Friends have genes similar to relatives

Friendly people are genetically more similar than strangers

07/16/2014

What criteria do we use to choose our friends? An exciting question that researchers from the University of California at San Diego and Yale University in New Haven have also studied. According to the saying „People of the same kind stick together“ apparently also among friends inventory, because these would be genetically more similar than people who do not know each other. Friendships could therefore be regarded as a kind of "functional relationship“ be understood, the scientists currently in the „Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences“ (PNAS).

Analyzed DNA from 1932 participants
How do you make friends? And what keeps friends together? As researchers James Fowler of the University of California, San Diego and Nicholas Christakis of Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA, have found, most likely, similarities. For their project, the two scientists had the DNA of a total of 1932 participants running for decades „Framingham Heart Study“ analyzed and examined to what extent genetic similarities exist between friends and between strangers. The scientists came to an interesting conclusion, because „On the whole genome, on average, we are genetically similar to our friends”, said Fowler in a statement from the University of California.

Genetic consistency equals that of fourth cousins
According to the saying „People of the same kind stick together“ So also be applied to friendships: „We share more DNA with people we choose as friends than with strangers from the same population“, Fowler continues. The genetic similarity among friends would affect about one percent of the genes, which would be the match of cousin fourth degree equal. Even if one percent, according to Nicholas Christakis probably would not appear much for a layman, this is „for geneticists a significant number. And how remarkable: most people do not even know who their fourth cousins ​​are! Yet, we somehow manage, under a myriad of possibilities, to select the people who resemble our relatives.“

Functional relationships bring many evolutionary benefits
Common characteristics among friends or "functional affinities" could bring a variety of evolutionary benefits - „because when the friend is just as cold as a self and then ignites a fire, both benefit from it at the same time“, so the announcement of the university on. Especially with the genes related to the sense of smell, the researchers had found many similarities among friendly people - unlike in terms of the immune system. Here, friends would have distinguished themselves even more than strangers, which from the scientific perspective, however, would also be beneficial: For if people in a group are immune to various pathogens, the risk of spread is thereby lower. (Ag)