The emergence of Y-chromosome haplogroup J1e among Arabic-speaking populations.

Haplogroup J1 is a prevalent Y-chromosome lineage within the Near East. We report the frequency and YSTR diversity data for its major sub-clade (J1e). The overall expansion time estimated from 453 chromosomes is 10,000 years. Moreover, the previously described J1 (DYS388=13) chromosomes, frequently found in the Caucasus and eastern Anatolian populations, were ancestral to J1e and displayed an expansion time of 9000 years. For J1e, the Zagros/Taurus mountain region displays the highest haplotype diversity, although the J1e frequency increases toward the peripheral Arabian Peninsula. The southerly pattern of decreasing expansion time estimates is consistent with the serial drift and founder effect processes. The first such migration is predicted to have occurred at the onset of the Neolithic, and accordingly J1e parallels the establishment of rain-fed agriculture and semi-nomadic herders throughout the Fertile Crescent. Subsequently, J1e lineages might have been involved in episodes of the expansion of pastoralists into arid habitats coinciding with the spread of Arabic and other Semitic-speaking populations.

Effect of the opioid blockade on the feeding-induced growth hormone response to growth hormone-releasing hormone in women with polycystic ovary syndrome.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effect of naloxone, an opioid receptor antagonist, on the release of growth hormone (GH) induced by the growth hormone-releasing hormone (GHRH) in normal-weight and obese women with PCOS in relation to feeding. DESIGN: Prospective clinical study. SETTING: Academic research center. PATIENT(S): Seventeen women with PCOS (10 who were normal weight and 7 who were obese) and 14 control women (7 who were normal weight and 7 who were obese). INTERVENTION(S): A GHRH test (50 microg i.v.) and, on a different day, a GHRH test during a naloxone infusion (1.6 mg/h) during fasting. The same tests were repeated after a standard meal. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): GH response to GHRH (expressed as the area under the curve [AUC]) in different experimental conditions. RESULT(S): All normal-weight women showed a significantly higher AUC-GH compared with obese women in the fasting state. Normal-weight controls had a decrease in GH response to GHRH after feeding, and naloxone did not reverse the decrease. In obese controls, feeding increased the GH response but naloxone induced a decrease in the AUC. In fasting, normal-weight women with PCOS, naloxone significantly decreased the AUC-GH; in these patients, food intake induced an inhibition of GH response to GHRH, reversed by naloxone infusion. In obese PCOS patients, GH levels did not increase significantly after GHRH stimulation, either in the fasting state or after a meal, and naloxone did not affect these responses. CONCLUSION(S): Factors other than obesity and insulin may be involved in disruption of GH secretion in women with PCOS.