1. Randy Jirtle was born on November 9,1947 and is an American biologist noted for his research in epigenetics, the branch of biology that deals with inherited information that does not reside in the nucleotide sequence of DNA.
17 Facts About Randy Jirtle
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Randy Jirtle is presently Professor of Epigenetics in the Department of Biological Sciences at North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC.
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Randy Jirtle remained at Duke until 2012, and is currently Professor of Epigenetics in the Department of Biological Sciences at North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC.
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Randy Jirtle developed the first in vivo clonogenic assay for hepatocytes, and used it to quantify their survival when exposed to X-rays and neutrons.
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Randy Jirtle used this clonal assay to study the phenomenon of liver regeneration.
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Randy Jirtle initially took a phylogenetic approach to the study of genomic imprinting, examining allelic expression, in a range of mammalian orders, of the genes encoding the IGF2R and its ligand, IGF2.
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Randy Jirtle was the first to show that imprinting arose in an ancestor of metatherian and therian mammals, which feature placentation and live birth, but is not a feature of prototherian mammals.
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Randy Jirtle used the A mouse system to show that embryonic stem cells exposed in vivo to low doses of a physical agent, X-rays, induce positive adaptive responses in the offspring by altering the epigenome, and that these changes are mitigated by antioxidants.
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Randy Jirtle has edited a book on Liver Regeneration and Carcinogenesis, and two books on Environmental Epigenomics in Health and Disease.
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Randy Jirtle has received a number of awards in recognition of his achievements.
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Randy Jirtle was honored in 2006 with the Distinguished Achievement Award from the College of Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
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In 2007 Randy Jirtle was nominated to be Time Magazine's Person of the Year by Dr Nora Volkow, Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
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Randy Jirtle was a featured scientist on the PBS NOVA television program on epigenetics in 2007 entitled Ghost in Your Genes.
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Randy Jirtle was the inaugural recipient of the Epigenetic Medicine Award.
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In 2009, Randy Jirtle received the STARS Lecture Award in Nutrition and Cancer from the National Cancer Institute.
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Dr Randy Jirtle was invited in 2012 to present the NIH Director's WALS lecture.
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Randy Jirtle received the Linus Pauling Award from the Institute of Functional Medicine in 2014.