WOW African-American Gene Linked to Alzheimer’s Risk A variant of a gene involved in cholesterol and lipid metabolism, ABCA7, appears to be a stronger risk factor for late-onset Alzheimer’s disease in African Americans than in non-Hispanic whites of European ancestry. In the largest genome-wide association study conducted to date in African Americans, the Alzheimer’s Disease Genetics Consortium and Columbia University Medical Center, New York City, researchers analyzed genetic data from 5,896 participants age 60 or older, of whom 1,968 had Alzheimer’s disease and the rest were cognitively normal (Reitz et al., 2013). The gene variants associated with increased Alzheimer’s disease risk in African Americans matched variants previously identified as risk factors in white Americans of European ancestry. However, the ABCA7 gene variant almost doubled the risk of Alzheimer’s disease in African Americans, whereas variants in the same gene increased risk by only 10 to 20 percent in whites. The risk from the ABCA7 gene variant was as strong in African Americans as that from the apolipoprotein E ɛ4 (APOE ɛ4) allele, the most important known genetic risk factor for late-onset Alzheimer’s in whites. Although preliminary, these findings suggest that the two racial groups may have different genetic risk profiles for the most common form of Alzheimer’s dementia.
Posted on: Tue, 22 Jul 2014 18:20:41 +0000
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