Epigenetics: A New Bridge between Nutrition and Health

Abstract

Nutrients can reverse or change epigenetic phenomena such as DNA methylation and histone modifications, thereby modifying the expression of critical genes associated with physiologic and pathologic processes, including embryonic development, aging, and carcinogenesis. It appears that nutrients and bioactive food components can influence epigenetic phenomena either by directly inhibiting enzymes that catalyze DNA methylation or histone modifications, or by altering the availability of substrates necessary for those enzymatic reactions. In this regard, nutritional epigenetics has been viewed as an attractive tool to prevent pediatric developmental diseases and cancer as well as to delay aging-associated processes. In recent years, epigenetics has become an emerging issue in a broad range of diseases such as type 2 diabetes mellitus, obesity, inflammation, and neurocognitive disorders. Although the possibility of developing a treatment or discovering preventative measures of these diseases is exciting, current knowledge in nutritional epigenetics is limited, and further studies are needed to expand the available resources and better understand the use of nutrients or bioactive food components for maintaining our health and preventing diseases through modifiable epigenetic mechanisms.

Dietary factors, epigenetic modifications and obesity outcomes: Progresses and perspectives

“…Many nutrients act as regulators of DNA methylation and histone modifications either by directly inhibiting enzymes that catalyze the processes, or by altering the availability of substrates necessary for the enzymatic reactions (Choi and Friso, 2010).…”

“…Epigenetics, that has been defined as heritable changes in gene expression that cannot be explained by changes in DNA sequence (Christensen and Marsit, 2011), has been subject of special interest in the last years mainly because there is evidence on the impact of different nutrients, environmental compounds and metabolic situations on the epigenome, which may lead to the development of more personalized disease prevention and treatment strategies (Campion et al, 2010;Choi and Friso, 2010). As epigenetic changes are modulated by environmental exposures, epigenetics is considered the interface between genetics and the environment.…”

Effect of intrauterine growth retardation on liver and long-term metabolic risk

“…113 Future research will test the feasibility and effectiveness of targeted nutritional interventions at different stages of development (from periconceptual time to puberty) in preventing or reversing the epigenetic programming. 114 Finally, the knowledge of epigenomic markers, such as methylation patterns in specific gene promoters, may enable the identification of individuals who will have increased susceptibility to chronic disease in adulthood because of adverse factors in their early environment. The identification of such individuals may allow targeted prevention strategies, either by lifestyle modification or by active nutritional or pharmacological interventions.…”

The Golden 1,000 Days

“…Such induced epigenetic changes can be inherited during cell division in the first phases of life, namely in the first part of the golden 1,000 days, resulting in permanent conservation of the acquired phenotype. In the nutritional field, epigenetics is hugely important, because nutrients and bioactive food components can modify epigenetic manifestations of DNA and consequently the expression of genes during their transcription [9]. Experiments in mice show how important a mother's diet is in building the epigenome of her offspring.…”