specific visualization of single methylated cytosine on tissue sections using ICON probe and rolling-circle amplification.Histochemistry and cell biology · 2023Article
- Linear high-dimensional mediation models adjusting for confounders using propensity score method.Frontiers in genetics · 2022Article
- High-Dimensional DNA Methylation Mediates the Effect of Smoking on Crohn's Disease.Frontiers in genetics · 2022Article
- Does DNA methylation mediate the association of age at puberty with forced vital capacity or forced expiratory volume in 1 s?ERJ open research · 2022Article
- Intersection of Epigenetic and Immune Alterations: Implications for Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder and Mental Health.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2021Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
DNA methylation (DNAm) is one of the most studied epigenetic modifications. DNAm has emerged as a key biological mechanism and biomarkers to test associations between environmental exposure and outcomes in epidemiological studies. Although previous studies have focused on associations between DNAm and either exposure/outcomes, it is useful to test for mediation of the association between exposure and outcome by DNAm. The purpose of this scoping review is to introduce the methodological essence of statistical mediation analysis and to examine emerging epidemiological research applying mediation analyses. We conducted this scoping review for published peer-reviewed journals on this topic using online databases (PubMed, Scopus, Cochrane, and CINAHL) ending in December 2020. We extracted a total of 219 articles by initial screening. After reviewing titles, abstracts, and full texts, a total of 69 articles were eligible for this review. The breakdown of studies assigned to each category was 13 for smoking (18.8%), 8 for dietary intake and famine (11.6%), 6 for other lifestyle factors (8.7%), 8 for clinical endpoints (11.6%), 22 for environmental chemical exposures (31.9%), 2 for socioeconomic status (SES) (2.9%), and 10 for genetic factors and race (14.5%). In this review, we provide an exposure-wide summary for the mediation analysis using DNAm levels. However, we found heterogenous methods and interpretations in mediation analysis with typical issues such as different cell compositions and tissue-specificity. Further accumulation of evidence with diverse exposures, populations and with rigorous methodology will be expected to provide further insight in the role of DNAm in disease susceptibility.
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Registered trials
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