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Genetic association & human height

Explore genetic association studies revealing how genetic variation influences height across European populations.

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First, check out this quick primer on genetic association studies. With that, Combined Genome Scans for Body Stature in 6,602 European Twins: Evidence for Common Caucasian Loci @ PLOS. You need such huge sample sizes to pick up the relatively weak singals from numerous quantitative trait loci. The study reiterates the finding that height is about 80% heritable, that is, 4/5^ths of the population wide variation is due to genetic variation. At least amongst whites in the modern world (where nutritional deficit is minimized). That being said, though plenty of potentialities lurk beneath the surface of the data the study, despite its massive scope they found a smoking gun for just one location in the genome (make sure you know what LOD is):

...We found evidence for a shared genetic locus accounting for human stature on Chromosome 8, and suggestive evidence for loci on Chromosomes X, 7, and 20. Since ...

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