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Science

3rd Chromosome Deciphered 194

Posted by chrisd from the all-your-bases-belong-to-us dept.
veeoh writes: "Another chapter in the human book of life has been published. Scientists working as part of the Human Genome Project(including some from the Wellcome Trust) have deciphered the complete genetic instructions of a third chromosome, one of the 24 bundles of DNA that carry our genetic material. The BBC has an article about the discovery"
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3rd Chromosome Deciphered More

3rd Chromosome Deciphered

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  • Comparison to mice chromosomes? (Score:4, Informative)

    by Harumuka ( 219713 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @04:43PM (#2733880)
    With the 3rd human genome chromosome completely mapped out, it's time to move on to other chromosomes such as the 17th. According to A Brief History of The Human Genome Project [dartmouth.edu],
    For example the 17th chromosome in mice is homologous in large part to the 11th in human beings and of the 35 mapped loci in both organisms on these chromosomes, all but two are ordered into the same sequence.

    I wonder how similar 3rd chromosome of mice is to the 3rd chromosome of the human genome. Any research being done in this field?

    • The problem with this type of comparison is that, for all we know, these genes could just say "make hair like this". 2 different animals could have COMPLETELY different bodies and one, or even many, identical chromosomes because it could only describe what it takes for the body to make hair, or bone, or anything common between the animals.

      Since most(all I believe, but I'll stick with most in case I'm wrong) mammals fall under the mammalia Family, there can be many upon many similarities between the genetic makeups of the animals and still have little if none of it be relevant.

      (standard disclaimer: I'm a physicist and if anything I said is blatantly wrong, oh well. Mod me down)

      Pat

      • Re:Comparison to mice chromosomes? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by barawn ( 25691 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @05:03PM (#2734020) Homepage
        Actually, it's worse than that - chromosomes don't say "make hair like this" - they say "make this protein", and that's -all- they say. To paraphrase a great quote from Alpha Centuari (the game, yes) "You cannot take the gene for an elephant's trunk and put it onto a giraffe, and get a giraffe with an elephant's trunk, because there IS no gene for an elephant's trunk. What you can do with genes is chemistry, because genes code for chemicals."

        That said, you don't know HOW a particular protein will interact in a given host unless you know the rest of the chemistry for that host. Stick human growth hormone in a fish, and it won't grow - thus, if you stuck the gene that codes for HGH into a fish, it won't get bigger either.

        Then again, all of this is somewhat moot, because for the most part, they do understand a good deal of the biochemistry of animals (including mice) and it's very similar to that of humans.
        • Thank you for clearing that up for me. I took a basic genetics course 3 years ago but it's sort of achieved that tofu state in my head where you know it's there, you just can't really get anything useful out of it.

          You confirmed the point I was making however, I just didn't QUITE understand the low-level working of genetics. Maybe after /. runs a few more articles about it I will.

          The greatest gift you can give anyone is to teach them something new.

          Pat
          • No problem. Actually, the main difficulty understanding genetics is to get over the problem in my previous post - DNA is not like computer instructions - all DNA does is code for protein, and then the protein interacts in the body and 'does what it is supposed to do' (hopefully). The belief that genetic engineering can end all disease, make perfect humans, etc. is a common mistake, and definitely not true - many human diseases are completely agenetic (take cancer, for instance - everyone would probably eventually develop cancer, given enough time) and more importantly, many of the mechanisms in place in living systems are simply to fix or deal with things that break (again, cancer). To make humans immune to cancer, for instance, you'd have to make a better system than nature designed - good luck. You could, however, cure it, and that's the real benefit of genetic engineering, is that it may help us cure and treat diseases better.

            The other point is that I do want to stress that the mouse/human comparison is not quite as useless as a first glance might make it seem. The fact is, if we know how a protein (and therefore a gene) behaves in a mouse, and we alter that gene, and see how that protein behaves, we've got a good guess that it will cause the same behavior in humans. It's not -guaranteed-, but it's better than doing the experiment blindly on humans (animal rights activists aside: from a purely practical standpoint, mice breed faster than humans and have a shorter lifespan, so from a completely amoral standpoint, it's better to do it on mice. It's also harder to control the environment). Wow I could still get flamed for that comment.
            • And this is where the animal rights activists do not get it...many have suggested that science has progressed to the point where test tube or computer models suffice, and animals do not need to be used. This completely ignores the fact that computers have not yet progressed to the state where we can model a single protein, and test tubes are not complete living systems.

