Submitted by MistWeaver80 t3_z6uwtr in science
I can't remember where I read it, but we saw this with people who were born after 9/11 in the States. Pregnant mothers who experienced heightened levels of anxiety and PTSD after the attack had significantly lower cortisol levels and they passed that onto their children in utero. I imagine that happens all over the world with traumatic events.
You mean "higher" cortisol levels, I think.
Oops maybe I got it backwards, it's been a while since I read it.
The human body Is crazy awesome. I wonder what benefits “perfect” conditions could offer to human development?
High cortisol is bad for you, it's a stress indicator.
That's one of the reasons I don't think I'll ever have kids, I could not live with the fact that I - even if accidentally - caused a living being to come into an already austere world with lifelong complications
When I first learned of epigenetic transgenerational inheritance, I really wanted to explore it as my dissertation. I didn't but I've always thought it'd be interesting to examine how extreme adverse effects get passed down to subsequent generations through DNA.
If I were starting all over, I'd definitely do this now. Either that or study feline cognition, of course. ;)
Under the perfect conditions, one would assume a perfect could be made. But that's the trouble, trying to determine what these perfect conditions are. Or if they are morally correct to enact.
How are you gonna measure that?
I won't, I just won't have kids
This title would be a perfect use case for em dashes.
> Researchers have found that the cells of people who were conceived during the Great Depression—which lasted from 1929 to 1939 and, at its height, saw about 25% of the US workforce unemployed—show signs of accelerated aging.
Wow, I didn't realize Lysenkoism was being taken seriously again.
I guess denial of genetic evolution still isn't exclusive to theists
> one would assume a perfect could be made
There really is no such thing, even traits that we often consider disorders such as ADHD or being in the Autism spectrum can lead to increased fitness under the right evolutionary pressures.
There's a lot of randomness involved.
[removed]
This isn’t denial of genetic evolution at all - this is epigenetics, which studies changes in gene expression which can be caused by environmental factors. No-one is taking Lysenkoism seriously.
Perfect conditions should indicate no mutation is necessary. I believe pressure makes diamonds.
> which studies changes in gene expression which can be caused by environmental factors
Yes, that is literaly Lysenkoism. "Plant seeds in the freezing ground, so the next generation of seeds becomes cold resistant, and nobody in our country will ever starve again"
I think the idea is that stress or starvation that was happening to your parents/mother during your gestation/conception can do something genetic to you to cause accelerated aging.
It's not necessarily about your personal trauma here I believe.
I think what you are describing is more accurately Lamarckian thinking rather than Lysenkoism. Lysenko's ideas were inspired by Lamarck's, but he also believed that all organisms helped each other so they should be crowded together. So he would suggest extra seeds be grown in the same plot because the plants would help their comrades.
But yes, the idea we are discussing bears some similarity to Lamarck's ideas. The big difference is that epigenetics has proposed and observed chemical mechanisms to explain it. Another difference is that Lamarck believed anything could evolve with the correct selective pressure, but epigenetic action is only an activation of already-evolved traits.
I am right there with you.
I do want to adopt kids, though. Like, they already exist, but by me choosing to adopt them, I am providing them a better life.
I fits, therefore, I sits.
Tiny red dot must be DESTROYED!
That's style guide stuff. It might work better for some people, but not others. I had no problem reading the title.
It's one of parents'greatest fears, ngl.
No hard facts, but could these results not follow from the life these kids had during and after those events? Not because their parents happen to have been in them for a time. The depression lasted during their early years and results of war will last into their early childhood (etc for other traumatic lasting events), with all the effects this had on their new parents, surroundings and society. Their upbringing/'indoctrination' would have probably changed from their parents' for example (edit typo)
Technically correct, since epigenetic tags can change the shape of DNA, but no, your DNA doesn't change in response to environmental conditions. Lamarck was wrong. The environment does shape your DNA's expression tho. And epigenetics can have effects for multiple generations.But your genetic code stays the same.
I don't understand how feline cognition is an understudied field. Conducting cat observations for data collection seems like anyone's dream.
Maybe this is why when we look at our grandparents pics from when they were our age that they look much older than we do?
Because cats can do certain things that involve memory, task completion, and reasoning, they just don't care.
[removed]
I read something awhile back that described a similar phenomena in Finland. They found genetic traits carried through several generations from those who were starving during WW2.
[removed]
Pretty sure that’s from malnutrition at early stages in life not dna being “re-written”.
I've read a couple of studies that suggest that environmental factors can cause tangible genetic changes that persist through generations. For example, in Holocaust survivors and their children. I believe there have also been studies in mice that suggest that certain fears can be bred and passed down to their offspring.
Elder Millennial here, Genz is so much nicer and more thoughtful than either of our generations.
[removed]
[removed]
I'm not sure genes work that way. It is no longer a natural selection process; those genes won't be weened out quite like hundreds of years ago. The only way I see it as possible would be to also introduce gene correction - and religious folks don't like people playing God.
Edited: And yes, environment plays a role in development as previously pointed out.
I guess the God fearing folks don't like the idea of playing God. It's only a matter of time before a culture or country starts correcting genes to create a more well rounded diseaseless as possible people. Anyone think China isn't already on top of this? It's already been done before, rogue scientist or not (HIV immune twins). Yeah they have a decreased lifespan of 20%, but the proof is there. If CRISPR mutates inert genes though, that could prove problematic in the future evolution of humans.
Semi off topic but I just read about a startup that is making video games for dogs. Maybe there is some good feline cognition studies on the horizon!
