genetics

About 10 percent of kids born with kidney defects have large alterations in their genomes known to be linked with neurodevelopmental delay and mental illness, a new study by Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC) researchers has shown.

While many intellectual disabilities are caused directly by a genetic mutation in the so-called “protein coding” part of our genes, the researchers found that in their case the answer laid outside the gene and in the regulation of proteins.