How trauma can be passed on through generations

Guest: Randy Jirtle, Professor of Biology, North Carolina State University Did you know that life experiences of your parents and grandparents may be embedded in your genes? For example, a recent study of Civil War and US Census data found that the sons of soldiers held in particularly harsh prison camps during the war had shorter lives. We’re talking about the sons of the soldiers – sons who weren’t even alive during the war. How can that be that a father might pass his own emotional or physical trauma down to a child through his genes?