title: Epigenetics and childhood asthma: current evidence and future research directions.
abstract: Asthma is the most common chronic disease of childhood, affecting one in eight children in the USA and worldwide. It is a complex disease, influenced by both environmental exposures and genetic factors. Although epigenetic modifications (DNA methylation, histone modification and miRNA) can affect transcriptional activity in multiple genetic pathways relevant for asthma development, very limited work has been carried out so far to examine the role of epigenetic variations on asthma development and management. This review provides a brief overview of epigenetic modifications, summarizes recent findings, and discusses some of the major methodological concerns that are relevant for asthma epigenetics.
authors.affiliation: Department of Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90033, USA. msalam@usc.edu
authors.forename: Muhammad T
authors.initials: MT
authors.lastname: Salam
authors.forename: Ying
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Kohinoor
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Begum
mesh_terms: D001249:Asthma / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology / Q000235:genetics*; D002648:Child; D019175:DNA Methylation; D004781:Environmental Exposure; D020868:Gene Silencing; D006657:Histones / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000378:metabolism; D011499:Protein Processing, Post-Translational
chemical_list: D006657:Histones; D035683:MicroRNAs