Ancestry plays vital role in nutrition and disease, study shows

Tuesday, June 14, 2011 - 13:30 in Health & Medicine

Scientists are just beginning to consider the impact of gene-diet interactions in different populations in regards to disease prevention and treatment. In a new study, researchers reveal how humans of different ancestry process a certain type of fat called polyunsaturated (PUFA) fat. Their findings suggest that the dramatic increase in a particular type of fatty acid, omega-6 PUFAs, in the American diet, together with a genetic propensity, causes individuals of African descent to more efficiently convert these dietary PUFAs to long chain PUFAs in the human body. Long chain PUFA can then, in turn, be converted to inflammatory messengers. Increased inflammatory messengers have been associated with a variety of chronic diseases including cardiovascular disease, arthritis, allergies and asthma, and diabetes.

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