              Though I'll grant that we don't need to pump rabbits full of mascara just to see HOW MUCH is toxic...
        • Actually, it's worse than that - chromosomes don't say "make hair like this" - they say "make this protein",

          IMHO, thats where the real fun starts is in protien folding. It's extremely difficult to take apart the molecules and fold them correctly back to a stable state. The best analogy i heard was from the director of the HGP, "Its like the highway system, its expensive to build, time consuming, and doesn't generate revenue directly. But it is the first step in the next generation of genetics reaserch needed for sucess."
        • There are two sorts of genes found on chromasomes, coding genes, which as described above are (eventually) transcribed to proteins, and regulatory genes, which work at a higher level, and control which proteins will be expressed and when. Regulatory genes aren't transcribed. A good description of the process is here [earthlink.net]. There is of course a third usage of the DNA, which is junk DNA, but (as far as we know) this has no purpose at all.
          • There is of course a third usage of the DNA, which is junk DNA, but (as far as we know) this has no purpose at all.

            Actually one use is very well known, it is to limit the environmental damage done to the actively coded regions of the chromosome. If every chemical or radiation source that hits the chromosome was hiting actively coded regions then mutation rates and cancer et all would be so prevelant that life would be unstable.
            • On the other hand, if you have a smaller chromosome, then the chance of a mutagen hitting hte chromosome would correspondingly decrease.

              Some bacteria have virtually no junk DNA at all. Living in an enviroment where reproducing as fast as possible is desirable has eliminated as much junk as possible.

        • Actually, it's worse than that - chromosomes don't say "make hair like this" - they say "make this protein", and that's -all- they say.

          It's much worse than you think. This site codes for protein so-n-so. So does that one over there. But this here site codes for the suppression of that same protein.

          There doesn't appear to be a simple correspondence between codons and protein expressions. Rather, it seems that the actual proteins that get expressed in the cell are the result of a complex interference pattern among the codons in the cell's genome.

          This makes DNA fairly redundant-- quite a bit has to go wrong before the cell stops working altogether. Of course, proof against accidental changes (transcription errors or whatnot) is also proof against deliberate changes (gene therapy).

          So it's a lot more complex than it appears at first glance.
      • 2 different animals could have COMPLETELY different bodies and one, or even many, identical chromosomes because it could only describe what it takes for the body to make hair, or bone, or anything common between the animals.

        Replace "chromosomes" with "genes" and you're right. But knowing that the same gene makes hair in humans and mice, functions in the same pathway is turned on and off by the same other proteins is hardly irrelevant -- it tells what you the core elements of hair specification are and enables you to do experiments that you can't do with humans.

        I did hear a talk recently abot human-chimp comparisons, which was more like what you have in mind. Because almost all the genes are identical there, looking at the subtle differences is a powerful way to get at why we're taller, less hairy, walk on two legs and (in most cases) are smarter.

    • Um, you may want to reread that quote- it's the 17th chromosome of *mice* that maps to the -11th- in humans, not the 17th.

      Thus there is no reason to believe that mice chromosome #3 should be similar to human chromosome #3. My guess is that the 1117 connection is probably the best one in the micehuman comparison.

      In addition, they meant "Chromosome 20 has been sequenced, making it the third human chromosome to be sequenced", not that chromosome #3 has been sequenced (which is much much larger than #20, I believe).

      Read the article to see the depiction of the numbered chromosomes.
    • This isn't chromosome #3, it is chromosome #20.


      There have been 2 previously mapped out chromosomes (#21 and #22), so this is the third to be mapped out.

    • I wonder how similar 3rd chromosome of mice is to the 3rd chromosome of the human genome. Any research being done in this field?

      Imagine if you took the 23 human chromosomes, broke them up into a couple of hundred chunks (I forget the exact number) and randomly reassembled them to make the 20 mouse chromosomes. That's what it looks like [nih.gov]. So rodent and human chromosomes don't directly map to one another (that site aside) but there are large chunks containing many genes that can be directly compared.

      With the mouse genome being sequenced now, that's one of the big things going on -- regions that are similar between the mouse and human sequences are presumably imnportant enough to be conserved over hundreds of millions of years, and therefore give a clue to the location of important features like genes and regulatory elements. That's one of the major pushes in genomics right now.

  • Poor practice (Score:1, Interesting)

    by SumDeusExMachina ( 318037 )
    I'm appalled that our government would waste so much money on something that could easily be done in the private sector. In fact, the last time I heard, they were actively competing with a private sector team in order to see who would first decode the human genome.

    Come on, the only thing worse than being patented by a private corporation is being patented by your government. Either way, they'll own the rights to our genetic patterns, but in one instance I'll end up with a tax cut that gives me enough money to move to a country that ignores patent laws, while in the other my government throws away my money competing competing with the private sector. The government should never be competing with the private sector.

