Evidence map›Paper›PMID 35523147›Full record

ArticleAmerican journal of human genetics2022

Response to Wyckelsma et al.: Loss of α-actinin-3 during human evolution provides superior cold resilience and muscle heat generation.

Alexander Mörseburg, Luca Pagani, Boris Malyarchuk, Miroslava Derenko, Toomas Kivisild

Open access · greenAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in American journal of human genetics, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
2citing papers in PubMed
1.1field-weighted citation impact, top 21% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

2 citing papers in PubMed, 6 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Body Temperature Regulation in the Rat by Muscle Tone.Acta physiologica (Oxford, England) · 2026
    Article
  2. Response to Mörseburg et al.American journal of human genetics · 2022
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.

Alexander MörseburgMetabolic Research Laboratories, Wellcome Trust-MRC Institute of Metabolic Science, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 0QQ, UK. Electronic address: am2037@cam.ac.uk.
Luca PaganiEstonian Biocentre, Institute of Genomics, University of Tartu, Riia 23B, Tartu 51010, Estonia; Department of Biology, University of Padova, 35131 Padova, Italy.
Boris MalyarchukGenetics Laboratory, Institute of Biological Problems of the North, Russian Academy of Sciences, Portovaya str. 18, Magadan 685000, Russia.
Miroslava DerenkoGenetics Laboratory, Institute of Biological Problems of the North, Russian Academy of Sciences, Portovaya str. 18, Magadan 685000, Russia.
Toomas KivisildEstonian Biocentre, Institute of Genomics, University of Tartu, Riia 23B, Tartu 51010, Estonia; Department of Human Genetics, KU Leuven, Leuven, Herestraat 3000, Belgium. Electronic address: toomas.kivisild@kuleuven.be.
Estonian Biocentre · EEInstitute of Biological Problems of the North · RUWellcome/MRC Institute of Metabolic Science · GB

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The common loss-of-function mutation R577X in the structural muscle protein ACTN3 emerged as a potential target of positive selection from early studies and has been the focus of insightful physiological work suggesting a significant impact on muscle metabolism. Adaptation to cold climates has been proposed as a key adaptive mechanism explaining its global allele frequency patterns. Here, we re-examine this hypothesis analyzing modern (n = 3,626) and ancient (n = 1,651) genomic data by using allele-frequency as well as haplotype homozygosity-based methods. The presented results are more consistent with genetic drift rather than selection in cold climates as the main driver of the ACTN3 R577X frequency distribution in human populations across the world. This Matters Arising paper is in response to Wyckelsma et al. (2021),

Indexed as

ActininMuscle, SkeletalCold TemperatureGene FrequencyHomozygoteHumansThermogenesisActininACTN3 protein, humanACTN3cold adaptationloss of function mutationspositive selection

Identifiers

PMID35523147
PMCPMC9118108
OpenAlexW4229003022

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.