Book contents
- Environmental Impacts on Reproductive Health and Fertility
- Environmental Impacts on Reproductive Health and Fertility
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Environmental contaminants and exposure
- 3. Development and maturation of the normal female reproductive system
- 4 Development and maturation of the normal male reproductive system
- 5 Modern genetics of reproductive biology
- 6. Mechanisms of endocrine disruption
- 7. Developmental exposures and implications for early and latent disease
- 8 Wildlife as sentinels of environmental impacts on reproductive health and fertility
- 9 Environmental contaminants and effects on timing and progression of human pubertal development
- 10 Environmental contaminants and impacts on healthy and successful pregnancies
- 11 Environmental contaminants and reproductive and fertility effects in the male
- 12. Environmental contaminants, female reproductive health and fertility
- 13 Environmental contaminants and related systems that have implications for reproduction
- 14 Environmental contaminants and cancers of the reproductive tract
- 15 Communicating with patients and the public about environmental exposures and reproductive risk
- 16 Interpreting science in the policy context
- 17 Conclusions – what does all this mean, and where are we going?
- Index
5 - Modern genetics of reproductive biology
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 February 2010
Book contents
- Environmental Impacts on Reproductive Health and Fertility
- Environmental Impacts on Reproductive Health and Fertility
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Environmental contaminants and exposure
- 3. Development and maturation of the normal female reproductive system
- 4 Development and maturation of the normal male reproductive system
- 5 Modern genetics of reproductive biology
- 6. Mechanisms of endocrine disruption
- 7. Developmental exposures and implications for early and latent disease
- 8 Wildlife as sentinels of environmental impacts on reproductive health and fertility
- 9 Environmental contaminants and effects on timing and progression of human pubertal development
- 10 Environmental contaminants and impacts on healthy and successful pregnancies
- 11 Environmental contaminants and reproductive and fertility effects in the male
- 12. Environmental contaminants, female reproductive health and fertility
- 13 Environmental contaminants and related systems that have implications for reproduction
- 14 Environmental contaminants and cancers of the reproductive tract
- 15 Communicating with patients and the public about environmental exposures and reproductive risk
- 16 Interpreting science in the policy context
- 17 Conclusions – what does all this mean, and where are we going?
- Index
Summary
Epidemiologic studies and animal studies increasingly suggest that exposures to environmental chemicals, nutrition, physical factors, and other factors early in development have a role in susceptibility to disease in later life. The mammalian female reproductive system arises from the uniform paramesonephric duct, the müllerian duct. The major subtypes of epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) show morphologic features that resemble those of the müllerian duct-derived epithelia of the reproductive tract. Exposure of the developing female reproductive tract to diethylstilbestrol (DES), either in vivo or in organ culture, repressed the expression of HOXA10 in the uterus and resulted in uterine metaplasia. Epigenetic change in the molecular program of cell differentiation in the affected tissues may be a common mechanism. Most regions of the mammalian genome exhibit little variability among individuals in tissue-specific DNA methylation levels. Future analyses of epigenetic imprints of genes explain the developmental origins of disease.
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- Information
- Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010