Chromatin dynamics during replication and DNA recombination.

CpG islands are regions about 1 kb long that colocalize with 70% of
human gene promoters. In contrast with the genome average, CpG dinucleotides in CpG islands are non-methylated and their frequency is 10-fold higher. Lack of methylation is essential for their promoter activity and, in fact, aberrant CpG island methylation is the main epigenetic difference between normal and cancer cells.
The impact of CpG island methylation in cancer has been far more studied that during normal aging. In this project we will analyze the possible susceptibility to accidental methylation of CpG islands during aging in normal cells and its relationship with the expression pattern of the genes associated with them.