Gene raises asthma risk, offers treatment

[FourScore]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Researchers studying an isolated community of farmers have identified a new gene linked with asthma and said it might be used both to diagnose the condition and perhaps to treat it.

Variations in the gene, known as CHI3L1, can either promote or protect against asthma, they wrote in a report in the New England Journal of Medicine.

"There is a good deal more we need to find out about this connection, but now we know where to look," Carole Ober, a professor of human genetics at the University of Chicago who led the study, said in a statement.

Her team studied a group of Hutterites, members of an Anabaptist group who follow an agrarian lifestyle. They intermarry and thus have a clear genetic lineage that is easy to follow. They also suffer from high rates of asthma.

The researchers homed in on a gene called CHI3L1, which affects levels of a specific compound linked with susceptibility to asthma, overreaction of the bronchial tubes and damaged lung function.

One version raises levels of this compound, YKL-40, while another lowers it and protects people against asthma, they found...

http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSN0938510020080409

[ColbertWatcher]

1. I say: "Send this Gene to Gitmo! Stat!" n/t

Wait, what?

Oh, genes! Okay.

Just as long as they don't interfere with creationism, we're cool.