There's an article in the paper today about the discovery of a gene
for the personality trait of "novelty-seeking" (the first gene for any
personality trait). The original reports appeared in Nature Genetics,
accompanied by a commentary by Prof. C Robert Cloninger of Washington
U., St. Louis.
This discovery is a direct outcome of the theory that was announced 10
years ago by Cloninger - two of his original articles announcing his
theory were part of the reading list in one of my posts last week on
integrated approaches to studying the brain.
The newspaper report only identified the gene as being for one of
the dopamine receptors. Incidentally, personality is controlled by
more than one gene - the total number could run into thousands,
though the contributions of many of them would be quite small.
Onward and upwards!
AJR
