@article {1274, title = {A bivariate genome-wide approach to metabolic syndrome: STAMPEED consortium.}, journal = {Diabetes}, volume = {60}, year = {2011}, month = {2011 Apr}, pages = {1329-39}, abstract = {

OBJECTIVE The metabolic syndrome (MetS) is defined as concomitant disorders of lipid and glucose metabolism, central obesity, and high blood pressure, with an increased risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. This study tests whether common genetic variants with pleiotropic effects account for some of the correlated architecture among five metabolic phenotypes that define MetS. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Seven studies of the STAMPEED consortium, comprising 22,161 participants of European ancestry, underwent genome-wide association analyses of metabolic traits using a panel of \~{}2.5 million imputed single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Phenotypes were defined by the National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP) criteria for MetS in pairwise combinations. Individuals exceeding the NCEP thresholds for both traits of a pair were considered affected. RESULTS Twenty-nine common variants were associated with MetS or a pair of traits. Variants in the genes LPL, CETP, APOA5 (and its cluster), GCKR (and its cluster), LIPC, TRIB1, LOC100128354/MTNR1B, ABCB11, and LOC100129150 were further tested for their association with individual qualitative and quantitative traits. None of the 16 top SNPs (one per gene) associated simultaneously with more than two individual traits. Of them 11 variants showed nominal associations with MetS per se. The effects of 16 top SNPs on the quantitative traits were relatively small, together explaining from \~{}9\% of the variance in triglycerides, 5.8\% of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, 3.6\% of fasting glucose, and 1.4\% of systolic blood pressure. CONCLUSIONS Qualitative and quantitative pleiotropic tests on pairs of traits indicate that a small portion of the covariation in these traits can be explained by the reported common genetic variants.

}, keywords = {Adult, Aged, Female, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genome-Wide Association Study, Genotype, Humans, Male, Meta-Analysis as Topic, Metabolic Syndrome, Middle Aged, Phenotype, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide}, issn = {1939-327X}, doi = {10.2337/db10-1011}, author = {Kraja, Aldi T and Vaidya, Dhananjay and Pankow, James S and Goodarzi, Mark O and Assimes, Themistocles L and Kullo, Iftikhar J and Sovio, Ulla and Mathias, Rasika A and Sun, Yan V and Franceschini, Nora and Absher, Devin and Li, Guo and Zhang, Qunyuan and Feitosa, Mary F and Glazer, Nicole L and Haritunians, Talin and Hartikainen, Anna-Liisa and Knowles, Joshua W and North, Kari E and Iribarren, Carlos and Kral, Brian and Yanek, Lisa and O{\textquoteright}Reilly, Paul F and McCarthy, Mark I and Jaquish, Cashell and Couper, David J and Chakravarti, Aravinda and Psaty, Bruce M and Becker, Lewis C and Province, Michael A and Boerwinkle, Eric and Quertermous, Thomas and Palotie, Leena and Jarvelin, Marjo-Riitta and Becker, Diane M and Kardia, Sharon L R and Rotter, Jerome I and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Borecki, Ingrid B} } @article {6089, title = {Genome-wide association study for circulating levels of PAI-1 provides novel insights into its regulation.}, journal = {Blood}, volume = {120}, year = {2012}, month = {2012 Dec 06}, pages = {4873-81}, abstract = {

We conducted a genome-wide association study to identify novel associations between genetic variants and circulating plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 (PAI-1) concentration, and examined functional implications of variants and genes that were discovered. A discovery meta-analysis was performed in 19 599 subjects, followed by replication analysis of genome-wide significant (P < 5 {\texttimes} 10(-8)) single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 10 796 independent samples. We further examined associations with type 2 diabetes and coronary artery disease, assessed the functional significance of the SNPs for gene expression in human tissues, and conducted RNA-silencing experiments for one novel association. We confirmed the association of the 4G/5G proxy SNP rs2227631 in the promoter region of SERPINE1 (7q22.1) and discovered genome-wide significant associations at 3 additional loci: chromosome 7q22.1 close to SERPINE1 (rs6976053, discovery P = 3.4 {\texttimes} 10(-10)); chromosome 11p15.2 within ARNTL (rs6486122, discovery P = 3.0 {\texttimes} 10(-8)); and chromosome 3p25.2 within PPARG (rs11128603, discovery P = 2.9 {\texttimes} 10(-8)). Replication was achieved for the 7q22.1 and 11p15.2 loci. There was nominal association with type 2 diabetes and coronary artery disease at ARNTL (P < .05). Functional studies identified MUC3 as a candidate gene for the second association signal on 7q22.1. In summary, SNPs in SERPINE1 and ARNTL and an SNP associated with the expression of MUC3 were robustly associated with circulating levels of PAI-1.

}, keywords = {Adaptor Proteins, Signal Transducing, ARNTL Transcription Factors, ATPases Associated with Diverse Cellular Activities, Cell Line, Cell Line, Tumor, Cohort Studies, Coronary Artery Disease, Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2, Gene Expression Profiling, Gene Expression Regulation, Gene Frequency, Genome-Wide Association Study, Genotype, Humans, LIM Domain Proteins, Meta-Analysis as Topic, Monocytes, Mucin-3, Plasminogen Activator Inhibitor 1, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, PPAR gamma, Proteasome Endopeptidase Complex, RNA Interference, Transcription Factors}, issn = {1528-0020}, doi = {10.1182/blood-2012-06-436188}, author = {Huang, Jie and Sabater-Lleal, Maria and Asselbergs, Folkert W and Tregouet, David and Shin, So-Youn and Ding, Jingzhong and Baumert, Jens and Oudot-Mellakh, Tiphaine and Folkersen, Lasse and Johnson, Andrew D and Smith, Nicholas L and Williams, Scott M and Ikram, Mohammad A and Kleber, Marcus E and Becker, Diane M and Truong, Vinh and Mychaleckyj, Josyf C and Tang, Weihong and Yang, Qiong and Sennblad, Bengt and Moore, Jason H and Williams, Frances M K and Dehghan, Abbas and Silbernagel, G{\"u}nther and Schrijvers, Elisabeth M C and Smith, Shelly and Karakas, Mahir and Tofler, Geoffrey H and Silveira, Angela and Navis, Gerjan J and Lohman, Kurt and Chen, Ming-Huei and Peters, Annette and Goel, Anuj and Hopewell, Jemma C and Chambers, John C and Saleheen, Danish and Lundmark, Per and Psaty, Bruce M and Strawbridge, Rona J and Boehm, Bernhard O and Carter, Angela M and Meisinger, Christa and Peden, John F and Bis, Joshua C and McKnight, Barbara and Ohrvik, John and Taylor, Kent and Franzosi, Maria Grazia and Seedorf, Udo and Collins, Rory and Franco-Cereceda, Anders and Syv{\"a}nen, Ann-Christine and Goodall, Alison H and Yanek, Lisa R and Cushman, Mary and M{\"u}ller-Nurasyid, Martina and Folsom, Aaron R and Basu, Saonli and Matijevic, Nena and van Gilst, Wiek H and Kooner, Jaspal S and Hofman, Albert and Danesh, John and Clarke, Robert and Meigs, James B and Kathiresan, Sekar and Reilly, Muredach P and Klopp, Norman and Harris, Tamara B and Winkelmann, Bernhard R and Grant, Peter J and Hillege, Hans L and Watkins, Hugh and Spector, Timothy D and Becker, Lewis C and Tracy, Russell P and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Eriksson, Per and Cambien, Francois and Morange, Pierre-Emmanuel and Koenig, Wolfgang and Soranzo, Nicole and van der Harst, Pim and Liu, Yongmei and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Hamsten, Anders} } @article {6155, title = {Multiethnic meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies in >100 000 subjects identifies 23 fibrinogen-associated Loci but no strong evidence of a causal association between circulating fibrinogen and cardiovascular disease.}, journal = {Circulation}, volume = {128}, year = {2013}, month = {2013 Sep 17}, pages = {1310-24}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Estimates of the heritability of plasma fibrinogen concentration, an established predictor of cardiovascular disease, range from 34\% to 50\%. Genetic variants so far identified by genome-wide association studies explain only a small proportion (<2\%) of its variation.

METHODS AND RESULTS: We conducted a meta-analysis of 28 genome-wide association studies including >90 000 subjects of European ancestry, the first genome-wide association meta-analysis of fibrinogen levels in 7 studies in blacks totaling 8289 samples, and a genome-wide association study in Hispanics totaling 1366 samples. Evaluation for association of single-nucleotide polymorphisms with clinical outcomes included a total of 40 695 cases and 85 582 controls for coronary artery disease, 4752 cases and 24 030 controls for stroke, and 3208 cases and 46 167 controls for venous thromboembolism. Overall, we identified 24 genome-wide significant (P<5{\texttimes}10(-8)) independent signals in 23 loci, including 15 novel associations, together accounting for 3.7\% of plasma fibrinogen variation. Gene-set enrichment analysis highlighted key roles in fibrinogen regulation for the 3 structural fibrinogen genes and pathways related to inflammation, adipocytokines, and thyrotrophin-releasing hormone signaling. Whereas lead single-nucleotide polymorphisms in a few loci were significantly associated with coronary artery disease, the combined effect of all 24 fibrinogen-associated lead single-nucleotide polymorphisms was not significant for coronary artery disease, stroke, or venous thromboembolism.

CONCLUSIONS: We identify 23 robustly associated fibrinogen loci, 15 of which are new. Clinical outcome analysis of these loci does not support a causal relationship between circulating levels of fibrinogen and coronary artery disease, stroke, or venous thromboembolism.

}, keywords = {Adolescent, Adult, African Continental Ancestry Group, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Cardiovascular Diseases, Coronary Artery Disease, European Continental Ancestry Group, Female, Fibrinogen, Genetic Loci, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genome-Wide Association Study, Hispanic Americans, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Myocardial Infarction, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Risk Factors, Stroke, Venous Thromboembolism, Young Adult}, issn = {1524-4539}, doi = {10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.113.002251}, author = {Sabater-Lleal, Maria and Huang, Jie and Chasman, Daniel and Naitza, Silvia and Dehghan, Abbas and Johnson, Andrew D and Teumer, Alexander and Reiner, Alex P and Folkersen, Lasse and Basu, Saonli and Rudnicka, Alicja R and Trompet, Stella and M{\"a}larstig, Anders and Baumert, Jens and Bis, Joshua C and Guo, Xiuqing and Hottenga, Jouke J and Shin, So-Youn and Lopez, Lorna M and Lahti, Jari and Tanaka, Toshiko and Yanek, Lisa R and Oudot-Mellakh, Tiphaine and Wilson, James F and Navarro, Pau and Huffman, Jennifer E and Zemunik, Tatijana and Redline, Susan and Mehra, Reena and Pulanic, Drazen and Rudan, Igor and Wright, Alan F and Kolcic, Ivana and Polasek, Ozren and Wild, Sarah H and Campbell, Harry and Curb, J David and Wallace, Robert and Liu, Simin and Eaton, Charles B and Becker, Diane M and Becker, Lewis C and Bandinelli, Stefania and R{\"a}ikk{\"o}nen, Katri and Widen, Elisabeth and Palotie, Aarno and Fornage, Myriam and Green, David and Gross, Myron and Davies, Gail and Harris, Sarah E and Liewald, David C and Starr, John M and Williams, Frances M K and Grant, Peter J and Spector, Timothy D and Strawbridge, Rona J and Silveira, Angela and Sennblad, Bengt and Rivadeneira, Fernando and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Franco, Oscar H and Hofman, Albert and van Dongen, Jenny and Willemsen, Gonneke and Boomsma, Dorret I and Yao, Jie and Swords Jenny, Nancy and Haritunians, Talin and McKnight, Barbara and Lumley, Thomas and Taylor, Kent D and Rotter, Jerome I and Psaty, Bruce M and Peters, Annette and Gieger, Christian and Illig, Thomas and Grotevendt, Anne and Homuth, Georg and V{\"o}lzke, Henry and Kocher, Thomas and Goel, Anuj and Franzosi, Maria Grazia and Seedorf, Udo and Clarke, Robert and Steri, Maristella and Tarasov, Kirill V and Sanna, Serena and Schlessinger, David and Stott, David J and Sattar, Naveed and Buckley, Brendan M and Rumley, Ann and Lowe, Gordon D and McArdle, Wendy L and Chen, Ming-Huei and Tofler, Geoffrey H and Song, Jaejoon and Boerwinkle, Eric and Folsom, Aaron R and Rose, Lynda M and Franco-Cereceda, Anders and Teichert, Martina and Ikram, M Arfan and Mosley, Thomas H and Bevan, Steve and Dichgans, Martin and Rothwell, Peter M and Sudlow, Cathie L M and Hopewell, Jemma C and Chambers, John C and Saleheen, Danish and Kooner, Jaspal S and Danesh, John and Nelson, Christopher P and Erdmann, Jeanette and Reilly, Muredach P and Kathiresan, Sekar and Schunkert, Heribert and Morange, Pierre-Emmanuel and Ferrucci, Luigi and Eriksson, Johan G and Jacobs, David and Deary, Ian J and Soranzo, Nicole and Witteman, Jacqueline C M and de Geus, Eco J C and Tracy, Russell P and Hayward, Caroline and Koenig, Wolfgang and Cucca, Francesco and Jukema, J Wouter and Eriksson, Per and Seshadri, Sudha and Markus, Hugh S and Watkins, Hugh and Samani, Nilesh J and Wallaschofski, Henri and Smith, Nicholas L and Tregouet, David and Ridker, Paul M and Tang, Weihong and Strachan, David P and Hamsten, Anders and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J} } @article {6586, title = {Extreme deep white matter hyperintensity volumes are associated with African American race.}, journal = {Cerebrovasc Dis}, volume = {37}, year = {2014}, month = {2014}, pages = {244-50}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: African Americans (AAs) have a higher prevalence of extreme ischemic white matter hyperintensities (WMHs) on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) than do European Americans (EAs) based on the Cardiovascular Health Study (CHS) score. Ischemic white matter disease, limited to the deep white matter, may be biologically distinct from disease in other regions and may reflect a previously observed trend toward an increased risk of subcortical lacunar infarcts in AAs. We hypothesized that extreme deep WMH volume (DWMV) or periventricular volume (PV) may also have a higher prevalence in AAs. Thus, we studied extreme CHS scores and extreme DWMV and PV in a healthy population enriched for cardiovascular disease risk factors.

METHODS: We imaged the brains of 593 subjects who were first-degree relatives of probands with early onset coronary disease prior to 60 years of age. WMHs were manually delineated on 3-tesla cranial MRI by a trained radiology reader; the location and volume of lesions were characterized using automated software. DWMV and PV were measured directly with automated software, and the CHS score was determined by a neuroradiologist. Volumes were characterized as being in the upper 25\% versus lower 75\% of total lesion volume. Volumes in the upper versus the remaining quartiles were examined for AA versus EA race using multiple logistic regression (generalized estimating equations adjusted for family relatedness) and adjusted for major vascular disease risk factors including age >=55 years versus <55, sex, current smoking, obesity, hypertension, diabetes and low-density lipoprotein >160 mg/dl.

RESULTS: Participants were 58\% women and 37\% AAs, with a mean age of 51.5 {\textpm} 11.0 years (range, 29-74 years). AAs had significantly higher odds of having extreme DWMVs (odds ratio, OR, 1.8; 95\% confidence interval, CI, 1.2-2.9; p = 0.0076) independently of age, sex, hypertension and all other risk factors. AAs also had significantly higher odds of having extreme CHS scores >=3 (OR, 1.3; 95\% CI, 1.1-3.6; p = 0.025). Extreme PV was not significantly associated with AA race (OR, 1.3; 95\% CI, 0.81-2.1; p = 0.26).

