International Symposium on Epigenetic Inheritance 2026
This inaugural symposium, supported by the LSU Provost’s Fund, establishes a North American sister meeting to the biennial series founded in 2017 by Isabelle Mansuy at ETH Zurich. Held in alternating years, the Baton Rouge meeting is designed to complement the Zurich symposium and strengthen continuity across the international epigenetic inheritance community.
The Baton Rouge symposium builds directly on this foundation, with the objective of increasing the frequency and accessibility of scientific exchange in North America while maintaining strong transatlantic integration. Beyond presenting new data, the meeting aims to refine theoretical frameworks, consolidate core mechanistic concepts, and accelerate maturation of the field.
The program will integrate molecular, cellular, behavioral, and evolutionary perspectives on how environmental exposures and life experiences shape phenotypes across generations.
Key themes include:
- Germline mechanisms of epigenetic transmission
- RNA-mediated and chromatin-based inheritance pathways
- Parental diet, metabolism, and behavioral reprogramming in offspring
- Developmental plasticity and multi-generational stability
- Evolutionary consequences of non-genetic inheritance
- Epigenetic variation in human health and disease
This structure positions the LSU symposium as a sustained institutional platform for advancing rigor, conceptual clarity, and global collaboration in transgenerational biology.
LSU Vet Med is hosting the 2026 Epigenetic Inheritance Symposium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, from July 15-17.
Preliminary Program
| Tuesday, July 14 | Arrival | |
|---|---|---|
| 17:30 - 20:30 | Light evening reception | |
| Wednesday, July 15 | Molecular/Cellular | |
| 8:00 - 9:00 | Registration | |
| 9:00 - 9:10 | Introduction | |
| 9:10 - 9:50 | Plenary Lecture: Understanding the "sperm RNA code" for epigenetic inheritance with emerging tools | Qi Chen |
| 9:50 - 10:20 | Invited Talk: Sperm RNA-mediated intergenerational epigenetic inheritance. | Upasna Sharma |
| 10:20 - 10:50 | Coffee break | |
| 10:50 - 11:20 | Invited Talk: Transgenerational Inheritance of Epigenetic Memory in Mammals | Yuta Takahashi |
| 11:20 - 11:50 | Invited Talk | Sarah Kimmins |
| 11:50 - 12:10 | 2 Early Career Talks (10 min) | |
| 12:10 - 13:40 | Lunch break | |
| 13:40 - 14:20 | Plenary Lecture: Environmental toxins impact on germline epigenetics | Mike Skinner |
| 14:20 - 14:50 | Invited Talk: Sperm RNAs, placentation and fetal growth | Sonia de Assis |
| 14:50 - 15:20 | Invited Talk: The Key Role of Placental miRNA in the Crosstalk Driving Fetal Fat Accrual | Perrie O'Tierney-Ginn |
| 15:20 - 15:40 | 2 Flash Talks | |
| 15:40 - 17:10 | Coffee and Poster Session | |
| 18:00 - 21:00 | Dinner with guest speakers | |
| Thursday, July 16 | Organismal/Behavioral | |
| 8:30 - 8:55 | Registration | |
| 8:55 - 9:00 | Provost Welcome | |
| 9:00 - 9:50 | Keynote Lecture: How life experiences can influence us and our descendants: An epigenetic perspective | Isabelle Mansuy |
| 9:50 - 10:20 | Invited Talk (online): The Intergenerational Impact of Paternal Pre-Conceptional Health | Raffaele Teperino |
| 10:20 - 10:50 | Coffee break | |
| 10:50 - 11:30 | LBRN Lecture: Role of Ribosome Heterogeneity in Epigenetic Inheritance | Eric Greer |
| 11:30 - 12:00 | Invited Talk: Investigating the Metabolic Initiation of Transgenerational Epigenetic Inheritance | Patrick Allard |
| 12:00 - 13:30 | Lunch break and vendor show | |
| 13:30 - 14:00 | Invited Talk: Paternal Epigenetic Inheritance as a Determinant of Metabolic Disease Susceptibility | Valérie Grandjean |
| 14:00 - 14:30 | Invited Talk: Effects of maltreatment during infancy on RNA signatures in rhesus macaques – lessons from EVs | Brian Dias |
| 14:30 - 16:00 | Coffee and Poster Session II | |
| 16:00 - 16:30 | Invited Talk: Tentative: Epigenetic inheritance and the evolution of worker sterility in the honey bee | Benjamin Oldroyd |
| 16:30 - 17:10 | Plenary Lecture (online): Nongenetic inheritance in evolution and everyday life | Russell Bonduriansky |
| 18:00 - 21:00 | Dinner with guest speakers | |
| Friday, July 17 | Organismal/Behavioral | |
| 9:00 - 9:30 | Invited Talk (online): Diet, Sperm, and Epigenetic Transmission: Mechanisms of Paternal Influence | Anita Ost |
| 9:30 - 10:00 | Invited Talk: Intergenerational regulation of brain energy metabolism driven by parental dietary and exercise exposures | Alexander Murashov |
