Thursday, January 26, 2006

All are children of Adam

NEW YORK, Jan. 25 - A large proportion of Ashkenazi Jews and North African Arabs with Parkinson’s disease carry the same single gene mutation, according to two studies.

The mutation -- apparently derived from a single “founder” individual several centuries ago -- was found in 18.3% of a cohort of 120 Ashkenazi Jews treated for Parkinson’s at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Beth Israel Medical Center.

The same mutation was found in 39% of a cohort of 76 Arabs with the disease, French researchers said. Both studies were published as letters in the Jan. 26 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

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