by Robin Foster You’ve watched others shed pounds in a matter of weeks after taking one of the new blockbuster weight-loss drugs, so you decide to try one of the medications yourself, only to discover the needle on your bathroom scale barely budges. Why? New research presented Monday at the Digestive Disease Week conference in...
Tag: <span>Genetics</span>
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Black individuals with a genetic mutation found to have increased risk of developing atrial fibrillation, heart failure
by Anna Jones, University of Alabama at Birmingham This figure depicts the cumulative incidence of the study outcomes stratified by the hiPSI TTNtv carrier status in individuals of African ancestry. The study outcomes include atrial fibrillation, DCM and heart failure. TTNtv carriers and noncarriers have been depicted in red and blue, respectively. Credit: Nature Cardiovascular...
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Tool Uses Genetics to Diagnose Early Inflammatory Arthritis
Lucy Hicks A new diagnostic tool can effectively discriminate different rheumatologic conditions and could potentially aid in the diagnosis of early inflammatory arthritis. The algorithm — called Genetic Probability tool (G-PROB) — uses genetic information to calculate the probability of certain diseases. “At such an early stage of disease, it’s not always easy to determine...
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Clues to preventing Alzheimer’s come from patient who evaded disease, despite genetics
by Washington University School of Medicine Credit: Cell (2023). DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2023.11.029 Alzheimer’s disease has plagued one large Colombian family for generations, striking down half of its members in the prime of life. But one member of that family evaded what had seemed would be fate: Despite inheriting the genetic defect that caused her relatives to develop...
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The ‘Christchurch mutation’: How good can overpower evil in the genetic determination of Alzheimer’s disease
by Gladstone Institutes New research, led by a Gladstone team including Maxine Nelson (left) and Yadong Huang (right), sheds light on protective mechanisms of the “Christchurch mutation.” Credit: Michael Short/Gladstone Institutes (2023) Researchers at Gladstone Institutes have discovered that a rare genetic variant known as the “Christchurch mutation” can block detrimental effects of apolipoprotein E4, the...
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Genetics and concussion—why a minor knock can be devastating for some people
by Lyn Griffiths and Annette Greenhow, The Conversation Credit: Shutterstock Concussion and head trauma is a real and serious risk for many Australians. While most people suffer acute and relatively short-lived effects, such as dizziness and headache, in some cases symptoms persist for weeks, months or years. It can result in long-term and debilitating neurological impairment....
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Homing in on the genetics of severe COVID in children
ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY One of the most terrifying aspects of the COVID pandemic has been its unpredictably severe impact on some children. While most infected kids have few or no symptoms, one in 10,000 fall suddenly and dramatically ill about a month after a mild infection, landing in the hospital with inflamed hearts, lungs, kidneys, and...
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Age vs. genetics: Which is more important for determining how we age?
by Robert Sanders, University of California – Berkeley Age impacts the predictive power of eQTLs in many tissues. Credit: Nature Communications (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-33509-0 Amid much speculation and research about how our genetics affect the way we age, a University of California, Berkeley, study now shows that individual differences in our DNA matter less as we get...
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People respond differently to psychedelic drugs—genetics could be the reason
by American Chemical Society Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Cluster headaches, anxiety and depression can be debilitating for people living with these conditions. Psychedelic drugs have shown benefits as treatments for these conditions in clinical studies, but not for everyone. Now, in ACS Chemical Neuroscience, researchers report that one reason could be common genetic variations in one serotonin...
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Combining genetics and brain MRI can aid in predicting chances of Alzheimer’s disease
by Simon Fraser University Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Simon Fraser University researchers are studying how a combination of genetics and brain MRIs may be used to predict the chances of developing Alzheimer’s disease in the future. In a newly published study, researchers from SFU’s Functional and Anatomical Imaging & Shape Analysis Lab (FAISAL) identified distinct properties...