This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. The primary focus of the proposed project is to identify the genetic risk factors for alcoholism in Mexican Americans. The genes selected for this study belong to two major categories: (1) those controlling how alcohol is broken down and eliminated from the body and (2) those associated with the action of alcohol and/or the potential for addiction to alcohol (i.e. dopamine, serotonin and GABA). As the risk factors involved in alcohol use and addiction are most likely due to a number of different reasons, this appears to be a reasonable approach. With the simultaneous examination of genes from both categories, we aim at not only describing the distribution in Mexican Americans of genes that have been well characterized in other populations and found to be associated with drinking behavior, alcohol addiction and alcohol related medical problems, but also to explore the interaction of those two categories of genes in alcoholism. Furthermore, it is crucial to include women because of the serious drinking problem in female Mexican Americans and because women are more susceptible to alcohol related injury. Although we do not anticipate that the frequency of a certain gene is different between men and women in the non-alcoholic population, we do speculate that a stronger association between genetics and alcoholism might be found in women than men if both genders have the same severity of alcoholism, since female gender is a protecting factor for drinking.
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