Among both Finns and French, people born with an apo E-2 gene have a four-fold greater likelihood of reaching 100 than those born with an apo E-4, the studies find.
What really shook up the world's neurologists, though, was the Duke team's finding that people born with two copies of the E-4 version of apo E developed Alzheimer's symptoms an average of 20 years earlier in life than those born with an E-2 version.