An interesting Guardian article - and link onwards to Nature.
I didn't notice any mention of thyroid but that doesn't mean there is no connection. I simply don't know.
Genetic traits of Black Death survivors linked to autoimmune diseases today
Scientists find people with ERAP2 variant survived 14th-century plague at much higher rates
Yes it's fascinating. It does make sense that our highly sensitive immune systems could be useful in Plague times, but with less of a job to do in modern times have turned on the body itself which is not so helpful. I wonder if that means we are less likely to get Covid even wthout the vaccine or suffer badly from it if we do? It begs lots of questions doesn't it? Mind you, wouldn't want to be a researcher handling biological samples from a plague victim 
They have found that people with neanderthal ancestry suffer worse with covid. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/335... How that relates to this gene linked with black death and autoimmune I don't know.
It's amazing how genetic science has become so influential and accelerated over recent years. It's used to explain so much now. Thanks for the interesting paper.
It really is. It's fascinating.
I though there was a theory that the immune system might be affected by Neanderthal inheritance. They were kicking around a lot lot longer than we have been so you’d think they might have had a superior immune systems to ours, but it might come with penalties I suppose. Mine is on the higher end of % Neanderthal according to 23&me. I have never had covid even after being in an office where everyone had it and I have been in close proximity to someone who then tested positive. Is it sheer luck? They never mention superspreaders anymore. I do wonder if I have some sort of immunity yet a close relative went down with it straight away in the first wave, was in ITU for three weeks and nearly died of it - it was pre-vaccine. I get my second booster next week so fingers crossed I keep free of it. My relative knows to their misfortune that long covid is pretty grim.
Is this what you meant?
How Our Neanderthal Genes Affect the COVID-19 Mortality: Iran and Mongolia, Two Countries with the Same SARS-CoV-2 Mutation Cluster but Different Mortality Rates
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/335...
I went down the rabbit-hole following helvella's link.
At the bottom of the rabbit hole is a Wonderland.
“Oh my ears and whiskers, how late it’s getting!”
Fascinating! It really is swings and roundabouts, isn't it? A gene that helps you survive a plague, but makes you susceptible to autoimmunity. I really love this type of research that looks into the past of humanity and disease, now that we have powerful genetic tools to investigate DNA.
I actually checked my DNA and found that I have the deleterious GG alleles for the SNP mentioned and so think I would not do well encountering the Black Plague! The Nature paper says that the selectively advantageous ERAP2 variant is also a known risk factor for Crohn’s disease - I don't have either the advantageous variant nor Crohn's.
Would be interesting if anyone else has their raw DNA data then they could check this SNP mentioned:
rs2248374 - GG is the 'deleterious' variant wrt susceptibility to the Black Death plague bacterium Yersinia pestis. This variant they call 'Haplotype B'. If you have AA alleles here then you have the 'protective' variant - Haplotype A.
They found that individuals homozygous for the protective rs2248374 A allele only express Haplotype A, whereas individuals homozygous for the rs2248374 G allele almost exclusively express the truncated Haplotype B.
No mention of the thyroid but mentioning autoimmunity means the thyroid can be involved as can any other organ where autoimmunity occurs.
Seems I'm doubly unlucky with Hashimoto's! So if the Black Death ever reappears, I will be hiding under a rock!
And I am A / G !
Ha! You can hedge your bets and come out from under the rock for a quick walk!
Hi Fox, that was very interesting and appreciate what you must have gone through to make the discovery. Are there any blogs you hang out with? I have my raw data but am fairly clueless except for the usual suspects. DNA may not be the last word but can certainly show certain health risks. I hope you find a good comfortable rock
No blogs, don't seem to have time for that as well as everything else! I think one needs to be a bit circumspect with DNA as it's all down to probabilities, but it is really fascinating stuff.
Understood. My daughter works with GedMatch and perhaps it will be more valuable in that area. Thank you.
That’s really interesting, thanks for the comment because I seem to have missed the rs2248374 number. I have AA for it but I’m not in any hurry to test it out on Black Death!
I am sure it is related to autoimmune thyroid disease like you say it’s the autoimmunity that’s key rather than what it goes for.
No Crohns but a genetic tendency to coeliac.
Black Death good autoimmunity bad genetically speaking in my case!
I am AG just downloaded from AncestryDNA test from 2018…. !
Thanks, for such interesting information
Apparently my Dupuytrens is from a Viking ancestor - thanks for that Thor!
My other 6 autoimmunes may mean I would have survived the Black Death, but it certainly does not protect me from the current NHS!
