Health Updates 005: What is Epigenetics?
Per the CDC, Epigenetics would be best defined as:
"Your genes play an important role in your health, but so do your behaviors and environment, such as what you eat and how physically active you are.
Epigenetics is the study of how your behaviors and environment can cause changes that affect the way your genes work. Unlike genetic changes, epigenetic changes are reversible and do not change your DNA sequence, but they can change how your body reads a DNA sequence.
Gene expression refers to how often or when proteins are created from the instructions within your genes. While genetic changes can alter which protein is made, epigenetic changes affect gene expression to turn genes “on” and “off.” Since your environment and behaviors, such as diet and exercise, can result in epigenetic changes, it is easy to see the connection between your genes and your behaviors and environment."(1)
How this plays into our perspective on supplement usage is that many supplements, both herbs and vitamins/minerals, have been show to have epigenetic effects. That is to say when you ingest these ingredients they actually have the ability to change your genetic expression and usually its for good (reduced inflammation, higher levels of healthy markers).
A classic example of this is how Turmeric has been shown to reduce levels of inflammation genes or markers such as Nf-Kb (2). This is of significance because " NF-kB is a protein complex regulating immune response, inflammation, cell growth, and survival, pivotal in health and disease management.". Numerous in lab studies have shown the relationships between what we ingest and what genes our body expresses. This is a very powerful concept as there are few medications available today which can make this claim.
This modality of treatment and effect is a main cornerstone of our philosophy that "Prevention is the best medicine", because we truly do have the ability to regulate our biology and get it back on the right path. If we don't, and enough inflammation or negative epigenetic influence occurs this often will lead to chronic disease which often is non curable or causes life long issues.
Contact Your Personal Pharmacist today to set up a personalized consultation to learn more about what supplement options exist and could be a good fit for you!
(1)- https://www.cdc.gov/genomics/disease/epigenetics.htm
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