Genetic variation implicated in Pima obesity

New evidence that genetics plays a key role in obesity is published today in the International Journal of Bioinformatics Research and Applications. The findings relate to the genetics of modern Pima Indians who have an unusually high rate of obesity but could be extrapolated to all people. Their obesity is thought to be linked to a thrifty metabolism that allowed them to metabolize food more efficiently in times when little was available but causes problems when food is in abundance.

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A person is 100 times more likely to get cancer at age 65 than at age 35. But new research reported today in the journal “Nature Genetics” identifies naturally occurring processes that allow many genes to both slow aging and protect against cancer in the much-studied C. elegans roundworm.

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Microscopic worms used for scientific research are living longer despite cellular defects, a discovery that is shedding light on how the human body ages and how doctors could one day limit or reverse genetic mutations that cause inherited diseases, according to a new University of Colorado at Boulder study.

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Teresa Gallardo, senior research scientist in pathology and Dr. Diego Castrillon, assistant professor of pathology, have discovered nearly 350 genes associated with female fertility. Their findings will provide new directions… Click here for more information.

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Analyses publicly available for use by other researchers
Boston, MA—Researchers from Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM), Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH), and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI), have completed analyses of a genome-wide scan on a group of two generations of participants from the landmark Framingham Heart Study (FHS). The analyses, which examine genetic differences that potentially affect the risk for cardiovascular disease and other disorders using data collected from FHS participants, are described in a series of articles published today in the on-line open access issue of BMC Medical Genetics.

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Cornell researchers take a look at Australia’s most diverse vertebrates: skinks

A new study of finger-sized Australian lizards sheds light on one of the most striking yet largely unexplained patterns in nature: why is it that some groups of animals have evolved into hundreds, even thousands of species, while other groups include only a few?

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Genes and disease? It’s what you do with what you have

A new study published in Nature Genetics on Sunday 16 September 2007 show that common, complex diseases are more likely to be due to genetic variation in regions that control activity of genes, rather than in the regions that specify the protein code.

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The results of this research have strong implications for the cellular causes of FXS and will open new streams of research
An important finding has been made by McMaster researchers about Fragile X Syndrome (FXS), a sex-linked genetic disorder that affects approximately one in 4,000 males and one in 6,000 females.

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