Naslov
Five reasons why inbreeding could have large effect on post-reproductive health

Autori
Rudan, Igor ; Campbell, Harry

Izvornik
Collegium Antropologicum (0350-6134) 28 (2004), 2; 497-502

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Radovi u časopisima, uvodnik, znanstveni

Ključne riječi
inbreeding; post-reproductive health; human

Sažetak
Inbreeding in humans could have a considerable effect on the occurrence of complex late-onset diseases. This is due to at least five theoretical postulates. The first one is the fact that modest levels of inbreeding are expected to have much larger effects on the population distributions of polygenically determined traits than on oligogenic traits and diseases. The second concern is that the inbreeding is going to have much larger effect on the population-attributable fraction of disease cases if the underlying variants are rare rather than common. The third concern is that the risk of genetically determined disease in pre-reproductive age is rather minor because the responsible mutations are dramatically reducing fitness and are therefore constantly being cleared from the gene pool by selection. The fourth concern is that inbreeding depression may act on many intermediate disease phenotypes at once, thus leading to multiplicative deletorious effects. Finally, all of the sparse empirical evidence reviewed suggests that the size of this effect is indeed large. We call for further research in this neglected area.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

Znanstvena područja
Temeljne medicinske znanosti, Kliničke medicinske znanosti, Javno zdravstvo i zdravstvena zaštita

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