Early life experience drives structural variation of neural genomes in mice

The brain is a genomic mosaic owing to somatic mutations that arise throughout development. Mobile genetic elements, including retrotransposons, are one source of somatic mosaicism in the brain. Retrotransposition may represent a form of plasticity in response to experience. Here, we use droplet dig...

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Published inScience (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Vol. 359; no. 6382; pp. 1395 - 1399
Main Authors Bedrosian, Tracy A, Quayle, Carolina, Novaresi, Nicole, Gage, Fred H
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States The American Association for the Advancement of Science 23.03.2018
Subjects
Binding sites
Brain
Deoxyribonucleic acid
Developmental plasticity
DNA
DNA methylation
Early experience
Genomes
Hippocampus
Methyltransferase
Mice
Mosaicism
Mutation
Neural plasticity
Plastic properties
Plasticity
Polymerase chain reaction
Retrotransposition
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Summary:The brain is a genomic mosaic owing to somatic mutations that arise throughout development. Mobile genetic elements, including retrotransposons, are one source of somatic mosaicism in the brain. Retrotransposition may represent a form of plasticity in response to experience. Here, we use droplet digital polymerase chain reaction to show that natural variations in maternal care mediate the mobilization of long interspersed nuclear element-1 (LINE-1 or L1) retrotransposons in the hippocampus of the mouse brain. Increasing the amount of maternal care blocks the accumulation of L1. Maternal care also alters DNA methylation at YY1 binding sites implicated in L1 activation and affects expression of the de novo methyltransferase DNMT3a. Our observations indicate that early life experience drives somatic variation in the genome via L1 retrotransposons.
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ISSN:0036-8075
1095-9203
DOI:10.1126/science.aah3378