Assisted Reproductive Technology and Embryonic DNA Methylation

WANG Zheng; XU Jia-wei; SUN Ying-pu

doi:10.3969/j.issn.1674-1889.2017.01.011

Abstract：Epigenetic modification, especially DNA methylation, plays an important role in controlling the cell functions. 70%to 80%of the CpG locus in mammalian genome are methylated. The hypermethylated DNA is associated with the gene silence, while the hypormethylated DNA can activate the gene transcription. Furthermore, DNA methylation status is not as steady as genome. There are a series of restructures, such as the methylation pattern erasure, methylation pattern re-establishment and methylation pattern maintenance, in the primordial germ cells (PGCs) and the early embryo. Assisted reproductive technology (ART) accounts for 1% to 3% of annual births in those industrialized countries. Due to the variability in ART protocols and the rarity of imprinting disorders, it is difficult to clarify the causative relationship between ART and an increased incidence of imprinting disorders. Except for an increased incidence of premature births, it has been confirmed that the procedure of ART may result in abnormal epigenetic modification and reorganization for both germ cells and embryos. Beckwith-Wiedemann syndrome (BWS), Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS), and so on, are the most representative imprinting disorders.