CONCLUSIONS: AAs from families with early-onset cardiovascular disease are more likely to have extreme DWMVs (a subclinical form of cerebrovascular disease) and an extreme CHS score, but not extreme PV, independently of age and other cardiovascular disease risk factors. These findings suggest that this AA population is at an increased risk for DWMV and may be at an increased risk for future subcortical stroke. Longitudinal studies are required to see if DWMV is predictive of symptomatic subcortical strokes in this population.

}, keywords = {Adult, African Americans, Age Factors, Aged, Cerebrovascular Disorders, European Continental Ancestry Group, Female, Humans, Hypertension, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Middle Aged, Prevalence, Risk Factors, White Matter}, issn = {1421-9786}, doi = {10.1159/000358117}, author = {Nyquist, Paul A and Bilgel, Murat S and Gottesman, Rebecca and Yanek, Lisa R and Moy, Taryn F and Becker, Lewis C and Cuzzocreo, Jennifer and Prince, Jerry and Yousem, David M and Becker, Diane M and Kral, Brian G and Vaidya, Dhananjay} } @article {6367, title = {Genome-wide association study for circulating tissue plasminogen activator levels and functional follow-up implicates endothelial STXBP5 and STX2.}, journal = {Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol}, volume = {34}, year = {2014}, month = {2014 May}, pages = {1093-101}, abstract = {

OBJECTIVE: Tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), a serine protease, catalyzes the conversion of plasminogen to plasmin, the major enzyme responsible for endogenous fibrinolysis. In some populations, elevated plasma levels of tPA have been associated with myocardial infarction and other cardiovascular diseases. We conducted a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies to identify novel correlates of circulating levels of tPA.

APPROACH AND RESULTS: Fourteen cohort studies with tPA measures (N=26 929) contributed to the meta-analysis. Three loci were significantly associated with circulating tPA levels (P<5.0{\texttimes}10(-8)). The first locus is on 6q24.3, with the lead single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP; rs9399599; P=2.9{\texttimes}10(-14)) within STXBP5. The second locus is on 8p11.21. The lead SNP (rs3136739; P=1.3{\texttimes}10(-9)) is intronic to POLB and <200 kb away from the tPA encoding the gene PLAT. We identified a nonsynonymous SNP (rs2020921) in modest linkage disequilibrium with rs3136739 (r(2)=0.50) within exon 5 of PLAT (P=2.0{\texttimes}10(-8)). The third locus is on 12q24.33, with the lead SNP (rs7301826; P=1.0{\texttimes}10(-9)) within intron 7 of STX2. We further found evidence for the association of lead SNPs in STXBP5 and STX2 with expression levels of the respective transcripts. In in vitro cell studies, silencing STXBP5 decreased the release of tPA from vascular endothelial cells, whereas silencing STX2 increased the tPA release. Through an in silico lookup, we found no associations of the 3 lead SNPs with coronary artery disease or stroke.

CONCLUSIONS: We identified 3 loci associated with circulating tPA levels, the PLAT region, STXBP5, and STX2. Our functional studies implicate a novel role for STXBP5 and STX2 in regulating tPA release.

}, keywords = {Aged, Cells, Cultured, Coronary Artery Disease, Endothelial Cells, Europe, Female, Gene Expression Regulation, Gene Silencing, Genetic Loci, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Nerve Tissue Proteins, Phenotype, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, R-SNARE Proteins, Risk Factors, Stroke, Syntaxin 1, Tissue Plasminogen Activator, Transfection, United States, Up-Regulation}, issn = {1524-4636}, doi = {10.1161/ATVBAHA.113.302088}, author = {Huang, Jie and Huffman, Jennifer E and Yamakuchi, Munekazu and Yamkauchi, Munekazu and Trompet, Stella and Asselbergs, Folkert W and Sabater-Lleal, Maria and Tr{\'e}gou{\"e}t, David-Alexandre and Chen, Wei-Min and Smith, Nicholas L and Kleber, Marcus E and Shin, So-Youn and Becker, Diane M and Tang, Weihong and Dehghan, Abbas and Johnson, Andrew D and Truong, Vinh and Folkersen, Lasse and Yang, Qiong and Oudot-Mellkah, Tiphaine and Buckley, Brendan M and Moore, Jason H and Williams, Frances M K and Campbell, Harry and Silbernagel, G{\"u}nther and Vitart, Veronique and Rudan, Igor and Tofler, Geoffrey H and Navis, Gerjan J and DeStefano, Anita and Wright, Alan F and Chen, Ming-Huei and de Craen, Anton J M and Worrall, Bradford B and Rudnicka, Alicja R and Rumley, Ann and Bookman, Ebony B and Psaty, Bruce M and Chen, Fang and Keene, Keith L and Franco, Oscar H and B{\"o}hm, Bernhard O and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Carter, Angela M and Jukema, J Wouter and Sattar, Naveed and Bis, Joshua C and Ikram, Mohammad A and Sale, Mich{\`e}le M and McKnight, Barbara and Fornage, Myriam and Ford, Ian and Taylor, Kent and Slagboom, P Eline and McArdle, Wendy L and Hsu, Fang-Chi and Franco-Cereceda, Anders and Goodall, Alison H and Yanek, Lisa R and Furie, Karen L and Cushman, Mary and Hofman, Albert and Witteman, Jacqueline C M and Folsom, Aaron R and Basu, Saonli and Matijevic, Nena and van Gilst, Wiek H and Wilson, James F and Westendorp, Rudi G J and Kathiresan, Sekar and Reilly, Muredach P and Tracy, Russell P and Polasek, Ozren and Winkelmann, Bernhard R and Grant, Peter J and Hillege, Hans L and Cambien, Francois and Stott, David J and Lowe, Gordon D and Spector, Timothy D and Meigs, James B and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and Eriksson, Per and Becker, Lewis C and Morange, Pierre-Emmanuel and Soranzo, Nicole and Williams, Scott M and Hayward, Caroline and van der Harst, Pim and Hamsten, Anders and Lowenstein, Charles J and Strachan, David P and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J} } @article {6573, title = {Trans-ethnic meta-analysis of white blood cell phenotypes.}, journal = {Hum Mol Genet}, volume = {23}, year = {2014}, month = {2014 Dec 20}, pages = {6944-60}, abstract = {

White blood cell (WBC) count is a common clinical measure used as a predictor of certain aspects of human health, including immunity and infection status. WBC count is also a complex trait that varies among individuals and ancestry groups. Differences in linkage disequilibrium structure and heterogeneity in allelic effects are expected to play a role in the associations observed between populations. Prior genome-wide association study (GWAS) meta-analyses have identified genomic loci associated with WBC and its subtypes, but much of the heritability of these phenotypes remains unexplained. Using GWAS summary statistics for over 50 000 individuals from three diverse populations (Japanese, African-American and European ancestry), a Bayesian model methodology was employed to account for heterogeneity between ancestry groups. This approach was used to perform a trans-ethnic meta-analysis of total WBC, neutrophil and monocyte counts. Ten previously known associations were replicated and six new loci were identified, including several regions harboring genes related to inflammation and immune cell function. Ninety-five percent credible interval regions were calculated to narrow the association signals and fine-map the putatively causal variants within loci. Finally, a conditional analysis was performed on the most significant SNPs identified by the trans-ethnic meta-analysis (MA), and nine secondary signals within loci previously associated with WBC or its subtypes were identified. This work illustrates the potential of trans-ethnic analysis and ascribes a critical role to multi-ethnic cohorts and consortia in exploring complex phenotypes with respect to variants that lie outside the European-biased GWAS pool.

}, keywords = {African Americans, Asian Continental Ancestry Group, Bayes Theorem, European Continental Ancestry Group, Genome, Human, Genome-Wide Association Study, Genotype, Humans, Leukocyte Count, Leukocytes, Linkage Disequilibrium, Phenotype, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Quantitative Trait Loci}, issn = {1460-2083}, doi = {10.1093/hmg/ddu401}, author = {Keller, Margaux F and Reiner, Alexander P and Okada, Yukinori and van Rooij, Frank J A and Johnson, Andrew D and Chen, Ming-Huei and Smith, Albert V and Morris, Andrew P and Tanaka, Toshiko and Ferrucci, Luigi and Zonderman, Alan B and Lettre, Guillaume and Harris, Tamara and Garcia, Melissa and Bandinelli, Stefania and Qayyum, Rehan and Yanek, Lisa R and Becker, Diane M and Becker, Lewis C and Kooperberg, Charles and Keating, Brendan and Reis, Jared and Tang, Hua and Boerwinkle, Eric and Kamatani, Yoichiro and Matsuda, Koichi and Kamatani, Naoyuki and Nakamura, Yusuke and Kubo, Michiaki and Liu, Simin and Dehghan, Abbas and Felix, Janine F and Hofman, Albert and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and van Duijn, Cornelia M and Franco, Oscar H and Longo, Dan L and Singleton, Andrew B and Psaty, Bruce M and Evans, Michelle K and Cupples, L Adrienne and Rotter, Jerome I and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Takahashi, Atsushi and Wilson, James G and Ganesh, Santhi K and Nalls, Mike A} } @article {7138, title = {Exome Genotyping Identifies Pleiotropic Variants Associated with Red Blood Cell Traits.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {99}, year = {2016}, month = {2016 Jul 7}, pages = {8-21}, abstract = {

Red blood cell (RBC) traits are important heritable clinical biomarkers and modifiers of disease severity. To identify coding genetic variants associated with these traits, we conducted meta-analyses of seven RBC phenotypes in 130,273 multi-ethnic individuals from~studies genotyped on an exome array. After conditional analyses and replication in 27,480 independent individuals, we identified 16 new RBC variants. We found low-frequency missense variants in MAP1A (rs55707100, minor allele frequency [MAF] = 3.3\%, p = 2~{\texttimes}~10(-10) for hemoglobin [HGB]) and HNF4A (rs1800961, MAF = 2.4\%, p < 3~{\texttimes} 10(-8) for hematocrit [HCT] and HGB). In African Americans, we identified a nonsense variant in CD36 associated with higher RBC distribution width (rs3211938, MAF = 8.7\%, p = 7~{\texttimes} 10(-11)) and showed that it is associated with lower CD36 expression and strong allelic imbalance in ex~vivo differentiated human erythroblasts. We also identified a rare missense variant in ALAS2 (rs201062903, MAF = 0.2\%) associated with lower mean corpuscular volume and mean corpuscular hemoglobin (p < 8~{\texttimes} 10(-9)). Mendelian mutations in ALAS2 are a cause of sideroblastic anemia and erythropoietic protoporphyria. Gene-based testing highlighted three rare missense variants in PKLR, a gene mutated in Mendelian non-spherocytic hemolytic anemia, associated with HGB and HCT (SKAT p < 8~{\texttimes} 10(-7)). These rare, low-frequency, and common RBC variants showed pleiotropy, being also associated with platelet, white blood cell, and lipid traits. Our association results and functional annotation suggest the involvement of new genes in human erythropoiesis. We also confirm that rare and low-frequency variants play a role in the architecture of complex human traits, although their phenotypic effect is generally smaller than originally anticipated.

}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2016.05.007}, author = {Chami, Nathalie and Chen, Ming-Huei and Slater, Andrew J and Eicher, John D and Evangelou, Evangelos and Tajuddin, Salman M and Love-Gregory, Latisha and Kacprowski, Tim and Schick, Ursula M and Nomura, Akihiro and Giri, Ayush and Lessard, Samuel and Brody, Jennifer A and Schurmann, Claudia and Pankratz, Nathan and Yanek, Lisa R and Manichaikul, Ani and Pazoki, Raha and Mihailov, Evelin and Hill, W David and Raffield, Laura M and Burt, Amber and Bartz, Traci M and Becker, Diane M and Becker, Lewis C and Boerwinkle, Eric and Bork-Jensen, Jette and Bottinger, Erwin P and O{\textquoteright}Donoghue, Michelle L and Crosslin, David R and de Denus, Simon and Dub{\'e}, Marie-Pierre and Elliott, Paul and Engstr{\"o}m, Gunnar and Evans, Michele K and Floyd, James S and Fornage, Myriam and Gao, He and Greinacher, Andreas and Gudnason, Vilmundur and Hansen, Torben and Harris, Tamara B and Hayward, Caroline and Hernesniemi, Jussi and Highland, Heather M and Hirschhorn, Joel N and Hofman, Albert and Irvin, Marguerite R and K{\"a}h{\"o}nen, Mika and Lange, Ethan and Launer, Lenore J and Lehtim{\"a}ki, Terho and Li, Jin and Liewald, David C M and Linneberg, Allan and Liu, Yongmei and Lu, Yingchang and Lyytik{\"a}inen, Leo-Pekka and M{\"a}gi, Reedik and Mathias, Rasika A and Melander, Olle and Metspalu, Andres and Mononen, Nina and Nalls, Mike A and Nickerson, Deborah A and Nikus, Kjell and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Chris J and Orho-Melander, Marju and Pedersen, Oluf and Petersmann, Astrid and Polfus, Linda and Psaty, Bruce M and Raitakari, Olli T and Raitoharju, Emma and Richard, Melissa and Rice, Kenneth M and Rivadeneira, Fernando and Rotter, Jerome I and Schmidt, Frank and Smith, Albert Vernon and Starr, John M and Taylor, Kent D and Teumer, Alexander and Thuesen, Betina H and Torstenson, Eric S and Tracy, Russell P and Tzoulaki, Ioanna and Zakai, Neil A and Vacchi-Suzzi, Caterina and van Duijn, Cornelia M and van Rooij, Frank J A and Cushman, Mary and Deary, Ian J and Velez Edwards, Digna R and Vergnaud, Anne-Claire and Wallentin, Lars and Waterworth, Dawn M and White, Harvey D and Wilson, James G and Zonderman, Alan B and Kathiresan, Sekar and Grarup, Niels and Esko, T{\~o}nu and Loos, Ruth J F and Lange, Leslie A and Faraday, Nauder and Abumrad, Nada A and Edwards, Todd L and Ganesh, Santhi K and Auer, Paul L and Johnson, Andrew D and Reiner, Alexander P and Lettre, Guillaume} } @article {7146, title = {Large-Scale Exome-wide Association Analysis Identifies Loci for White Blood Cell Traits and Pleiotropy with Immune-Mediated Diseases.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {99}, year = {2016}, month = {2016 Jul 7}, pages = {22-39}, abstract = {

White blood cells play diverse roles in innate and adaptive immunity. Genetic association analyses of phenotypic variation in circulating white blood cell (WBC) counts from large samples of otherwise healthy individuals can provide insights into genes and biologic pathways involved in production, differentiation, or clearance of particular WBC lineages (myeloid, lymphoid) and also potentially inform the genetic basis of autoimmune, allergic, and blood diseases. We performed an exome array-based meta-analysis of total WBC and subtype counts (neutrophils, monocytes, lymphocytes, basophils, and eosinophils) in a multi-ancestry discovery and replication sample of~\~{}157,622 individuals from 25 studies. We identified 16 common variants (8 of which were coding variants) associated with one or more WBC traits, the majority of which are pleiotropically associated with autoimmune diseases. Based on functional annotation, these loci included genes encoding surface markers of myeloid, lymphoid, or hematopoietic stem cell differentiation (CD69, CD33, CD87), transcription factors regulating lineage specification during hematopoiesis (ASXL1, IRF8, IKZF1, JMJD1C, ETS2-PSMG1), and molecules involved in neutrophil clearance/apoptosis (C10orf54, LTA), adhesion (TNXB), or centrosome and microtubule structure/function (KIF9, TUBD1). Together with recent reports of somatic ASXL1 mutations among individuals with idiopathic cytopenias or clonal hematopoiesis of undetermined significance, the identification of a common regulatory 3{\textquoteright} UTR variant of ASXL1 suggests that both germline and somatic ASXL1 mutations contribute to lower blood counts in otherwise asymptomatic individuals. These association results shed light on genetic mechanisms that regulate circulating WBC counts and suggest a prominent shared genetic architecture with inflammatory and autoimmune diseases.

