Sewaybricker LE, Melhorn SJ, Askren MK, Webb MF, Tyagi V, De Leon MRB, Grabowski TJ, Seeley WW, Schur EA. BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES The salience network (SN) comprises brain regions that evaluate cues in the external environment in light of internal signals. We examined the SN response to meal intake and potential genetic and acquired influences on SN […]
Avery AR, Duncan GE Approximately 12% of U.S. adults have type 2 diabetes (T2D). Diagnosed T2D is caused by a combination of genetic and environmental factors including age and lifestyle. In adults 45 years and older, the Discordant Twin (DISCOTWIN) consortium of twin registries from Europe and Australia showed a moderate-to-high contribution of genetic factors […]
Goldfarb DS, Avery AR, Beara-Lasic L, Duncan GE, Goldberg J. Background Nephrolithiasis is a complex phenotype influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. Previously we found a genetic component to stone disease using a sample of male twin pairs. We now report on the genetic contribution to stones in a sample of female and male […]
Ramchandani MS, Jing L, Russell RM, Tran T, Laing KJ, Magaret AS, Selke S, Cheng A, Huang ML, Xie H, Strachan E, Greninger AL, Roychoudhury P, Jerome KR, Wald A, Koelle DM. BACKGROUND Orolabial herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) infection has wide severity spectrum in immunocompetent persons. To study the role of viral genotype […]
Telfer S, Bigham JJ, Sudduth ASM. Identifying environmental risk factors for musculoskeletal disorders is challenging due to the number of potential confounders. Twins are of particular interest for researchers interested in studying these types of problems due to their inherent control for the influence of genetic factors. In twin studies, this population can allow environmental […]
Zadro JR, Shirley D, Duncan GE, Ferreira PH. BACKGROUND It is unknown how familial factors influence the recovery from low back pain (LBP) and the maintenance activity behaviours. We aimed to investigate whether individual and within-family physical activity (PA) and sedentary behaviour influenced recovery from LBP, and maintenance of PA and sedentary behaviour in people […]
Duncan GE, Seto E, Avery AR, Oie M, Carvlin G, Austin E, Shirai JH, He J, Ockerman B, Novosselov I. Background There is considerable evidence that exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) air pollution is associated with a variety of adverse health outcomes. However, true exposure-outcome associations are hampered by measurement issues, including compliance and […]
Berkseth KE, Rubinow KB, Melhorn SJ, Webb MF, De Leon MRB, Marck BT, Matsumoto AM, Amory JK, Page ST, Schur EA. Objective This study aimed to determine whether a relationship was evident between gliosis in the mediobasal hypothalamus (MBH) and plasma testosterone concentrations in men. Methods A total of 41 adult men (aged 18-50 years) […]
Strachan E, Zhao J, Roy-Byrne PP, Fowler E, Bacus T. Major depression is a complex disorder with no single, direct causal mechanism. Morbidity has been linked to genetic processes, developmental history, and unique environmental exposures. Epigenetic mechanisms, especially DNA methylation, are also likely important factors in the pathogenesis of major depressive disorder (MDD). A community-based […]
Kim S, Wyckoff J, Morris AT, Succop A, Avery A, Duncan GE, Michal Jazwinski S. Variation in healthy aging and lifespan is ascribed more to various non-genetic factors than to inherited genetic determinants, and a major goal in aging research is to reveal the epigenetic basis of aging. One approach to this goal is to […]
Peng H, Zhu Y, Strachan E, Fowler E, Bacus T, Roy-Byrne P, Goldberg J, Vaccarino V, Zhao J. Objective DNA methylation has been associated with both early life stress and depression. This study examined the combined association of DNA methylation at multiple CpG probes in five stress-related genes with depressive symptoms, and tested whether these […]
Cook DJ, Duncan G, Sprint G, Fritz R. Smart cities use information and communication technologies (ICT) to scale services include utilities and transportation to a growing population. In this article we discuss how smart city ICT can also improve healthcare effectiveness and lower healthcare cost for smart city residents. We survey current literature and introduce […]
Tsang S, Duncan GE, Dinescu D, Turkheimer E. Background Body Mass Index (BMI), like most human phenotypes, is substantially heritable. However, BMI is not normally distributed; the skew appears to be structural, and increases as a function of age. Moreover, twin correlations for BMI commonly violate the assumptions of the most common variety of the […]
Cohen-Cline H, Beresford SA, Barrington W, Matsueda R, Wakefield J, Duncan GE. Social capital is associated with depression independently of individual-level risk factors. We used a sample of 1586 same-sex twin pairs to test the association between seven measures of social capital and two related measures of neighborhood characteristics with depressive symptoms accounting for uncontrolled […]
Cohen-Cline H, Beresford SAA, Barrington WE, Matsueda RL, Wakefield J, Duncan GE. Background Depression is an important contributor to the global burden of disease. Besides several known individual-level factors that contribute to depression, there is a growing recognition that neighbourhood environment can also profoundly affect mental health. This study assessed associations between three neighbourhood constructs-socioeconomic […]
Melhorn SJ, Askren MK, Chung WK, Kratz M, Bosch TA, Tyagi V, Webb MF, De Leon MRB, Grabowski TJ, Leibel RL, Schur EA. Background Variants in the first intron of the fat mass and obesity-associated (FTO) gene increase obesity risk. People with “high-risk” FTO genotypes exhibit preference for high-fat foods, reduced satiety responsiveness, and greater […]
Rhew IC, Kosterman R, Duncan GE, Mair C. Objective The purpose of this study was to examine whether neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation and alcohol outlet density are associated with hazardous drinking using a co-twin design to control for confounding because of genetic and shared environmental factors. Method The study sample included cross-sectional data from 1,996 same-sex […]
Schur E, Carnell S. Purpose of Review Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) using visual food cues provides insight into brain regulation of appetite in humans. This review sought evidence for genetic determinants of these responses. Recent Findings Echoing behavioral studies of food cue responsiveness, twin study approaches detect significant inherited influences on brain response to […]
Silventoinen K, Jelenkovic A, Hopper JL, Busjahn A, Cozen W, Mack TM, Sumathipala A, Harris JR, Goldberg JH, Harden KP, Duncan GE, Buchwald D, Turkheimer E, Kaprio J, et al. Whether monozygotic (MZ) and dizygotic (DZ) twins differ from each other in a variety of phenotypes is important for genetic twin modeling and for inferences […]
Eney AE, Tsang S, Delaney JA, Turkheimer E, Duncan GE. Background Consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages, such as soda, have been shown to play an important role in weight gain. Although soda consumption has been associated with body mass index (BMI) in many studies, it has been difficult to ascertain a true causal relationship between soda […]
