title: Y is there a risk to being male?
abstract: Being male or female can make a vital difference to many important biological functions and can lead to disparities in health. The Y chromosome carries the sex-determining sex reversal Y (SRY) gene and recent studies show that it might also harbor genes that have important biological functions other than sex determination. One such example is the emerging evidence from animal models and humans that supports the presence of cardiovascular genes on the Y chromosome. A significant amount of work remains to identify these genes; however, we report here observations linking the Y chromosome to hypertension, which could explain the higher incidence of cardiovascular disease in males compared with females.
authors.affiliation: BHF Glasgow Cardiovascular Research Centre, Division of Cardiovascular and Medical Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G11 6NT, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Fadi J
authors.initials: FJ
authors.lastname: Charchar
authors.forename: Maciej
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Tomaszewski
authors.forename: Pamela
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Strahorn
authors.forename: Benedicte
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Champagne
authors.forename: Anna F
authors.initials: AF
authors.lastname: Dominiczak
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001161:Arteriosclerosis / Q000235:genetics; D001794:Blood Pressure / Q000235:genetics; D002318:Cardiovascular Diseases / Q000235:genetics*; D006801:Humans; D006973:Hypertension / Q000235:genetics; D008297:Male; D012307:Risk Factors; D012737:Sex Factors; D014998:Y Chromosome / Q000235:genetics*