Doctoral Dissertation Research: DNA Methylation and Human Reproductive Life History

月经初潮(第一次月经)是一个关键的生殖生活史标志，与早期生活环境和后期健康风险有潜在联系。本论文从生活史的角度对月经初潮进行研究，以更好地了解DNA修饰、早期生活心理社会和能量压力源与初潮年龄之间的关系，以及这些变量对成年生殖激素水平的影响。该项目将有助于增加关于儿童环境变量直接和间接影响人类生殖生活史轨迹的方式的知识，并可能为与月经初潮时间相关的公共卫生研究提供信息。这项研究的结果将与更广泛的科学界分享，该项目将支持对一名女研究生的培训和包容性科学宣传努力。表观遗传特征，如DNA甲基化，被认为是由S早期的个人环境改变的。这个项目考察了DNA甲基化作为不同环境产生生殖特征变异的一种方式，即月经初潮年龄和成年生殖激素浓度。这项研究是在生活在不同早期生活环境中的两个遗传相似的群体中进行的，以解析基因和发育环境对这些生殖特征的不同影响。研究人员将在描述童年环境对成人生殖特征影响的现有概念模型的基础上，探索能量压力源与心理社会压力源更有可能影响月经初潮年龄的背景。研究人员将测试DNA甲基化和早期应激源对月经初潮年龄的综合影响，以及所有这三个变量对成年激素浓度的影响。

Menarche (first menses) is a critical reproductive life history marker with potential links to early-life environment and later-life health risks. This dissertation research project investigates menarche in a life history framework, to better understand the relationship among DNA modifications, early life psychosocial and energetic stressors, and age at menarche, as well as the effect of these variables on adult reproductive hormone levels. The project will contribute to a growing body of knowledge on the ways that childhood environmental variables directly and indirectly affect human reproductive life history trajectories, and may inform public health research related to the timing of menarche. Results of this study will be shared with the wider scientific community, and the project will support training of a female graduate student and inclusive science outreach efforts. Epigenetic traits like DNA methylation are thought to be modified by an individual?s early environment. This project examines DNA methylation as one way that different environments can produce variation in reproductive traits, namely age at menarche and adult reproductive hormone concentrations. The research is conducted in two genetically similar populations living in different early-life environments, in order to parse the different effects of genes and developmental environments on these reproductive traits. The investigators will explore the contexts in which energetic versus psychosocial stressors are more likely to affect age at menarche, building on current conceptual models that describe the effects of childhood environments on adult reproductive traits. The investigators will test for combined effects of DNA methylation and early stressors on menarcheal age, and for effects of all three variables on adult hormone concentrations.