Hahaha yes it's not just bacteria and viruses we need to worry about, but the NHS as well!
I think I have duputchrens (most of my close relative have had operations for it - and three had thyroid disease as well, that I know of ) it’s not too bad but the trigger finger (which is common in sufferers) was driving me nuts they injected it at the docs a month back and it’s really helped, the anaesthetic was heavenly (bar the initial pain) as my hand no longer constantly ached. It feels like a claw really tight and stiff pity the anaesthesia wore off 🤣🤣🤣 the triggering kept going for three days must have been it’s swan song because it has completely stopped which is a huge relief. The pinkie curls in and the ring finger is crossing in front of the middle digit but I have been told it’s nothing more than arthritis. Trouble is all I think is Oh yeah? Just like my thyroid disorder was nothing more than the menopause 🙄 I don't believe a word of it. It’s ’s not too bad just annoying but one relative begged to have their pinkie amputated couldn’t put their coat etc on and another looks like they have been crucified - it was in both hands. The consultant said I was highly unlikely to develop it because I was ‘ too old’ at 63 but how come another relative developed it in their 70’s? He couldn’t explain the ledderhose lump in my foot that was just airbrushed out of the consultation. The crucified one has that too, possibly in both feet. Double dose of viking perhaps?
I’ve a few more autoimmunities on top of the atropic autoimmune thyroiditis but not six - that’s quite a tally. I hope they aren’t too debilitating. Mine are a pest but I have managed to live with them. The thyroid was a bit of a disaster but I have managed to pull back to something reasonable now after a hell of a time with it.
Had to laugh at your NHS comment!
I have Dupuytrens in my right hand and arthritis in both. Double ledderhose in my left foot. Recently told I was too old to have any operations on my hands. The vitiligo has left me about 50% deathly white, including a streak in my hair - a la Cruella de Ville. Despite that, being old and female, I am invisible and ignored by the NHS and that is the worst bit.
They operated on my mums when she was c .75 it did help although it started to contract again, but things have gone downhill since then of course . I remember my mother taking us to see 1001 Dalmatians so I remember Cruella she was a bit scary! It’s a strange looking thing vitiligo. I was impressed that nike are using a male model who has it on his face and body. I salute them for that I find him an excellent model.
I agree about being invisible I noticed it as I got older as if you’re a ghost and not actually present. Part of me quite likes it, but it can be very irritating and a complete disaster for health care after all the darn NI contributions we’ve coughed up, a lot more than youngesters who might croak early too at least we’ve managed to stay the course despite the autoimmune battering and we deserve decent health care being vallient health warriors!
I’m so sorry to read this - what a sad indictment of the NHS.
i'm confused ... the father of one of my kids was definitely a neanderthal.. does that mean that kid is more or less likely to survive if the back death escapes from the lab ?
lol!
I’m drawn to cavemen too 🙄 but I’m an evolutionary dead end rather like the Neanderthals lurking in my genes!
Most interesting. Thanks for posting.
The main rs number is in my 23&me raw data but the alleles have not been analysed which is annoying all I know is they are c or t …. which makes a lot of difference. The other one mentioned is not there at all. Given autoimmune disease is rife in my family on the maternal side it would be interesting to know what’s going on genetically and why it may have come about. This article is really facsinating.
I read somewhere that our DNA is altered if our ancestors lived through famine(s). I'm half Scottish & apparently Scotland suffered many famines through the ages. My DIO2 gene test returned as a mutated gene from one parent (heterogenous) which is presumably from my Scottish mother.
irishcentral.com/roots/hist...
Some who believe in WTS cite it as a “starvation coping mechanism gone amuck,” meaning that the bodies of those who have suffered from prolonged periods of hunger have altered the way in which their thyroid works, to slow down their metabolism and preserve energy. In certain cases, they claim, following these periods of hunger the thyroid continues to function abnormally and that this trait has been passed down to their ancestors causing thyroid problems in our current generation.
It is very important to distinguish between:
A
Lots of people died because their genes did not enable them to survive long periods of starvation. Thus, the survivors have a genetic inheritance which means that they might be slightly better at surviving a future period of starvation.
B
Lots of people died because of starvation but that starvation itself caused their genes to change so as to be better able to survive starvation. Thus starvation caused genetic changes, and thus inheritance, to make the survivors slightly better at surviving a future period of starvation.
A is, I think, a reasonable observation.
B is, I think, pure speculation without any evidence to back it up.
