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Dynamic nature of epigenetic patterns observed during the Mars 520-d mission simulation

Metadata Updated: April 24, 2025

Interplanetary human spaceflight represents a formidable medical challenge but also provides a unique platform for investigating human adaptation to extreme environmental changes. Understanding the long-term effects of isolation has relevance in a range of scenarios and it is well recognized that a better understanding of the relationship between environmental exposure and the epigenome can lead to more effective preventive measures. Here we conduct a longitudinal epigenetic mood state and biochemical profiling of 6 crew members in an experiment simulating a 520-day mission to Mars. Illumina HumanMethylation450 BeadChip was used to obtain DNA methylation profiles. Firstly we found that long-term isolation can induce global DNA methylation remodeling and this change seems to be an active adaptation (rather than a random process or a by-product of the isolation). This study is the first to demonstrate the dynamic relationship between global epigenetic remodeling and isolation-induced mood state and biochemical changes. Secondly by considering the location of methylation sites within the genome and using gene-pathway annotation we were able to identify pathways that were significantly enriched in methylation events and consider their association with specific function and the timeline of the mission. Thirdly via our definition of epi-entropy a measure of entropy adapted to methylation events we observed that the methylation remodeling produced a marked reduction in epi-entropy. Results suggest that DNA methylation change is an indicator of change rather than its by-product i.e. there is a psychology-epigenome-metabolism model of long-term depression; DNA methylation programs the environment signal into the epigenome which is subsequently transformed into the biochemical output and health outcome. Thus longitudinal epigenetic profiling could code the effect of isolation and act as early indicators of latent health outcome. A longitudinal epigenetic mood state and biochemical profiling of 6 crew members in an experiment simulating a 520-day mission to Mars. 36 samples of blood cell DNA methylation profiling were obtained by Illumina HumanMethylation450 BeadChip across 6 sampling points during the 520 days mission for all of the 6 crew members.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date January 31, 2023
Metadata Updated Date April 24, 2025
Data Update Frequency irregular

Metadata Source

Harvested from NASA Data.json

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date January 31, 2023
Metadata Updated Date April 24, 2025
Publisher National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Maintainer
Identifier nasa_genelab_GLDS-140_p9x5-mwci
Data First Published 2018-06-26
Data Last Modified 2025-04-23
Category Earth Science
Public Access Level public
Data Update Frequency irregular
Bureau Code 026:00
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id 7a0058ae-aeb5-4abd-a718-02b401386cf0
Harvest Source Id 58f92550-7a01-4f00-b1b2-8dc953bd598f
Harvest Source Title NASA Data.json
Homepage URL https://data.nasa.gov/dataset/dynamic-nature-of-epigenetic-patterns-observed-during-the-mars-520-d-mission-simulation
Program Code 026:005
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 860cb983114492c8cbae1ba4a76601d7d27016c49dad9857b13704a628f0ae6d
Source Schema Version 1.1

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