Ten genes up sudden death risk: Study

Researchers have found nine new gene variations that can make a person vulnerable to sudden cardiac death and confirmed the role of another, international researchers said on Sunday.

"Almost half were new genes that no one would have guessed as being involved in cardiac biology," Dan Arking of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, whose team was one of many working on the study said in the journal Nature Genetics.

Last month, Arking's group reported in the journal Circulation that it had found a single gene that raises the risk of cardiac death. The new study identifies that gene plus nine new ones that modify the timing of heart contractions, a measure known as the QT interval.