| All told, men and women may differ by as much as 2% of their entire genetic inheritance, greater than the hereditary gap between humankind and its closest relative — the chimpanzee. |
The results of this study are simply amazing, turning much of accepted wisdom about human genetics and sex on its head. Where men have an X and a Y sex chromosome, women have two X's. The assumption has always been that one of those X's remains silent and unexpressed. But apparently, not only was that wrong, it was very VERY wrong.
| "What had looked like a simple yes or no has turned into a thousand shades of gray," said molecular biologist David Page, an expert on sex evolution at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge, Mass. |
"OK, fine," you say. "Why should I care?"
| The newly discovered genetic variation among women might help account for differing gender reactions to prescription drugs and the heightened vulnerability of women to some diseases, experts said.
"The important question becomes how men and women actually vary and how much variability there is in females," Carrel said. "We now might have new candidate genes that could explain differences between men and women." ..snip.. The X chromosome contains a larger share of genes linked to disease than any other chromosome. It is implicated in 300 hereditary disorders, including color blindness, hemophilia and Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Nearly 10% of the genes may belong to a group known to be more active in testicular cancers, melanomas and other cancers, the team reported. |
Got your attention now?
As one of the researchers reported,
| "We often describe the results of sequencing as a 'catalog of human genes.' The results of projects such as the finished X chromosome are so much more than that. They are the forces that will drive biomedical advance in the U.K. and around the world." |
20 years from now medicine is going to look nothing like it does to day. Nothing. Can you imagine 50 years? 100? What an amazing time to be alive.
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