    • Re:Poor practice (Score:5, Insightful)

      by lavaforge ( 245529 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @04:48PM (#2733916)
      I for one am glad that my government is competing with the private sector. This doubling of the research makes sure that it is more reliable when it is finished.

      How would you like to get a revolutionary new cancer drug, only to find out that the shotgunning method used by Celera missed a few steps? With the government and Celera both having data, errors can be found and corrected before they cost someone dearly.

      • Huh? (Score:2, Interesting)

        by zook ( 34771 )
        I don't disagree with your competition point, but your reason seems a bit strange.

        Cancer drugs, and drugs in general, will still go through many rounds of testing to measure their safety and efficacy. If a drug makes it through the testing and proves its worth, how much do we care if it was developed from faulty data? In this case the ends really do justify the means. Hell, I can randomly stick atoms together, and if I come up with something that cures cancer, I'd call that a success.

        Now, if I were a, say, cancer researcher, I'd want the most accurate sequence I could get, since it might make finding a useful drug much faster and easier. As a consumer, I want the researchers to have accurate sequences for just that reason, but I'm not too concerned about trusting what they come up with if it's not.

        • I was thinking more along the lines of preventative medicine. If cancer is genetic, and only one entity (gov, corp, etc) has that information, there will be nothing to check it against.

          I imagine an incident where some researcher is absolutely *sure* that sequence gaagattat is the cancer gene, when in fact in controls how many testicles I have

          • Re:Huh? (Score:1)

            by zook ( 34771 )
            That still doesn't make much sense.

            First, any drug company would buy the data if they had to when developing such a treatment. Celera is selling their data right now and the government data is freely available ( [nih.gov]).

            Second, using your example, if they thought that some sequence controlled cancer, but in fact controlled how many balls you have, then this would come out in testing. (Pun inadvertant, but amusing.)

    • There are a couple of possible scenarios that make government involvement worth considering in the case of research as fundamental as this. Perhaps the licensing of this technology will recoup in part the costs of supporting the research. Or perhaps, if they weren't involved, the company who achieved this privately would not engage in RAND licensing practices, thus denying future health care advances and perhaps resulting in preventable deaths. (RAND == Reasonable and non-discriminatory.)

    • Re:Poor practice (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Microlith ( 54737 )
      DUH. The government can't hold patents.

      And why shouldn't the Government compete with the private sector? Especially in cases like this, where the companies would undoubtedly make a move to restrict the information and use of it, it's good to have a group who is required to release it into the Public Domain later working on it.

      Of course, I could be totally wrong.
    • Government projects:
      NASA
      Panama Canal
      Mt. Rushmore
      Fermilab
      Manhattan Project

      The government should never be competing with the private sector.

      Get your head out of your ass and quit making stupid generalizations.

    • Re:Poor practice (Score:4, Insightful)

      by pubjames ( 468013 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @05:00PM (#2734006)
      I'm appalled that our government would waste so much money on something that could easily be done in the private sector.
      [...]
      The government should never be competing with the private sector.

      Hhmm...

      This type of view is often seen on Slashdot. It seems to be a common view in America. It is much less common over here in Europe. (But then we're a bunch of liberal losers, of course...)

      Your government put a man on the Moon. Do you think that would have happened if it was left up to the private sector? Similarly with the Genome project. There is masses of work to be done, expensive work, a lot of which is not going to have any immediate financial payback. (Despite what most people think, the mapping of the genome is just a small part of the task ahead to actually understand the whole thing).

      Just as the Moon landing would never have taken place without the government, neither would the complete mapping of the Human Genome, and Mankind would be poorer for it.

      As a Slashdot reader you may appreciate another perspective. The Internet came out of US government funded work. The Web came out of the CERN project, which is funded by governments internationally. Many of the most commonly-used formats on the web (JPEG, MPEG, MP3) came from EU funded projects. If it was left up to private corporations, it might have taken another twenty years (or more?) before we had anything resembling the Web we have today.

      I know a lot of you Americans hate paying taxes and distrust your government, but don't let that blind you to the fact that governments are often the driving force behind new technologies, not corporations.
      • >Your government put a man on the Moon. Do you think that would have happened if it was left up to the private sector?

        I'll leave arguing with your main points to other people, but I'd like to give you a link to a bunch of privately funded people who just might make something of the moon: the Artemis Project [asi.org].

        I wish them all the luck in the world, except for my luck. I need it myself.

    • buy a clue.
      The government can not patent something.

