Developmental Epigenetics Group

The overall scientific theme of the group is to explore how genetic pathways act during early life to modulate metabolic/endocrine health across the life-course. Our work focuses on a group of genes that encode important genetic regulators of growth, placentation and embryonic nutrition, known as imprinted genes. Imprinted gene products are dosage regulated by epigenetic silencing of a single parental allele. By studying imprinting we can learn a great deal about the key pathways regulating nutrient acquisition during early life. Moreover, these findings extend beyond imprinting, giving insights into how the genotype and environment can interact to modify the body plan and determine set points of metabolic homeostasis for a lifetime.