Health and behavior are shaped not only by present circumstances, but also by experiences that begin before birth. Elif Duman, a behavioral neuroscientist whose research focuses on stress, epigenetics, and intergenerational health, studies how prenatal and early life environments influence development across the lifespan.
This summer, Duman will teach the Columbia summer courses Prenatal Programming (Session A) and Behavioral Neuroscience (Session B).
For those unfamiliar with the field, what is “prenatal programming,” and why is it such an important area of study today?
Prenatal programming refers to the process by which the environment during the prenatal period alters maternal and fetal physiology, starting from the molecular level, to program lifelong health and development of the offspring. It is an important area of study, because it shows us that our behavior and health are not influenced only by our current environment, but by our environment starting from conception. This is critical to understanding health and behavior from a lifespan perspective, which has crucial social policy implications.
Can you tell us a bit about your background and what led you to focus on prenatal programming and behavioral neuroscience?
I have always had a keen interest in understanding individual differences in behavior. I first started with the contributions of genetic factors, and gained a B.Sc. in Molecular Biology and Genetics from Istanbul Technical University, and then focused on the contributions of psychological and neural factors during my M.A. in Psychology and Ph.D. in Biopsychology from Stony Brook University. This interdisciplinary foundation allowed me to gain experience in psychological, genetic, epigenetic, and neuroendocrine contributors to behavior. I later started my own lab called Psychoepigenetics Lab in Istanbul, Turkey, where my main focus was on understanding how genetic and environmental factors across development interact through epigenetic mechanisms to shape our physiology, health, and behavior. I am currently a lecturer at the Department of Psychology and serve as the director of the Cognitive Science program at Columbia where I am very happy to contribute with this interdisciplinary background.
What are you currently focused on in your research or teaching, and how is the field evolving?
My research focuses on the intergenerational transmission of early life stress and how maternal stress biology during pregnancy translates this impact into infant development and health. At Columbia, I have taught lecture courses such as Behavioral Neuroscience as well as seminar courses such as Gene-Environment Interactions & Epigenetics and Prenatal Programming, all of which emphasize the biological embedding of experience and its impact on physiology and behavior.
Can you tell us about your Prenatal Programming course and what students can expect from it?
The Prenatal Programming seminar is a course that explores how the prenatal period shapes offspring health and development across the lifespan. In order to explain the mechanisms of action, I divide the course into three major themes that reflect the chronological development of the field of prenatal programming: linking prenatal factors with offspring health and development, discussing the underlying neural and physiological processes, and explaining the underlying epigenetic mechanisms shaping these processes. Students can expect a deeper understanding of the mechanisms that allow the programming of our health and behavior starting from the prenatal period.
What do you find most surprising or impactful about the idea that our health and behavior can be shaped before birth?
The most impactful aspect is the need to see that our health and behavior are shaped across the lifespan, starting from the prenatal period. This has implications both for research and social policies. For instance, when I am trying to understand an adulthood disorder, I know that I need to also look into prenatal factors that would influence the development of systems related to that disorder. This means when we think about social policies related to prevention and intervention strategies for that disorder we have to start early on, not in adulthood. Another important aspect is how this impact can potentially influence future generations—and that partially contributes to understanding intergenerational cycles.
What key insights or skills do you hope students take away from the course?
I expect students to gain:
- A comprehensive understanding of how physiology and behavior are programmed starting in the womb.
- Knowledge of the specific biological mechanisms (epigenetic, neural, endocrine, and immune) that drive these changes.
- The ability to place health and behavior into a lifelong and intergenerational perspective.
- Critical skills in evaluating empirical research and contributing to scientific discussions.
Who is this course best suited for?
This seminar is primarily designed for students interested in understanding the molecular, developmental, and physiological mechanisms underlying individual differences across the lifespan. While prior knowledge of basic biology would be recommended, I generally tailor the course structure to include enough of the fundamentals so that students from different fields can still follow.
You will also be teaching Behavioral Neuroscience this summer. What does that course explore, and how does it complement Prenatal Programming?
This course starts with the principles covered in Prenatal Programming, such that genetic, environmental and developmental factors shape our systems, like the nervous system, to influence our behavior. Afterwards, we follow the fundamentals of neuroanatomy, neurophysiology and methods to gain a comprehensive understanding of the nervous system. We then go into specific topics, such as how senses, emotions, memory, and stress are represented in the nervous system.