      If this is done with public funds, then it will be open to the public. If the pvt. sector does it, then they will patent it. they'll probably loose it in the long run.

    • Re:Poor practice (Score:4, Informative)

      by frenchs ( 42465 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @05:15PM (#2734088) Homepage
      Some people will see this as "a waste of money". But I would much rather the government spend money through grants and do some research itself, because they can't hold the patents on this information once they finish it. It's OUR money, so it's OUR information when they find it out.

      Chimera [ucsf.edu] (unix, linux, windows) is a molecular modeling program developed by UC San Francisco, but it was funded by a government grant from the NIH, so guess what, you can download it for free provided you don't want to make money using it.

      The NIH (government orginization) has actually REQUIRED [rcsb.org] that people that use their money to come up with a protein sequence should deposit it in a freely accessable database [rcsb.org]

      Also, just a side note. If anyone wants to download the program, just grab some protiens from the protien database and load them up. Some stuff you might find interesting in the way of proteins.

      tryptophan

      hemoglobin

      Alcohol Dehydrogenase [rcsb.org]

      DNA [rcsb.org] (not a protein, but oh well)

      Insulin [rcsb.org]

      more... [rcsb.org]

      Enjoy,
      Steve

    • I'm appalled that our government would waste so much money on something that could easily be done in the private sector. In fact, the last time I
      heard, they were actively competing with a private sector team in order to see who would first decode the human genome.

      This is pure science. The government should fund pure science. Technology is what the private sector should fund.

    • "I'm appalled that our government would waste so much money on something that could easily be done in the private sector."

      Firstly its not just your government spending money on this. A lot of it came from other governments. Indeed in Europe a large amount of the money came from the Welcome trust. Certainly it's this group that has spent a lot of the money going on decoding the genome, and providing base line annotation.

      Secondly its not clear that the private sector could do this. Although they have been involved late in the day, they were not when the early pioneering work which has made this possible, from Fred Sangers original work on sequencing technology, to all the mapping efforts, cloning techniques and so on. This of course includes most of the work that was done by Venter before Celera came into being.

      And third are you really suggesting that as soon as any company opens up, that the government should immediately shut down all resources that they are providing for a specific project.

      And finally of course the data which has been produced from the "public sector" (much of the funding for which has not come from your, or indeed any government), has been released freely into the public domain. In other words the rights are not owned by the government.

      Its easy to come out with a knee jerk libertarian "the free market can do anything" response to things. The reality is that it can't, and often doesn't. There is a big role for people doing things in other ways. Science in particular benefits from this. Its much easier to advance if you don't have to read pages of NDA's for every single piece of data that you need. And if the free software/open source community does not show you that, then what will.

      Phil
  • "Once again, we are seeing the fruits of the two key commitments of the Human Genome Project: to make the sequence freely available and to produce a quality finished sequence."

    How long would it take for politicians to understand that? Again, this shows that innovation can only come from having information/knowledge freely available.

    Just wishing that we had more enlightened politicians..... is this just a fat dream?

  • 24? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Byteme ( 6617 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @04:46PM (#2733902) Homepage
    I have 46. I am special.

    • Re:24? (Score:5, Informative)

      by bats ( 8748 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @04:55PM (#2733980) Homepage
      There are 24 chromosomes. There are 46 chromosomes. Stop! You're both right.

      The average human has 46 chromosomes. There are 23 pairs of them. Of the 23 pairs, 22 pairs consist of similarly constructed mates only differing in the base pairs (AGTC) -- but the structure of the thing is the same. The other set is the XY pair (which determines sex), which are structurally different, ie different sizes, shapes.

      So there are 24 kinds of chromosomes, of which most people have 46. Girls have 23 different kinds (no Y) while guys have all 24.

      • Re:24? (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Byteme ( 6617 )
        Then there is Down, Turner's and Klinefelter's syndromes. Down has an extra 21. Turner's is a monosomy X with sexually underdeveloped females. Klinefelter's syndrome are males with extra X chromos, XXY - XXXY. There is also XXX, XXXX and XXXXX female karyotypes with mild effects as the extra X's are inactivated and converted into Barr bodies.

        • minor addendum: there are also XYY males, who tend to suffer from testosterone poisoning. Not entirely a joke -- per a study made ca. 1970, about 1/3rd of chronically violent males in prison were XYY. (This factoid came up in one of my college biochemistry classes. Gods, I feel old :)

    • On the web, no one knows you are not a dog.

  • You almost got me with "chomosome". At first I thought this was about a religious artifact.
  • For anyone interested in a more detailed article, visit this link [nature.com]

    /wave
  • ... have deciphered the complete genetic instructions of a third chromosome, one of the 24 bundles of DNA that carry our genetic material.

