Clustering of metabolic risk factors in young adults: Genes and environment

Based on our sample of young adults with a low prevalence of the MetS, it can be concluded that both genes and environment contribute significantly to the clustering of the MRFs although the majority of the variation is MRF-specific. Therefore, future QTL searches in young adults may want to focus on MRF-specific loci, rather than 'cluster-phenotypes' such as the MetS.