Hoping to shed more light on inherited traits – and potentially give scientists and doctors new tools to fight some genetic conditions – theorists at SFI are piecing together a model for how the same genes from mothers and fathers behave differently as a child grows, according to an Albuquerque Journal article describing the work of SFI Professor Jon Wilkins and Omidyar Fellow Jeremy Van Cleve.
Doctors and scientists searching for ways to treat genetic conditions tend to focus their efforts on drugs that hit the gas or put the brakes on trouble-making genes, Jeremy explains in the article. "But it’s not easy to affect trouble-making genes without understanding why they’re making trouble, and, unfortunately, scientists still have a way to go in that regard."
The two say it’s important to update the theory and try to explain the wrinkles in the model.
Read the Albuquerque Journal article (June 13, 2011)
Read about a recent SFI working group that began to examine current theory.