We are genetically similar to our friends

Written by PTI | Washington | Updated: Jul 15 2014, 19:36pm hrs
Friends are the family you choose! Friends who are not biologically related still resemble each other genetically, according to a new study.

Researchers from the University of California, San Diego, and Yale University found that we have more DNA in common with the people we pick as friends than we do with strangers in the same population.

"Looking across the whole genome, we find that, on average, we are genetically similar to our friends," said James Fowler, professor of medical genetics and political science at UC San Diego.





Fowler and Nicholas Christakis, professor of sociology, evolutionary biology, and medicine at Yale, found friends are as "related" as fourth cousins or people who share great-great-great grandparents. That translates to about 1 per cent of our genes.

"One per cent may not sound like much to the layperson but to geneticists it is a significant number," Christakis said.


Researchers said why we might be most similar in our olfactory genes needs further research.



Genes that were more similar between friends seem to be evolving faster than other genes, said researchers, adding that this may help to explain why human evolution appears to have speeded up over the last 30,000 years.
