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Volume 36 Issue 12, December 2004

Cover art: Lazar by Eva Langhans (e-mail: e.langha@t-online.de)

Volume 36 Issue 12

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Editorial

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Book Review

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News & Views

  • As geneticists begin to identify gene variants associated with common diseases and responses to treatment, it is increasingly important to determine whether these variants have consistent effects across different 'racial' or 'ethnic' groups. Until recently, too little was known about either disease genetics or pharmacogenetics to make a detailed assessment. Now, a new study reviewing 43 disease-associated gene variants suggests that the effects of gene variants may be largely consistent across different 'racial' or 'ethnic' groups.

    • David B Goldstein
    • Joel N Hirschhorn
    News & Views

  • In eukaryotes, RNA silencing suppresses gene expression through sequence-specific interactions involving endogenous small RNAs. Although our understanding of the diversity, biogenesis and function of these regulatory RNAs is growing rapidly, their evolutionary origin is not well understood. Now, a new study of plants uncovers an important role for inverted duplication of small RNA target genes in the origin of new regulatory RNAs.

    • Olivier Voinnet
    News & Views

  • A massive study of expressed-sequence tags from both free-living and parasitic nematodes identifies tens of thousands of genes not present in Caenorhabditis elegans. Half of these are unique to nematodes and should provide new insights into the lifestyles of parasitic nematodes.

    • Thomas Blumenthal
    • Richard E Davis
    News & Views

  • Protein tyrosine phosphatases (PTPs) have diverse roles as negative regulators of stimulatory signaling cascades and are widely recognized as key to maintaining immune cellular homeostasis. Recent data implicating the PTP Lyp in susceptibility to four autoimmune diseases attests to the biological importance of PTP immune regulatory roles and to the etiologic relatedness of different autoimmune conditions.

    • Katherine A Siminovitch
    News & Views
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Brief Communication

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Article

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Letter

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Technical Report

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