Maintaining genome stability is essential to an organism's health and survival. Breakdown of the mechanisms protecting the genome and the resulting genome instability are an important aspect of the aging process and have been linked to diseases such as cancer. Thus, a large network of interconnected pathways is responsible for ensuring genome integrity in the face of the continuous challenges that induce DNA damage. While these pathways are diverse, epigenetic mechanisms play a central role in many of them. DNA modifications, histone variants and modifications, chromatin structure, and non-coding RNAs all carry out a variety of functions to ensure that genome stability is maintained. Epigenetic mechanisms ensure the functions of centromeres and telomeres that are essential for genome stability. Epigenetic mechanisms also protect the genome from the invasion by transposable elements and contribute to various DNA repair pathways. In this review, we highlight the integral role of epigenetic mechanisms in the maintenance of genome stability and draw attention to issues in need of further study.

中文翻译：

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表观遗传学和基因组稳定性。

维持基因组稳定性对于生物体的健康和生存至关重要。保护基因组的机制和导致的基因组不稳定性的破坏是衰老过程的重要方面，并且与诸如癌症的疾病有关。因此，面对诱导DNA损伤的连续挑战，一个相互连接的途径的庞大网络负责确保基因组的完整性。尽管这些途径是多种多样的，但表观遗传机制在其中许多中起着核心作用。DNA修饰，组蛋白变体和修饰，染色质结构和非编码RNA均具有多种功能，可确保维持基因组稳定性。表观遗传机制确保着丝粒和端粒的功能，这对基因组稳定性至关重要。表观遗传机制还保护基因组免受转座因子的侵袭，并有助于各种DNA修复途径。在这篇综述中，我们着重介绍了表观遗传机制在维持基因组稳定性中的不可或缺的作用，并引起对需要进一步研究的问题的关注。