Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
Fels Institute for Cancer Research and Molecular Biology, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
Epigenetics. 2020 Jan-Feb;15(1-2):12-25. doi: 10.1080/15592294.2019.1646572. Epub 2019 Jul 25.
Children conceived by Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) are at moderately increased risk for a number of undesirable outcomes, including low birth weight. Whether the additional risk is associated with specific procedures used in ART or biological factors that are intrinsic to infertility has been the subject of much debate, as has the mechanism by which ART or infertility might influence this risk. The potential effect of ART clinical and laboratory procedures on the gamete and embryo epigenomes heads the list of mechanistic candidates that might explain the association between ART and undesirable clinical outcomes. The reason for this focus is that the developmental time points at which ART clinical and laboratory procedures are implemented are precisely the time points at which large-scale reorganization of the epigenome takes place during normal development. In this manuscript, we review the many human studies comparing the epigenomes of ART children with children conceived in vivo, as well as assess the potential of individual ART clinical and laboratory procedures to alter the epigenome.
通过辅助生殖技术（ART）受孕的儿童存在多种不良结局的中度风险，包括低出生体重。ART 中使用的特定程序或与不孕相关的内在生物学因素是否会导致这种额外的风险一直存在争议，ART 或不孕如何影响这种风险的机制也存在争议。ART 临床和实验室程序对配子和胚胎表观基因组的潜在影响首当其冲，成为可能解释 ART 与不良临床结局之间关联的机制候选者。关注这一点的原因是，ART 临床和实验室程序实施的发育时间点正是正常发育过程中表观基因组大规模重组发生的时间点。在本文中，我们回顾了许多比较 ART 儿童和体内受孕儿童表观基因组的人类研究，并评估了个别 ART 临床和实验室程序改变表观基因组的潜力。
