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A small but significant proportion of morbidly obese people are missing a section of their DNA, according to research published today in Nature. The authors of the study, from Imperial College London and ten other European Centres, say that missing DNA such as that identified in this research may be having a dramatic effect on some people's weight. According to the new findings, around seven in every thousand morbidly obese people are missing a part of their DNA, containing approximately 30 genes. The researchers did not find this kind of genetic variation in any normal weight people.
Some morbidly obese people are missing genes, shows new research
Seeded on Wed Feb 3, 2010 3:57 PM EST
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- Public Discussion (4)
Today's research is the first to clearly demonstrate that obesity in otherwise physically healthy individuals can be caused by a rare genetic variation in which a section of a person's DNA is missing.
#1 - Wed Feb 3, 2010 3:57 PM ESTSo they want to ID people with this defect, using dna screening, and then offer these people fat surgery to help then get the weight off. How does that really help them? The stomach stapling is not universally successful, and comes with the risk of complications and further surgery to fix anything that went wrong. Who really benefits?
#3 - Thu Feb 4, 2010 1:53 AM ESTI think you are right in the "let's do something" category. On the other hand, perhaps this will be one of the drops in the bucket of seeing even obese people as having more than a "lazy" problem.
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