}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2016.05.003}, author = {Tajuddin, Salman M and Schick, Ursula M and Eicher, John D and Chami, Nathalie and Giri, Ayush and Brody, Jennifer A and Hill, W David and Kacprowski, Tim and Li, Jin and Lyytik{\"a}inen, Leo-Pekka and Manichaikul, Ani and Mihailov, Evelin and O{\textquoteright}Donoghue, Michelle L and Pankratz, Nathan and Pazoki, Raha and Polfus, Linda M and Smith, Albert Vernon and Schurmann, Claudia and Vacchi-Suzzi, Caterina and Waterworth, Dawn M and Evangelou, Evangelos and Yanek, Lisa R and Burt, Amber and Chen, Ming-Huei and van Rooij, Frank J A and Floyd, James S and Greinacher, Andreas and Harris, Tamara B and Highland, Heather M and Lange, Leslie A and Liu, Yongmei and M{\"a}gi, Reedik and Nalls, Mike A and Mathias, Rasika A and Nickerson, Deborah A and Nikus, Kjell and Starr, John M and Tardif, Jean-Claude and Tzoulaki, Ioanna and Velez Edwards, Digna R and Wallentin, Lars and Bartz, Traci M and Becker, Lewis C and Denny, Joshua C and Raffield, Laura M and Rioux, John D and Friedrich, Nele and Fornage, Myriam and Gao, He and Hirschhorn, Joel N and Liewald, David C M and Rich, Stephen S and Uitterlinden, Andre and Bastarache, Lisa and Becker, Diane M and Boerwinkle, Eric and de Denus, Simon and Bottinger, Erwin P and Hayward, Caroline and Hofman, Albert and Homuth, Georg and Lange, Ethan and Launer, Lenore J and Lehtim{\"a}ki, Terho and Lu, Yingchang and Metspalu, Andres and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Chris J and Quarells, Rakale C and Richard, Melissa and Torstenson, Eric S and Taylor, Kent D and Vergnaud, Anne-Claire and Zonderman, Alan B and Crosslin, David R and Deary, Ian J and D{\"o}rr, Marcus and Elliott, Paul and Evans, Michele K and Gudnason, Vilmundur and K{\"a}h{\"o}nen, Mika and Psaty, Bruce M and Rotter, Jerome I and Slater, Andrew J and Dehghan, Abbas and White, Harvey D and Ganesh, Santhi K and Loos, Ruth J F and Esko, T{\~o}nu and Faraday, Nauder and Wilson, James G and Cushman, Mary and Johnson, Andrew D and Edwards, Todd L and Zakai, Neil A and Lettre, Guillaume and Reiner, Alex P and Auer, Paul L} } @article {6936, title = {A meta-analysis of 120 246 individuals identifies 18 new loci for fibrinogen concentration.}, journal = {Hum Mol Genet}, volume = {25}, year = {2016}, month = {2016 Jan 15}, pages = {358-70}, abstract = {

Genome-wide association studies have previously identified 23 genetic loci associated with circulating fibrinogen concentration. These studies used HapMap imputation and did not examine the X-chromosome. 1000 Genomes imputation provides better coverage of uncommon variants, and includes indels. We conducted a genome-wide association analysis of 34 studies imputed to the 1000 Genomes Project reference panel and including \~{}120 000 participants of European ancestry (95 806 participants with data on the X-chromosome). Approximately 10.7 million single-nucleotide polymorphisms and 1.2 million indels were examined. We identified 41 genome-wide significant fibrinogen loci; of which, 18 were newly identified. There were no genome-wide significant signals on the X-chromosome. The lead variants of five significant loci were indels. We further identified six additional independent signals, including three rare variants, at two previously characterized loci: FGB and IRF1. Together the 41 loci explain 3\% of the variance in plasma fibrinogen concentration.

}, issn = {1460-2083}, doi = {10.1093/hmg/ddv454}, author = {de Vries, Paul S and Chasman, Daniel I and Sabater-Lleal, Maria and Chen, Ming-Huei and Huffman, Jennifer E and Steri, Maristella and Tang, Weihong and Teumer, Alexander and Marioni, Riccardo E and Grossmann, Vera and Hottenga, Jouke J and Trompet, Stella and M{\"u}ller-Nurasyid, Martina and Zhao, Jing Hua and Brody, Jennifer A and Kleber, Marcus E and Guo, Xiuqing and Wang, Jie Jin and Auer, Paul L and Attia, John R and Yanek, Lisa R and Ahluwalia, Tarunveer S and Lahti, Jari and Venturini, Cristina and Tanaka, Toshiko and Bielak, Lawrence F and Joshi, Peter K and Rocanin-Arjo, Ares and Kolcic, Ivana and Navarro, Pau and Rose, Lynda M and Oldmeadow, Christopher and Riess, Helene and Mazur, Johanna and Basu, Saonli and Goel, Anuj and Yang, Qiong and Ghanbari, Mohsen and Willemsen, Gonneke and Rumley, Ann and Fiorillo, Edoardo and de Craen, Anton J M and Grotevendt, Anne and Scott, Robert and Taylor, Kent D and Delgado, Graciela E and Yao, Jie and Kifley, Annette and Kooperberg, Charles and Qayyum, Rehan and Lopez, Lorna M and Berentzen, Tina L and R{\"a}ikk{\"o}nen, Katri and Mangino, Massimo and Bandinelli, Stefania and Peyser, Patricia A and Wild, Sarah and Tr{\'e}gou{\"e}t, David-Alexandre and Wright, Alan F and Marten, Jonathan and Zemunik, Tatijana and Morrison, Alanna C and Sennblad, Bengt and Tofler, Geoffrey and de Maat, Moniek P M and de Geus, Eco J C and Lowe, Gordon D and Zoledziewska, Magdalena and Sattar, Naveed and Binder, Harald and V{\"o}lker, Uwe and Waldenberger, Melanie and Khaw, Kay-Tee and McKnight, Barbara and Huang, Jie and Jenny, Nancy S and Holliday, Elizabeth G and Qi, Lihong and Mcevoy, Mark G and Becker, Diane M and Starr, John M and Sarin, Antti-Pekka and Hysi, Pirro G and Hernandez, Dena G and Jhun, Min A and Campbell, Harry and Hamsten, Anders and Rivadeneira, Fernando and McArdle, Wendy L and Slagboom, P Eline and Zeller, Tanja and Koenig, Wolfgang and Psaty, Bruce M and Haritunians, Talin and Liu, Jingmin and Palotie, Aarno and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Stott, David J and Hofman, Albert and Franco, Oscar H and Polasek, Ozren and Rudan, Igor and Morange, Pierre-Emmanuel and Wilson, James F and Kardia, Sharon L R and Ferrucci, Luigi and Spector, Tim D and Eriksson, Johan G and Hansen, Torben and Deary, Ian J and Becker, Lewis C and Scott, Rodney J and Mitchell, Paul and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and Wareham, Nick J and Peters, Annette and Greinacher, Andreas and Wild, Philipp S and Jukema, J Wouter and Boomsma, Dorret I and Hayward, Caroline and Cucca, Francesco and Tracy, Russell and Watkins, Hugh and Reiner, Alex P and Folsom, Aaron R and Ridker, Paul M and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Smith, Nicholas L and Strachan, David P and Dehghan, Abbas} } @article {7257, title = {Multiethnic Exome-Wide Association Study of Subclinical Atherosclerosis.}, journal = {Circ Cardiovasc Genet}, year = {2016}, month = {2016 Nov 21}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: -The burden of subclinical atherosclerosis in asymptomatic individuals is heritable and associated with elevated risk of developing clinical coronary heart disease (CHD). We sought to identify genetic variants in protein-coding regions associated with subclinical atherosclerosis and the risk of subsequent CHD.

METHODS AND RESULTS: -We studied a total of 25,109 European ancestry and African-American participants with coronary artery calcification (CAC) measured by cardiac computed tomography and 52,869 with common carotid intima media thickness (CIMT) measured by ultrasonography within the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology (CHARGE) Consortium. Participants were genotyped for 247,870 DNA sequence variants (231,539 in exons) across the genome. A meta-analysis of exome-wide association studies was performed across cohorts for CAC and CIMT. APOB p.Arg3527Gln was associated with four-fold excess CAC (P = 3{\texttimes}10(-10)). The APOE ε2 allele (p.Arg176Cys) was associated with both 22.3\% reduced CAC (P = 1{\texttimes}10(-12)) and 1.4\% reduced CIMT (P = 4{\texttimes}10(-14)) in carriers compared with non-carriers. In secondary analyses conditioning on LDL cholesterol concentration, the ε2 protective association with CAC, although attenuated, remained strongly significant. Additionally, the presence of ε2 was associated with reduced risk for CHD (OR 0.77; P = 1{\texttimes}10(-11)).

CONCLUSIONS: -Exome-wide association meta-analysis demonstrates that protein-coding variants in APOB and APOE associate with subclinical atherosclerosis. APOE ε2 represents the first significant association for multiple subclinical atherosclerosis traits across multiple ethnicities as well as clinical CHD.

}, issn = {1942-3268}, doi = {10.1161/CIRCGENETICS.116.001572}, author = {Natarajan, Pradeep and Bis, Joshua C and Bielak, Lawrence F and Cox, Amanda J and D{\"o}rr, Marcus and Feitosa, Mary F and Franceschini, Nora and Guo, Xiuqing and Hwang, Shih-Jen and Isaacs, Aaron and Jhun, Min A and Kavousi, Maryam and Li-Gao, Ruifang and Lyytik{\"a}inen, Leo-Pekka and Marioni, Riccardo E and Schminke, Ulf and Stitziel, Nathan O and Tada, Hayato and van Setten, Jessica and Smith, Albert V and Vojinovic, Dina and Yanek, Lisa R and Yao, Jie and Yerges-Armstrong, Laura M and Amin, Najaf and Baber, Usman and Borecki, Ingrid B and Carr, J Jeffrey and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Cupples, L Adrienne and de Jong, Pim A and de Koning, Harry and de Vos, Bob D and Demirkan, Ayse and Fuster, Valentin and Franco, Oscar H and Goodarzi, Mark O and Harris, Tamara B and Heckbert, Susan R and Heiss, Gerardo and Hoffmann, Udo and Hofman, Albert and I{\v s}gum, Ivana and Jukema, J Wouter and K{\"a}h{\"o}nen, Mika and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kral, Brian G and Launer, Lenore J and Massaro, Joseph and Mehran, Roxana and Mitchell, Braxton D and Mosley, Thomas H and de Mutsert, Ren{\'e}e and Newman, Anne B and Nguyen, Khanh-Dung and North, Kari E and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Oudkerk, Matthijs and Pankow, James S and Peloso, Gina M and Post, Wendy and Province, Michael A and Raffield, Laura M and Raitakari, Olli T and Reilly, Dermot F and Rivadeneira, Fernando and Rosendaal, Frits and Sartori, Samantha and Taylor, Kent D and Teumer, Alexander and Trompet, Stella and Turner, Stephen T and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Vaidya, Dhananjay and van der Lugt, Aad and V{\"o}lker, Uwe and Wardlaw, Joanna M and Wassel, Christina L and Weiss, Stefan and Wojczynski, Mary K and Becker, Diane M and Becker, Lewis C and Boerwinkle, Eric and Bowden, Donald W and Deary, Ian J and Dehghan, Abbas and Felix, Stephan B and Gudnason, Vilmundur and Lehtim{\"a}ki, Terho and Mathias, Rasika and Mook-Kanamori, Dennis O and Psaty, Bruce M and Rader, Daniel J and Rotter, Jerome I and Wilson, James G and van Duijn, Cornelia M and V{\"o}lzke, Henry and Kathiresan, Sekar and Peyser, Patricia A and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J} } @article {7139, title = {Platelet-Related Variants Identified by Exomechip Meta-analysis in 157,293 Individuals.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {99}, year = {2016}, month = {2016 Jul 7}, pages = {40-55}, abstract = {

Platelet production, maintenance, and clearance are tightly controlled processes indicative of platelets{\textquoteright} important roles in hemostasis and thrombosis. Platelets are common targets for primary and secondary prevention of several conditions. They are monitored clinically by complete blood counts, specifically with measurements of platelet count (PLT) and mean platelet volume (MPV). Identifying genetic effects on PLT and MPV can provide mechanistic insights into platelet biology and their role in disease. Therefore, we formed the Blood Cell Consortium (BCX) to perform a large-scale meta-analysis of Exomechip association results for PLT and MPV in 157,293 and 57,617 individuals, respectively. Using the low-frequency/rare coding variant-enriched Exomechip genotyping array, we sought to identify genetic variants associated with PLT and MPV. In addition to confirming 47 known PLT and 20 known MPV associations, we identified 32 PLT and 18 MPV associations not previously observed in the literature across the allele frequency spectrum, including rare large effect (FCER1A), low-frequency (IQGAP2, MAP1A, LY75), and common (ZMIZ2, SMG6, PEAR1, ARFGAP3/PACSIN2) variants. Several variants associated with PLT/MPV (PEAR1, MRVI1, PTGES3) were also associated with platelet reactivity. In concurrent BCX analyses, there was overlap of platelet-associated variants with red (MAP1A, TMPRSS6, ZMIZ2) and white (PEAR1, ZMIZ2, LY75) blood cell traits, suggesting common regulatory pathways with shared genetic architecture among these hematopoietic lineages. Our large-scale Exomechip analyses identified previously undocumented associations with platelet traits and further indicate that several complex quantitative hematological, lipid, and cardiovascular traits share genetic factors.