    Wouldnt it be cool if they found an easter-egg in the "instructions"?

    or if there was a secret message encoded in them ala the Netscape Weenies message.
  • Though most of the issues are readily apparent and most people are at least partially familiar with them, there are some that I foun to be quite interesting (especially the commercialization aspect of genetic code):

    Ethical, legal, and social issues [ornl.gov]
  • http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/SportFit/AKC/Zanshin/V01 I02/art07.html
    The only Chomo that Some might know.

  • 3rd Chromosome (Score:2, Insightful)

    by ivrcti ( 535150 )
    As always the difference between the fool and the wiseman is knowing what to do with the information at hand....
  • For those who don't know, chomosome is actually the genetic code that makes one more or less like Noam Chomsky.
  • Great, but can I grow that third arm I've always wanted? NO! Damn hippy scientists.

    -Matt
    digitalmeca.com [digitalmeca.com]

    • Re:Whoohoo! (Score:2, Funny)

      by main() ( 147152 )

      > Great, but can I grow that third arm I've always wanted? NO! Damn hippy scientists.

      I have one for spanking the monkey and one for moving the mouse and clicking the buttons.

      What do I need a third one for?

      Si

  • XMEN (Score:2)

    by sabinm ( 447146 )
    Intriguingly, some people (37%) have an extra chunk of DNA in chromosome 20 and could have an extra copy of a specific gene of unknown function

    Make way for homo superior

    Cant wait till my kids start manifesting the X FACTOR
  • If you are interested in reading about genomics and you want a high level view that has enough science to be interesting without being too specialized, I strongly recommend Matt Ridley's book "Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters". Here's a link [amazon.com].

    The book has one chapter for each of the 23 chromosomes and it has some general discussion as well as some facts that are known or suspected about the sequences in that chromosome.

  • Department (Score:2, Funny)

    by Amaranth ( 87020 )
    Shouldn't this be the "All-your-Base-Pair-are-belong-to-us" department?

  • DNA Pic? (Score:2, Funny)

    by bwindle2 ( 519558 )
    Why does that DNA link go to a picture of Douglas Adams? Just because his initals are DNA doesn't make him the genetic code of us ;)

  • What does this say about us? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Zen Mastuh ( 456254 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @05:12PM (#2734072)
    From the article, my emphasis added:
    The discovery could shed light on why some people are more likely to develop common diseases such as diabetes, obesity or eczema
    because of their genes.

    It's a sad commentary on "civilized" society that three lifestyle-related diseases are presented in a sentence that places the blame on essentially defective genes. Diabetes, now reaching epidemic proportions in adults and children, is nearly always caused by a poor diet. Obesity is caused by poor diet and lack of exercise. As a former sufferer of eczema, I proved for myself that a lifestyle change could cure it. By converse, my lifestyle caused it.

    I'm not finding fault with the researchers or trying to cause a ruckus in general, but don't be surprised if these discoveries lead to a society where no one is aware that these (and other) diseases are a result of lifestyle, and every one is lined up at the doctor's office to shell out large sums of $$$ to have their "defective" genes fixed. Remember also that these diseases strain the bodily systems (or cause "imbalance" in non-allotropic medical parlance), and lead to other diseases, causing a potentially endless cycle ending only in bankruptcy/non-insurability/death...

    • This nature vs nurture debate is as old as the hills. In the end it is a little bit of both that has an impact. For example, by father eats nothing but red meat and potatoes and yet he is healthy as a horse - including healthily low cholesterol and blood pressure. There's got to be something hard coded in there to make that possible.

      • Do you know your dad's Blood Type? I bet it's "B". A majority of meat-and-potatoes dieters who resist heart disease are type B. Not that blood type is a causal factor (see "Eat Right for Your Type" by D'Adamo for interesting correlations...), but the Blood Type is probably correlated to your father's good health. It's true that there is a combination of nature and nurture at work; my post was just to point out that unhealthy lifestyles, which have become fashionable, are the cause behind these epidemics. The media, and maybe some of the researchers, can't make money by saying "Hey fatass--put down that chocolate dipped donut!", but they can make tons of money advertising expensive genetic treatments.

        • You have my whole hearted agreement on that. I am a big "no drug" person. The only time I take anything is when I have a headache and that is because I am a wimp. My girlfriend also read a book about how dehydration is the cause of many problems and that just by drinking water we could solve problems that medicine only covers (like indigestion).
    • If you could keep the life style you enjoy, and take a pill to cure any possible side effects, wouldn't you? I would.
      I exercise, but I HATE it with passion.
      I try to eat a well balanced diet, but I don't WANT to.

