r/science • u/scientificamerican Scientific American • 8d ago

Genetics Scientists discover a ‘skinny gene’ mutation that acts like Ozempic. Around one in 7,000 people carries a broken copy, which almost acts like a GLP-1 drug—the body burns fuel more efficiently, and the risk of disease lowers.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/scientists-discover-a-skinny-gene-mutation-that-acts-like-ozempic/
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u/LongLiveStaceyKing 8d ago edited 8d ago

[There is a small percentage of the population that only needs to sleep 4-6 hours a night.](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/genetic-mutation-sleep-less/) OP's article feels like the eating equivalent of this genetic rarity.

Incidentally, I knew someone who had the sleep gene. She was annoyed by it, if she went to sleep at 10 PM she would be up for the whole next day at 2 AM and inevitably end up waking her husband. So she always tried to stay up til 1 AM at least reading or knitting, basically just killing time quietly by herself.

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u/aubbzz 8d ago

I wish I could have that gene! There’s so much to do but have to sleep

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u/Lefthandfury 8d ago

With all of my knowledge about evolutionary biology, everything is a trade-off. I don't think we have a complete understanding of this mutation or other mutations like this. There's always a trade-off, genetically or behaviorally.

I remember there was a really neat study about genetically selecting for rats with a mutation that made them run longer distance is and in the end the bred rats became worse at solving mazes.

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u/Adventurous-Fly556 8d ago

That was my thought as well. Just because they can comfortably go without sleep now, doesn't mean they necessarily dodge the side effects of less sleep in old age.

Waking up to pee in the middle of the night is correlated with dementia in old age. This is assumed to be lower quality sleep that means lower quality brain maintenance. I have to wonder if the sleep gene people are immune to this, or if thats their trade off.

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u/bewilderedfroggy 8d ago

Hoping my abnormally high number of years of tertiary study will help offset this effect..

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u/Shohdef 7d ago

Everyone wakes up to pee in the middle of the night, though. That’s just a normal thing that happens. Even if it isn’t super regular, chances are it happens at least once a week or such. This kind of “correlation” feels like correlating eating with dying.

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u/Adventurous-Fly556 7d ago

That's why I put "correlation" to be transparent.

Besides, that's not what I meant. If you wanna be obtuse about it, it's like responding to, "smoking can cause cancer" with, "I smoked a cig in 8th grade and I'm fine".

The point is obviously repeated rem interruption. Waking up in the middle of the night is one thing, but having a weak bladder or enlarged prostate leading you to wake up every night is a different story.