Re: Jill: Food and Genetics

[Guest guest]

Hi Jill -- thank you for your reply as well. Perhaps the study I mentioned is

basically

saying the same thing -- that food can change the way one's genes EXPRESS

themselves?

Here's the article (with perhaps a misleading headline)

The food you eat may change your genes for life

IT SOUNDS like science fiction: simply swallowing a pill, or eating a specific

food

supplement, could permanently change your behaviour for the better, or reverse

diseases

such as schizophrenia, Huntington's or cancer.

Yet such treatments are looking increasingly plausible. In the latest

development, normal

rats have been made to behave differently just by injecting them with a specific

amino

acid. The change to their behaviour was permanent. The amino acid altered the

way the

rat's genes were expressed, raising the idea that drugs or dietary supplements

might

permanently halt the genetic effects that predispose people to mental or

physical illness.

It is not yet clear whether such interventions could work in humans. But there

is good

reason to believe they could, as evidence mounts that a range of simple

nutrients might

have such effects.

Two years ago, researchers led by Randy Jirtle of Duke University Medical Center

in

Durham, North Carolina, showed that the activity of a mouse's genes can be

influenced by

food supplements eaten by its mother just prior to, or during, very early

pregnancy (New

Scientist, 9 August 2003, p 14). Then last year, Moshe Szyf, Meaney and

colleagues at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, showed that mothers could

influence

the way a rat's genes are expressed after it has been born. If a rat is not

licked, groomed

and nursed enough by its mother, chemical tags known as methyl groups are added

to the

DNA of a particular gene.

The affected gene codes for the glucocorticoid receptor gene, expressed in the

hippocampus of the brain. The gene helps mediate the animal's response to

stress, and in

poorly raised rats, the methylation damped down the gene's activity. Such pups

produced

higher levels of stress hormones and were less confident exploring new

environments. The

effect lasted for life (Nature Neuroscience, vol 7, p 847).

Now the team has shown that a food supplement can have the same effect on

well-reared

rats at 90 days old - well into adulthood. The researchers injected

L-methionine, a

common amino acid and food supplement, into the brains of well-reared rats. The

amino

acid methylated the glucocorticoid gene, and the animals' behaviour changed.

" They were

almost exactly like the poorly raised group, " says Szyf, who announced his

findings at a

small meeting on environmental epigenomics earlier this month in Durham, North

Carolina.

" This opens up new ways of thinking about treating and preventing diseases

caused by

how our DNA is expressed "

Though the experiment impaired well-adjusted animals, the opposite should be

possible,

and Szyf has already shown that a chemical called TSA that is designed to strip

away

methyl groups can turn a badly raised rat into a more normal one.

No one is envisaging injecting supplements into people's brains, but Szyf says

his study

shows how important subtle nutrients and supplements can be. " Food has a

dramatic

effect, " he says. " But it can go both ways, " he cautions. Methionine, for

instance, the

supplement he used to make healthy rats stressed, is widely available in capsule

form

online or in health-food stores - and the molecules are small enough to get into

the brain

via the bloodstream.

Rob Waterland from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, who attended

the

meeting, says Szyf's ideas are creating a buzz, as they suggest that methylation

can

influence our DNA well into adulthood. A huge number of diseases are caused by

changes

to how our DNA is expressed, and this opens up new ways of thinking about how to

prevent and treat them, he says.

But Waterland points out there is still much work to be done. Substances like

methionine

and TSA are, he says, a " sledgehammer approach " , in that they are likely to

demethylate

lots of genes, and we don't even know which they will affect. But he speculates

that

techniques such as " RNA-directed DNA methylation " , so far tested only in plants

but

theoretically possible in mammals, may allow us to target such methylation much

more

precisely.

> > >

> > > > If u don't mind, I will answer because I have another comment.

> > > > FFC stands for Fibromyalgia and Fatigue Centers. It is easily

> > > > googled to find one near u, but they are expensive.

> > >

> > > " Expensive " is a relative term. My adventure at FFC has cost me

> about

> > > $3K so far (for a year's treatment, including tests and several

> phone

> > > and in-person visits). But it's also made it possible for me to

> > > return to school and contemplate going back to work for the first

> > > time in a decade. If that happens -- and it promises to -- then I

> may

> > > someday make that back in a month or two. And, even if that doesn't

> > > happen, it's a small amount of money to feel as much better as I do.

> > >

> > > I've wasted a whole lot more on doctors and treatments that did a

> > > hell of a lot less. I suspect that's true of many of us.

> > >

> > > > Also, doesn't anyone find it odd that Amy Yasko's primary focus is

> > > > on Autism, yet we are promoting (as a list) her genetic testing,

> > > > which I find very interesting, but we are also treating her as more

> > > > or less an expert on CFS?

> > >

> > > I don't think so. I think there's a lot of excitement and buzz here

> > > because many of us are trying something very new and experimental

> > > here. There's a lot of comparing of notes; and she gets invoked

> > > fairly often because she's the one whose protocol it is. That makes

> > > her an expert on her protocol, which may or may not turn out to be

> > > useful to PWCs. I don't think anybody here thinks for a minute that

> > > she's an expert on CFS.

> > >

> > > > Obviously the genetic abnormalities

> > > > could be helped w/ her treatments, but do we even know that the

> > > > genetic component has anything to do w/ CFS?

> > >

> > > The CDC has come out and said straight out that CFS has a genetic

> > > component. Apart from Yasko, Rich's explanation for the biochemistry

> > > of CFS -- which is driven and shaped by genetic factors -- is the

> > > most complete one I've come across in 23 years. It appears to tie

> > > together many of the other major hypothesis, including the cardiac,

> > > viral up-regulation, mycotoxin, gluthathione, and other theories of

> > > the disease that are in current clinical use. (Many of those

> theories

> > > postulate genetic issues as well.)

> > >

> > > I think anybody arguing against genetic involvement at this point

> > > would have a serious uphill battle against a growing mountain of

> > > evidence.

> > >

> > > > CFS could be all environmental as and others have mentioned.

> > >

> > > If it's all environmental, then everybody would react as we do when

> > > exposed to various biological and toxic agents. Not everybody does

> --

> > > in fact, most people don't. It's just us. Even points out that

> > > some people in Incline got sick and got over it; and others never did.

> > >

> > > So the next question is: Why us? And the most obvious answer --

> which

> > > has found solid scientific support -- is that we're genetically

> > > different in ways that make us react differently to virii, toxins,

> > > and other environmental stressors.

> > >

> > > It's not either/or. (Almost nothing in life is.) It's both.

> > >

> > > Sara

> > >

> >

>