Recently identified gene mutation increases the risk of developing type 2 diabetes tenfold. It was found in the DNA of the population of Greenland.
 
The study by scientists from Copenhagen gives a new perspective on innate predisposition and the real danger of diabetes.
 
Of course, the presence of the mutation TBC1D4, is not confined only within the largest island on the planet. It has already detected among many Europeans suffering from diabetes.
 
Its "arms" consists in the development of insulin resistance in muscle.
 
The discovery allows for harder prevention of diseases and the development of new techniques for treatment.
 
"We know that each of us has his heredity, which, unfortunately, when diabetes is critical. It is not enough to become diabetics. We do not inherit the disease, and the tendency of its manifestation.
 
Our meeting with a number of external factors such as viruses, chemicals, and other stressful situations may trigger a series of autoimmune processes in our body that damage and destroy cells of the pancreas that produce the hormone insulin, "comment the investigators.
 
They point out that diabetes is not a disease, as it causes many damages to the human body.
 
"We can not change our heredity, but we can change our lifestyle.
 
If you take care of your health in time through healthy eating and daily physical activity we can gain skills for coping with stress alone can reduce the likelihood of falling ill from diabetes, "concluded the report by researchers from Copenhagen.

Zebrafish with very weak muscles helped scientists decode the elusive genetic mutation responsible for Native American myopathy, a rare, hereditary muscle disease that afflicts Native Americans in North Carolina.

Scientists led by John Kuwada, professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology at the University of Michigan, and Hiromi Hirata of the National Institute of Genetics in Japan originally identified the gene in mutant zebrafish that exhibited severe muscle weakness. Native American myopathy causes muscle weakness from birth and other severe problems that can lead to death before adulthood.

The findings appear in the journal Nature Communications.

The responsible gene encodes for a muscle protein called Stac3, which in turn regulates a physiological process required for muscle contraction. The muscles of zebrafish and people with the genetic mutation don't make normal Stac3 protein and the muscles don't contract effectively.

Scientists established the importance of Stac3 for muscle function in zebrafish by studying the small fish physiologically and genetically. Scientists then looked at the human version of the gene, and found that the gene was mutated in people suffering from Native American myopathy.

For many degenerative muscle diseases few drugs help, largely because scientists don't know the genes responsible for many of these muscle diseases, making it difficult to develop drugs and other therapies that target the condition. The discovery of the gene for Native American myopathy, however, may help develop drugs to treat the myopathy, as well as other related muscle diseases.

Bulgarian scientists have discovered a new disease. It is a neurological and is caused by mutation of genes, said Prof. Ivaylo Tarnev.

New diagnosis called autosomal recessive congenital ataxia. It is accompanied by oftalmopareza and mental retardation.

The disease is due to a mutation in a gene which encodes a metabotropic glutamate receptor 1 (mGluR1) on chromosome 6q24.

The results of the Bulgarian medics were published in the prestigious scientific journal American Journal of Human Genetics.