Sherry Marts, scientific director for the Society for Women's Health Research, thinks these areas will be focal points. "We're looking at this as the start of a new field of research," she says. "In another 10 years [sex-based differences] is going to be like neuroscience, where it started out as a few physiologists and a few biochemists, and pretty soon you've got a core group that's really moving the field forward. Then folks start to realize that this is actually something you can build a career on." Carmen Sapienza, professor of pathology at Temple University School of Medicine, Philadelphia, and an Institute of Medicine (IOM) 1 study panel member comments, "There will be lots of biochemical differences that are genetic between males and females that may not have anything to do with hormones."
Biologist Sharon P. Shriver, Pennsylvania State University, studies the gene gastrin-releasing peptide receptor (GRPR), which codes for ...
