Paris, February 04: Debate over the obesity epidemic sweeping parts of the world has focussed on whether lifestyle — too much junk food and couch-potato living — is the big culprit or whether genes are also to blame.
A new study may help tip the balance in favour of those who claim that fat runs in their family and there is little they can do about it.
People who are morbidly obese lack a tiny stretch of DNA containing around 30 genes, according to the investigation released on Wednesday by the British journal Nature.
Obesity means having a body mass index of 30 or more, while morbid obesity is classified as having a BMI of at least 40. BMI is determined by one’s weight in kilos divided by one’s height, in metres, squared.
The probe by a consortium of European scientists found that 0.7 percent, or seven in every thousand, of morbidly obese people have a “micro-deletion” of genetic code, located on Chromosome 16.
The telltale sign was initially found among 31 individuals and confirmed among 19 other cases in a trawl through the genomes of 16,053 other people who were either obese or of normal weight.
—-PTI