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The X chromosome and its diminutive partner, Y, play a bigger part in human health than was previously thought. Credit: Biophoto Associates/Science Photo Library

Cholesterol-lowering statins are among the most widely prescribed drugs in the world. They can have side effects, however, including muscle pain that affects twice as many women as men. When Karen Reue, a geneticist at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), set out to discover why, she expected that the answer would lie in the sex hormones, such as oestrogen and testosterone, which are produced by the ovaries and testes.

The ‘crazy rule-defying’ genes that determine sex

The misunderstood sex chromosome: how X affects your health