Global DNA Methylation influenced by smoking

One of the very important factor in pathogenesis of human diseases is the level of epigenetic methylation. The association of the offspring’s DNA methylation is the strongest with the paternal DNA methylation if both of them are non smokers but on the other hand, if the offspring smoked, it completely vanished.
The epigenetic promoter methylation of the p16gene has been one of the major pathways responsible for the pathogenesis of the lung cancer. The major aim of the paper has been to find out a relation between epigenetics and the DNA methylation. The influence of environmental factors on the epigenetic mechanisms helps us understand the pathological mechanisms of a lot of diseases. This paper highlights on the possibility of the long term effects of smoking on global DNA methylation which was done by using the paternal heredity because the epigenetic global DNA methylation is paternal.
Global DNA methylation is not a marker for gene specific epigenetic changes, as global DNA hypomethylation can also be seen in gene specific hypomethylation or vice versa. Thus the effect of smoking on promoter specific DNA methylation of selected protooncogenes and tumor suppressor genes should be investigated on which would help in assessing clinical importance of possible epigenetic changes caused due to smoking habits.


Suneha Mohanty