ArticleeLife2022
Environmentally sensitive hotspots in the methylome of the early human embryo.
Article in eLife, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 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
13 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 23 citations in OpenAlex.
- Analysis of DNA methylation at birth and in childhood reveals changes associated with season of birth and latitude.Clinical epigenetics · 2023Pooled it
- An ancestral molecular response to nanomaterial particulates.Nature nanotechnology · 2023Pooled it
- Environmental and Genetic Perturbations of the Sperm Epigenome.Advances in experimental medicine and biology · 2026Review
- Birth season shapes the infant metabolome and development in Tanzania: a secondary explorative analysis of the early life interventions for childhood growth and development in Tanzania (ELICIT) trial.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Review
- Father's adolescent body silhouette is associated with offspring asthma, lung function and BMI through DNA methylation.Communications biology · 2025Article
- Supplementation with autologous adipose stem cell-derived mitochondria can be a safe and promising strategy for improving oocyte quality.Journal of assisted reproduction and genetics · 2024Article
- DNA methylation at the suppressor of cytokine signaling 3 (SOCS3) gene influences height in childhood.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Article
- The influence of early environment and micronutrient availability on developmental epigenetic programming: lessons from the placenta.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2023Review
- Differentially methylated regions identified in bovine embryos are not observed in adulthood.Animal reproduction · 2023Article
- Tissue- and ethnicity-independent hypervariable DNA methylation states show evidence of establishment in the early human embryo.Nucleic acids research · 2022Article
- Epigenetics of pregnancy: looking beyond the DNA code.Journal of assisted reproduction and genetics · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
16 authors at 8 institutions in 7 countries.
Funding
Abstract
In humans, DNA methylation marks inherited from gametes are largely erased following fertilisation, prior to construction of the embryonic methylome. Exploiting a natural experiment of seasonal variation including changes in diet and nutritional status in rural Gambia, we analysed three datasets covering two independent child cohorts and identified 259 CpGs showing consistent associations between season of conception (SoC) and DNA methylation. SoC effects were most apparent in early infancy, with evidence of attenuation by mid-childhood. SoC-associated CpGs were enriched for metastable epialleles, parent-of-origin-specific methylation and germline differentially methylated regions, supporting a periconceptional environmental influence. Many SoC-associated CpGs overlapped enhancers or sites of active transcription in H1 embryonic stem cells and fetal tissues. Half were influenced but not determined by measured genetic variants that were independent of SoC. Environmental 'hotspots' providing a record of environmental influence at periconception constitute a valuable resource for investigating epigenetic mechanisms linking early exposures to lifelong health and disease.
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.