}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2016.05.005}, author = {Eicher, John D and Chami, Nathalie and Kacprowski, Tim and Nomura, Akihiro and Chen, Ming-Huei and Yanek, Lisa R and Tajuddin, Salman M and Schick, Ursula M and Slater, Andrew J and Pankratz, Nathan and Polfus, Linda and Schurmann, Claudia and Giri, Ayush and Brody, Jennifer A and Lange, Leslie A and Manichaikul, Ani and Hill, W David and Pazoki, Raha and Elliot, Paul and Evangelou, Evangelos and Tzoulaki, Ioanna and Gao, He and Vergnaud, Anne-Claire and Mathias, Rasika A and Becker, Diane M and Becker, Lewis C and Burt, Amber and Crosslin, David R and Lyytik{\"a}inen, Leo-Pekka and Nikus, Kjell and Hernesniemi, Jussi and K{\"a}h{\"o}nen, Mika and Raitoharju, Emma and Mononen, Nina and Raitakari, Olli T and Lehtim{\"a}ki, Terho and Cushman, Mary and Zakai, Neil A and Nickerson, Deborah A and Raffield, Laura M and Quarells, Rakale and Willer, Cristen J and Peloso, Gina M and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Liu, Dajiang J and Deloukas, Panos and Samani, Nilesh J and Schunkert, Heribert and Erdmann, Jeanette and Fornage, Myriam and Richard, Melissa and Tardif, Jean-Claude and Rioux, John D and Dub{\'e}, Marie-Pierre and de Denus, Simon and Lu, Yingchang and Bottinger, Erwin P and Loos, Ruth J F and Smith, Albert Vernon and Harris, Tamara B and Launer, Lenore J and Gudnason, Vilmundur and Velez Edwards, Digna R and Torstenson, Eric S and Liu, Yongmei and Tracy, Russell P and Rotter, Jerome I and Rich, Stephen S and Highland, Heather M and Boerwinkle, Eric and Li, Jin and Lange, Ethan and Wilson, James G and Mihailov, Evelin and M{\"a}gi, Reedik and Hirschhorn, Joel and Metspalu, Andres and Esko, T{\~o}nu and Vacchi-Suzzi, Caterina and Nalls, Mike A and Zonderman, Alan B and Evans, Michele K and Engstr{\"o}m, Gunnar and Orho-Melander, Marju and Melander, Olle and O{\textquoteright}Donoghue, Michelle L and Waterworth, Dawn M and Wallentin, Lars and White, Harvey D and Floyd, James S and Bartz, Traci M and Rice, Kenneth M and Psaty, Bruce M and Starr, J M and Liewald, David C M and Hayward, Caroline and Deary, Ian J and Greinacher, Andreas and V{\"o}lker, Uwe and Thiele, Thomas and V{\"o}lzke, Henry and van Rooij, Frank J A and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Franco, Oscar H and Dehghan, Abbas and Edwards, Todd L and Ganesh, Santhi K and Kathiresan, Sekar and Faraday, Nauder and Auer, Paul L and Reiner, Alex P and Lettre, Guillaume and Johnson, Andrew D} } @article {7263, title = {Whole-Exome Sequencing Identifies Loci Associated with Blood Cell Traits and Reveals a Role for Alternative GFI1B Splice Variants in Human Hematopoiesis.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {99}, year = {2016}, month = {2016 Sep 01}, pages = {785}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2016.08.002}, author = {Polfus, Linda M and Khajuria, Rajiv K and Schick, Ursula M and Pankratz, Nathan and Pazoki, Raha and Brody, Jennifer A and Chen, Ming-Huei and Auer, Paul L and Floyd, James S and Huang, Jie and Lange, Leslie and van Rooij, Frank J A and Gibbs, Richard A and Metcalf, Ginger and Muzny, Donna and Veeraraghavan, Narayanan and Walter, Klaudia and Chen, Lu and Yanek, Lisa and Becker, Lewis C and Peloso, Gina M and Wakabayashi, Aoi and Kals, Mart and Metspalu, Andres and Esko, T{\~o}nu and Fox, Keolu and Wallace, Robert and Franceschini, Nora and Matijevic, Nena and Rice, Kenneth M and Bartz, Traci M and Lyytik{\"a}inen, Leo-Pekka and K{\"a}h{\"o}nen, Mika and Lehtim{\"a}ki, Terho and Raitakari, Olli T and Li-Gao, Ruifang and Mook-Kanamori, Dennis O and Lettre, Guillaume and van Duijn, Cornelia M and Franco, Oscar H and Rich, Stephen S and Rivadeneira, Fernando and Hofman, Albert and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Wilson, James G and Psaty, Bruce M and Soranzo, Nicole and Dehghan, Abbas and Boerwinkle, Eric and Zhang, Xiaoling and Johnson, Andrew D and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Johnsen, Jill M and Reiner, Alexander P and Ganesh, Santhi K and Sankaran, Vijay G} } @article {7364, title = {Genome-wide Trans-ethnic Meta-analysis Identifies Seven Genetic Loci Influencing Erythrocyte Traits and a Role for RBPMS in Erythropoiesis.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {100}, year = {2017}, month = {2017 Jan 05}, pages = {51-63}, abstract = {

Genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have identified loci for erythrocyte traits in primarily European ancestry populations. We conducted GWAS meta-analyses of six erythrocyte traits in 71,638 individuals from European, East Asian, and African ancestries using a Bayesian approach to account for heterogeneity in allelic effects and variation in the structure of linkage disequilibrium between ethnicities. We identified seven loci for erythrocyte traits including a locus (RBPMS/GTF2E2) associated with mean corpuscular hemoglobin and mean corpuscular volume. Statistical fine-mapping at this locus pointed to RBPMS at this locus and excluded nearby GTF2E2. Using zebrafish morpholino to evaluate loss of function, we observed a strong in~vivo erythropoietic effect for RBPMS but not for GTF2E2, supporting the statistical fine-mapping at this locus and demonstrating that RBPMS is a regulator of erythropoiesis. Our findings show the utility of trans-ethnic GWASs for discovery and characterization of genetic loci influencing hematologic traits.

}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2016.11.016}, author = {van Rooij, Frank J A and Qayyum, Rehan and Smith, Albert V and Zhou, Yi and Trompet, Stella and Tanaka, Toshiko and Keller, Margaux F and Chang, Li-Ching and Schmidt, Helena and Yang, Min-Lee and Chen, Ming-Huei and Hayes, James and Johnson, Andrew D and Yanek, Lisa R and Mueller, Christian and Lange, Leslie and Floyd, James S and Ghanbari, Mohsen and Zonderman, Alan B and Jukema, J Wouter and Hofman, Albert and van Duijn, Cornelia M and Desch, Karl C and Saba, Yasaman and Ozel, Ayse B and Snively, Beverly M and Wu, Jer-Yuarn and Schmidt, Reinhold and Fornage, Myriam and Klein, Robert J and Fox, Caroline S and Matsuda, Koichi and Kamatani, Naoyuki and Wild, Philipp S and Stott, David J and Ford, Ian and Slagboom, P Eline and Yang, Jaden and Chu, Audrey Y and Lambert, Amy J and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Franco, Oscar H and Hofer, Edith and Ginsburg, David and Hu, Bella and Keating, Brendan and Schick, Ursula M and Brody, Jennifer A and Li, Jun Z and Chen, Zhao and Zeller, Tanja and Guralnik, Jack M and Chasman, Daniel I and Peters, Luanne L and Kubo, Michiaki and Becker, Diane M and Li, Jin and Eiriksdottir, Gudny and Rotter, Jerome I and Levy, Daniel and Grossmann, Vera and Patel, Kushang V and Chen, Chien-Hsiun and Ridker, Paul M and Tang, Hua and Launer, Lenore J and Rice, Kenneth M and Li-Gao, Ruifang and Ferrucci, Luigi and Evans, Michelle K and Choudhuri, Avik and Trompouki, Eirini and Abraham, Brian J and Yang, Song and Takahashi, Atsushi and Kamatani, Yoichiro and Kooperberg, Charles and Harris, Tamara B and Jee, Sun Ha and Coresh, Josef and Tsai, Fuu-Jen and Longo, Dan L and Chen, Yuan-Tsong and Felix, Janine F and Yang, Qiong and Psaty, Bruce M and Boerwinkle, Eric and Becker, Lewis C and Mook-Kanamori, Dennis O and Wilson, James G and Gudnason, Vilmundur and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Dehghan, Abbas and Cupples, L Adrienne and Nalls, Michael A and Morris, Andrew P and Okada, Yukinori and Reiner, Alexander P and Zon, Leonard I and Ganesh, Santhi K} } @article {7924, title = {Genome-Wide Association Trans-Ethnic Meta-Analyses Identifies Novel Associations Regulating Coagulation Factor VIII and von Willebrand Factor Plasma Levels.}, journal = {Circulation}, year = {2018}, month = {2018 Nov 20}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Factor VIII (FVIII) and its carrier protein von Willebrand factor (VWF) are associated with risk of arterial and venous thrombosis and with hemorrhagic disorders. We aimed to identify and functionally test novel genetic associations regulating plasma FVIII and VWF.

METHODS: We meta-analyzed genome-wide association results from 46,354 individuals of European, African, East Asian, and Hispanic ancestry. All studies performed linear regression analysis using an additive genetic model and associated approximately 35 million imputed variants with natural-log transformed phenotype levels. In vitro gene silencing in cultured endothelial cells was performed for candidate genes to provide additional evidence on association and function. Two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) analyses were applied to test the causal role of FVIII and VWF plasma levels on the risk of arterial and venous thrombotic events.

RESULTS: We identified 13 novel genome-wide significant (p<=2.5x10) associations; 7 with FVIII levels ( FCHO2/TMEM171/TNPO1, HLA, SOX17/RP1, LINC00583/NFIB, RAB5C-KAT2A, RPL3/TAB1/SYNGR1, and ARSA) and 11 with VWF levels ( PDHB/PXK/KCTD6, SLC39A8, FCHO2/TMEM171/TNPO1, HLA, GIMAP7/GIMAP4, OR13C5/NIPSNAP, DAB2IP, C2CD4B, RAB5C-KAT2A, TAB1/SYNGR1, and ARSA), beyond 10 previously reported associations with these phenotypes. Functional validation provided further evidence of association for all loci on VWF except ARSA and DAB2IP. MR suggested causal effects of plasma FVIII activity levels on venous thrombosis and coronary artery disease risk and plasma VWF levels on ischemic stroke risk.

CONCLUSIONS: The meta-analysis identified 13 novel genetic loci regulating FVIII and VWF plasma levels, 10 of which we validated functionally. We provide some evidence for a causal role of these proteins in thrombotic events.

}, issn = {1524-4539}, doi = {10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.118.034532}, author = {Sabater-Lleal, Maria and Huffman, Jennifer E and de Vries, Paul S and Marten, Jonathan and Mastrangelo, Michael A and Song, Ci and Pankratz, Nathan and Ward-Caviness, Cavin K and Yanek, Lisa R and Trompet, Stella and Delgado, Graciela E and Guo, Xiuqing and Bartz, Traci M and Martinez-Perez, Angel and Germain, Marine and de Haan, Hugoline G and Ozel, Ayse B and Polasek, Ozren and Smith, Albert V and Eicher, John D and Reiner, Alex P and Tang, Weihong and Davies, Neil M and Stott, David J and Rotter, Jerome I and Tofler, Geoffrey H and Boerwinkle, Eric and de Maat, Moniek P M and Kleber, Marcus E and Welsh, Paul and Brody, Jennifer A and Chen, Ming-Huei and Vaidya, Dhananjay and Soria, Jos{\'e} Manuel and Suchon, Pierre and van Hylckama Vlieg, Astrid and Desch, Karl C and Kolcic, Ivana and Joshi, Peter K and Launer, Lenore J and Harris, Tamara B and Campbell, Harry and Rudan, Igor and Becker, Diane M and Li, Jun Z and Rivadeneira, Fernando and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Hofman, Albert and Franco, Oscar H and Cushman, Mary and Psaty, Bruce M and Morange, Pierre-Emmanuel and McKnight, Barbara and Chong, Michael R and Fernandez-Cadenas, Israel and Rosand, Jonathan and Lindgren, Arne and Gudnason, Vilmundur and Wilson, James F and Hayward, Caroline and Ginsburg, David and Fornage, Myriam and Rosendaal, Frits R and Souto, Juan Carlos and Becker, Lewis C and Jenny, Nancy S and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and Jukema, J Wouter and Dehghan, Abbas and Tr{\'e}gou{\"e}t, David-Alexandre and Morrison, Alanna C and Johnson, Andrew D and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Strachan, David P and Lowenstein, Charles J and Smith, Nicholas L} } @article {8050, title = {Mendelian randomization evaluation of causal effects of fibrinogen on incident coronary heart disease.}, journal = {PLoS One}, volume = {14}, year = {2019}, month = {2019}, pages = {e0216222}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Fibrinogen is an essential hemostatic factor and cardiovascular disease risk factor. Early attempts at evaluating the causal effect of fibrinogen on coronary heart disease (CHD) and myocardial infraction (MI) using Mendelian randomization (MR) used single variant approaches, and did not take advantage of recent genome-wide association studies (GWAS) or multi-variant, pleiotropy robust MR methodologies.

METHODS AND FINDINGS: We evaluated evidence for a causal effect of fibrinogen on both CHD and MI using MR. We used both an allele score approach and pleiotropy robust MR models. The allele score was composed of 38 fibrinogen-associated variants from recent GWAS. Initial analyses using the allele score used a meta-analysis of 11 European-ancestry prospective cohorts, free of CHD and MI at baseline, to examine incidence CHD and MI. We also applied 2 sample MR methods with data from a prevalent CHD and MI GWAS. Results are given in terms of the hazard ratio (HR) or odds ratio (OR), depending on the study design, and associated 95\% confidence interval (CI). In single variant analyses no causal effect of fibrinogen on CHD or MI was observed. In multi-variant analyses using incidence CHD cases and the allele score approach, the estimated causal effect (HR) of a 1 g/L higher fibrinogen concentration was 1.62 (CI = 1.12, 2.36) when using incident cases and the allele score approach. In 2 sample MR analyses that accounted for pleiotropy, the causal estimate (OR) was reduced to 1.18 (CI = 0.98, 1.42) and 1.09 (CI = 0.89, 1.33) in the 2 most precise (smallest CI) models, out of 4 models evaluated. In the 2 sample MR analyses for MI, there was only very weak evidence of a causal effect in only 1 out of 4 models.

CONCLUSIONS: A small causal effect of fibrinogen on CHD is observed using multi-variant MR approaches which account for pleiotropy, but not single variant MR approaches. Taken together, results indicate that even with large sample sizes and multi-variant approaches MR analyses still cannot exclude the null when estimating the causal effect of fibrinogen on CHD, but that any potential causal effect is likely to be much smaller than observed in epidemiological studies.

}, issn = {1932-6203}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0216222}, author = {Ward-Caviness, Cavin K and de Vries, Paul S and Wiggins, Kerri L and Huffman, Jennifer E and Yanek, Lisa R and Bielak, Lawrence F and Giulianini, Franco and Guo, Xiuqing and Kleber, Marcus E and Kacprowski, Tim and Gro{\ss}, Stefan and Petersman, Astrid and Davey Smith, George and Hartwig, Fernando P and Bowden, Jack and Hemani, Gibran and M{\"u}ller-Nuraysid, Martina and Strauch, Konstantin and Koenig, Wolfgang and Waldenberger, Melanie and Meitinger, Thomas and Pankratz, Nathan and Boerwinkle, Eric and Tang, Weihong and Fu, Yi-Ping and Johnson, Andrew D and Song, Ci and de Maat, Moniek P M and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Franco, Oscar H and Brody, Jennifer A and McKnight, Barbara and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Psaty, Bruce M and Mathias, Rasika A and Becker, Diane M and Peyser, Patricia A and Smith, Jennifer A and Bielinski, Suzette J and Ridker, Paul M and Taylor, Kent D and Yao, Jie and Tracy, Russell and Delgado, Graciela and Trompet, Stella and Sattar, Naveed and Jukema, J Wouter and Becker, Lewis C and Kardia, Sharon L R and Rotter, Jerome I and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and D{\"o}rr, Marcus and Chasman, Daniel I and Dehghan, Abbas and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Smith, Nicholas L and Peters, Annette and Morrison, Alanna C} } @article {8625, title = {Genetic loci associated with prevalent and incident myocardial infarction and coronary heart disease in the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology (CHARGE) Consortium.}, journal = {PLoS One}, volume = {15}, year = {2020}, month = {2020}, pages = {e0230035}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Genome-wide association studies have identified multiple genomic loci associated with coronary artery disease, but most are common variants in non-coding regions that provide limited information on causal genes and etiology of the disease. To overcome the limited scope that common variants provide, we focused our investigation on low-frequency and rare sequence variations primarily residing in coding regions of the genome.

METHODS AND RESULTS: Using samples of individuals of European ancestry from ten cohorts within the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology (CHARGE) consortium, both cross-sectional and prospective analyses were conducted to examine associations between genetic variants and myocardial infarction (MI), coronary heart disease (CHD), and all-cause mortality following these events. For prevalent events, a total of 27,349 participants of European ancestry, including 1831 prevalent MI cases and 2518 prevalent CHD cases were used. For incident cases, a total of 55,736 participants of European ancestry were included (3,031 incident MI cases and 5,425 incident CHD cases). There were 1,860 all-cause deaths among the 3,751 MI and CHD cases from six cohorts that contributed to the analysis of all-cause mortality. Single variant and gene-based analyses were performed separately in each cohort and then meta-analyzed for each outcome. A low-frequency intronic variant (rs988583) in PLCL1 was significantly associated with prevalent MI (OR = 1.80, 95\% confidence interval: 1.43, 2.27; P = 7.12 {\texttimes} 10-7). We conducted gene-based burden tests for genes with a cumulative minor allele count (cMAC) >= 5 and variants with minor allele frequency (MAF) < 5\%. TMPRSS5 and LDLRAD1 were significantly associated with prevalent MI and CHD, respectively, and RC3H2 and ANGPTL4 were significantly associated with incident MI and CHD, respectively. No loci were significantly associated with all-cause mortality following a MI or CHD event.

