TY - JOUR
T1 - Beyond race
T2 - Towards a whole-genome perspective on human populations and genetic variation
AU - Foster, Morris W.
AU - Sharp, Richard R.
N1 - Funding Information:
This publication was made possible by grants from the National Institute on Environmental Health Sciences and from the National Human Genome Research Institute. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the NIEHS, NHGRI or the National Institutes of Health. We also are grateful for comments made by L. D. Brooks and two anonymous reviewers on an earlier version.
PY - 2004/10
Y1 - 2004/10
N2 - The renewed emphasis on population-specific genetic variation, exemplified most prominently by the International HapMap Project, is complicated by a longstanding, uncritical reliance on existing population categories in genetic research. Race and other pre-existing population definitions (ethnicity, religion, language, nationality, culture and so on) tend to be contentious concepts that have polarized discussions about the ethics and science of research into population-specific human genetic variation. By contrast, a broader consideration of the multiple historical sources of genetic variation provides a whole-genome perspective on the ways i n which existing population definitions do, and do not, account for how genetic variation is distributed among individuals. Although genetics will continue to rely on analytical tools that make use of particular population histories, it is important to interpret findings in a broader genomic context.
AB - The renewed emphasis on population-specific genetic variation, exemplified most prominently by the International HapMap Project, is complicated by a longstanding, uncritical reliance on existing population categories in genetic research. Race and other pre-existing population definitions (ethnicity, religion, language, nationality, culture and so on) tend to be contentious concepts that have polarized discussions about the ethics and science of research into population-specific human genetic variation. By contrast, a broader consideration of the multiple historical sources of genetic variation provides a whole-genome perspective on the ways i n which existing population definitions do, and do not, account for how genetic variation is distributed among individuals. Although genetics will continue to rely on analytical tools that make use of particular population histories, it is important to interpret findings in a broader genomic context.
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U2 - 10.1038/nrg1452
DO - 10.1038/nrg1452
M3 - Review article
C2 - 15510170
AN - SCOPUS:5044224706
SN - 1471-0056
VL - 5
SP - 790
EP - 796
JO - Nature Reviews Genetics
JF - Nature Reviews Genetics
IS - 10
ER -