      Plus those thing can be caused genetically.

      • No, I don't. I used to, but grew tired of the myriad unpleasant side effects and successor diseases. Now that I have become aware of how my body feels as a result of healthy food and exercise, I never want to go back.

        You bring up a good point, though. Most people would do it. Most people would take a pill for their ulcer, then develop stomach cancer years later due to the lowered stomach acid levels caused by the ulcer meds. It's an endless cycle ('til death/yada) that causes everyone's health insurance premiums to go up. I haven't been to a doctor in two years (never happened before...), but no insurance company is offering me any discounts for living healthy. Hmmm....disease must be profitable, huh?

    • No, what does this say about YOU. (Score:5, Informative)

      by Xzzy ( 111297 ) <sether@@@tru7h...org> on Thursday December 20, 2001 @05:27PM (#2734159) Homepage
      > Diabetes, now reaching epidemic proportions in
      > adults and children, is nearly always caused by
      > a poor diet.

      Dude, feel free to talk about your eczema however you want because you probably know a fair a bit about it but don't EVEN go spouting this crap about diabetics unless you're going to get your facts straight.

      There's two types of diabetes. While I'll grant that one of them is triggered by lifestyle (but that's not all there is to it, else EVERY obese person in the world would be diabetic, which obviously isn't the case), the other is strictly hereditery.

      It usually hits kids just as they start going into puberty; sixth grade and around in there. It has nothing to do with lifestyle; I spent easily half my time tearing around the neighrbood with friends and I was within a few pounds of "average" weight, yet fate still plucked me out and gave me the disease.
      Unless of course you're prepared to claim that having an active childhood causes diabetes..

      Diabetes is hereditary. Fact, end of story. If I sound pissed off, it's because I am.
      • Dude, I know three diabetics. One has the kind you describe as hereditary. The other two are morbidly obese. Which is more common? I don't know...but don't go flying off the handle if someone comes up with statistics saying the obesity type is...

      • I bet you drank sugary drinks as a child, didn't you? Our bodies have evolved to digest normal quantities of natural sugars (fructose in fruits, lactose in mother's milk, glucose in fruits/vegetables/grains, etc...) found in their natural state. True, there is some genetic predisposition, but re-read my initial post to see that I didn't say that every case is strictly lifestyle-related.

        • > I bet you drank sugary drinks as a child, didn't you?

          Well duh, what kid exists that doesn't make it through childhood without a bit of kool-aid? My parents were never big soda drinkers, either. Anything we did have around the house was diet soda. And it was never with meals; was either fruit juice or milk at our house.

          > I didn't say that every case is strictly lifestyle-related.

          Well if 5-10 percent of all cases of diabetes are the childhood type 1 kind, that still leaves about 1.2 million people who develop the disease through no significant fault of their own (or as the case may be, their parents).

          So if you're going to make accusatory statements about lifestyle you need to take care to specify quantities better than by using the term "nearly always".

          1.2 million people is not "nearly always".

      • Speaking as a scientist... (Score:4, Informative)

        by Chico Science ( 151552 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @07:24PM (#2734915) Homepage
        I think I can shed some light on the subject...

        The pathology of diabetes is complex. First, one has two recognize there's two types of diabetes. Type 1, called juvenile or insulin-dependent, diabetes and type 2, or non-insulin-dependent, diabetes.

        Type 1 is most definitely genetic. While it doesn't have 100% concordance between identical twins, developmental factors can come into play, there is a genetic predisposition. Several genes have been linked with type I diabetes. The primary pathology of this disease is that it is an autoimmune disease. The immune system of the diabetic attacks the cells of the pancreas, depleting the organ of its ability to produce insulin.

        Type 2 is a far more complex disorder. The pathology of this disease is that the pancreas is able to produce insulin, albeit not as much as normal people. The significant issue is insulin resistance. The body starts to ignore the metabolic signals of insulin, which causes a feedback loop that ultimately taxes the pancreas and leads to depletion of the pancreatic insulin function (it peters out over time). Due to its complexity and the generalization that it is a disease of obesity, it was considered more of a behavioral disorder (at least more so than type 1). Research, however, is showing there are genetic predispositions to type 2 diabetes (some of this is not even in the genome of the diabetic, but int the small chromosome of the mitochondria, the energy producing organelle in the cells). Also, studies are finding there also seems to be some autoimmunity involved in type 2 diabetes. Lastly, there appears to be a trigger event, believed to possibly be viral.