Possibly that paired with out of style fashion (clothing, hair, makeup)
[deleted]
After a long enough period of time epigenetic changes get transferred to the genetic code of an organism, so it does change. So, Lamarck was right.
Also pretending that inherited epigenetic changes don't count because they don't change one's DNA is playing linguistic games to avoid conceding that you're wrong.
And it's peculiar that there's resistance to simply admitting that he was right. Because it's one of the most logical things nature would do.
Environmental adaptations being passed on to future generations would increase an organisms evolutionary fitness. Which makes far more sense than the illogical notion of random mutations being created and hoping that one is the right one.
Leave it to “science” to pick and choose what history is important in these findings.
Prior to 1948 there was no wastewater treatment funding so Nationwide the water and its filtration methods varied.
The Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1984 provided for comprehensive planning, technical services, research, and financial assistance by the federal government to state and local governments for sanitary infrastructure. The Act was amended in 1965, establishing a uniform set of water quality standards and creating a Federal Water Pollution Control Administration authorized to set standards where states failed to do so
EPA wasn’t established until the ‘70’s
Paris Green & DDT were heavily used
Housing, hospitals, the streets, all still had very poor and unsanitary living conditions.
... just to name a few.
Perhaps those, too, have contributed to poor health outcomes.
>After a long enough period of time epigenetic changes get transferred to the genetic code of an organism, so it does change.
Sauce? What would be the mechanism?
I mean they've observed this before for decedents from the Irish potato famine.
>And epigenetics can have effects for multiple generations.
In plants, yes. There's no good evidence of this happening in humans. There are a handful of studies claiming to have found evidence, e.g. with the Dutch famine, but the findings are weak and they fail to rule out alternative explanations.
In rats too IIRC.
[removed]
That's an awesome way to do it.
[removed]
Kinda makes me think about people who carry Jewish dna and all the health complications from being repressed for centuries
Alpha is not going to fare much better. Being a young child or infant during a global pandemic is going to have a life-long effect on all of these kids.
[removed]
There's pretty solid evidence that even under perfect conditions people won't live past ~120. There's so many people on earth that you'd expect to see pretty much every outlier occur, and yet only one person ever cracked 120 (died at 122 I believe) and nearly all other ultra long lives have died in the 1-teens. So that's one area that we roughly know.
Stress is a helluva drug.
Same here. I have terrible eczema and allergic to most things - gluten dairy tomatoes most fruits avacado detergent fragrance and lots more. Im not gonna bring another life to this world and experience the same suffering i do- or worse.
ADHD can be caused by a pregnant woman living in a loud environment with very few quiet moments. Something about the noise during the first trimester changes the way the fetus develops.
How does it compare to 1939-1945? I would imagine those years caused as much if not more stress.
My gramma was born (poor) in 1930 and still lives independently at 93, imagine if she was aging normally!
[removed]
I wonder if this also applies to men for sperm. And if the damage from high cortisol levels can be reversed by being happier and living a healthy lifestyle.
This explains how every actor on the Twilight Zone was supposed to be 20s and looked 45.
Anecdotal but my great grandfather was 6’10”. All four of my grandfathers sisters were over 6’4” and born in the roaring 20s. My grandfather was born in 1935 at the height of the Great Depression and he was only 5’5”. Most of my family is over 6’3” except for the branch from my grandfather, we are just average height respective of gender.
Is alpha next? We’ve been saying AA
Well everyone smoking, drinking and leaded gasoline didn't help either
Almost like proper nutrition is important for growing humans or anything for that matter.
So after the rich boomer generation, things will be better right? Right?!
If perfect people mate with perfect people, inevitably mutations will arise that lengthen lifespan, and then continue with that perfect on perfect and you’ll increase human longevity.
In the past those with short lifespans were less likely to mate, so in all likelihood only those with longer lifespans mated.
Now, there’s no need / external pressure to live longer.
Get rid of the ", I think" u drunk, be confident
Source: read this exact thing in a psychology book 2 weeks ago. It's why kids under constant stress will hit puberty earlier than their peers without that constant excess cortisol.
>In the past those with short lifespans were less likely to mate, so in all likelihood only those with longer lifespans mated.
Humans can have kids at like 12-13. Living to 50+ for men might mean more kids if you can keep finding mates. You will be competing with younger healthier males for those mates. You also have to factor in that a LOT more men died from violence in the past. Hunting, farming, and war tend to reduce the male population a ton.
Women tended tomdie in child birth of those first kid a lot more in the past. They also can't really have kids past their late 40s. Living longer won't change that.
Lamarck was accidentally wrong. Lysenko ignored observations that didn't match his ideological worldview. We're currently much closer to Lysenko's than to Lamarck's reasoning. Just look at the accompanying Nature article. There is more text about politics than about the actual science.
This is a super clear instance of epigenetic influence on DNA. We are the grandchildren and great grandchildren of people who lived through this time.
One of the studies I read, about this generation, is that the DNA changes caused by epigenetic pressure caused many of their children to be prone to obesity.
Almost as if the genes were prepared for hardship and famine.
The children's bodies stored more fat than their parents, and the grandchildren were often not affected as long as the hardship and famine were not felt by their parents generation.
We have so much to understand about how the lives of our ancestors affect our lives, today.
Sure...and your source?
Her name was Jeanne Calment. She died at 122.
She stopped smoking in her 90s when she went into a nursing home. Then she decided it was silly to stop because she enjoyed it so, she started again. Stop doing things you enjoy and you may as well pack it in.
You probably missed that part...or maybe they left it out. Moderation in all things.
Agreed, maybe the author is getting paid by the comma?
AutoModerator t1_iy37fub wrote
Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our normal comment rules apply to all other comments.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.