Timescales of human adaptation: the role of epigenetic processes
Timescales of human adaptation: the role of epigenetic processes
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DOI：
10.2217/epi.11.11
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发表时间：
2011-04-01
期刊：
影响因子：
3.8
通讯作者：
Thayer, Zaneta M.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Kuzawa, Christopher W.;Thayer, Zaneta M.
人类生物学包括多种适应机制，可以适应环境变化的不同时间尺度。早期发育的敏感或关键时期允许环境信息在代际之间传递，这有助于有机体跟踪逐渐的环境变化。越来越多的证据表明，后代的生物学对母体生物学及其表观基因组中编码的经验做出反应，这些经验通过胎盘和母乳中营养物质和激素的转移而发出信号。进化和比较生物学的原理导致人们预期，与人类等大型长寿物种相比，早期经历的短暂波动对小型短命物种的长期影响应该更大。这意味着对人类早期生活压力的负面影响有更大的缓冲，但也降低了对旨在改善长期健康结果的短期干预措施的敏感性。认真对待适应的时间尺度将允许设计模拟长期环境变化的干预措施，从而诱使发育中的人体致力于改变长期战略，从而持久改善人类健康和福祉。
Human biology includes multiple adaptive mechanisms that allow adjustment to varying timescales of environmental change. Sensitive or critical periods in early development allow for the transfer of environmental information between generations, which helps an organism track gradual environmental change. There is growing evidence that offspring biology is responsive to experiences encoded in maternal biology and her epigenome as signaled through the transfer of nutrients and hormones across the placenta and via breast milk. Principles of evolutionary and comparative biology lead to the expectation that transient fluctuations in early experience should have greater long-term impacts in small, short-lived species compared with large, long-lived species such as humans. This implies greater buffering of the negative effects of early-life stress in humans, but also a reduced sensitivity to short-term interventions that aim to improve long-term health outcomes. Taking the timescales of adaptation seriously will allow the design of interventions that emulate long-term environmental change and thereby coax the developing human body into committing to a changed long-term strategy, yielding lasting improvements in human health and wellbeing.