THE decoding of the human gene make-up (called the Human Genome Project) took 10 years and cost US$3 billion (RM9.2 billion). It was concluded in 2000, depending on what is considered a “complete” human genome sequencing.

Gene sequencing costs have been dropped exponentially since the sequencing of the human genome in 2000.

All kinds of genetic tests are becoming cheap as chips. The cost of testing labs is following Moore’s Law down the cost curve.

We have mapped the human genome. Fast-evolving technology is making it possible to make gene-testing common place. This will see the birth of what I call the 3Ps of medicine — personalised, preventive and predictive.

It is not with drugs but with food and supplements that you can personalise, predict and most important, prevent.

One of my favourite medical journals is the American Journal Of Clinical Nutrition, which publishes more than 300 pages of research with no advertising every month.

Let us take a journey through one issue of this journal to see just how much research is being done on how food and nutrients affect our health.

The sad thing is that it can take 20 years before this knowledge becomes commonplace or used in medical practice.

These are all in the May 2007 issue. The most important study in this journal is on nutrigenomics. The basic idea is that food is healing nutrition, not just calories. Actually food can heal or kill. You need to know which to take and which to avoid.

In this study, researchers from Finland took two groups of people with metabolic syndrome (pre-diabetes) and gave each group a different diet.

It was different only in the type of carbohydrates they consumed for 12 weeks. The rest of their diet was identical — the same calories and the same amount of fat, protein, carbohydrate and fibre.

The first group had wheat, oats, and potatoes as the source of their carbohydrates while the second group ate rye.

So in effect, we were comparing wheat and potato to rye.

After the 12 weeks, the researchers took a fat sample and analysed it to find out which genes were turned on or off.

The results were amazing.

In the wheat, oat, and potato group, 62 genes were activated that increased inflammation, oxidative stress and the stress response, worsened blood sugar balance, and generally amplified all of the forces in the body that lead to obesity, heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease!
It was a 100 per cent effect — no good genes were turned on.

In the rye group, 71 genes were turned on that prevent diabetes, lower cholesterol, reduce inflammation, and improve blood sugar control. This was a 100 per cent good gene effect.

Now that should have been headline news — but the rye lobby is just not that powerful!

In fact, in an accompanying editorial called Putting your genes on a diet: The molecular effects of carbohydrate, Harvard researcher David Ludwig wrote that “Molecular pathways involved in hormone action have been the target of a multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical research effort. However, many of these pathways may normally be under dietary regulation.”

If rye was a synthetic drug that could be patented, it would be a blockbuster.
Food can heal or hurt. Here are findings from a few other key studies from that May 2007 issue which are worth noting:

• Long-term fish consumption protects against arrhythmia or irregular heart beats.

• Eating a diet high in monounsaturated fats from olive oil can help reduce blood pressure while a high refined-carbohydrate diet can increase blood pressure.

• Combining fish oil supplements with regular aerobic exercise helps improve body composition and reduce heart disease risk factors (lower triglycerides, higher HDL).

• Women need more choline (a nutrient that is needed for cell membrane formation and to make the neurotransmitter acetylcholine necessary for brain function) after menopause or are at risk of liver and muscle damage.

• If women with HIV are given a multivitamin, they have less anaemia and so will their children. Anaemia in HIV is associated with a much faster rate of disease progression and death.

• In Bangladesh, where arsenic poisoning is common, giving folate, vitamins B12 and B6, choline, and niacin has reduced the toxic effects of arsenic.

The June 2007 issue has a fantastic randomised controlled study of calcium and vitamin D, which shows that those nutrients substantially reduce risk for all cancers and that the blood level of vitamin D is the most important predictor of decreased risk.

Do you want to live well in the 21st Century and perhaps, beyond? You can certainly do well in looking for clues in your genes. Armed which the weaknesses in your genes and the effects of nutrients on them, you can have a remarkable control of your destiny as you move from “prediction” to “personalisation” and finally “prevention”.

Your genes can be very susceptible to turmeric and yet, totally resistant to vitamin D. Now you can effectively follow a plan to “turn on” and “turn off” the necessary genes to create healthier future.

That day is not far off. Indeed, we have come a long way from that Austrian Priest and scientist, Gregor Johann Mendel birthed the field of genetic before he passed in 1884.

This article was published in www.nst.com.my on 20 September 2010.