To 29 represent moderate to severe depression.Materials and Methods Ethics purchase 317318-84-6 StatementThis study was conducted according to the guidelines of the Helsinki declaration, and the study protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health.SubjectsClinical data was obtained from a Finnish cohort comprising of female health care professionals, mainly nurses, midwives and nursing assistants. 422 individuals were recruited from a total of 5615 health care professionals that were part of a Finnish Public Sector Study [26]. This group represents the entire personnel of 21 Finnish public hospitals. These subjects were classified into lowestSite-specific DNA MethylationWe isolated DNA from peripheral blood leucocytes using QIAGEN Autopure (Qiagen). CpG methylation status of the CpG-rich region in the SLC6A4 gene promoter was investigated by bisulfite K162 site sequencing [41]. The region of SLC6A4 that 1326631 was includedStress Affects Serotonin Transporter Methylationin the analysis (Figure 1) has been previously shown to be differentially methylated in infants exposed to prenatal maternal depressed mood [9]. 500 ng of genomic DNA from leucocytes was treated with sodium bisulfite using the EZ DNA Methylation-Gold Kit (Zymoresearch) following the manufacturer’s protocol. The region of interest was amplified by standard PCR from bisulfite-treated DNA using AmpliTaq Gold Hot Start Polymerase (Applied Biosystems) based on previously published primers [9] with slight modifications in region coverage as a necessity to produce good quality sequence with direct sequencing. SLC6A4F: gtattgttaggttttaggaagaaagagaga and SLC6A4R: aaaaatcctaactttcctrctctttaactt (Figure 1). Overhanging tails in the 59 end were designed for both forward and reverse primers that match with common T7 (taatacgactcactataggg) and T3 (attaaccctcactaaaggga) sequencing primers respectively. Cycling conditions were 95uC for 11 minutes followed by 40 cycles of 95uC for 30 seconds, 60uC for 30 seconds, and 72uC for 40 seconds with a final extension of 10 minutes at 72uC. PCR products were verified randomly on a 2 agarose gel (GellyPhor, Euroclone). The remaining PCR product was purified using the Quickstep 2 PCR Purification Kit (Edge Bio). Cycle sequencing was 
performed with the BigDye Terminator version 3.1 Cycle Sequencing Kit (Applied Biosystems) using T7 and T3 sequencing primers. Sequencing was performed by capillary sequencing (Finnish Institute for Molecular Medicine). A similar method has been previously described [42]. Methylation percentage at each CpG site was quantified manually using the Sequence Scanner version 1.0 (Applied Biosystems) by two 15900046 independent examiners (JA and AT) blind to the sample identification codes. The peak heights of C versus the combined heights of C + T peaks (C/C+T) at each CpG locus were calculated as a percentage [Lewin et al. 2004]. The five CpG locations were 28 563 120 (CpG5), 28 563 109 (CpG4), 28 563 107 (CpG3), 28 563 
102 (CpG2), and 28 563 090 (CpG1) as per GRCh37 build (NCBI Reference Sequence: NC_000017.10). The success rate for DNA amplification and bisulfite sequencing was 73 (49/67). Human Methylation 450k BeadChip (Illumina Inc.) was used for verification of the results in 10 nurse pairs of same age from the high- and low work stress environments. Fully methylated and unmethylated, bisulfite converted, DNAs (Epitech) and two duplicates were included for quality controls. DNA methylation data was then processed usi.To 29 represent moderate to severe depression.Materials and Methods Ethics StatementThis study was conducted according to the guidelines of the Helsinki declaration, and the study protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health.SubjectsClinical data was obtained from a Finnish cohort comprising of female health care professionals, mainly nurses, midwives and nursing assistants. 422 individuals were recruited from a total of 5615 health care professionals that were part of a Finnish Public Sector Study [26]. This group represents the entire personnel of 21 Finnish public hospitals. These subjects were classified into lowestSite-specific DNA MethylationWe isolated DNA from peripheral blood leucocytes using QIAGEN Autopure (Qiagen). CpG methylation status of the CpG-rich region in the SLC6A4 gene promoter was investigated by bisulfite sequencing [41]. The region of SLC6A4 that 1326631 was includedStress Affects Serotonin Transporter Methylationin the analysis (Figure 1) has been previously shown to be differentially methylated in infants exposed to prenatal maternal depressed mood [9]. 500 ng of genomic DNA from leucocytes was treated with sodium bisulfite using the EZ DNA Methylation-Gold Kit (Zymoresearch) following the manufacturer’s protocol. The region of interest was amplified by standard PCR from bisulfite-treated DNA using AmpliTaq Gold Hot Start Polymerase (Applied Biosystems) based on previously published primers [9] with slight modifications in region coverage as a necessity to produce good quality sequence with direct sequencing. SLC6A4F: gtattgttaggttttaggaagaaagagaga and SLC6A4R: aaaaatcctaactttcctrctctttaactt (Figure 1). Overhanging tails in the 59 end were designed for both forward and reverse primers that match with common T7 (taatacgactcactataggg) and T3 (attaaccctcactaaaggga) sequencing primers respectively. Cycling conditions were 95uC for 11 minutes followed by 40 cycles of 95uC for 30 seconds, 60uC for 30 seconds, and 72uC for 40 seconds with a final extension of 10 minutes at 72uC. PCR products were verified randomly on a 2 agarose gel (GellyPhor, Euroclone). The remaining PCR product was purified using the Quickstep 2 PCR Purification Kit (Edge Bio). Cycle sequencing was performed with the BigDye Terminator version 3.1 Cycle Sequencing Kit (Applied Biosystems) using T7 and T3 sequencing primers. Sequencing was performed by capillary sequencing (Finnish Institute for Molecular Medicine). A similar method has been previously described [42]. Methylation percentage at each CpG site was quantified manually using the Sequence Scanner version 1.0 (Applied Biosystems) by two 15900046 independent examiners (JA and AT) blind to the sample identification codes. The peak heights of C versus the combined heights of C + T peaks (C/C+T) at each CpG locus were calculated as a percentage [Lewin et al. 2004]. The five CpG locations were 28 563 120 (CpG5), 28 563 109 (CpG4), 28 563 107 (CpG3), 28 563 102 (CpG2), and 28 563 090 (CpG1) as per GRCh37 build (NCBI Reference Sequence: NC_000017.10). The success rate for DNA amplification and bisulfite sequencing was 73 (49/67). Human Methylation 450k BeadChip (Illumina Inc.) was used for verification of the results in 10 nurse pairs of same age from the high- and low work stress environments. Fully methylated and unmethylated, bisulfite converted, DNAs (Epitech) and two duplicates were included for quality controls. DNA methylation data was then processed usi.