CAREER: Maternal age effects in an ecologically-important aquatic invertebrate: Genetic and epigenetic controls and fitness outcomes in variable environments

职业：母亲年龄对生态重要的水生无脊椎动物的影响：遗传和表观遗传控制以及可变环境中的健康结果

• 批准号: 1942606
• 负责人: Kristin Gribble
• 金额: $ 97.62万
• 依托单位: Marine Biological Laboratory
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-05-01 至 2025-04-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1942606&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Maternal; age; effects; ecologically

A mother’s environment or physical condition can affect her offspring’s health and lifespan, a phenomenon known as a “maternal effect.” Maternal age effects, in which advanced maternal age causes decreased offspring lifespan and reproduction, are common among diverse species, including humans. Thus, maternal age effects have important implications for everything from determining an individual’s disease risk and aging rate to determining population growth rates and community structure. This research aims to identify the molecular mechanisms by which information about a mother’s age is transmitted to her developing offspring, and how that leads to changes in offspring health. Additionally, this project will explore how maternal age effects change population growth rates and structure in different environments. The results may reveal the importance of maternal age in determining a population’s fitness in stable versus changing environments and could inform the search for therapies to improve health during aging and to extend reproductive longevity. This project will benefit society by broadening participation in research by under-represented groups at many educational levels. The goal of the project’s education plan is to increase diversity of those involved in biology research and to promote public understanding of the research process by integrating the research program with hands-on educational and research opportunities for undergraduates and underserved high school and community college students. The researchers hypothesize that maternal age effects are mediated by epigenetic changes in histone post-translational modifications that alter chromatin structure, causing gene expression changes that impact cellular function in offspring. Using the rotifer Brachionus manjavacas as a study system, this project will (1) characterize the genetic and epigenetic mechanisms driving maternal age effects using comparative RNA-Seq, ATAC-Seq, mass spectrometry, and RNAi; and (2) quantify the impact of maternal age effects on offspring adaptation and fitness in variable environments using life table and population growth assays. Results will advance the understanding of the role of transgenerational inheritance in structuring populations and provide insights to how maternal age effects on fitness change depending on environmental context. Research aims will be integrated with the project’s education objectives, to (1) create a research internship program for community college students, to provide research opportunities for non-traditional students and increase diversity in STEM; (2) develop education modules for high school students in the Marine Biological Laboratory’s secondary education initiative, to expose students to the research process, aquatic ecology, and evolutionary biology; and (3) create courses for undergraduates, to provide interdisciplinary ecological and molecular biology research training.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

母亲的环境或身体状况会影响其后代的健康和寿命，这种现象被称为“母性效应”。 母亲年龄效应，即高龄母亲导致后代寿命和繁殖减少，在包括人类在内的不同物种中很常见。因此，母亲年龄效应对从确定个人的疾病风险和老龄化率到确定人口增长率和社区结构的一切都有重要影响。这项研究旨在确定母亲年龄信息传递给其发育中的后代的分子机制，以及如何导致后代健康状况的变化。此外，该项目将探索孕产妇年龄的影响如何改变不同环境中的人口增长率和结构。研究结果可能揭示了母亲年龄在确定人口在稳定环境与变化环境中的适应性方面的重要性，并可能为寻找治疗方法以改善衰老过程中的健康状况和延长生殖寿命提供信息。该项目将通过扩大在许多教育水平上代表性不足的群体对研究的参与来造福社会。该项目的教育计划的目标是增加参与生物学研究的人员的多样性，并通过将研究计划与本科生和服务不足的高中生和社区大学生的实践教育和研究机会相结合，促进公众对研究过程的理解。 研究人员假设，母体年龄效应是由组蛋白翻译后修饰的表观遗传变化介导的，组蛋白翻译后修饰改变了染色质结构，导致基因表达变化，影响后代的细胞功能。该项目以臂尾轮虫为研究系统，将（1）利用比较RNA-Seq、ATAC-Seq、质谱和RNAi来表征驱动母体年龄效应的遗传和表观遗传机制;（2）利用生命表和种群增长测定来量化母体年龄效应对后代适应性和适应性的影响。研究结果将促进对跨代遗传在构建人群中的作用的理解，并提供有关母亲年龄如何影响环境背景下健身变化的见解。研究目标将与项目的教育目标相结合，（1）为社区大学生创建研究实习计划，为非传统学生提供研究机会，增加STEM的多样性;（2）在海洋生物实验室的中学教育倡议中为高中生开发教育模块，让学生接触研究过程、水生生态学、该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

The Contributions of Maternal Age Heterogeneity to Variance in Lifetime Reproductive Output

母亲年龄异质性对终生生殖产出差异的贡献

• DOI: 10.1086/718716
• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: The American Naturalist
• 作者: van Daalen, Silke F.;Hernández, Christina M.;Caswell, Hal;Neubert, Michael G.;Gribble, Kristin E.
• 通讯作者: Gribble, Kristin E.