Genetic Epidemiology, Translational Neurogenomics, Psychiatric Genetics and Statistical Genetics Laboratories investigate the pattern of disease in families, particularly identical and non-identical twins, to assess the relative importance of genes and environment in a variety of important health problems.
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PMID
11931686
TITLE
Heritabilities of apolipoprotein and lipid levels in three countries.
ABSTRACT
This study investigated the influence of genes and environment on the variation of apolipoprotein and lipid levels, which are important intermediate phenotypes in the pathways toward cardiovascular disease. Heritability estimates are presented, including those for apolipoprotein E and AII levels which have rarely been reported before. We studied twin samples from the Netherlands (two cohorts; n = 160 pairs, aged 13-22 and n = 204 pairs, aged 34-62), Australia (n = 1362 pairs, aged 28-92) and Sweden (n = 302 pairs, aged 42-88). The variation of apolipoprotein and lipid levels depended largely on the influences of additive genetic factors in each twin sample. There was no significant evidence for the influence of common environment. No sex differences in heritability estimates for any phenotype in any of the samples were observed. Heritabilities ranged from 0.48-0.87, with most heritabilities exceeding 0.60. The heritability estimates in the Dutch samples were significantly higher than in the Australian sample. The heritabilities for the Swedish were intermediate to the Dutch and the Australian samples and not significantly different from the heritabilities in these other two samples. Although sample specific effects are present, we have shown that genes play a major role in determining the variance of apolipoprotein and lipid levels in four independent twin samples from three different countries.
DATE PUBLISHED
2002 Apr
HISTORY
PUBSTATUS PUBSTATUSDATE
pubmed 2002/04/05 10:00
medline 2002/08/16 10:01
entrez 2002/04/05 10:00
AUTHORS
NAME COLLECTIVENAME LASTNAME FORENAME INITIALS AFFILIATION AFFILIATIONINFO
Beekman M Beekman Marian M Molecular Epidemiology Section, Department of Medical Statistics and Bioinformatics, Leiden University Center, Leiden, The Netherlands. M.Beekman@LUMC.nl
Heijmans BT Heijmans Bastiaan T BT
Martin NG Martin Nicholas G NG
Pedersen NL Pedersen Nancy L NL
Whitfield JB Whitfield John B JB
DeFaire U DeFaire Ulf U
van Baal GC van Baal G Caroline M GC
Snieder H Snieder Harold H
Vogler GP Vogler George P GP
Slagboom PE Slagboom P Eline PE
Boomsma DI Boomsma Dorret I DI
INVESTIGATORS
JOURNAL
VOLUME: 5
ISSUE: 2
TITLE: Twin research : the official journal of the International Society for Twin Studies
ISOABBREVIATION: Twin Res
YEAR: 2002
MONTH: Apr
DAY:
MEDLINEDATE:
SEASON:
CITEDMEDIUM: Print
ISSN: 1369-0523
ISSNTYPE: Print
MEDLINE JOURNAL
MEDLINETA: Twin Res
COUNTRY: Australia
ISSNLINKING: 1369-0523
NLMUNIQUEID: 9815819
PUBLICATION TYPE
PUBLICATIONTYPE TEXT
Journal Article
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S.
Twin Study
COMMENTS AND CORRECTIONS
GRANTS
GRANTID AGENCY COUNTRY
AG04563 NIA NIH HHS United States
HL55976 NHLBI NIH HHS United States
GENERAL NOTE
KEYWORDS
MESH HEADINGS
DESCRIPTORNAME QUALIFIERNAME
Adolescent
Adult
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Analysis of Variance
Apolipoprotein A-II blood
Apolipoproteins E genetics
Australia epidemiology
Cardiovascular Diseases genetics
Cholesterol, HDL blood
Cholesterol, LDL blood
Cohort Studies blood
Diseases in Twins genetics
Female genetics
Genetic Predisposition to Disease genetics
Humans genetics
Lipids blood
Male blood
Middle Aged blood
Netherlands epidemiology
Sweden epidemiology
SUPPLEMENTARY MESH
GENE SYMBOLS
CHEMICALS
REGISTRYNUMBER NAMEOFSUBSTANCE
0 Apolipoprotein A-II
0 Apolipoproteins E
0 Cholesterol, HDL
0 Cholesterol, LDL
0 Lipids
OTHER ID's