Beware the pseudo gene genies
Adam Rutherford
After ‘nano’ and ‘quantum’, epigenetics, an important branch of biology, is the latest scientific buzzword to be hijacked by quackery
theguardian.com/science/201...
B Sounds feasible to me, as all events must alter our being/genes in fundamental ways, as we are dynamic beings and that would lead me to believe it evolved like this so we can cope with a lot is what life throws at us. But I could be completely wrong.
One event that I would not have overcome with any amount of genes or environmentally induced modifications to them , was auto immune thyroid disorder. So may be you are right about B having genes for it and relatives getting it, has not stopped it one iota.
Our lives affect our genes. For example, radiation can result in imperfect copies of genes being made.
But there is nothing about those changes which is directed or results in us being less prone to the genetic effects of radiation. Some changes will be beneficial. Some changes will be harmful. And many will have no identifiable effect whatsoever!
Further, by far the majority of these (effectively) random changes occur in cells throughout our bodies. And not in the genetic material we pass on.
So one cell, somewhere, might get one gene impacted. Another cell somewhere else gets an entirely different impact. At that point, two cells are affected, we have billions of cells that have not been affected at all. And one of those cells could function not as well, maybe not at all, and so disappear. And if we are really, really unlucky, the other cell could behave differently, wrongly, even to the extent of being cancerous.
But, mostly, we have unaffected cells by the billion and pretty large numbers of cells with numerous different effects. That is, instead of the classical idea that ALL cells have identical genetic material, we have huge numbers with very, very minute differences.
Despite that, all those differences amount to almost nothing to our progeny. Only those that affect germ cells matter.
(Hypersimplifed and I know full well that I know very little.)
so each cell is not quite as the next one - bit mind boggling. I had that classical idea of them all being genetically homogenous everywhere. It’s when you read all these thyroid cascade articles fox this and ctrl4 that and a miriad of other impossible to recall names and numbers - is hedgehog one that’s slightly more memorable, I guess there’s a whole set of wildlife if fox is another one, and they are busy changing everything in the genes, getting in there by active transport, electron chains, Ligands and god knows what other methods - it sounds like anarchy to me! That nothing in our bodies stays the same even for a nanosecond! It’s not easy to grasp at all. Well not for me anyway. Now none of the cells are even standard! Shifting sands or what ?
Anything in your drop box medicine cabinet of curios you could recommend that might help me get a better grasp of it?
Well, imagine when we are born, every cell is identical.
But each day, a few receive some damage (e.g. cosmic rays or natural radioactivity such as in granite areas - to avoid any man-made issues).
Even if the actual numbers are small, even if we assume no cell gets two changes, the numbers simply accumulate over the years.
If those affected cells can still replicate as normal, then they remain in the population of cells of the individual - likely for as long as we live.
What we see in genome testing is (mostly) the original, identical cells, but we can't rule out variations being detected.
It is even possible for us to have two slightly different cell populations from very, very early on. Known as mosaicism.
Interesting….. my maternal line is also Scottish with lots of thyroid disorder, non Hodgkins lymphoma, duputchrens and ledderhose, and glaucoma with one branch that split two generations back all going blind. I also have one naff allele in DIO2 for conversion and I sure as hell didn’t convert very much Levothyroxine to T3. I’m fine on NDT.
It makes sense about the starvation altering thyroid function long term. Many generations back my direct maternal ancestor moved to Waterford in Ireland or rather her father to be more correct, and she ( or perhaps it was her daughter) came to England as a maid because her soldier husband died and she had no means of support . She left her daughter behind I presume looked after by her mother/mothers family. It must have been a long time ago because they did not meet until the daughter was 18, she came to England to find her mother. On meeting she asked her mother “dont yiu know who I am?’ The mother didn’t even recognise her it had been so long since she’d seen her, perhaps it was p re photography or they were too poor to afford them. They got on like a house on fire and remained great friends to the end. I assume things like that happened all the time back then. I suppose it could have been around the time of the potatoe famine. She must have been more distant in the past than my mums great great grandmas, all of whom she knew! If each generation was about 20 years apart and was three back that would go back to c. 1840 so only just before the height of the famine but I have a feeling she might have been even further back that that. It’s all very interesting.
Ta for the link 👍🏽
Well I never! you’ve sent me down a rabbit hole with this one helvella , I’ve been looking up RS numbers in my old ancestry DNA download all night, I’ve learned so much! I bet I could actually improve on my D grade in A Level Biology now 🤣
This paper was discussed on TWiEVo (This Week in Evolution)!
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