J. David Sweatt, Ph.D., chair of the Department of Neurobiology and director of the Evelyn F. McKnight Brain Institute, will speak about the epigenetic mechanisms in memory formation at the National Institutes of Health Campus in Bethesda, Md. on Friday, March 13. According to the NIH, the regulation of chromatin structure and control of direct methylation of DNA are the principal mechanisms of epigenetic regulation. The presentation will explore the idea that conservation of epigenetic mechanisms for information storage represents a unifying model in biology, with epigenetic mechanisms being utilized for cellular memory at levels from behavioral memory to development to cellular differentiation.
Sweatt’s lecture is part of an ongoing series sponsored by the NIH Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research to discuss cutting-edge research in the field. The talk begins at 2 p.m. A videocast of the lecture will be hosted live online at http://videocast.nih.gov/.