title: Genetic etiology of nuclear cataract: evidence for a major gene.
abstract: Sibling correlations and segregation analysis were used to examine the familial distribution of age-sex-adjusted measures of nuclear sclerosis in 1,247 individuals from 564 sibships in the Beaver Dam Eye Study. There are highly significant sibling correlations for all sibs, and separately for sister-sister, sister-brother, and brother-brother pairs. Two transformed normal distributions give the best fit to the data. The hypothesis of mendelian transmission of a major effect cannot be rejected, but the hypothesis of a random environmental major effect is rejected. The parameters of the tau AB free model showed close similarity to the values expected under a mendelian hypothesis. Our results suggest that a single major gene can account for 35% of the total variability of age-sex-adjusted measures of nuclear sclerosis.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biometry and Genetics, LSU Medical Center, New Orleans 70112.
authors.forename: I M
authors.initials: IM
authors.lastname: Heiba
authors.forename: R C
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Elston
authors.forename: B E
authors.initials: BE
authors.lastname: Klein
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Klein
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002386:Cataract / Q000235:genetics*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged