Wendy Robinson discussed DNA methylation and the placental
methylome. DNA methylation profiling of the human placenta can
have application to basic biology, clinical and epidemiological
questions. Placental methylation is quite distinct from somatic
tissues; while globally decreased, methylation is higher at some
regions, such as CpG island promoters. Placenta is also unique
amongst normal tissues in the presence of “partially methylated
domains”, large blocks of sequence along the chromosomes that
show distinctly lower methylation