CONCLUSION: This study identified one known locus (ANGPTL4) and four new loci (PLCL1, RC3H2, TMPRSS5, and LDLRAD1) associated with cardiovascular disease risk that warrant further investigation.

}, keywords = {Aging, Coronary Artery Disease, Cross-Sectional Studies, Europe, European Continental Ancestry Group, Genetic Loci, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Myocardial Infarction, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Prospective Studies}, issn = {1932-6203}, doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0230035}, author = {Hahn, Julie and Fu, Yi-Ping and Brown, Michael R and Bis, Joshua C and de Vries, Paul S and Feitosa, Mary F and Yanek, Lisa R and Weiss, Stefan and Giulianini, Franco and Smith, Albert Vernon and Guo, Xiuqing and Bartz, Traci M and Becker, Diane M and Becker, Lewis C and Boerwinkle, Eric and Brody, Jennifer A and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Franco, Oscar H and Grove, Megan and Harris, Tamara B and Hofman, Albert and Hwang, Shih-Jen and Kral, Brian G and Launer, Lenore J and Markus, Marcello R P and Rice, Kenneth M and Rich, Stephen S and Ridker, Paul M and Rivadeneira, Fernando and Rotter, Jerome I and Sotoodehnia, Nona and Taylor, Kent D and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and V{\"o}lker, Uwe and V{\"o}lzke, Henry and Yao, Jie and Chasman, Daniel I and D{\"o}rr, Marcus and Gudnason, Vilmundur and Mathias, Rasika A and Post, Wendy and Psaty, Bruce M and Dehghan, Abbas and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Morrison, Alanna C} } @article {8621, title = {Inherited causes of clonal haematopoiesis in 97,691 whole genomes.}, journal = {Nature}, volume = {586}, year = {2020}, month = {2020 10}, pages = {763-768}, abstract = {

Age is the dominant risk factor for most chronic human diseases, but the mechanisms through which ageing confers this risk are largely unknown. The age-related acquisition of somatic mutations that lead to clonal expansion in regenerating haematopoietic stem cell populations has recently been associated with both haematological cancer and coronary heart disease-this phenomenon is~termed clonal haematopoiesis of indeterminate potential (CHIP). Simultaneous analyses of germline and somatic whole-genome sequences provide the opportunity to identify root causes of CHIP. Here we analyse high-coverage whole-genome sequences from 97,691 participants of diverse ancestries in the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Trans-omics for Precision Medicine (TOPMed) programme, and identify 4,229 individuals with CHIP. We identify associations with blood cell, lipid and inflammatory traits that are specific to different CHIP~driver genes. Association of a genome-wide set of germline genetic variants enabled the identification of three genetic loci associated with CHIP status, including one locus at TET2 that was specific to individuals of African ancestry. In silico-informed in vitro evaluation of the TET2 germline locus enabled the identification of a causal variant that disrupts a TET2 distal enhancer, resulting in increased self-renewal of haematopoietic stem cells. Overall, we observe that germline genetic variation shapes haematopoietic stem cell function, leading to CHIP through mechanisms that are specific to clonal haematopoiesis as well as shared mechanisms that lead to somatic mutations across tissues.

}, issn = {1476-4687}, doi = {10.1038/s41586-020-2819-2}, author = {Bick, Alexander G and Weinstock, Joshua S and Nandakumar, Satish K and Fulco, Charles P and Bao, Erik L and Zekavat, Seyedeh M and Szeto, Mindy D and Liao, Xiaotian and Leventhal, Matthew J and Nasser, Joseph and Chang, Kyle and Laurie, Cecelia and Burugula, Bala Bharathi and Gibson, Christopher J and Lin, Amy E and Taub, Margaret A and Aguet, Francois and Ardlie, Kristin and Mitchell, Braxton D and Barnes, Kathleen C and Moscati, Arden and Fornage, Myriam and Redline, Susan and Psaty, Bruce M and Silverman, Edwin K and Weiss, Scott T and Palmer, Nicholette D and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Burchard, Esteban G and Kardia, Sharon L R and He, Jiang and Kaplan, Robert C and Smith, Nicholas L and Arnett, Donna K and Schwartz, David A and Correa, Adolfo and de Andrade, Mariza and Guo, Xiuqing and Konkle, Barbara A and Custer, Brian and Peralta, Juan M and Gui, Hongsheng and Meyers, Deborah A and McGarvey, Stephen T and Chen, Ida Yii-Der and Shoemaker, M Benjamin and Peyser, Patricia A and Broome, Jai G and Gogarten, Stephanie M and Wang, Fei Fei and Wong, Quenna and Montasser, May E and Daya, Michelle and Kenny, Eimear E and North, Kari E and Launer, Lenore J and Cade, Brian E and Bis, Joshua C and Cho, Michael H and Lasky-Su, Jessica and Bowden, Donald W and Cupples, L Adrienne and Mak, Angel C Y and Becker, Lewis C and Smith, Jennifer A and Kelly, Tanika N and Aslibekyan, Stella and Heckbert, Susan R and Tiwari, Hemant K and Yang, Ivana V and Heit, John A and Lubitz, Steven A and Johnsen, Jill M and Curran, Joanne E and Wenzel, Sally E and Weeks, Daniel E and Rao, Dabeeru C and Darbar, Dawood and Moon, Jee-Young and Tracy, Russell P and Buth, Erin J and Rafaels, Nicholas and Loos, Ruth J F and Durda, Peter and Liu, Yongmei and Hou, Lifang and Lee, Jiwon and Kachroo, Priyadarshini and Freedman, Barry I and Levy, Daniel and Bielak, Lawrence F and Hixson, James E and Floyd, James S and Whitsel, Eric A and Ellinor, Patrick T and Irvin, Marguerite R and Fingerlin, Tasha E and Raffield, Laura M and Armasu, Sebastian M and Wheeler, Marsha M and Sabino, Ester C and Blangero, John and Williams, L Keoki and Levy, Bruce D and Sheu, Wayne Huey-Herng and Roden, Dan M and Boerwinkle, Eric and Manson, JoAnn E and Mathias, Rasika A and Desai, Pinkal and Taylor, Kent D and Johnson, Andrew D and Auer, Paul L and Kooperberg, Charles and Laurie, Cathy C and Blackwell, Thomas W and Smith, Albert V and Zhao, Hongyu and Lange, Ethan and Lange, Leslie and Rich, Stephen S and Rotter, Jerome I and Wilson, James G and Scheet, Paul and Kitzman, Jacob O and Lander, Eric S and Engreitz, Jesse M and Ebert, Benjamin L and Reiner, Alexander P and Jaiswal, Siddhartha and Abecasis, Goncalo and Sankaran, Vijay G and Kathiresan, Sekar and Natarajan, Pradeep} } @article {8711, title = {Chromosome Xq23 is associated with lower atherogenic lipid concentrations and favorable cardiometabolic indices.}, journal = {Nat Commun}, volume = {12}, year = {2021}, month = {2021 04 12}, pages = {2182}, abstract = {

Autosomal genetic analyses of blood lipids have yielded key insights for coronary heart disease (CHD). However, X chromosome genetic variation is understudied for blood lipids in large sample sizes. We now analyze genetic and blood lipid data in a high-coverage whole X chromosome sequencing study of 65,322 multi-ancestry participants and perform replication among 456,893 European participants. Common alleles on chromosome Xq23 are strongly associated with reduced total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, and triglycerides (min P = 8.5 {\texttimes} 10), with similar effects for males and females. Chromosome Xq23 lipid-lowering alleles are associated with reduced odds for CHD among 42,545 cases and 591,247 controls (P = 1.7 {\texttimes} 10), and reduced odds for diabetes mellitus type 2 among 54,095 cases and 573,885 controls (P = 1.4 {\texttimes} 10). Although we observe an association with increased BMI, waist-to-hip ratio adjusted for BMI is reduced, bioimpedance analyses indicate increased gluteofemoral fat, and abdominal MRI analyses indicate reduced visceral adiposity. Co-localization analyses strongly correlate increased CHRDL1 gene expression, particularly in adipose tissue, with reduced concentrations of blood lipids.

}, issn = {2041-1723}, doi = {10.1038/s41467-021-22339-1}, author = {Natarajan, Pradeep and Pampana, Akhil and Graham, Sarah E and Ruotsalainen, Sanni E and Perry, James A and de Vries, Paul S and Broome, Jai G and Pirruccello, James P and Honigberg, Michael C and Aragam, Krishna and Wolford, Brooke and Brody, Jennifer A and Antonacci-Fulton, Lucinda and Arden, Moscati and Aslibekyan, Stella and Assimes, Themistocles L and Ballantyne, Christie M and Bielak, Lawrence F and Bis, Joshua C and Cade, Brian E and Do, Ron and Doddapaneni, Harsha and Emery, Leslie S and Hung, Yi-Jen and Irvin, Marguerite R and Khan, Alyna T and Lange, Leslie and Lee, Jiwon and Lemaitre, Rozenn N and Martin, Lisa W and Metcalf, Ginger and Montasser, May E and Moon, Jee-Young and Muzny, Donna and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Palmer, Nicholette D and Peralta, Juan M and Peyser, Patricia A and Stilp, Adrienne M and Tsai, Michael and Wang, Fei Fei and Weeks, Daniel E and Yanek, Lisa R and Wilson, James G and Abecasis, Goncalo and Arnett, Donna K and Becker, Lewis C and Blangero, John and Boerwinkle, Eric and Bowden, Donald W and Chang, Yi-Cheng and Chen, Yii-der I and Choi, Won Jung and Correa, Adolfo and Curran, Joanne E and Daly, Mark J and Dutcher, Susan K and Ellinor, Patrick T and Fornage, Myriam and Freedman, Barry I and Gabriel, Stacey and Germer, Soren and Gibbs, Richard A and He, Jiang and Hveem, Kristian and Jarvik, Gail P and Kaplan, Robert C and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kenny, Eimear and Kim, Ryan W and Kooperberg, Charles and Laurie, Cathy C and Lee, Seonwook and Lloyd-Jones, Don M and Loos, Ruth J F and Lubitz, Steven A and Mathias, Rasika A and Martinez, Karine A Viaud and McGarvey, Stephen T and Mitchell, Braxton D and Nickerson, Deborah A and North, Kari E and Palotie, Aarno and Park, Cheol Joo and Psaty, Bruce M and Rao, D C and Redline, Susan and Reiner, Alexander P and Seo, Daekwan and Seo, Jeong-Sun and Smith, Albert V and Tracy, Russell P and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Kathiresan, Sekar and Cupples, L Adrienne and Rotter, Jerome I and Morrison, Alanna C and Rich, Stephen S and Ripatti, Samuli and Willer, Cristen and Peloso, Gina M} } @article {8791, title = {FGL1 as a modulator of plasma D-dimer levels: Exome-wide marker analysis of plasma tPA, PAI-1, and D-dimer.}, journal = {J Thromb Haemost}, year = {2021}, month = {2021 Apr 20}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Use of targeted exome-arrays with common, rare variants and functionally enriched variation has led to discovery of new genes contributing to population variation in risk factors. Plasminogen activator-inhibitor 1 (PAI-1), tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), and the plasma product D-dimer are important components of the fibrinolytic system. There have been few large-scale genome-wide or exome-wide studies of PAI-1, tPA, and D-dimer.

OBJECTIVES: We sought to discover new genetic loci contributing to variation in these traits using an exome-array approach.

METHODS: Cohort-level analyses and fixed effects meta-analyses of PAI-1 (n~=~15~603), tPA (n~=~6876,) and D-dimer (n~=~19~306) from 12 cohorts of European ancestry with diverse study design were conducted, including single-variant analyses and gene-based burden testing.

RESULTS: Five variants located in NME7, FGL1, and the fibrinogen locus, all associated with D-dimer levels, achieved genome-wide significance (P~<~5~{\texttimes}~10 ). Replication was sought for these 5 variants, as well as 45 well-imputed variants with P~<~1~{\texttimes}~10 in the discovery using an independent cohort. Replication was observed for three out of the five significant associations, including a novel and uncommon (0.013 allele frequency) coding variant p.Trp256Leu in FGL1 (fibrinogen-like-1) with increased plasma D-dimer levels. Additionally, a candidate-gene approach revealed a suggestive association for a coding variant (rs143202684-C) in SERPINB2, and suggestive associations with consistent effect in the replication analysis include an intronic variant (rs11057830-A) in SCARB1 associated with increased D-dimer levels.

CONCLUSION: This work provides new evidence for a role of FGL1 in hemostasis.

}, issn = {1538-7836}, doi = {10.1111/jth.15345}, author = {Thibord, Florian and Song, Ci and Pattee, Jack and Rodriguez, Benjamin A T and Chen, Ming-Huei and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Kleber, Marcus E and Delgado, Graciela E and Guo, Xiuqing and Yao, Jie and Taylor, Kent D and Ozel, Ayse Bilge and Brody, Jennifer A and McKnight, Barbara and Gyorgy, Beata and Simonsick, Eleanor and Leonard, Hampton L and Carrasquilla, Germ{\'a}n D and Guindo-Martinez, Marta and Silveira, Angela and Temprano-Sagrera, Gerard and Yanek, Lisa R and Becker, Diane M and Mathias, Rasika A and Becker, Lewis C and Raffield, Laura M and Kilpel{\"a}inen, Tuomas O and Grarup, Niels and Pedersen, Oluf and Hansen, Torben and Linneberg, Allan and Hamsten, Anders and Watkins, Hugh and Sabater-Lleal, Maria and Nalls, Mike A and Tr{\'e}gou{\"e}t, David-Alexandre and Morange, Pierre-Emmanuel and Psaty, Bruce M and Tracy, Russel P and Smith, Nicholas L and Desch, Karl C and Cushman, Mary and Rotter, Jerome I and de Vries, Paul S and Pankratz, Nathan D and Folsom, Aaron R and Morrison, Alanna C and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and Tang, Weihong and Johnson, Andrew D} } @article {8666, title = {Sequencing of 53,831 diverse genomes from the NHLBI TOPMed Program.}, journal = {Nature}, volume = {590}, year = {2021}, month = {2021 02}, pages = {290-299}, abstract = {

The Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine (TOPMed) programme seeks to elucidate the genetic architecture and biology of heart, lung, blood and sleep disorders, with the ultimate goal of improving diagnosis, treatment and prevention of these diseases. The initial phases of the programme focused on whole-genome sequencing of individuals with rich phenotypic data and diverse backgrounds. Here we describe the TOPMed goals and design as well as the available resources and early insights obtained from the sequence data. The resources include a variant browser, a genotype imputation server, and genomic and phenotypic data that are available through dbGaP (Database of Genotypes and Phenotypes). In the first 53,831 TOPMed samples, we detected more than 400~million single-nucleotide and insertion or deletion variants after alignment with the reference genome. Additional previously undescribed variants were detected through assembly of unmapped reads and customized analysis in highly variable loci. Among the more than 400~million detected variants, 97\% have frequencies of less than 1\% and 46\% are singletons that are present in only one individual (53\% among unrelated individuals). These rare variants provide insights into mutational processes and recent human evolutionary history. The extensive catalogue of genetic variation in TOPMed studies provides unique opportunities for exploring the contributions of rare and noncoding sequence variants to phenotypic variation. Furthermore, combining TOPMed haplotypes with modern imputation methods improves the power and reach of genome-wide association studies to include variants down to a frequency of approximately 0.01\%.

