Slashdot Mirror
Baldness Gene Discovered — 1 In 7 Men "At Risk"
FiReaNGeL writes "Researchers conducted a genome-wide association study of 1,125 Caucasian men who had been assessed for male pattern baldness. They found two previously unknown genetic variants on chromosome 20 that substantially increased the risk of male pattern baldness. They then confirmed these findings in an additional 1,650 Caucasian men. 'If you have both the risk variants we discovered on chromosome 20 and the unrelated known variant on the X chromosome, your risk of becoming bald increases sevenfold. What's startling is that one in seven men have both of those risk variants.'" So maybe gene therapy will finally have a real purpose.
Of course, I'd argue that you're never sure where science is going to go, so pursuing different avenues is important, even if it seems a little less useful or even vain. In this case, I could foresee a situation where finding a solution to a rather simple problem, baldness, could help develop methods that would eventually be useful for dealing with cancer and Alzheimer's, which I can only imagine would be more complex to deal with. Also, you can't forget that its not like the entire community focuses on one topic at a time. Parallel research in separate but related areas tend to feedback off of each other; having too many people working on the same thing can at times only slow it down, since so much time is wasted either reinventing the wheel multiple times, or trying to keep things organized.
Of course baldness is a disease. A minor one at first sight, but it can lower people's self-esteem and cause severe psychological diseases, such as depression.
Not true. It does increase my self-esteem, knowing that my baldness is due to high testosterone. And I believe that bald people are more active in sex than others. Anyone losing their self-esteem due to baldness, just realize that you are more 'male' than non-bald others and cheer up.
As someone with depression, i'll tell you that minor physical imperfections do not cause or contribute to this problem.
Depression is an emotional reaction to sweeping, systemic problems in our society.
Have you also been diagnosed with egotism?
You've literally written off the entire spectrum of depressions in favor of your own limited definition.
Does losing a spouse/pet/job qualify as "an emotional reaction to sweeping, systemic problems in our society"? Because people get clinically depressed for those and millions of other much more trivial reasons. I could list another 50 examples, but I'm not sure it would change your self-centered world view.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Yup. The key is to note that the extra gene is quite common, so is not disabling, and probably has advantages. At a guess, it will be linked to increased testosterone. It would possibly be just as valid to call it the "Road Rage Gene". Nor is that a bad thing. Stupid on a road, but a lot of people respond positively to having aggressive defenders around them. (Ok, call it the Pit Bull gene.)
So having isolated out an important gene, and hopefully setting up a test for it, the next bit of research can be into finding out what else it is associated with. Should all vice-presidents be expected to carry it?
On the other hand, the baldest guy I know (for his age) is mild mannered, intelligent, strong in opinions but polite, and great to work with. So all this testosterone theorizing may be so much crap. It may be associated with testosterone tolerance. Now that is worth researching.
I don't get it, what's with the random dig at "profitability"? And why chromosome 21, in particular? Every chromosomes has genes related to various diseases, all of which could use "some of that" gene therapy.
Assuming you are talking about Down syndrome (since an Alzheimer's treatment would be stupendously profitable), that doesn't even make any sense: it's "trisomy 21", a duplication of the chromosome, and completely unrelated to gene therapy.
All in all, a bit of a stretch, just to get in knee-jerk dig at the pharmaceutical industry, wouldn't you say?
sic transit gloria mundi