School of Sociology and Social Policy, Institute for Science and Society, University of Nottingham Nottingham, UK.
Front Hum Neurosci. 2014 May 21;8:309. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2014.00309. eCollection 2014.
The rise of molecular epigenetics over the last few years promises to bring the discourse about the sociality and susceptibility to environmental influences of the brain to an entirely new level. Epigenetics deals with molecular mechanisms such as gene expression, which may embed in the organism "memories" of social experiences and environmental exposures. These changes in gene expression may be transmitted across generations without changes in the DNA sequence. Epigenetics is the most advanced example of the new postgenomic and context-dependent view of the gene that is making its way into contemporary biology. In my article I will use the current emergence of epigenetics and its link with neuroscience research as an example of the new, and in a way unprecedented, sociality of contemporary biology. After a review of the most important developments of epigenetic research, and some of its links with neuroscience, in the second part I reflect on the novel challenges that epigenetics presents for the social sciences for a re-conceptualization of the link between the biological and the social in a postgenomic age. Although epigenetics remains a contested, hyped, and often uncritical terrain, I claim that especially when conceptualized in broader non-genecentric frameworks, it has a genuine potential to reformulate the ossified biology/society debate.
过去几年中，分子表观遗传学的兴起有望将关于大脑的社会性和对环境影响的易感性的讨论提升到一个全新的水平。表观遗传学涉及基因表达等分子机制，这些机制可能会在生物体中“嵌入”社会经历和环境暴露的“记忆”。这些基因表达的变化可以在不改变 DNA 序列的情况下跨代传递。表观遗传学是新的后基因组和依赖于上下文的基因观点的最先进例子，该观点正在进入当代生物学。在我的文章中，我将以表观遗传学的当前出现及其与神经科学研究的联系为例，说明当代生物学新的、在某种程度上前所未有的社会性。在回顾了表观遗传学研究的最重要进展及其与神经科学的一些联系之后，我在第二部分反思了表观遗传学为社会科学提出的新挑战，需要重新概念化在后基因组时代生物与社会之间的联系。尽管表观遗传学仍然是一个有争议的、炒作的、且常常是不严谨的领域，但我声称，特别是当它被概念化为更广泛的非基因中心框架时，它确实有潜力重新构建僵化的生物学/社会辩论。
