Objectives: First, we test for differences in various cognitive abilities across trajectories of body mass index (BMI) over the later life course. Second, we examine whether genetic risk factors fo...
#1Ian J. Deary(Edin.: University of Edinburgh)H-Index: 184
#2Sarah E. Harris(Edin.: University of Edinburgh)H-Index: 71
Last. W. David Hill(Edin.: University of Edinburgh)H-Index: 25
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The associations between higher intelligence test scores from early life and later good health, fewer illnesses, and longer life are recent discoveries. Researchers are mapping the extent of these associations and trying to understanding them. Part of the intelligence-health association has genetic origins. Recent advances in molecular genetic technology and statistical analyses have revealed that: intelligence and many health outcomes are highly polygenic; and that modest but widespread genetic...
Last. William S. Kremen(UCSD: University of California, San Diego)H-Index: 70
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Author(s): Logue, MW; Panizzon, MS; Elman, JA; Gillespie, NA; Hatton, SN; Gustavson, DE; Andreassen, OA; Dale, AM; Franz, CE; Lyons, MJ; Neale, MC; Reynolds, CA; Tu, X; Kremen, WS | Abstract: Early identification of younger, non-demented adults at elevated risk for Alzheimer's disease (AD) is crucial because the pathological process begins decades before dementia onset. Toward that end, we showed that an AD polygenic risk score (PRS) could identify mild cognitive impairment (MCI) in adults who w...
The evidence that most adult-onset common diseases have a polygenic genetic architecture fully consistent with robust biological systems supported by multiple back-up mechanisms is now overwhelming. In this context, we consider the recent "omnigenic" or "core genes" model. A key assumption of the model is that there is a relatively small number of core genes relevant to any disease. While intuitively appealing, this model may underestimate the biological complexity of common disease, and therefo...
#1Asad Beck(SDSU: San Diego State University)H-Index: 5
#2Carol E. Franz(UCSD: University of California, San Diego)H-Index: 48
Last. William S. Kremen(UCSD: University of California, San Diego)H-Index: 70
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Background and Objectives: Childhood socioeconomic status (cSES) is found to predict later-life cognitive abilities, yet the mechanisms underlying these associations remain unclear. The objective of this longitudinal study was to examine the direct and indirect paths through which cSES influences late midlife cognitive outcomes. Research Design and Methods: Participants were 1,009 male twins in the Vietnam Era Twin Study of Aging (VETSA). At mean ages 20 and 62, participants completed a standard...
Last. William S. Kremen(UCSD: University of California, San Diego)H-Index: 70
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OBJECTIVE: Research on executive functions (EFs) has revealed evidence for general abilities that underlie performance across multiple EF tasks and domains. This Common EF factor is highly stable in adolescence through young adulthood, correlates with other important cognitive abilities, and is explained largely by genetic influences. However, little is known about Common EF beyond young adulthood. This study examines 3 hypotheses regarding the latent structure, genetic/environmental etiology, a...
A central goal of genetics is to understand the links between genetic variation and disease. Intuitively, one might expect disease-causing variants to cluster into key pathways that drive disease etiology. But for complex traits, association signals tend to be spread across most of the genome—including near many genes without an obvious connection to disease. We propose that gene regulatory networks are sufficiently interconnected such that all genes expressed in disease-relevant cells are liabl...
Last. Sarah E. Harris(Edin.: University of Edinburgh)H-Index: 71
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Causes of the association between cognitive ability and health remain unknown, but may reflect a shared genetic aetiology. This study examines the causal genetic associations between cognitive ability and physical health. We carried out two-sample Mendelian randomization analyses using the inverse-variance weighted method to test for causality between later life cognitive ability, educational attainment (as a proxy for cognitive ability in youth), BMI, height, systolic blood pressure, coronary a...
Last. Carol E. Franz(UCSD: University of California, San Diego)H-Index: 48
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Objective This study examined patterns of change in adiposity across four decades starting in young adulthood as well as associations between change and midlife cardiometabolic outcomes. Methods BMI was assessed at ages 20, 40, 56, and 62 years in 977 male veterans from the Vietnam Era Twin Study of Aging. Age 62 (range 56-66) cardiometabolic outcomes included hypertension, diabetes, dyslipidemia, inflammation, and ischemic heart disease. Analyses included latent growth modeling (LGM), latent cl...
Abstract Introduction We conducted a meta-analysis of the conflicting epidemiologic evidence on the association between midlife body mass index (BMI) and dementia. Methods We searched standard databases to identify prospective, population-based studies of dementia risk by midlife underweight, overweight, and obesity. We performed random-effects meta-analyses and meta-regressions of adjusted relative risk (RR) estimates and formally explored between-study heterogeneity. Results We included 19 stu...
#2Jian Yang(UQ: University of Queensland)H-Index: 181
Last. Ian J. Deary(Edin.: University of Edinburgh)H-Index: 184
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Obesity and low cognitive function are associated with multiple adverse health outcomes across the life course. They have a small phenotypic correlation (r=−0.11; high body mass index (BMI)−low cognitive function), but whether they have a shared genetic aetiology is unknown. We investigated the phenotypic and genetic correlations between the traits using data from 6815 unrelated, genotyped members of Generation Scotland, an ethnically homogeneous cohort from five sites across Scotland. Genetic c...