}, issn = {1476-4687}, doi = {10.1038/s41586-021-03205-y}, author = {Taliun, Daniel and Harris, Daniel N and Kessler, Michael D and Carlson, Jedidiah and Szpiech, Zachary A and Torres, Raul and Taliun, Sarah A Gagliano and Corvelo, Andr{\'e} and Gogarten, Stephanie M and Kang, Hyun Min and Pitsillides, Achilleas N and LeFaive, Jonathon and Lee, Seung-Been and Tian, Xiaowen and Browning, Brian L and Das, Sayantan and Emde, Anne-Katrin and Clarke, Wayne E and Loesch, Douglas P and Shetty, Amol C and Blackwell, Thomas W and Smith, Albert V and Wong, Quenna and Liu, Xiaoming and Conomos, Matthew P and Bobo, Dean M and Aguet, Francois and Albert, Christine and Alonso, Alvaro and Ardlie, Kristin G and Arking, Dan E and Aslibekyan, Stella and Auer, Paul L and Barnard, John and Barr, R Graham and Barwick, Lucas and Becker, Lewis C and Beer, Rebecca L and Benjamin, Emelia J and Bielak, Lawrence F and Blangero, John and Boehnke, Michael and Bowden, Donald W and Brody, Jennifer A and Burchard, Esteban G and Cade, Brian E and Casella, James F and Chalazan, Brandon and Chasman, Daniel I and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Cho, Michael H and Choi, Seung Hoan and Chung, Mina K and Clish, Clary B and Correa, Adolfo and Curran, Joanne E and Custer, Brian and Darbar, Dawood and Daya, Michelle and de Andrade, Mariza and DeMeo, Dawn L and Dutcher, Susan K and Ellinor, Patrick T and Emery, Leslie S and Eng, Celeste and Fatkin, Diane and Fingerlin, Tasha and Forer, Lukas and Fornage, Myriam and Franceschini, Nora and Fuchsberger, Christian and Fullerton, Stephanie M and Germer, Soren and Gladwin, Mark T and Gottlieb, Daniel J and Guo, Xiuqing and Hall, Michael E and He, Jiang and Heard-Costa, Nancy L and Heckbert, Susan R and Irvin, Marguerite R and Johnsen, Jill M and Johnson, Andrew D and Kaplan, Robert and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kelly, Tanika and Kelly, Shannon and Kenny, Eimear E and Kiel, Douglas P and Klemmer, Robert and Konkle, Barbara A and Kooperberg, Charles and K{\"o}ttgen, Anna and Lange, Leslie A and Lasky-Su, Jessica and Levy, Daniel and Lin, Xihong and Lin, Keng-Han and Liu, Chunyu and Loos, Ruth J F and Garman, Lori and Gerszten, Robert and Lubitz, Steven A and Lunetta, Kathryn L and Mak, Angel C Y and Manichaikul, Ani and Manning, Alisa K and Mathias, Rasika A and McManus, David D and McGarvey, Stephen T and Meigs, James B and Meyers, Deborah A and Mikulla, Julie L and Minear, Mollie A and Mitchell, Braxton D and Mohanty, Sanghamitra and Montasser, May E and Montgomery, Courtney and Morrison, Alanna C and Murabito, Joanne M and Natale, Andrea and Natarajan, Pradeep and Nelson, Sarah C and North, Kari E and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Palmer, Nicholette D and Pankratz, Nathan and Peloso, Gina M and Peyser, Patricia A and Pleiness, Jacob and Post, Wendy S and Psaty, Bruce M and Rao, D C and Redline, Susan and Reiner, Alexander P and Roden, Dan and Rotter, Jerome I and Ruczinski, Ingo and Sarnowski, Chloe and Schoenherr, Sebastian and Schwartz, David A and Seo, Jeong-Sun and Seshadri, Sudha and Sheehan, Vivien A and Sheu, Wayne H and Shoemaker, M Benjamin and Smith, Nicholas L and Smith, Jennifer A and Sotoodehnia, Nona and Stilp, Adrienne M and Tang, Weihong and Taylor, Kent D and Telen, Marilyn and Thornton, Timothy A and Tracy, Russell P and Van Den Berg, David J and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Viaud-Martinez, Karine A and Vrieze, Scott and Weeks, Daniel E and Weir, Bruce S and Weiss, Scott T and Weng, Lu-Chen and Willer, Cristen J and Zhang, Yingze and Zhao, Xutong and Arnett, Donna K and Ashley-Koch, Allison E and Barnes, Kathleen C and Boerwinkle, Eric and Gabriel, Stacey and Gibbs, Richard and Rice, Kenneth M and Rich, Stephen S and Silverman, Edwin K and Qasba, Pankaj and Gan, Weiniu and Papanicolaou, George J and Nickerson, Deborah A and Browning, Sharon R and Zody, Michael C and Z{\"o}llner, Sebastian and Wilson, James G and Cupples, L Adrienne and Laurie, Cathy C and Jaquish, Cashell E and Hernandez, Ryan D and O{\textquoteright}Connor, Timothy D and Abecasis, Goncalo R} } @article {8913, title = {Whole genome sequence analysis of platelet traits in the NHLBI trans-omics for precision medicine initiative.}, journal = {Hum Mol Genet}, year = {2021}, month = {2021 Sep 06}, abstract = {

Platelets play a key role in thrombosis and hemostasis. Platelet count (PLT) and mean platelet volume (MPV) are highly heritable quantitative traits, with hundreds of genetic signals previously identified, mostly in European ancestry populations. We here utilize whole genome sequencing from NHLBI{\textquoteright}s Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine Initiative (TOPMed) in a large multi-ethnic sample to further explore common and rare variation contributing to PLT (n = 61 200) and MPV (n = 23 485). We identified and replicated secondary signals at MPL (rs532784633) and PECAM1 (rs73345162), both more common in African ancestry populations. We also observed rare variation in Mendelian platelet related disorder genes influencing variation in platelet traits in TOPMed cohorts (not enriched for blood disorders). For example, association of GP9 with lower PLT and higher MPV was partly driven by a pathogenic Bernard-Soulier syndrome variant (rs5030764, p.Asn61Ser), and the signals at TUBB1 and CD36 were partly driven by loss of function variants not annotated as pathogenic in ClinVar (rs199948010 and rs571975065). However, residual signal remained for these gene-based signals after adjusting for lead variants, suggesting that additional variants in Mendelian genes with impacts in general population cohorts remain to be identified. Gene-based signals were also identified at several GWAS identified loci for genes not annotated for Mendelian platelet disorders (PTPRH, TET2, CHEK2), with somatic variation driving the result at TET2. These results highlight the value of whole genome sequencing in populations of diverse genetic ancestry to identify novel regulatory and coding signals, even for well-studied traits like platelet traits.

}, issn = {1460-2083}, doi = {10.1093/hmg/ddab252}, author = {Little, Amarise and Hu, Yao and Sun, Quan and Jain, Deepti and Broome, Jai and Chen, Ming-Huei and Thibord, Florian and McHugh, Caitlin and Surendran, Praveen and Blackwell, Thomas W and Brody, Jennifer A and Bhan, Arunoday and Chami, Nathalie and Vries, Paul S and Ekunwe, Lynette and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Hobbs, Brian D and Manichaikul, Ani and Moon, Jee-Young and Preuss, Michael H and Ryan, Kathleen and Wang, Zhe and Wheeler, Marsha and Yanek, Lisa R and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Almasy, Laura and Beaty, Terri H and Becker, Lewis C and Blangero, John and Boerwinkle, Eric and Butterworth, Adam S and Choquet, Helene and Correa, Adolfo and Curran, Joanne E and Faraday, Nauder and Fornage, Myriam and Glahn, David C and Hou, Lifang and Jorgenson, Eric and Kooperberg, Charles and Lewis, Joshua P and Lloyd-Jones, Donald M and Loos, Ruth J F and Min, Nancy and Mitchell, Braxton D and Morrison, Alanna C and Nickerson, Debbie and North, Kari E and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Pankratz, Nathan and Psaty, Bruce M and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Rich, Stephen S and Rotter, Jerome I and Smith, Albert V and Smith, Nicholas L and Tang, Hua and Tracy, Russell P and Conomos, Matthew P and Laurie, Cecelia A and Mathias, Rasika A and Li, Yun and Auer, Paul L and Thornton, Timothy and Reiner, Alexander P and Johnson, Andrew D and Raffield, Laura M} } @article {8779, title = {Whole-genome sequencing association analysis of quantitative red blood cell phenotypes: The NHLBI TOPMed program.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {108}, year = {2021}, month = {2021 05 06}, pages = {874-893}, abstract = {

Whole-genome sequencing (WGS), a powerful tool for detecting novel coding and non-coding disease-causing variants, has largely been applied to clinical diagnosis of inherited disorders. Here we leveraged WGS data in up to 62,653 ethnically diverse participants from the NHLBI Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine (TOPMed) program and assessed statistical association of variants with seven red blood cell (RBC) quantitative traits. We discovered 14 single variant-RBC trait associations at 12 genomic loci, which have not been reported previously. Several of the RBC trait-variant associations (RPN1, ELL2, MIDN, HBB, HBA1, PIEZO1, and G6PD) were replicated in independent GWAS datasets imputed to the TOPMed reference panel. Most of these discovered variants are rare/low frequency, and several are observed disproportionately among non-European Ancestry (African, Hispanic/Latino, or East Asian) populations. We identified a 3~bp indel p.Lys2169del (g.88717175_88717177TCT[4]) (common only in the Ashkenazi Jewish population) of PIEZO1, a gene responsible for the Mendelian red cell disorder hereditary xerocytosis (MIM: 194380), associated with higher mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC). In stepwise conditional analysis and in gene-based rare variant aggregated association analysis, we identified several of the variants in HBB, HBA1, TMPRSS6, and G6PD that represent the carrier state for known coding, promoter, or splice site loss-of-function variants that cause inherited RBC disorders. Finally, we applied base and nuclease editing to demonstrate that the sentinel variant rs112097551 (nearest gene RPN1) acts through a cis-regulatory element that exerts long-range control of the gene RUVBL1 which is essential for hematopoiesis. Together, these results demonstrate the utility of WGS in ethnically diverse population-based samples and gene editing for expanding knowledge of the genetic architecture of quantitative hematologic traits and suggest a continuum between complex trait and Mendelian red cell disorders.

}, keywords = {Adult, Aged, Chromosomes, Human, Pair 16, Datasets as Topic, Erythrocytes, Female, Gene Editing, Genetic Variation, Genome-Wide Association Study, HEK293 Cells, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (U.S.), Phenotype, Quality Control, Reproducibility of Results, United States}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2021.04.003}, author = {Hu, Yao and Stilp, Adrienne M and McHugh, Caitlin P and Rao, Shuquan and Jain, Deepti and Zheng, Xiuwen and Lane, John and M{\'e}ric de Bellefon, S{\'e}bastian and Raffield, Laura M and Chen, Ming-Huei and Yanek, Lisa R and Wheeler, Marsha and Yao, Yao and Ren, Chunyan and Broome, Jai and Moon, Jee-Young and de Vries, Paul S and Hobbs, Brian D and Sun, Quan and Surendran, Praveen and Brody, Jennifer A and Blackwell, Thomas W and Choquet, Helene and Ryan, Kathleen and Duggirala, Ravindranath and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Wang, Zhe and Chami, Nathalie and Preuss, Michael H and Min, Nancy and Ekunwe, Lynette and Lange, Leslie A and Cushman, Mary and Faraday, Nauder and Curran, Joanne E and Almasy, Laura and Kundu, Kousik and Smith, Albert V and Gabriel, Stacey and Rotter, Jerome I and Fornage, Myriam and Lloyd-Jones, Donald M and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Smith, Nicholas L and North, Kari E and Boerwinkle, Eric and Becker, Lewis C and Lewis, Joshua P and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Hou, Lifang and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Morrison, Alanna C and Beaty, Terri H and Kaplan, Robert and Correa, Adolfo and Blangero, John and Jorgenson, Eric and Psaty, Bruce M and Kooperberg, Charles and Walton, Russell T and Kleinstiver, Benjamin P and Tang, Hua and Loos, Ruth J F and Soranzo, Nicole and Butterworth, Adam S and Nickerson, Debbie and Rich, Stephen S and Mitchell, Braxton D and Johnson, Andrew D and Auer, Paul L and Li, Yun and Mathias, Rasika A and Lettre, Guillaume and Pankratz, Nathan and Laurie, Cathy C and Laurie, Cecelia A and Bauer, Daniel E and Conomos, Matthew P and Reiner, Alexander P} } @article {8914, title = {Whole-genome sequencing in diverse subjects identifies genetic correlates of leukocyte traits: The NHLBI TOPMed program.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {108}, year = {2021}, month = {2021 10 07}, pages = {1836-1851}, abstract = {

Many common and rare variants associated with hematologic traits have been discovered through imputation on large-scale reference panels. However, the majority of genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have been conducted in Europeans, and determining causal variants has proved challenging. We performed a GWAS of total leukocyte, neutrophil, lymphocyte, monocyte, eosinophil, and basophil counts generated from 109,563,748 variants in the autosomes and the X chromosome in the Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine (TOPMed) program, which included data from 61,802 individuals of diverse ancestry. We discovered and replicated 7 leukocyte trait associations, including (1) the association between a chromosome X, pseudo-autosomal region (PAR), noncoding variant located between cytokine receptor genes (CSF2RA and CLRF2) and lower eosinophil count; and (2) associations between single variants found predominantly among African Americans at the S1PR3 (9q22.1) and HBB (11p15.4) loci and monocyte and lymphocyte counts, respectively. We further provide evidence indicating that the newly discovered eosinophil-lowering chromosome X PAR variant might be associated with reduced susceptibility to common allergic diseases such as atopic dermatitis and asthma. Additionally, we found a burden of very rare FLT3 (13q12.2) variants associated with monocyte counts. Together, these results emphasize the utility of whole-genome sequencing in diverse samples in identifying associations missed by European-ancestry-driven GWASs.

}, keywords = {Asthma, Biomarkers, Dermatitis, Atopic, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genome, Human, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Leukocytes, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (U.S.), Phenotype, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Prognosis, Proteome, Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive, Quantitative Trait Loci, United Kingdom, United States, Whole Genome Sequencing}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2021.08.007}, author = {Mikhaylova, Anna V and McHugh, Caitlin P and Polfus, Linda M and Raffield, Laura M and Boorgula, Meher Preethi and Blackwell, Thomas W and Brody, Jennifer A and Broome, Jai and Chami, Nathalie and Chen, Ming-Huei and Conomos, Matthew P and Cox, Corey and Curran, Joanne E and Daya, Michelle and Ekunwe, Lynette and Glahn, David C and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Highland, Heather M and Hobbs, Brian D and Ilboudo, Yann and Jain, Deepti and Lange, Leslie A and Miller-Fleming, Tyne W and Min, Nancy and Moon, Jee-Young and Preuss, Michael H and Rosen, Jonathon and Ryan, Kathleen and Smith, Albert V and Sun, Quan and Surendran, Praveen and de Vries, Paul S and Walter, Klaudia and Wang, Zhe and Wheeler, Marsha and Yanek, Lisa R and Zhong, Xue and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Almasy, Laura and Barnes, Kathleen C and Beaty, Terri H and Becker, Lewis C and Blangero, John and Boerwinkle, Eric and Butterworth, Adam S and Chavan, Sameer and Cho, Michael H and Choquet, Helene and Correa, Adolfo and Cox, Nancy and DeMeo, Dawn L and Faraday, Nauder and Fornage, Myriam and Gerszten, Robert E and Hou, Lifang and Johnson, Andrew D and Jorgenson, Eric and Kaplan, Robert and Kooperberg, Charles and Kundu, Kousik and Laurie, Cecelia A and Lettre, Guillaume and Lewis, Joshua P and Li, Bingshan and Li, Yun and Lloyd-Jones, Donald M and Loos, Ruth J F and Manichaikul, Ani and Meyers, Deborah A and Mitchell, Braxton D and Morrison, Alanna C and Ngo, Debby and Nickerson, Deborah A and Nongmaithem, Suraj and North, Kari E and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Ortega, Victor E and Pankratz, Nathan and Perry, James A and Psaty, Bruce M and Rich, Stephen S and Soranzo, Nicole and Rotter, Jerome I and Silverman, Edwin K and Smith, Nicholas L and Tang, Hua and Tracy, Russell P and Thornton, Timothy A and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Zein, Joe and Mathias, Rasika A and Reiner, Alexander P and Auer, Paul L} } @article {9099, title = {Insights From a Large-Scale Whole-Genome Sequencing Study of Systolic Blood Pressure, Diastolic Blood Pressure, and Hypertension.}, journal = {Hypertension}, year = {2022}, month = {2022 Jun 02}, pages = {101161HYPERTENSIONAHA12219324}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: The availability of whole-genome sequencing data in large studies has enabled the assessment of coding and noncoding variants across the allele frequency spectrum for their associations with blood pressure.

