Ouch! Pain genes affected by lifestyle

• Autores: Andy Coghlan
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 2955, 2014, pág. 12
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Tim Spector of King's College London says people know that stressful life events such as diet, smoking, drinking and exposure to pollution all have effects on genes, but they didn't know if they specifically affected pain genes. Now, a study of identical twins suggests they do. It seems that epigenetic changes--environmentally triggered chemical alterations that affect how active your genes are--can dial pain threshold up or down. This implies that tweaks of this kind, such as the addition of one or more methyl groups to a gene, may account for some differences in how senses operate.