Department of Entomology

Title: DNA Methylation in Social Insects

Abstract: Epigenetic information affects gene function and plays a critical role in development.  DNA methylation is one of the most widespread epigenetic marks and has been linked to developmental plasticity in insects.  Our research focuses on understanding the function of DNA methylation in insects and determining how epigenetic information affects the evolution of social phenotypes.  Surprisingly, different insects show great variation in levels of DNA methylation.  However, DNA methylation shows similar associations with patterns of gene expression across species.  Thus the genes targeted by DNA methylation tend to be conserved among insects that have functional DNA methylation systems.  DNA methylation also shows associations with gene splicing and is strongly linked to other epigenetic marks, such as histone modifications, within insect genomes.  However, despite the recognition of these associations, the actual function of DNA methylation in social insect taxa remains unclear.  Consequently, continued investigation of DNA methylation in insects is necessary to further our understanding of the evolution and function of epigenetic information in eukaryotic systems.