Epigenetics: The reprogramming of genes By this time, I am definitely sure most of you have realised the change in our environment and lifestyle are the major causes of various diseases and disorders. Epigenetics is one such study probing to identify and reason the effect of environment and behaviour on gene expression. In other words, it is a study on the changes in the surrounding to lead to changes in gene expression. Does this mean there is a change in the DNA sequence causing mutation? that is a definite NO. The DNA sequence is not changed in any way, but the process of reading all the sequence of genes is changed. Hence, this causes the functioning of the proteins to vary, thereby either strengthening or weakening the biological mechanism of an organism. Gene expression functions by binary characteristics of either being turned 'on' or 'off'. This particular term gene is simply a portion of the long-chained DNA sequence coding for a particular protein. As know