12 March 2018

DNA distinguishes French-Canadians from different regions of Quebec

A study published in Nature Communications includes a finding that there is regional structure evident within the French Canadian population consistent with Quebec settlement history and local ancestry.
This result is a small part of the results published in Gene-by-environment interactions in urban populations modulate risk phenotypes. It shows how pollution exposure in the area of residence overwhelms French Canadian regional ancestry in several health measures.
A result I found most surprising is "the regional effect on the gene expression is mostly associated with ambient air pollution, and less so, or not at all, with diseases, smoking, or the socio-economic factors that were measured."
The article is based on the Quebec regional cohort, CARTaGENE, of a larger Canada’s precision medicine initiative, the Canadian Partnership for Tomorrow Project (CPTP: http://www.partnershipfortomorrow.ca) which has a cohort comprising over 315,000 Canadians. While the motivation is medical let's hope analysis for regional ancestral DNA variability will not be overlooked and become available to genetic genealogy interests.

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