METHODS: We conducted a multiancestry whole-genome sequencing analysis of blood pressure among 51 456 Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine and Centers for Common Disease Genomics program participants (stage-1). Stage-2 analyses leveraged array data from UK Biobank (N=383 145), Million Veteran Program (N=318 891), and Reasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke (N=10 643) participants, along with whole-exome sequencing data from UK Biobank (N=199 631) participants.

RESULTS: Two blood pressure signals achieved genome-wide significance in meta-analyses of stage-1 and stage-2 single variant findings (<5{\texttimes}10). Among them, a rare intergenic variant at novel locus, , was associated with lower systolic blood pressure in stage-1 (beta [SE]=-32.6 [6.0]; =4.99{\texttimes}10) but not stage-2 analysis (=0.11). Furthermore, a novel common variant at the known locus was suggestively associated with diastolic blood pressure in stage-1 (beta [SE]=-0.36 [0.07]; =4.18{\texttimes}10) and attained genome-wide significance in stage-2 (beta [SE]=-0.29 [0.03]; =7.28{\texttimes}10). Nineteen additional signals suggestively associated with blood pressure in meta-analysis of single and aggregate rare variant findings (<1{\texttimes}10 and <1{\texttimes}10, respectively).

DISCUSSION: We report one promising but unconfirmed rare variant for blood pressure and, more importantly, contribute insights for future blood pressure sequencing studies. Our findings suggest promise of aggregate analyses to complement single variant analysis strategies and the need for larger, diverse samples, and family studies to enable robust rare variant identification.

}, issn = {1524-4563}, doi = {10.1161/HYPERTENSIONAHA.122.19324}, author = {Kelly, Tanika N and Sun, Xiao and He, Karen Y and Brown, Michael R and Taliun, Sarah A Gagliano and Hellwege, Jacklyn N and Irvin, Marguerite R and Mi, Xuenan and Brody, Jennifer A and Franceschini, Nora and Guo, Xiuqing and Hwang, Shih-Jen and de Vries, Paul S and Gao, Yan and Moscati, Arden and Nadkarni, Girish N and Yanek, Lisa R and Elfassy, Tali and Smith, Jennifer A and Chung, Ren-Hua and Beitelshees, Amber L and Patki, Amit and Aslibekyan, Stella and Blobner, Brandon M and Peralta, Juan M and Assimes, Themistocles L and Palmas, Walter R and Liu, Chunyu and Bress, Adam P and Huang, Zhijie and Becker, Lewis C and Hwa, Chii-Min and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Carlson, Jenna C and Warren, Helen R and Das, Sayantan and Giri, Ayush and Martin, Lisa W and Craig Johnson, W and Fox, Ervin R and Bottinger, Erwin P and Razavi, Alexander C and Vaidya, Dhananjay and Chuang, Lee-Ming and Chang, Yen-Pei C and Naseri, Take and Jain, Deepti and Kang, Hyun Min and Hung, Adriana M and Srinivasasainagendra, Vinodh and Snively, Beverly M and Gu, Dongfeng and Montasser, May E and Reupena, Muagututi{\textquoteright}a Sefuiva and Heavner, Benjamin D and LeFaive, Jonathon and Hixson, James E and Rice, Kenneth M and Wang, Fei Fei and Nielsen, Jonas B and Huang, Jianfeng and Khan, Alyna T and Zhou, Wei and Nierenberg, Jovia L and Laurie, Cathy C and Armstrong, Nicole D and Shi, Mengyao and Pan, Yang and Stilp, Adrienne M and Emery, Leslie and Wong, Quenna and Hawley, Nicola L and Minster, Ryan L and Curran, Joanne E and Munroe, Patricia B and Weeks, Daniel E and North, Kari E and Tracy, Russell P and Kenny, Eimear E and Shimbo, Daichi and Chakravarti, Aravinda and Rich, Stephen S and Reiner, Alex P and Blangero, John and Redline, Susan and Mitchell, Braxton D and Rao, Dabeeru C and Ida Chen, Yii-Der and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kaplan, Robert C and Mathias, Rasika A and He, Jiang and Psaty, Bruce M and Fornage, Myriam and Loos, Ruth J F and Correa, Adolfo and Boerwinkle, Eric and Rotter, Jerome I and Kooperberg, Charles and Edwards, Todd L and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Zhu, Xiaofeng and Levy, Daniel and Arnett, Donna K and Morrison, Alanna C} } @article {8975, title = {Rare coding variants in 35 genes associate with circulating lipid levels-A multi-ancestry analysis of 170,000 exomes.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {109}, year = {2022}, month = {2022 01 06}, pages = {81-96}, abstract = {

Large-scale gene sequencing studies for complex traits have the potential to identify causal genes with therapeutic implications. We performed gene-based association testing of blood lipid levels with rare (minor allele frequency < 1\%) predicted damaging coding variation by using sequence data from >170,000 individuals from multiple ancestries: 97,493 European, 30,025 South Asian, 16,507 African, 16,440 Hispanic/Latino, 10,420 East Asian, and 1,182 Samoan. We identified 35 genes associated with circulating lipid levels; some of these genes have not been previously associated with lipid levels when using rare coding variation from population-based samples. We prioritize 32 genes in array-based genome-wide association study (GWAS) loci based on aggregations of rare coding variants; three (EVI5, SH2B3, and PLIN1) had no prior association of rare coding variants with lipid levels. Most of our associated genes showed evidence of association among multiple ancestries. Finally, we observed an enrichment of gene-based associations for low-density lipoprotein cholesterol drug target genes and for genes closest to GWAS index single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Our results demonstrate that gene-based associations can be beneficial for drug target development and provide evidence that the gene closest to the array-based GWAS index SNP is often the functional gene for blood lipid levels.

}, keywords = {Alleles, Blood Glucose, Case-Control Studies, Computational Biology, Databases, Genetic, Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2, Exome, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genetic Variation, Genetics, Population, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Lipid Metabolism, Lipids, Liver, Molecular Sequence Annotation, Multifactorial Inheritance, Open Reading Frames, Phenotype, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2021.11.021}, author = {Hindy, George and Dornbos, Peter and Chaffin, Mark D and Liu, Dajiang J and Wang, Minxian and Selvaraj, Margaret Sunitha and Zhang, David and Park, Joseph and Aguilar-Salinas, Carlos A and Antonacci-Fulton, Lucinda and Ardissino, Diego and Arnett, Donna K and Aslibekyan, Stella and Atzmon, Gil and Ballantyne, Christie M and Barajas-Olmos, Francisco and Barzilai, Nir and Becker, Lewis C and Bielak, Lawrence F and Bis, Joshua C and Blangero, John and Boerwinkle, Eric and Bonnycastle, Lori L and Bottinger, Erwin and Bowden, Donald W and Bown, Matthew J and Brody, Jennifer A and Broome, Jai G and Burtt, Noel P and Cade, Brian E and Centeno-Cruz, Federico and Chan, Edmund and Chang, Yi-Cheng and Chen, Yii-der I and Cheng, Ching-Yu and Choi, Won Jung and Chowdhury, Rajiv and Contreras-Cubas, Cecilia and C{\'o}rdova, Emilio J and Correa, Adolfo and Cupples, L Adrienne and Curran, Joanne E and Danesh, John and de Vries, Paul S and DeFronzo, Ralph A and Doddapaneni, Harsha and Duggirala, Ravindranath and Dutcher, Susan K and Ellinor, Patrick T and Emery, Leslie S and Florez, Jose C and Fornage, Myriam and Freedman, Barry I and Fuster, Valentin and Garay-Sevilla, Ma Eugenia and Garc{\'\i}a-Ortiz, Humberto and Germer, Soren and Gibbs, Richard A and Gieger, Christian and Glaser, Benjamin and Gonzalez, Clicerio and Gonzalez-Villalpando, Maria Elena and Graff, Mariaelisa and Graham, Sarah E and Grarup, Niels and Groop, Leif C and Guo, Xiuqing and Gupta, Namrata and Han, Sohee and Hanis, Craig L and Hansen, Torben and He, Jiang and Heard-Costa, Nancy L and Hung, Yi-Jen and Hwang, Mi Yeong and Irvin, Marguerite R and Islas-Andrade, Sergio and Jarvik, Gail P and Kang, Hyun Min and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kelly, Tanika and Kenny, Eimear E and Khan, Alyna T and Kim, Bong-Jo and Kim, Ryan W and Kim, Young Jin and Koistinen, Heikki A and Kooperberg, Charles and Kuusisto, Johanna and Kwak, Soo Heon and Laakso, Markku and Lange, Leslie A and Lee, Jiwon and Lee, Juyoung and Lee, Seonwook and Lehman, Donna M and Lemaitre, Rozenn N and Linneberg, Allan and Liu, Jianjun and Loos, Ruth J F and Lubitz, Steven A and Lyssenko, Valeriya and Ma, Ronald C W and Martin, Lisa Warsinger and Mart{\'\i}nez-Hern{\'a}ndez, Ang{\'e}lica and Mathias, Rasika A and McGarvey, Stephen T and McPherson, Ruth and Meigs, James B and Meitinger, Thomas and Melander, Olle and Mendoza-Caamal, Elvia and Metcalf, Ginger A and Mi, Xuenan and Mohlke, Karen L and Montasser, May E and Moon, Jee-Young and Moreno-Macias, Hortensia and Morrison, Alanna C and Muzny, Donna M and Nelson, Sarah C and Nilsson, Peter M and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Orho-Melander, Marju and Orozco, Lorena and Palmer, Colin N A and Palmer, Nicholette D and Park, Cheol Joo and Park, Kyong Soo and Pedersen, Oluf and Peralta, Juan M and Peyser, Patricia A and Post, Wendy S and Preuss, Michael and Psaty, Bruce M and Qi, Qibin and Rao, D C and Redline, Susan and Reiner, Alexander P and Revilla-Monsalve, Cristina and Rich, Stephen S and Samani, Nilesh and Schunkert, Heribert and Schurmann, Claudia and Seo, Daekwan and Seo, Jeong-Sun and Sim, Xueling and Sladek, Rob and Small, Kerrin S and So, Wing Yee and Stilp, Adrienne M and Tai, E Shyong and Tam, Claudia H T and Taylor, Kent D and Teo, Yik Ying and Thameem, Farook and Tomlinson, Brian and Tsai, Michael Y and Tuomi, Tiinamaija and Tuomilehto, Jaakko and Tusi{\'e}-Luna, Teresa and Udler, Miriam S and van Dam, Rob M and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Viaud Martinez, Karine A and Wang, Fei Fei and Wang, Xuzhi and Watkins, Hugh and Weeks, Daniel E and Wilson, James G and Witte, Daniel R and Wong, Tien-Yin and Yanek, Lisa R and Kathiresan, Sekar and Rader, Daniel J and Rotter, Jerome I and Boehnke, Michael and McCarthy, Mark I and Willer, Cristen J and Natarajan, Pradeep and Flannick, Jason A and Khera, Amit V and Peloso, Gina M} } @article {9261, title = {Whole genome sequencing identifies structural variants contributing to hematologic traits in the NHLBI TOPMed program.}, journal = {Nat Commun}, volume = {13}, year = {2022}, month = {2022 Dec 08}, pages = {7592}, abstract = {

Genome-wide association studies have identified thousands of single nucleotide variants and small indels that contribute to variation in hematologic traits. While structural variants are known to cause rare blood or hematopoietic disorders, the genome-wide contribution of structural variants to quantitative blood cell trait variation is unknown. Here we utilized whole genome sequencing data in ancestrally diverse participants of the NHLBI Trans Omics for Precision Medicine program (N = 50,675) to detect structural variants associated with hematologic traits. Using single variant tests, we assessed the association of common and rare structural variants with red cell-, white cell-, and platelet-related quantitative traits and observed 21 independent signals (12 common and 9 rare) reaching genome-wide significance. The majority of these associations (N = 18) replicated in independent datasets. In genome-editing experiments, we provide evidence that a deletion associated with lower monocyte counts leads to disruption of an S1PR3 monocyte enhancer and decreased S1PR3 expression.

}, keywords = {Blood Cells, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Whole Genome Sequencing}, issn = {2041-1723}, doi = {10.1038/s41467-022-35354-7}, author = {Wheeler, Marsha M and Stilp, Adrienne M and Rao, Shuquan and Halldorsson, Bjarni V and Beyter, Doruk and Wen, Jia and Mihkaylova, Anna V and McHugh, Caitlin P and Lane, John and Jiang, Min-Zhi and Raffield, Laura M and Jun, Goo and Sedlazeck, Fritz J and Metcalf, Ginger and Yao, Yao and Bis, Joshua B and Chami, Nathalie and de Vries, Paul S and Desai, Pinkal and Floyd, James S and Gao, Yan and Kammers, Kai and Kim, Wonji and Moon, Jee-Young and Ratan, Aakrosh and Yanek, Lisa R and Almasy, Laura and Becker, Lewis C and Blangero, John and Cho, Michael H and Curran, Joanne E and Fornage, Myriam and Kaplan, Robert C and Lewis, Joshua P and Loos, Ruth J F and Mitchell, Braxton D and Morrison, Alanna C and Preuss, Michael and Psaty, Bruce M and Rich, Stephen S and Rotter, Jerome I and Tang, Hua and Tracy, Russell P and Boerwinkle, Eric and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Blackwell, Thomas W and Smith, Albert V and Johnson, Andrew D and Mathias, Rasika A and Nickerson, Deborah A and Conomos, Matthew P and Li, Yun and {\TH}orsteinsdottir, Unnur and Magn{\'u}sson, Magn{\'u}s K and Stefansson, Kari and Pankratz, Nathan D and Bauer, Daniel E and Auer, Paul L and Reiner, Alex P} } @article {9387, title = {Aberrant activation of TCL1A promotes stem cell expansion in clonal haematopoiesis.}, journal = {Nature}, volume = {616}, year = {2023}, month = {2023 Apr}, pages = {755-763}, abstract = {

Mutations in a diverse set of driver genes increase the fitness of haematopoietic stem cells (HSCs), leading to clonal haematopoiesis. These lesions are precursors for blood cancers, but the basis of their fitness advantage remains largely unknown, partly owing to a paucity of large cohorts in which the clonal expansion rate has been assessed by longitudinal sampling. Here, to circumvent this limitation, we developed a method to infer the expansion rate from data from a single time point. We applied this method to 5,071 people with clonal haematopoiesis. A genome-wide association study revealed that a common inherited polymorphism in the TCL1A promoter was associated with a slower expansion rate in clonal haematopoiesis overall, but the effect varied by driver gene. Those carrying this protective allele exhibited markedly reduced growth rates or prevalence of clones with driver mutations in TET2, ASXL1, SF3B1 and SRSF2, but~this effect was not seen in~clones with~driver mutations in DNMT3A. TCL1A was not expressed in normal or DNMT3A-mutated HSCs, but the introduction of mutations in TET2 or ASXL1 led to the expression of TCL1A protein and the expansion of HSCs in vitro. The protective allele restricted TCL1A expression and expansion of mutant HSCs, as did experimental~knockdown of TCL1A expression. Forced expression of TCL1A promoted the expansion of human HSCs in vitro and mouse HSCs in vivo. Our results indicate that the fitness advantage of several commonly mutated driver genes in clonal haematopoiesis may be mediated by TCL1A activation.

