Research progress of genetic imprinting and placenta development

Genetic imprinting is a special phenomenon that only one of the parental allelic genes expressed, and these allelic genes defined as imprinted gene. Many studys reported that imprinting genes are widely expressed in the placenta, and participated in the placental development, morphogenesis, and the maternal-fetal transference. The analysis of imprinted genes can help us to understand why these genes are imprinted during mammalian development and the significance of imprinted genes on development. Related studies of imprinted genes provide new perspectives for understanding human disease, including low birth weight infants, genetic metabolic diseases and pregnancy complications, such as preeclampsia and gestational diabetes. Therefore, this review will explore the relationship between genomic imprinting and placental development from epigenetic perspective. Key words: Genetic imprinting; Placental development; Epigenetic; DNA methylation; Long non-coding RNA(LncRNA)