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Genetic Risk Factor for Parkinson's Disease Discovered

Inherited variations in proteins that produce energy for the body may provide protection from developing Parkinson’s disease, according to a new study by scientists at Duke University Medical Center. Furthermore, the inherited gene variations seem particularly to protect white women, which may help explain why Parkinson’s disease is seen more often in men.

Research points to chance as cause of genetic diseases in Ashkenazi Jews

A population of Jewish people known as the Ashkenazi Jews have an unusually high risk of several genetic diseases, and up until now, no one has understood why. Was it random chance that made mutations so common or did evolution play a role in keeping mutations around? The answer to this question, said researchers at Stanford University Medical Center, appears to be chance. Their findings appear in the March online issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics and in the journal’s April print edition.

New Genetic 'Fishing Net' Harvests Elusive Autism Gene

Researchers have developed a new statistical genetic “fishing net” that they have cast into a sea of complex genetic data on autistic children to harvest an elusive autism gene.
Moreover, the researchers said that the success of the approach will be broadly applicable to studying genetic risk factors for other complex genetic diseases, such as hypertension, diabetes and multiple sclerosis. In this case, the gene, which encodes part of a brain neurotransmitter docking station called the gamma-Aminobutyric Acid Receptor beta3-subunit (GABRB3), has been implicated in autism previously, but never positively linked to the disease. Their findings will be published in the March 2003 issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics.

Researchers find genetic link to bulimia nervosa

A team of researchers has linked an area of chromosome 10p to families with a history of bulimia nervosa, providing strong evidence that genes play a determining role in who is susceptible to developing the eating disorder. The finding, gleaned from blood studies of 316 patients with bulimia and their family members, is the result of the first multinational collaborative genome-wide linkage scan to look exclusively at bulimia. Earlier this year, another linkage scan found evidence of genes for the eating disorder anorexia nervosa on chromosome 1.