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“A University of Michigan Medical School rheumatologist and his colleagues are beginning to comprehend how identical twins can be so different when it comes to the development of diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis. This newfound understanding and appreciation stems from the recent findings of three over-expressed genes in RA that were not previously linked with the ailment. This discovery could provide the necessary avenues for understanding the widely variable nature of RA and open the door for new and improved treatment.”
“Rheumatoid arthritis is a painful, chronic disease that affects about two-million Americans. It's also genetic -- but most of the time, only one twin in a pair will inherit it.”
"They look the same ... sound the same ... and share the same genetic code. But what has stumped scientists -- why some of them develop genetic diseases while their twin stays healthy. "That brings the question whether there is beyond the genes, whether there is another factor that is playing a role," says Joseph Holoshitz, M.D. and rheumatologist at the University of Michigan." http://bit.ly/1e7DklI
Via The New Media Moguls
ABOUT THE STUDY: The advantage of studying twins is that they start out with the same genetic information, so differences in the way the genes act can be attributed to differences in the person's surroundings. Those differences could cause a random genetic mutation, or affect how DNA is packaged. Only 15% of identical twins will both develop as rheumatoid arthritis. To find out why, the UM scientists compared gene expression patterns of 11 pairs of monozygotic twins who shared the same egg and were genetically identical, but only one of them had rheumatoid arthritis. In addition to the three new overexpressed genes, the researchers also found that non-genetic factors influenced the action of these genes, and that if only one twin in the family had rheumatoid arthritis, the actions of the genes were different than if neither twin had rheumatoid arthritis.