Children’s anthropometrics and later disease incidence

Peer reviewe

Adolescent BMI greater than 50% is associated with adult cardiovascular-death risk

Non peer reviewe

Obesity and eating behavior from the perspective of twin and genetic research

Obesity has dramatically increased during the last decades and is currently one of the most serious global health problems. We present a hypothesis that obesity is a neuro-behavioral disease having a strong genetic background mediated largely by eating behavior and is sensitive to the macro-environment; we study this hypothesis from the perspective of genetic research. Genetic family and genome-wide-association studies have shown well that body mass index (BMI, kg/m(2)) is a highly heritable and polygenic trait. New genetic variation of BMI emerges after early childhood. Candidate genes of BMI notably express in brain tissue, supporting that this new variation is related to behavior. Obesogenic environments at both childhood family and societal levels reinforce the genetic susceptibility to obesity. Genetic factors have a clear influence on macro-nutrient intake and appetite-related eating behavior traits. Results on the gene-by-diet interactions in obesity are mixed, but emerging evidence suggests that eating behavior traits partly mediate the effect of genes on BMI. However, more rigorous prospective study designs controlling for measurement bias are still needed.Peer reviewe

Kattava synteesi taudeista ja niiden parantajista osana historiaa

Heikki S Vuorinen: Taudit, parantajat ja parannettavat. Vastapaino, Tampere 2010, 376 s

Weight status in young adulthood and survival after cardiovascular diseases and cancer

Peer reviewe

The CODAT wins project : the current status and recent findings of collaborative project of development of anthropometrical measures in twins

The COllaborative project of Development of Anthropometrical measures in Twins (CODATwins) project is a large international collaborative effort to analyze individual-level phenotype data from twins in multiple cohorts from different environments. The main objective is to study factors that modify genetic and environmental variation of height, body mass index (BMI, kg/m2 ) and size at birth, and additionally to address other research questions such as long-term consequences of birth size. The project started in 2013 and is open to all twin projects in the world having height and weight measures on twins with information on zygosity. Thus far, 54 twin projects from 24 countries have provided individual-level data. The CODATwins database includes 489,981 twin individuals (228,635 complete twin pairs). Since many twin cohorts have collected longitudinal data, there is a total of 1,049,785 height and weight observations. For many cohorts, we also have information on birth weight and length, own smoking behavior and own or parental education. We found that the heritability estimates of height and BMI systematically changed from infancy to old age. Remarkably, only minor differences in the heritability estimates were found across cultural– geographic regions, measurement time and birth cohort for height and BMI. In addition to genetic epidemiological studies, we looked at associations of height and BMI with education, birth weight and smoking status. Within-family analyses examined differences within same-sex and opposite-sex dizygotic twins in birth size and later development. The CODATwins project demonstrates the feasibility and value of international collaboration to address gene-by-exposure interactions that require large sample sizes and address the effects of different exposures across time, geographical regions and socioeconomic status

Changing associations of coronary heart disease incidence with current partnership status and marital history over three decades

Married men and women have better health than non-married, but little is known about how cohabitation and marital history are associated with coronary heart disease (CHD) incidence and how these associations have changed over time. We analyzed these associations by fitting Cox regression models to register data covering the whole Finnish population aged 35 years or older (N = 4,415,590), who experienced 530,560 first time non-fatal or fatal CHD events during the years 1990–2018. Further, we used stratified Cox regression models to analyze CHD incidence within same-sex sibling pairs (N = 377,730 pairs). Married men and women without previous divorce had the lowest CHD incidence whereas cohabitation and a history of divorce were associated with higher CHD incidence. The associations were stronger in younger (35–64 years old) than older participants (65 years or older). These associations remained after adjusting for several indicators of social position, and the lower CHD incidence among those married without previous divorce was also observed within sibling pairs with a shared family background. The differences in CHD incidence between the categories generally widened over time; the largest and most systematic widening was observed among women in the younger age category. The long standing negative effect of divorce suggests that selection may partly explain the association between partnership status and CHD incidence. Partnership status is an increasingly important factor contributing to social inequalities in health.Peer reviewe

Effects of Individual, Spousal, and Offspring Socioeconomic Status on Mortality Among Elderly People in China

Peer reviewe

Changing associations between partnership history and risk of accidents, violence and suicides

Peer reviewe

Kaksos- ja perhetutkimukset geneettisten ja ympäristötekijöiden vaikutuksen arvioimisessa

Kaksostutkimuksen avulla voidaan selvittää, kuinka yksilöiden väliset erot geneettisissä ja ympäristötekijöissä selittävät väestöllistä vaihtelua tutkittavassa ilmiössä. Yksilöiden välisten geneettisten erojen selittämää osuutta kokonaisvaihtelusta kutsutaan periytyvyysasteeksi. Periytyvyysasteen käsitettä ei voikaan soveltaa yksilöön, eikä siitä voi vetää suoraan johtopäätöksiä tekijöistä, jotka selittävät väestöjen välisiä eroja. Varhaiset kaksostutkimuksen menetelmät perustuivat pelkästään perimältään identtisten ja epäidenttisten kaksosten välisten korrelaatioiden vertailuun, mutta lineaariseen rakenneyhtälömallinnukseen perustuvat menetelmät syrjäyttivät nämä jo 1980-luvulla. Nykyään keskeisiä tutkimusongelmia kaksostutkimuksessa ovat esimerkiksi keskenään korreloivien muuttujien taustalla vaikuttavien yhteisten geneettisten tekijöiden arvioiminen sekä kehitysprosessien geneettinen dynamiikka. Vaikka kvantitatiivisessa genetiikassa onkin perinteisesti korostettu geneettisiä tekijöitä, ovat ne yhtä tärkeitä ympäristötekijöiden vaikutuksen arvioimisessa