| 10:00 - 10:10 | Flash Talks (10 min) | |
| 10:10 - 10:30 | Coffee beak | |
| 10:30 - 11:00 | Invited Talk: The sins of the fathers: Intergenerational effects of paternal stimulants | Chris Pierce |
| 11:00 - 11:30 | Invited Talk: Inter- and Transgenerational Consequences of Adolescent Opioid Exposure on Reward and Addiction Vulnerability | Fair Vassoler |
| 11:30 - 12:00 | Paternal drinking and the epigenetic influences on offspring mitochondrial function, placental health, structural birth defects, and age-related disease | Mike Golding |
| 12:00 - 12:45 | Lunch break | |
| 12:45 - 13:45 | Strategic Roundtable: Toward Mechanistic Resolution of Transgenerational Inheritance | Isabelle Mansuy, Sarah Kimmins, Qi Chen |
| 13:45 - 14:05 | Coffee break | |
| 14:05 - 15:05 | Strategic Forum: Building the Next Phase of the Field | Benjamin Odroyd, Patrick Allard, Brian Dias |
| 15:05 - 16:05 | Coffee and Poster Session III | |
| 16:05 - 16:20 | Awards and Closing | |
| 18:00 - 21:00 | Dinner and live music at the LSU Faculty Club | |
| Saturday, July 18 | Departure |
Speakers
| Speaker | Affiliation | Research Field | Photo |
|---|---|---|---|
| Patrick Allard | Institute for Society & Genetics at UCLA - USA | Environmental toxicants |  |
| Russell Bonduriansky | UNSW - Sydney, Australia | Evolution of parental effects; adaptive plasticity |  |
| Qui Chen | University of Utah - USA | Sperm RNAs; diet-induced inheritance |  |
| Sonia de Assis | Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, Georgetown University - USA | Diet-induced epigenetic risk; cancer |  |
| Brian Dias | USC Keck School of Medicine and Children's Hospital - Los Angeles, USA | Effects of parental stress or trauma on offspring |  |
| Michael Golding | Texas A&M University - USA |  |
|
| Valérie Grandjean | Université Cote d'Azur/Inserm (C3M) - France | Inheritance of metabolic diseases |  |
| Eric Greer | Washington University in St. Louis, Washington University Medicine - USA | Nutrient sensing; epigenetics of aging |  |
| Sarah Kimmins | Université de Montréal (and CRCHUM) - Canada | Changes to the epigenome by environmental factors | |
| Isabelle Mansuy | University of Zurich and ETH - Zurich, Switzerland | Transgenerational inheritance; brain and behavior |  |
| Alexander Murashov | Louisiana State University School of Veterinary Medicine - USA | Epigenetic mechanisms that control developmental changes in susceptibility to neurological and metabolic disorders, as well as disease prevention |  |
| Benjamin Oldroyd | The University of Sydney - Australia | Population epigenetics; insects |  |
| Anita Ost | Linköping University - Sweden | RNA-based epigenetic inheritance |  |
| Perrie O'Tierney Ginn | Mother+Baby Institute and Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, both at Tufts University - USA | ||
| Chris Pierce | Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School - USA | Epigenetics of addiction |  |
| Upasna Sharma | University of California, Santa Cruz - USA | Sperm small RNAs; environmental programming |  |
| Mike Skinner | Washington State University - USA | Environmental toxins impact on germline epigenetics |  |
| Yuta Takahashi | Kumamoto University - Japan | DNA-methylation-based epigenetic inheritance |  |
| Raffaele Teperino | Helmholtz Munich - Germany | Metabolism; diet-epigenome interactions |  |
| Fair Vassoler | Tufts University - USA | Epigenetics of addiction |  |
Registration
Please complete the form below and click on the button to submit your payment.
Hotel Information
The Cook Hotel and Conference Center at LSU is located on the LSU campus.
Organizing Committee
Sonia de Assis, PhD
Associate Professor, Department of Oncology
Georgetown University Medical Center
Chris Axelrod, Ph.D.
Director
Integrated Physiology and Molecular Medicine Laboratory
Pennington Biomedical Research Center
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Isabelle Mansuy, Ph.D.
Professor of Neuroepigenetics, ETH Zurich & University of Zurich
Alexander Murashov, MD, Ph.D. — Chair
Professor and Department Head
Comparative Biomedical Sciences
LSU School of Veterinary Medicine
Upasna Sharma, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Molecular, Cell & Developmental Biology
University of California, Santa Cruz
Michael Skinner, Ph.D.
Founding Director
Center for Reproductive Biology
School of Biological Sciences
Washington State University
Pullman, Washington