Lean Gene ups the risk of Diabetes and Heart Disease

[Parker]

http://beta.news.yahoo.com/lean-gene-ups-risk-heart-disease-diabetes-170721210.html

[burn2live]

http://beta.news.yahoo.com/lean-gene-ups-risk-heart-disease-diabetes-170721210.html

Interesting, the masters thesis I'm currently writing is based on the changes in insulin signalling with knockout of the IRS2 gene

[The True Adonis]

[Tre]

Skinny fat twinks are just fucked.  Or maybe we're the lucky ones in all this?? 

[Parker]

Interesting, the masters thesis I'm currently writing is based on the changes in insulin signalling with knockout of the IRS2 gene

Sooooo, what does this mean to your thesis?

[The Abdominal Snoman]

nicely played

[The Abdominal Snoman]

In my opinion "skinny fat" is probably the worst thing you can be. What it means to me is you never worked out in your life, you eat like shit, and the fat doesn't show on the outside but is building up on the inside.

[Fallsview]

This is the original Mean Gene....

[burn2live]

Sooooo, what does this mean to your thesis?

Not a whole lot. lol. Mine is related to the second of the insulin receptor substrates. IRS1 codes for the first. IRS1 knockout mice tend to show large decreases in body size and weight (~50% smaller I think) and slight insulin resistance. IRS2 knockout male mice are severely diabetic and die from severe hyperglycaemia at about 13-14 weeks, but only have bodyweight/body size decreases of ~10% and have developmental abnormalities of a few specific organs.

As an aside, I haven't read the study, but it sounds like a genome wide association study (GWAS). I think studies like these are sometimes a bit overstated. They are reflective of population traits and are not necessarily applicable at an individual level. (At least that's what I was taught!)

[Parker]

Not a whole lot. lol. Mine is related to the second of the insulin receptor substrates. IRS1 codes for the first. IRS1 knockout mice tend to show large decreases in body size and weight (~50% smaller I think) and slight insulin resistance. IRS2 knockout male mice are severely diabetic and die from severe hyperglycaemia at about 13-14 weeks, but only have bodyweight/body size decreases of ~10% and have developmental abnormalities of a few specific organs.

As an aside, I haven't read the study, but it sounds like a genome wide association study (GWAS). I think studies like these are sometimes a bit overstated. They are reflective of population traits and are not necessarily applicable at an individual level. (At least that's what I was taught!)

What do you think about "junk DNA"? What are your theories?

[G_Thang]

b e a n e r s and black folks' dietary habits right up there.

[US MUSL]

Pretty sure I have this gene. I have been very lean my entire life, have had high cholesterol since my early 20's, and the older I get the more sensitive I am to simple carbs.

[burn2live]

What do you think about "junk DNA"? What are your theories?

Last semester I remember a lecturer discussing this and saying that more evidence is gathering that "junk DNA" is not junk, but rather has regulatory functions. So it may not be directly expressed, but it does have influences on other genetic material and mechanisms

[Parker]

Last semester I remember a lecturer discussing this and saying that more evidence is gathering that "junk DNA" is not junk, but rather has regulatory functions. So it may not be directly expressed, but it does have influences on other genetic material and mechanisms

Basically, that they have to be "turned" on? In a sense activated? There is a theory that we can be "higher" individuals, and that "junk DNA" points to that---that as you said, they are regulatory.

[burn2live]

Basically, that they have to be "turned" on? In a sense activated? There is a theory that we can be "higher" individuals, and that "junk DNA" points to that---that as you said, they are regulatory.

I'm not sure. In some cases, yeh I'd say there is the need to "switch on" this DNA. But as far as I'm aware it's more active than people had originally thought. I'm not sure if switching on all this "junk DNA" would make us higher individuals. Different genes are switched on and off all the time for different reasons. "Switching on" every piece of DNA in the body at the same time would probably result in a lot of dysfunction and not a "higher" individual. Just speculating here, I'm by no means a geneticist! lol