Editorial: Genetic Epidemiology and Genetic Epidemiology
At the initiation of founding Editor-in-Chief, D.C. Rao, and in consultation with a nominating committee from the Editorial Board, the Publisher has appointed us to serve as the new Co-Editors-in-Chief of Genetic Epidemiology. That it should take two to fill his editorial shoes is a tribute to the sustained and tenacious efforts of our predecessor. The vision and conviction that a journal could catalyze the definition and development of the field of genetic epidemiology as an interdisciplinary area of inquiry prompted the launch of this publication in 1984. Through D.C. Rao's efforts in soliciting manuscripts, consulting widely for incisive and prompt reviews, and insisting on improvements, Genetic Epidemiology has matured over the last decade into a respected forum for communicating research on the distribution and determinants of human disease.
The same decade has witnessed the evolution of genetic epidemiology as a new scientific discipline-one that has gained in prominence, eminence and importanceand the recent emergence of the International Genetic Epidemiology Society (IGES) as a new professional organization. This intertwining of genetics and epidemiology is due in no small measure to the cross-fertilization of ideas, methods, and research challenges that have been achieved in the pages of Genetic Epidemiology.
A look back to the contents of the first issue reveals how far the field has progressed. That 1984 issue included reports on segregation analysis of breast cancer, familial aggregation of colon cancer, genetic and environmental analysis of alcohol use, and the prediction of Huntington disease using linked genetic markers. Eight years later, we now know the location of at least one breast cancer gene, several genes for colon cancer, and putative susceptibility genes for alcoholism. The Huntington disease gene has been localized to a 700 kilobase DNA segment, enabling future studies of its enigmatic properties. Much of this progress has been achieved through combined approaches of modem molecular genetics and quantitative genetic analysis. Indeed, both genetic epidemiology and Genetic Epidemiology are so much richer for the tools and advances of modem molecular genetics.
The last five years have seen the brilliant successes of deciphering the genetics of Mendelian disorders such as cystic fibrosis and Duchenne muscular dystrophy, and promising beginnings for understanding complex traits such as diabetes mellitus. The Mendelian nature of cystic fibrosis enabled linkage analysis and subsequent gene isolation by physical mapping approaches. This has led to studies of the population distribution of gene mutations, correlation of mutations with phenotype, and more recently, with quan-