Epigenetics

Abstract

While the aetiology of suicide is complex and not completely understood, earlylife adversity plays an important role in increasing lifetime risk for suicide. It is clear that the early-life environment has important influences on behavioural development, and only recently have we begun to better understand the molecular mechanisms through which early-life adversity may induce such profound effects on later behaviour, and as such, epigenetic processes have been implicated as one important mechanism. Epigenetics refers to the dynamic molecular processes that are involved in the regulation of gene expression through modifi- cations of the chemical composition or physical structure of DNA or chromatin without affecting the DNA sequence. Since the epigenome is responsive to the environment, it is thought that through epigenetic regulation early-life adversity may affect behavioural development, augmenting the risk for psychopathology including suicide. This chapter will review the data supporting this view describing epigenetic changes that are associated with early-life adversity and suicide.