        So, while type 2 diabetes is indeed exacerbated by obesity, one cannot call it a disease of diet.

        --

        On the topic of obesity, research is showing that there are more factors involved than 'being lazy and eating crap'. On the whole, 'being lazy and eating crap' is bad for your health and its true that our society is progressively leading less healthier lifestyles... but one should note some people can eat crap and not exercise and be perfectly svelte and healthy. Then there are people like one of my colleagues who is a world-class longcourse triathelete, exercises more than anyone I know, eats an exceptionally healthy diet, and can count the number of times she's been sick in the last decade on one hand.. yet she her body mass index puts her in the obese category.

        Increasingly, research is showing that adipose (fat) tissue should be considered an organ of the endocrine system. The complex events of endocrine singaling are what regulate resting metabolic rate, glucose and insulin levels, fat metabolism and deposition, caloric intake, response to diet, etc. It is a very complex system that has a lot of factors, including genetic ones.. as well as ones which may be environmental or behavioral but have very definite and difficult to reverse pathologies.

        The value of genetics research, pharmacogenetics and pharmacology should not be shrugged off. Yep, put down the donut is good advice, but let's not ignore complexicity because a simple answer sounds nice.

        --

        Ciao, C.Sc.
        • Mod the above poster up, there's some good points there.

          I also want to add one personal example to the debate concerning type II diabetes and genetics vs. behavior. My stepmother was recently diagnosed with Type II Diabetes, and she happens to be rail-thin, and has been all her life. I suspect she may even have been anorexic at one time, although I do not know for sure. I do know that our family doctor specifically cautioned her against trying to self-treat using diet and exercise, due to her already unusually low weight. Her father, who I believe was also thin, was Type II diabetic. So, that's my anecdote on what appears to be an example on the genetic side of the suceptibility curve.

          I, on the other hand, spend my days indoors in a lab, and buy twinkies in bulk. Yet both my weight and blood sugar levels are completely normal.

          So, as Chico Science says, "So, while type 2 diabetes is indeed exacerbated by obesity, one cannot call it a disease of diet."
    • Sorry, but diabetes is NOT a lifestyle disease.

      How can a perfectally healthy and active 14 year old who eats a healthy diet because he is very interested in health and nutrition (he wants to be a nutritionist) suddenly come down with diabetes? his lifestyle? that is pure bull-crap.

      Sorry but anyone that knows more than what filth they spew from their mouths knows that diabetes is NOT a lifestyle disease (STD's? those are lifestyle diseases... you cant get herpies from eating too much or gonneria from sitting on the couch)

      Please people, diabetes is a disease that has been proven to have genetic ties, just do some basic research on the disease and see.
      • Adult onset(type 2) Diabetes is CERTAINLY a lifestyle disease. Type 1 ("Juvinile") diabetes is not, which is painfully obvious.

        Type 1 and Type 2 differ significantly in the cause, but are similar in effect.

        "Adult Onset" is caused by people who continue to eat large amounts of carbohydrates, which continually pump larger and larger qunatities of insulin into their system. Over a very long period of time, they build up insulin resistance, and eventually their bodies are trying to produce massive amounts of insulin. This causes a failure point, in which they can not produce insulin any longer. The predisposition to this is genetic in nature, but somewhere around 1 in 3 people has this genetic predisposition, which is demonstrated in the world's massive pandemic of diabetes

        "Juvinile" is not environmental in nature, but a true defect in the original ability to produce insulin.

        :{
    • Diabetes, now reaching epidemic proportions in adults and children, is nearly always caused by a poor diet.

      You are severely misinformed. Juvenile-onset diabetes is never caused by a poor diet... it is caused by a genetic disorder affecting the pancreas. I don't know about you, but I'm not going to blame my friend's internal organs dying within the first ten years of life on diet...

      Do not compare Eczema (an annoyance) with Juvenile-onset Diabetes. You just show your ignorance. Please check this [healthatoz.com] link for more information about type 1 (Juvenile-onset) diabetes.


    • Yes, lifestyle changes can cure certain diseases. That dosen't mean people weren't genetically predisposed to the problems.

      It's almost impossible for me to gain weight, for example, because of my genes. I can't get above 130 lbs without intensive exercise.

      To change the emphasis of the sentance you cited;

      The discovery could shed light on why some
      people are more likely to develop common
      diseases

      Just because lifestyle can be changed to help with a disease dosen't mean that some people aren't a lot more succeptible to particular conditions. The fact that a particular substance can be used to cure a condition does not prove that lack of said substance therefore 'caused' the condition.
    • Diabetes, now reaching epidemic proportions in adults and children, is nearly always caused by a poor diet. Obesity is caused by poor diet and lack of exercise. As a former sufferer of eczema, I proved for myself that a lifestyle change could cure it. By converse, my lifestyle caused it.

