Abstract
Fluctuations and deterioration in environmental conditions potentially have a phenotypic impact that extends over generations. Transgenerational epigenetics is the defined term for such intergenerational transient inheritance without an alteration in the DNA sequence. The model organism Caenorhabditis elegans is exceptionally valuable to address transgenerational epigenetics due to its short lifespan, well-mapped genome and hermaphrodite behavior. While the majority of the transgenerational epigenetics on the nematodes focuses on generations-wide heritage, short-term and in-depth analysis of this phenomenon in a well-controlled manner has been lacking. Here, we present a novel microfluidic platform to observe mother-to-progeny heritable transmission in C. elegans at high imaging resolution, under significant automation, and enabling parallelized studies. After approximately 24 hours of culture of L4 larvae under various concentrations and application periods of doxycycline, we investigated if mitochondrial stress was transferred from the mother nematodes to the early progenies. Automated and custom phenotyping algorithms revealed that a minimum doxycycline concentration of 30 µg/mL and a drug exposure time of 15 hours applied to the mothers could induce mitochondrial stress in first embryo progenies indeed, while this inheritance was not clearly observed later in L1 progenies. We believe that our new device could find further usage in transgenerational epigenetic studies modeled on C. elegans.
Highlights
Certain experiences and stress during the life of an organism can have significant effects on the successive generations[1]
Short-term analysis of the effects of stressed mothers on development during the embryonic and first larval stages is a field of epigenetic inheritance research that is perfectly compatible with microfluidics
We present a microfluidic device for the observation of mother-to-progeny epigenetic inheritance in C. elegans
Summary
Certain experiences and stress during the life of an organism can have significant effects on the successive generations[1]. The main challenge in the short-term epigenetic studies in C. elegans is to establish a sustainable approach to obtain sufficient data of both the parental generation and the progenies at high-resolution Such procedures require assisting tools, like offered by microfluidics and Lab-on-a-chip (LoC) technologies, to accomplish both tasks at the same time instead of standard agar plate-based methods[19]. A PDMS design with embryo incubators has been proposed to observe embryogenesis of the first embryo progenies[31] This design was further modified to obtain first embryo progenies by mechanically compressing adult nematodes[32] or studying the development of embryos released from the parental generation in worm culture chambers[33]. Our results revealed that a dose-dependent maternal nematode treatment resulted in mitochondrial stress in the embryos of the generation and that this inheritance could possibly be maintained in L1 progenies
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
