Simon Dankel (pictured), Christine Haugen, Gunnar Mellgren and others at K2/the Hormon Laboratoy have participated in a study that was published in New England Journal of Medicine Wednesday evening.
The study describes how a common genetic obesity-variant in the FTO-gene region alters the energy metabolism directly in fat cells, and which genes and proteins that are involved in this new mechanism. Using the FTO-variant as an example, the study presents new  comprehensive strategies to explore and understand the mechanisms of regulatory genetic variants in non-coding DNA, which gives hope of finding a number of new targets for personalized treatment of common                                                                       diseases in the decades to come.

Photo: Jørgen Barth