      Tall people have tall childen, Chinese people have Chinese children, and fat people (often) have fat children. It's pretty simple. Yes, obesity may be the *direct* result of over-eating, but this behaviour is driven to a large extent by the innate characteristics of our bodies and the personalities we inherit from our parents. There are *many* factors which cause people to become obese - most can be controlled, but they're most certainly *all* influenced by a person's genes. BTW I'm not fat nor am I defending lazy fat people. I'm just trying to tell you it's all about genetics.

      You are (almost) completely mistaken about diabetes. There are two very distinct kinds of diabetes. Type 1, insulin dependent diabetes is when the pancreas shuts off completely, and often begins during childhood, in otherwise perfectly healthy children. My sister is Type 1 diabetic, she eats well, and she runs marathons. She tests her blood sugar four times a day, and has to take insulin injections two or three times daily. Type 1 diabetes is *NOT* a fat people's disease. Interestingly, the cause of childhood diabetes is not understood. While in some cases it can be hereditary, more ofen it just happens for no apparent reason. Because of this, it is seldom diagnosed correctly the first time, in children.

      You're correct about type II diabetes, it is usually caused by obesity. Generally, type II diabetes does *not* mean you are completely insulin dependent, as with childhood diabetes. You take insulin as needed and you have to watch your sugar intake, but it is not as severe as the total failure of the pancreas, as with childhood diabetes.

      IANAD (I am not a dermatologist), but my understanding from talking to a friend who has severe eczema is that it is a type of skin allergy which is usually inherited, and is common in people with other kinds of allergies. I am surprised to hear that you were able to control it though a change of lifestyle, unless by that you mean just staying away from things you're allergic to. Again, I don't know much about eczema, but I've seen a severe case of it, and so I'm curious as to what you did to cure it or cause it.
  • Dammit, If DNA was open source it wouldn't take that long, or if God would've commented his code and aligned properly using atleast 4 tabs for nested statements it would be a lot easier !
    • What, DNA *isn't* open source? Does this mean the Human Genome Project is illegal because according to the DMCA we can't reverse engineer the content?

      (consulting my EULA)
  • The academic consortium and Celera lied when they announce completion of the genome in 2000. All they had was a rough draft of the ACGT order. The precise ordering, gene decoding, and followup work is continuing more slowly. The three shortest of the 24 unique human chromosomes have now been decode, with the rest by 2005 or sooner.
    • It depends on what you mean by 'completion'. This is a very long and involved project. Sequencing was a milestone, but it's not the end of the process. Decoding is also a milestone, but it's not the end of the process either. Understanding the genes are will probably take decades.
  • Funny, how did they get my DNA without my knowledge!?

    1% of a very large number is still a very large number
  • The 20th,21st,and 22nd chromosomes look drastically smaller than the 1st,2nd, and third will that correspond with how much work will be needed to decipher them?

    And does anyone have an idea how long it will take to put this inforamtion to practical use?

    And as we discover more and more chromosmes will there be repeated parts in the other unkown ones that will save us time?

    Just some questions i had.

  • Not the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics (Score:3, Informative)

    by JeffL ( 5070 ) on Thursday December 20, 2001 @06:13PM (#2734523) Homepage
    The work was actually done at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute [sanger.ac.uk] near the town of Cambridge, not at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics [ox.ac.uk], part of the University of Oxford.

    The WTCHG is actually a cool place that looks for genes for complex diseases [ox.ac.uk], writes useful software [ox.ac.uk], and are heavily invested in using Linux as a scientific computing platform [colorado.edu].

    They have an 86 [colorado.edu] cpu [colorado.edu] Mosix/Linux cluster, and two 8 CPU, 8GB [colorado.edu] machines running Linux.

  • Can someone tell me what the difference is between the "rough draft" that was finished in the spring and the "gold standard" that this decoding is part of? How are they different? How can the completion of the Human Genome Project be asserted when there are still plenty of missing pieces? If this is only the 3rd chromosome that was "fully" decoded (fully in quotes because there still are 4 gaps in this one), then how can scientists claim that they're close to being finished?

    It sounds a bit like a play for funding.

    Scientist: Look how great our work is! We've finished decoding the Human Genome!

    Funding source: Um. There are lots of gaps here. Isn't this work unfinished?

    Scientist: That's why we need more funding!

    Funding source: (scratches head) Uhhh...okay.

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