Entropic Flip: November 2013

Wednesday, November 27, 2013

The "Warrior Gene"

Genetic Ramifications:

Rapid Processing of dynamic stimuli under stressful conditions
At the cost of Memory and Attention to details
Higher error rate
Ability enhancement triggered by Dopamine release
Higher resistance to pain
More easily Hypnotized
Less affected by Placebos
More likely to develop schizophrenia

Source: http://snpedia.com/index.php/Rs4680

"rs4680 (Val158Met) is a well studied SNP in the COMT gene. 23andMe blog summarizes them as

rs4680(A) = Worrier. Met, more exploratory, lower COMT enzymatic activity, therefore higher dopamine levels; lower pain threshold, enhanced vulnerability to stress, yet also more efficient at processing information under most conditions
rs4680(G) = Warrior. Val, less exploratory, higher COMT enzymatic activity, therefore lower dopamine levels; higher pain threshold, better stress resiliency, albeit with a modest reduction in executive cognition performance under most conditions

Roughly speaking, the predominant wisdom (known colloquially as the warrior/worrier hypothesis; summary at [PMID 17008817]) posits that people with Val alleles have increased COMT activity and lower prefrontal extracellular dopamine compared with those with the Met substitution. Val158 alleles may be associated with an advantage in the processing of aversive stimuli (warrior strategy), while Met158 alleles may be associated with an advantage in memory and attention tasks (worrier strategy). Under conditions of increased dopamine release (eg, stress), individuals with Val158 alleles may have improved dopaminergic transmission and better performance, while individuals with Met158 alleles may have less efficient neurotransmission and worse performance. Some evidence suggests that Val158 alleles are associated with schizophrenia, while Met158 alleles are associated with anxiety."