This is really interesting because it makes me think of how adults are always saying that kids are looking older at younger ages every year. I'm sure at least part of this is due to hypersexualization in the media but this makes be think that it could also have something to with estrogen or other EDCs leeching into the environment. I know one thing that leads to increased levels of estrogen in the environment is birth control. I wonder what the best course of action would be to ensure that individuals still had access to proper, non-invasive birth control options while also decreasing the amount of estrogen being released into the environment.

It seems weird that there aren't laws against putting out chemicals without testing to see if they have harmful side effects such as endocrine disruption. Since this is such a serious issue for both humans and animals it seems that there should be stronger regulations for chemicals that enter the marketplace.

I thought DNA methylation could happen in promoter regions. Now I am confused. Does this just not happen often? I had expected that would happen a lot.

This reminds me of what I am doing for my research proposal. The epigenetic variation isn't random because it happens in direct correlation to the fitness of the mother. If the mother has GDM or diabetes then the child is more at risk for developing insulin resistance due to DNA methylation.

So does this mean that there could be individuals from a group that exhibit plasticity that are either not plastic or ther phenotype changes in a different way due to mutations in DNA?

This seems to be an ongoing theme in class. Epigenetic variation can cause changes in phenotype through epigenetic tags. It is important to keep track of what parts of the phenotype of different species are plastic in order to avoid incorrectly identifying two or more groups as separate species when they are actually the same species with different epi tags. This could mean that the groups were thought to be bordering on endangered and when they were actually less high-risk.

cells that make up the muscle of the heart

It seems like possible insulin resistance in the child is caused by a lot of factors. Like just about everything discussed so far seems to be linked to insulin resistance or diabetes. Why is that?

So it gave them an anxiety disorder?

Is this referring to the vitamin b12? If so then that makes the importance of prenatal vitamins all the more obvious. This does make me wonder though if a person is already getting enough b12 and they take a supplement containing b12 will that also cause an imbalance? I know too many vitamins don't usually harm an individual once they are born but would too much intake of b12 cause an imbalance that could cause insulin deficiency in the case of a fetus?

It wouldn't let me highlight the whole quote but this is exactly what I am interested in. I think I will do my research paper about something that relates to this.

This is really interesting! I hadn't really thought about how birth weight alone could have such a serious impact on an individual's health later on.

So I looked this up and it said that this was a bunch of different conditions that work together to increase a person's risk of getting heart disease, having a stroke, etc. Why is it called "the metabolic syndrome"? Isn't that kind of confusing because (if I am correct) there are more than one?

Use vs Disuse

The formation physiological abnormalities in a fetus or embryo.

The collection of phenotypes that can come from one genotype.

When the organisms' tissues and cells take their proper shapes.

This is a real area of interest for me. Ever since I was younger I have always been curious about how gene expression impacts the individual. This reminds me of epigenetics which was one of my favorite subjects in BioSci. It is the study of gene expression, and how a gene being active or inactive affects an individual without changing their genotype.