Changes in DNA methylation over the growing season differ between North Carolina farmworkers and non-farmworkers.

ABSTRACT:

Purpose

The occupational risk to farmworkers, particularly chronic exposure to pesticides, is an acknowledged environmental and work-related health problem. Epigenetics has recently been shown to contribute to a number of complex diseases and traits, including measures of cognitive function and preclinical neurodegenerative disease. We sought to determine whether changes in DNA methylation existed between farmworker and non-farmworker populations and to identify the genes most likely involved in those changes.

Methods

Eighty-three farmworkers and 60 non-farmworkers were selected from PACE4, a community-based, participatory research project comparing occupational exposures between immigrant Latino farmworker and non-farmworker manual workers. Measurements of DNA methylation w

SUBMITTER: Howard TD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5007182 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature