scholarly journals Sex-specific gene and pathway modeling of inherited glioma risk

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Quinn T. Ostrom ◽  
Warren Coleman ◽  
William Huang ◽  
Joshua B. Rubin ◽  
Justin D. Lathia ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTBackgroundGenome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified 25 risk variants for glioma, which explain ~30% of heritable risk. Most glioma histologies occur with significantly higher incidence in males. A sex-stratified analysis ide7ntified sex-specific glioma risk variants, and further analyses using gene- and pathway-based approaches may further elucidate risk variation by sex.MethodsResults from the Glioma International Case-Control Study were used as a testing set, and results from three GWAS were combined via meta-analysis and used as a validation set. Using summary statistics for autosomal SNPs found to be nominally significant (p<0.01) in a previous meta-analysis and X chromosome SNPs with nominally significant association (p<0.01), three algorithms (Pascal, BimBam, and GATES) were used to generate gene-scores, and Pascal was used to generate pathway scores. Results were considered significant when p<3.3x10−6in ⅔ algorithms.Results25 genes within five regions and 19 genes within six regions reached the set significance threshold in at least 2/3 algorithms in males and females, respectively.EGFRandRTEL1-TNFRSF6Bwere significantly associated with all glioma and glioblastoma in males only, and a female-specific association inTERT, all of which remained nominally significant after conditioning on known risk loci. There were nominal associations with the Telomeres, Telomerase, Cellular Aging, and Immortality pathway in both males and females.ConclusionsThese results suggest that there may be biologically relevant significant differences by sex in genetic risk for glioma. Additional gene- and pathway-based analyses may further elucidate the biological processes through which this risk is conferred.

Circulation ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 127 (suppl_12) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Justice ◽  
Kari North ◽  
Ruth Loos ◽  
Sailaja Vedantam ◽  
Felix Day ◽  
...  

Obesity is a rising global concern as it substantially contributes to cardiovascular disease (CVD) and CVD risk factors (e.g. insulin resistance, dyslipidemia, Type 2 Diabetes). BMI (body mass index) is an easily obtained measure of obesity, which is highly heritable, and often used as a proxy when searching for genetic risk factors. Previous analyses of genome-wide association studies (GWAS) in the GIANT (Genetic Investigation of ANthropometric Traits) Consortium identified 32 loci containing common variants associated with BMI in adults of European ancestry. To enhance discovery of common causal variants for BMI, GIANT has expanded to include 82 studies with GWAS data and 43 studies with Metabochip data in more ancestrally diverse populations including up to 339,224 individuals. We performed a meta-analysis of the study-specific summary statistics for the BMI associations, assuming an additive model and using a fixed-effects inverse variance method. SNPs in 97 loci reached genome-wide significance (P<10-8), of which 31 loci had previously been identified for BMI in European-descent samples. Of the 66 novel BMI loci, three had previously been identified for association with adiposity related traits in specific populations. Many of the 97 loci contain strong biological candidates, and multiple methods were employed to pinpoint the most likely candidate gene(s) within the main signal regions. In addition to manual curation, GRAIL, and MAGENTA, we also employed a newly developed, unbiased computational approach that integrates a variety of data types (i.e. tissue-specific gene expression data, phenotypic information from mouse knockout studies, etc.) to identify potentially causal genes and pathways. Consistent with previous findings, many of these BMI loci contain genes that have a potential neuronal role in regulating appetite (e.g. MC4R, POMC, GRID1, NAV1 ). Our analyses also highlight loci with genes in pathways that were previously less apparent, such as those related to glucose and insulin homeostasis ( TCF7L2 , GIPR ), lipid metabolism ( APOE -cluster, NPC1 , NR1H3 ), the immune system ( TLR4) , and others. Additionally, many of the newly associated variants are in high LD with previously identified SNPs associated with related phenotypes, including other CVD risk factors (e.g. SNPs nearby IRS1 associated with T2D, adiposity, HDL, TG, adiponectin levels, and CHD; and SNPs near NT5C2 associated with CHD and blood pressure variables). This large-scale meta-analysis has greatly increased the number of identified obesity-susceptibility loci and continues to contribute to our understanding of the complex biology of adiposity. Our results have highlighted overlapping GWAS signals and important pathways which connect BMI and other CVD risk factors supporting the importance of pleiotropic effects in the pathogenesis of common complex diseases.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brenton R. Swenson ◽  
Tin Louie ◽  
Henry J. Lin ◽  
Raú MéndezGiráldez ◽  
Jennifer E Below ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTBackgroundThe electrocardiographically quantified QRS duration measures ventricular depolarization and conduction. QRS prolongation has been associated with poor heart failure prognosis and cardiovascular mortality, including sudden death. While previous genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified 32 QRS SNPs across 26 loci among European, African, and Asian-descent populations, the genetics of QRS among Hispanics/Latinos has not been previously explored.MethodsWe performed a GWAS of QRS duration among Hispanic/Latino ancestry populations (n=15,124) from four studies using 1000 Genomes imputed genotype data (adjusted for age, sex, global ancestry, clinical and study-specific covariates). Study-specific results were combined using fixed-effects, inverse variance-weighted meta-analysis.ResultsWe identified six loci associated with QRS (P<5×10−8), including two novel loci: MYOCD, a nuclear protein expressed in the heart, and SYT1, an integral membrane protein. The top association in the MYOCD locus, intronic SNP rs16946539, was found in Hispanics/Latinos with a minor allele frequency (MAF) of 0.04, but is monomorphic in European and African descent populations. The most significant QRS duration association was for intronic SNP rs3922344 (P= 8.56×10−26) in SCN5A/SCN10A. Three additional previously identified loci, CDKN1A, VTI1A, and HAND1, also exceeded the GWAS significance threshold among Hispanics/Latinos. A total of 27 of 32 previously identified QRS duration SNPs were shown to generalize in Hispanics/Latinos.ConclusionsOur QRS duration GWAS, the first in Hispanic/Latino populations, identified two new loci, underscoring the utility of extending large scale genomic studies to currently under-examined populations.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kyoko Watanabe ◽  
Philip R. Jansen ◽  
Jeanne E. Savage ◽  
Priyanka Nandakumar ◽  
Xin Wang ◽  
...  

AbstractInsomnia is a heritable, highly prevalent sleep disorder, for which no sufficient treatment currently exists. Previous genome-wide association studies (GWASs) with up to 1.3 million subjects identified over 200 associated loci. This extreme polygenicity suggested many more loci to be discovered. The current study almost doubled the sample size to over 2.3 million individuals thereby increasing statistical power. We identified 554 risk loci (confirming 190 previously associated loci and detecting 364 novel), and capitalizing on this large number of loci, we propose a novel strategy to prioritize genes using external biological resources and information on functional interactions between genes across risk loci. Of all 3,898 genes naively implicated from the risk loci, we prioritize 289. For these, we find brain-tissue expression specificity and enrichment in specific gene-sets of synaptic signaling functions and neuronal differentiation. We show that the novel gene prioritization strategy yields specific hypotheses on causal mechanisms underlying insomnia, which would not fully have been detected using traditional approaches.


2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yingchang Lu ◽  
Sinae Kane ◽  
Haoyan Chen ◽  
Argentina Leon ◽  
Ethan Levin ◽  
...  

Recent genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified multiple genetic risk factors for psoriasis, but data on their association with age of onset have been marginally explored. The goal of this study was to evaluate known risk alleles of psoriasis for association with age of psoriasis onset in three well-defined case-only cohorts totaling 1,498 psoriasis patients. We selected 39 genetic variants from psoriasis GWAS and tested these variants for association with age of psoriasis onset in a meta-analysis. We found that rs10484554 and rs12191877 near HLA-C and rs17716942 near IFIH1 were associated with age of psoriasis onset with false discovery rate < 0.05. The association between rs17716942 and age of onset was not replicated in a fourth independent cohort of 489 patients (). The imputed HLA-C*06:02 allele demonstrated a much stronger association with age of psoriasis onset than rs10484554 and rs12191877. We conclude that despite the discovery of numerous psoriasis risk alleles, HLA-C*06:02 still plays the most important role in determining the age of onset of psoriasis. Larger studies are needed to evaluate the contribution of other risk alleles, including IFIH1, to age of psoriasis onset.


2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jayaram Vijayakrishnan ◽  
Maoxiang Qian ◽  
James B. Studd ◽  
Wenjian Yang ◽  
Ben Kinnersley ◽  
...  

AbstractThere is increasing evidence for a strong inherited genetic basis of susceptibility to acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) in children. To identify new risk variants for B-cell ALL (B-ALL) we conducted a meta-analysis with four GWAS (genome-wide association studies), totalling 5321 cases and 16,666 controls of European descent. We herein describe novel risk loci for B-ALL at 9q21.31 (rs76925697, P = 2.11 × 10−8), for high-hyperdiploid ALL at 5q31.1 (rs886285, P = 1.56 × 10−8) and 6p21.31 (rs210143 in BAK1, P = 2.21 × 10−8), and ETV6-RUNX1 ALL at 17q21.32 (rs10853104 in IGF2BP1, P = 1.82 × 10−8). Particularly notable are the pleiotropic effects of the BAK1 variant on multiple haematological malignancies and specific effects of IGF2BP1 on ETV6-RUNX1 ALL evidenced by both germline and somatic genomic analyses. Integration of GWAS signals with transcriptomic/epigenomic profiling and 3D chromatin interaction data for these leukaemia risk loci suggests deregulation of B-cell development and the cell cycle as central mechanisms governing genetic susceptibility to ALL.


2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Quinn T. Ostrom ◽  
Ben Kinnersley ◽  
Margaret R. Wrensch ◽  
Jeanette E. Eckel-Passow ◽  
Georgina Armstrong ◽  
...  

AbstractIncidence of glioma is approximately 50% higher in males. Previous analyses have examined exposures related to sex hormones in women as potential protective factors for these tumors, with inconsistent results. Previous glioma genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have not stratified by sex. Potential sex-specific genetic effects were assessed in autosomal SNPs and sex chromosome variants for all glioma, GBM and non-GBM patients using data from four previous glioma GWAS. Datasets were analyzed using sex-stratified logistic regression models and combined using meta-analysis. There were 4,831 male cases, 5,216 male controls, 3,206 female cases and 5,470 female controls. A significant association was detected at rs11979158 (7p11.2) in males only. Association at rs55705857 (8q24.21) was stronger in females than in males. A large region on 3p21.31 was identified with significant association in females only. The identified differences in effect of risk variants do not fully explain the observed incidence difference in glioma by sex.


Cancers ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (12) ◽  
pp. 2001 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wendy Yi-Ying Wu ◽  
Gunnar Johansson ◽  
Carl Wibom ◽  
Thomas Brännström ◽  
Annika Malmström ◽  
...  

Genome-wide association studies have identified 25 germline genetic loci that increase the risk of glioma. The somatic tumor molecular alterations, including IDH-mutation status and 1p/19q co-deletion, have been included into the WHO 2016 classification system for glioma. To investigate how the germline genetic risk variants correlate with the somatic molecular subtypes put forward by WHO, we performed a meta-analysis that combined findings from 330 Swedish cases and 876 controls with two other recent studies. In total, 5,103 cases and 10,915 controls were included. Three categories of associations were found. First, variants in TERT and TP53 were associated with increased risk of all glioma subtypes. Second, variants in CDKN2B-AS1, EGFR, and RTEL1 were associated with IDH-wildtype glioma. Third, variants in CCDC26 (the 8q24 locus), C2orf80 (close to IDH), LRIG1, PHLDB1, ETFA, MAML2 and ZBTB16 were associated with IDH-mutant glioma. We therefore propose three etiopathological pathways in gliomagenesis based on germline variants for future guidance of diagnosis and potential functional targets for therapies. Future prospective clinical trials of patients with suspicion of glioma diagnoses, using the genetic variants as biomarkers, are necessary to disentangle how strongly they can predict glioma diagnosis.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiang Shu ◽  
Jirong Long ◽  
Qiuyin Cai ◽  
Sun-Seog Kweon ◽  
Ji-Yeob Choi ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTCommon genetic variants in 183 loci have been identified in relation to breast cancer risk in genome-wide association studies (GWAS). These risk variants combined explain only a relatively small proportion of breast cancer heritability, particularly in Asian populations. To search for additional genetic susceptibility loci for breast cancer, we performed a meta-analysis of data from GWAS conducted in Asians (24,206 cases and 24,775 controls). Variants showing an association with breast cancer risk at P < 0.01 were evaluated in GWAS conducted in European women including 122,977 cases and 105,974 controls. In the combined analysis of data from both Asian and European women, the lead variant in 28 loci not previously reported showed an association with breast cancer risk at P < 5 ×10−8. In the meta-analysis of all GWAS data from Asian and European descendants, we identified SNPs in three additional loci in association with breast cancer risk at P < 5 ×10−8. The associations for 10 of these loci were replicated in an independent sample of 16,787 cases and 16,680 controls of Asian women (P < 0.05). Expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) and gene-based analyses provided evidence for the possible involvement of the YBEY, MAN2C1, SNUPN, TBX1, SEMA4A, STC1, MUTYH, LOXL2, and LINC00886 genes underlying the associations observed in eight of these 28 newly identified risk loci. In addition, we replicated the association for 78 of the 166 previously reported risk variants at P < 0.05 in women of Asian descent using GWAS data. These findings improve our understanding of breast cancer genetics and etiology and extend to Asian populations previous findings from studies of European women.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arjun Bhattacharya ◽  
Jibril B Hirbo ◽  
Dan Zhou ◽  
Wei Zhou ◽  
Jie Zheng ◽  
...  

The Global Biobank Meta-analysis Initiative (GBMI), through its genetic and demographic diversity, provides a valuable opportunity to study population-wide and ancestry-specific genetic associations. However, with multiple ascertainment strategies and multi-ethnic study populations across biobanks, the GBMI provides a distinct set of challenges in implementing statistical genetics methods. Transcriptome-wide association studies (TWAS) are a popular tool to boost detection power for and provide biological context to genetic associations by integrating single nucleotide polymorphism to trait (SNP-trait) associations from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) with SNP-based predictive models of gene expression. TWAS presents unique challenges beyond GWAS, especially in a multi-biobank and meta-analytic setting like the GBMI. In this work, we present the GBMI TWAS pipeline, outlining practical considerations for ancestry and tissue specificity and meta-analytic strategies, as well as open challenges at every step of the framework. Our work provides a strong foundation for adding tissue-specific gene expression context to biobank-linked genetic association studies, allowing for ancestry-aware discovery to accelerate genomic medicine.


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