Doctors find critical links in Jews of the Diaspora useful for medical treatment

by Carol Forsloff - If the Jews aren't the only chosen people, they
were certainly genetically designed to stick together in many ways, as
scientists have found genetic links showing their connections to one
another over centuries.

Jews often reflect on the fact they are

different.  Social scientists, historians and scientists have long
debated whether they are a race or a culture and if there was evidence
to support a special group with defined genetic history.

Now the
Albert Einstein School of Medicine tells us, yes there is.


Scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University
and New York University School of Medicine recently published a studying
showing Jews are a widely dispersed group but have a common ancestry.
In fact Jews from different regions of the world were found to share
many genetic traits that makes them a defined group.  These links date
back to ancient times.


The study also provides the first detailed
genetic maps of the major Jewish subpopulations, a resource that can be
used to study the genetic origins of disease. The findings appear in the
June 3 online issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics.

“This
study provides new genomic information that can benefit not only those
of Jewish ancestry, but the population at large,” said co-author Edward
Burns, M.D., executive dean and professor of pathology and of medicine
at Einstein. “By providing a comprehensive genetic fingerprint of
various Jewish subpopulations, it can help us understand genetic links
to heart disease, cancer, diabetes and other common diseases.”

 

To
get this information Harry Ostrer, M.D. professor of pediatrics,
pathology and medicine at NYU, looked at a genome-wide analysis of three
major groups fromed by the Diasporas.  The Diasporas is the term used
for the scattering of Jews into Europe and throughout the Middle East.

 

The
research examined 237 participants from Jewish communities in the
metropolitan New York region, Seattle, Athens, Rome and Israel. Subjects
were included only if all four grandparents came from the same Jewish
community. The results were compared with a genetic analysis of 418
people from non-Jewish groups around the world.

It was
by doing this researchers discovered how that Jews from the major
Diaspora groups formed "a distinct population cluster."

“The
study supports the idea of a Jewish people linked by a shared genetic
history,” said Dr. Ostrer of NYU. “Yet the admixture with European
people explains why so many European and Syrian Jews have blue eyes and
blond hair.”

“The goal of the study was to determine a
genomic baseline,” said lead author Gil Atzmon, Ph.D., assistant
professor of medicine and of genetics at Einstein. “With this
established, we’ll be able to more easily identify genes associated with
complex disorders like diabetes that are determined by multiple
variants across the genome. Armed with this information, we will be

better positioned to treat patients.”