Researchers Are Figuring Out How African Ancestry Can Affect Certain Brain Disorders

Short Wave

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🗓️ 3 July 2024

⏱️ 16 minutes

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Summary

Black Americans have been underrepresented in most genomic studies of neurological disorders. As a result, scientists don't know much about whether African ancestry affects a person's risk for these disorders or their response to a particular treatment. To help close this gap, the Lieber Institute for Brain Development, African American community leaders in Baltimore, and researchers from Duke University and Morgan State University created the African Ancestry Neuroscience Research Initiative in 2019. The team found that genes associated with African ancestry appear to affect certain brain cells in ways that could increase the risk of Alzheimer's disease and stroke.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Christian nationalists want to turn America into a theocracy, a government under biblical rule.
0:07.0	If they gain more power, it could mean fewer rights for you.
0:12.0	I'm Heath Drusen and on the new season of Extremely
0:15.0	American I'll take you inside the movement. Listen to Extremely American
0:19.8	from Boise State Public Radio, part of the NPR Network.
0:24.0	You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.
0:30.0	Hey Short Waivers, Emily Kwong here with a look at how an effort to diversify brain science
0:35.9	has led to a discovery about diseases like Alzheimer's, stroke, and Parkinson's.
0:41.1	And Piers's main brain correspondent, John John Hamilton has been covering this story.
0:45.4	John, hello.
0:46.4	Hey Emily.
0:47.4	What I've got for you is actually an update on something that you and I chatted about on this
0:51.8	podcast several years ago.
0:54.0	I remember this conversation, John.
0:55.8	We were talking about how Alzheimer's disease seems to be more common in black Americans
1:01.4	than in white Americans, but nobody knows why.
1:04.0	Exactly. The questions are is it the way doctors are assessing symptoms? Is it living
1:09.0	conditions? Is it racism? Yeah. It's all a big mystery.
1:12.6	And it's not just about Alzheimer's.
1:14.4	We know that stroke and some psychiatric disorders
1:17.0	are also more common in black Americans.
1:19.6	At the same time, we know Parkinson's disease
	...

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