Gene expression in teratogenic exposures: a new approach to understanding individual risk.
The phenomenon of partial or incomplete penetrance is common to many paradigms of exposure to teratogens, where only some of the exposed individuals exhibit developmental defects. We here argue that the most widely used experimental approaches in reproductive toxicology do not take partial penetrance into account, and are thus likely to miss differences between affected and unaffected individuals that contribute to susceptibility for teratogenesis. We propose that focus on the variation between exposed individuals could help to discover factors that may play a causative role for abnormal developmental processes that occur with incomplete penetrance.
Department of Developmental Biology, Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Louisiana State University System, 6400 Perkins Road, Baton Rouge, LA 70808, United States. Electronic address: Claudia.Kappen@pbrc.edu.
Claudia
C
Kappen
Laboratory of Regulation of Gene Expression, Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Louisiana State University System, 6400 Perkins Road, Baton Rouge, LA 70808, United States.
J Michael
JM
Salbaum
D000014:Abnormalities, Drug-Induced / Q000235:genetics*; D000818:Animals; D018507:Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental; D014644:Genetic Variation; D051379:Mice; D012306:Risk; D013723:Teratogens / Q000633:toxicity*
D013723:Teratogens
Gene expression; Maternal diabetes; Mouse model; Neural tube defect; Phenotype; Susceptibility; Teratogen exposure; Variation