Genetic cause of BAV and thoracic aortic aneurysms

[pekster11]

Just after Xmas my parents unfortunately caught covid.
My Dad (who is 75) got it bad and was in hospital for over 2 weeks. During that time he had a chest scan on his lungs. This scan picked up that he had a thoracic aortic aneurysm.
After he recovered from covid he was referred to the same heart hospital I attend, and was seen by the same consultants i see !
A CT scan showed he too has a bicuspid aortic valve, like me. However, his BAV is not so misshapen or calcified to cause much stenosis. At some point he may need the aneurysm treated if it worsens.
So there is a genetic link between my heart complaint and my Dad's

However, now this is were it gets weird.
I am an identical twin...My twin does not have a BAV or associated thoracic aortic aneurysm

A cause of genetic predisposition and epi-genetic triggers perhaps ?

 

[pellicle]

A cause of genetic predisposition and epi-genetic triggers perhaps ?

correct ... we know its strongly associated but to my knowledge we do not know yet causal gene chemistry.

this reading may help
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5573733/
as a young scientist in the making you can be sure that (before this was even known to be heritable) this influenced strongly my decision to study biochemistry (with a slant on Genetics and DNA manipulation {then in its infancy})

I was quite concerned about the idea that I would potentially pass this on to children I may have. I have always taken very seriously the importance of of having kids and wanting them to have the best start in life.

Some decades back I came to the conclusion that I was actually better off in many ways for this "affliction". I have said this here a number of times

https://www.valvereplacement.org/th...-valves-blood-thinners-etc.887758/post-900840
Best Wishes