}, keywords = {Alleles, Animals, Clonal Hematopoiesis, Genome-Wide Association Study, Hematopoiesis, Hematopoietic Stem Cells, Humans, Mice, Mutation, Promoter Regions, Genetic}, issn = {1476-4687}, doi = {10.1038/s41586-023-05806-1}, author = {Weinstock, Joshua S and Gopakumar, Jayakrishnan and Burugula, Bala Bharathi and Uddin, Md Mesbah and Jahn, Nikolaus and Belk, Julia A and Bouzid, Hind and Daniel, Bence and Miao, Zhuang and Ly, Nghi and Mack, Taralynn M and Luna, Sofia E and Prothro, Katherine P and Mitchell, Shaneice R and Laurie, Cecelia A and Broome, Jai G and Taylor, Kent D and Guo, Xiuqing and Sinner, Moritz F and von Falkenhausen, Aenne S and K{\"a}{\"a}b, Stefan and Shuldiner, Alan R and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Lewis, Joshua P and Boerwinkle, Eric and Barnes, Kathleen C and Chami, Nathalie and Kenny, Eimear E and Loos, Ruth J F and Fornage, Myriam and Hou, Lifang and Lloyd-Jones, Donald M and Redline, Susan and Cade, Brian E and Psaty, Bruce M and Bis, Joshua C and Brody, Jennifer A and Silverman, Edwin K and Yun, Jeong H and Qiao, Dandi and Palmer, Nicholette D and Freedman, Barry I and Bowden, Donald W and Cho, Michael H and DeMeo, Dawn L and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Yanek, Lisa R and Becker, Lewis C and Kardia, Sharon L R and Peyser, Patricia A and He, Jiang and Rienstra, Michiel and van der Harst, Pim and Kaplan, Robert and Heckbert, Susan R and Smith, Nicholas L and Wiggins, Kerri L and Arnett, Donna K and Irvin, Marguerite R and Tiwari, Hemant and Cutler, Michael J and Knight, Stacey and Muhlestein, J Brent and Correa, Adolfo and Raffield, Laura M and Gao, Yan and de Andrade, Mariza and Rotter, Jerome I and Rich, Stephen S and Tracy, Russell P and Konkle, Barbara A and Johnsen, Jill M and Wheeler, Marsha M and Smith, J Gustav and Melander, Olle and Nilsson, Peter M and Custer, Brian S and Duggirala, Ravindranath and Curran, Joanne E and Blangero, John and McGarvey, Stephen and Williams, L Keoki and Xiao, Shujie and Yang, Mao and Gu, C Charles and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Lee, Wen-Jane and Marcus, Gregory M and Kane, John P and Pullinger, Clive R and Shoemaker, M Benjamin and Darbar, Dawood and Roden, Dan M and Albert, Christine and Kooperberg, Charles and Zhou, Ying and Manson, JoAnn E and Desai, Pinkal and Johnson, Andrew D and Mathias, Rasika A and Blackwell, Thomas W and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Smith, Albert V and Kang, Hyun M and Satpathy, Ansuman T and Natarajan, Pradeep and Kitzman, Jacob O and Whitsel, Eric A and Reiner, Alexander P and Bick, Alexander G and Jaiswal, Siddhartha} } @article {9479, title = {Carriers of rare damaging genetic variants are at lower risk of atherosclerotic disease.}, journal = {medRxiv}, year = {2023}, month = {2023 Aug 16}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: The CCL2/CCR2 axis governs monocyte trafficking and recruitment to atherosclerotic lesions. Human genetic analyses and population-based studies support an association between circulating CCL2 levels and atherosclerosis. Still, it remains unknown whether pharmacological targeting of CCR2, the main CCL2 receptor, would provide protection against human atherosclerotic disease.

METHODS: In whole-exome sequencing data from 454,775 UK Biobank participants (40-69 years), we identified predicted loss-of-function (LoF) or damaging missense (REVEL score >0.5) variants within the gene. We prioritized variants associated with lower monocyte count (p<0.05) and tested associations with vascular risk factors and risk of atherosclerotic disease over a mean follow-up of 14 years. The results were replicated in a pooled cohort of three independent datasets (TOPMed, deCODE and Penn Medicine BioBank; total n=441,445) and the effect of the most frequent damaging variant was experimentally validated.

RESULTS: A total of 45 predicted LoF or damaging missense variants were identified in the gene, 4 of which were also significantly associated with lower monocyte count, but not with other white blood cell counts. Heterozygous carriers of these variants were at a lower risk of a combined atherosclerosis outcome, showed a lower burden of atherosclerosis across four vascular beds, and were at a lower lifetime risk of coronary artery disease and myocardial infarction. There was no evidence of association with vascular risk factors including LDL-cholesterol, blood pressure, glycemic status, or C-reactive protein. Using a cAMP assay, we found that cells transfected with the most frequent damaging variant (3:46358273:T:A, M249K, 547 carriers, frequency: 0.14\%) show a decrease in signaling in response to CCL2. The associations of the M249K variant with myocardial infarction were consistent across cohorts (OR : 0.62 95\%CI: 0.39-0.96; OR : 0.64 95\%CI: 0.34-1.19; OR : 0.64 95\%CI: 0.45-0.90). In a phenome-wide association study, we found no evidence for higher risk of common infections or mortality among carriers of damaging variants.

CONCLUSIONS: Heterozygous carriers of damaging variants have a lower burden of atherosclerosis and lower lifetime risk of myocardial infarction. In conjunction with previous evidence from experimental and epidemiological studies, our findings highlight the translational potential of CCR2-targeting as an atheroprotective approach.

}, doi = {10.1101/2023.08.14.23294063}, author = {Georgakis, Marios K and Malik, Rainer and Hasbani, Natalie R and Shakt, Gabrielle and Morrison, Alanna C and Tsao, Noah L and Judy, Renae and Mitchell, Braxton D and Xu, Huichun and Montasser, May E and Do, Ron and Kenny, Eimear E and Loos, Ruth J F and Terry, James G and Carr, John Jeffrey and Bis, Joshua C and Psaty, Bruce M and Longstreth, W T and Young, Kendra A and Lutz, Sharon M and Cho, Michael H and Broome, Jai and Khan, Alyna T and Wang, Fei Fei and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Seshadri, Sudha and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Palmer, Nicholette D and Freedman, Barry I and Bowden, Donald W and Yanek, Lisa R and Kral, Brian G and Becker, Lewis C and Peyser, Patricia A and Bielak, Lawrence F and Ammous, Farah and Carson, April P and Hall, Michael E and Raffield, Laura M and Rich, Stephen S and Post, Wendy S and Tracy, Russel P and Taylor, Kent D and Guo, Xiuqing and Mahaney, Michael C and Curran, Joanne E and Blangero, John and Clarke, Shoa L and Haessler, Jeffrey W and Hu, Yao and Assimes, Themistocles L and Kooperberg, Charles and Damrauer, Scott M and Rotter, Jerome I and de Vries, Paul S and Dichgans, Martin} } @article {9419, title = {The genetic determinants of recurrent somatic mutations in 43,693 blood genomes.}, journal = {Sci Adv}, volume = {9}, year = {2023}, month = {2023 Apr 28}, pages = {eabm4945}, abstract = {

Nononcogenic somatic mutations are thought to be uncommon and inconsequential. To test this, we analyzed 43,693 National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine blood whole genomes from 37 cohorts and identified 7131 non-missense somatic mutations that are recurrently mutated in at least 50 individuals. These recurrent non-missense somatic mutations (RNMSMs) are not clearly explained by other clonal phenomena such as clonal hematopoiesis. RNMSM prevalence increased with age, with an average 50-year-old having 27 RNMSMs. Inherited germline variation associated with RNMSM acquisition. These variants were found in genes involved in adaptive immune function, proinflammatory cytokine production, and lymphoid lineage commitment. In addition, the presence of eight specific RNMSMs associated with blood cell traits at effect sizes comparable to Mendelian genetic mutations. Overall, we found that somatic mutations in blood are an unexpectedly common phenomenon with ancestry-specific determinants and human health consequences.

}, keywords = {Germ-Line Mutation, Hematopoiesis, Humans, Middle Aged, Mutation, Mutation, Missense, Phenotype}, issn = {2375-2548}, doi = {10.1126/sciadv.abm4945}, author = {Weinstock, Joshua S and Laurie, Cecelia A and Broome, Jai G and Taylor, Kent D and Guo, Xiuqing and Shuldiner, Alan R and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Lewis, Joshua P and Boerwinkle, Eric and Barnes, Kathleen C and Chami, Nathalie and Kenny, Eimear E and Loos, Ruth J F and Fornage, Myriam and Redline, Susan and Cade, Brian E and Gilliland, Frank D and Chen, Zhanghua and Gauderman, W James and Kumar, Rajesh and Grammer, Leslie and Schleimer, Robert P and Psaty, Bruce M and Bis, Joshua C and Brody, Jennifer A and Silverman, Edwin K and Yun, Jeong H and Qiao, Dandi and Weiss, Scott T and Lasky-Su, Jessica and DeMeo, Dawn L and Palmer, Nicholette D and Freedman, Barry I and Bowden, Donald W and Cho, Michael H and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Johnson, Andrew D and Yanek, Lisa R and Becker, Lewis C and Kardia, Sharon and He, Jiang and Kaplan, Robert and Heckbert, Susan R and Smith, Nicholas L and Wiggins, Kerri L and Arnett, Donna K and Irvin, Marguerite R and Tiwari, Hemant and Correa, Adolfo and Raffield, Laura M and Gao, Yan and de Andrade, Mariza and Rotter, Jerome I and Rich, Stephen S and Manichaikul, Ani W and Konkle, Barbara A and Johnsen, Jill M and Wheeler, Marsha M and Custer, Brian S and Duggirala, Ravindranath and Curran, Joanne E and Blangero, John and Gui, Hongsheng and Xiao, Shujie and Williams, L Keoki and Meyers, Deborah A and Li, Xingnan and Ortega, Victor and McGarvey, Stephen and Gu, C Charles and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Lee, Wen-Jane and Shoemaker, M Benjamin and Darbar, Dawood and Roden, Dan and Albert, Christine and Kooperberg, Charles and Desai, Pinkal and Blackwell, Thomas W and Abecasis, Goncalo R and Smith, Albert V and Kang, Hyun M and Mathias, Rasika and Natarajan, Pradeep and Jaiswal, Siddhartha and Reiner, Alexander P and Bick, Alexander G} } @article {9501, title = {Multi-ancestry genome-wide study identifies effector genes and druggable pathways for coronary artery calcification.}, journal = {Nat Genet}, volume = {55}, year = {2023}, month = {2023 Oct}, pages = {1651-1664}, abstract = {

Coronary artery calcification (CAC), a measure of subclinical atherosclerosis, predicts future symptomatic coronary artery disease (CAD). Identifying genetic risk factors for CAC may point to new therapeutic avenues for prevention. Currently, there are only four known risk loci for CAC identified from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) in the general population. Here we conducted the largest multi-ancestry GWAS meta-analysis of CAC to date, which comprised 26,909 individuals of European ancestry and 8,867 individuals of African ancestry. We identified 11 independent risk loci, of which eight were new for CAC and five had not been reported for CAD. These new CAC loci are related to bone mineralization, phosphate catabolism and hormone metabolic pathways. Several new loci harbor candidate causal genes supported by multiple lines of functional evidence and are regulators of smooth muscle cell-mediated calcification ex vivo and in vitro. Together, these findings help refine the genetic architecture of CAC and extend our understanding of the biological and potential druggable pathways underlying CAC.

}, issn = {1546-1718}, doi = {10.1038/s41588-023-01518-4}, author = {Kavousi, Maryam and Bos, Maxime M and Barnes, Hanna J and Lino Cardenas, Christian L and Wong, Doris and Lu, Haojie and Hodonsky, Chani J and Landsmeer, Lennart P L and Turner, Adam W and Kho, Minjung and Hasbani, Natalie R and de Vries, Paul S and Bowden, Donald W and Chopade, Sandesh and Deelen, Joris and Benavente, Ernest Diez and Guo, Xiuqing and Hofer, Edith and Hwang, Shih-Jen and Lutz, Sharon M and Lyytik{\"a}inen, Leo-Pekka and Slenders, Lotte and Smith, Albert V and Stanislawski, Maggie A and van Setten, Jessica and Wong, Quenna and Yanek, Lisa R and Becker, Diane M and Beekman, Marian and Budoff, Matthew J and Feitosa, Mary F and Finan, Chris and Hilliard, Austin T and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kovacic, Jason C and Kral, Brian G and Langefeld, Carl D and Launer, Lenore J and Malik, Shaista and Hoesein, Firdaus A A Mohamed and Mokry, Michal and Schmidt, Reinhold and Smith, Jennifer A and Taylor, Kent D and Terry, James G and van der Grond, Jeroen and van Meurs, Joyce and Vliegenthart, Rozemarijn and Xu, Jianzhao and Young, Kendra A and Zilh{\~a}o, Nuno R and Zweiker, Robert and Assimes, Themistocles L and Becker, Lewis C and Bos, Daniel and Carr, J Jeffrey and Cupples, L Adrienne and de Kleijn, Dominique P V and de Winther, Menno and den Ruijter, Hester M and Fornage, Myriam and Freedman, Barry I and Gudnason, Vilmundur and Hingorani, Aroon D and Hokanson, John E and Ikram, M Arfan and I{\v s}gum, Ivana and Jacobs, David R and K{\"a}h{\"o}nen, Mika and Lange, Leslie A and Lehtim{\"a}ki, Terho and Pasterkamp, Gerard and Raitakari, Olli T and Schmidt, Helena and Slagboom, P Eline and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Vernooij, Meike W and Bis, Joshua C and Franceschini, Nora and Psaty, Bruce M and Post, Wendy S and Rotter, Jerome I and Bj{\"o}rkegren, Johan L M and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Bielak, Lawrence F and Peyser, Patricia A and Malhotra, Rajeev and van der Laan, Sander W and Miller, Clint L} } @article {9537, title = {Type 2 Diabetes Modifies the Association of CAD Genomic Risk Variants With Subclinical Atherosclerosis.}, journal = {Circ Genom Precis Med}, year = {2023}, month = {2023 Nov 28}, pages = {e004176}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Individuals with type 2 diabetes (T2D) have an increased risk of coronary artery disease (CAD), but questions remain about the underlying pathology. Identifying which CAD loci are modified by T2D in the development of subclinical atherosclerosis (coronary artery calcification [CAC], carotid intima-media thickness, or carotid plaque) may improve our understanding of the mechanisms leading to the increased CAD in T2D.

METHODS: We compared the common and rare variant associations of known CAD loci from the literature on CAC, carotid intima-media thickness, and carotid plaque in up to 29 670 participants, including up to 24 157 normoglycemic controls and 5513 T2D cases leveraging whole-genome sequencing data from the Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine program. We included first-order T2D interaction terms in each model to determine whether CAD loci were modified by T2D. The genetic main and interaction effects were assessed using a joint test to determine whether a CAD variant, or gene-based rare variant set, was associated with the respective subclinical atherosclerosis measures and then further determined whether these loci had a significant interaction test.

RESULTS: Using a Bonferroni-corrected significance threshold of <1.6{\texttimes}10, we identified 3 genes (, , and ) associated with CAC and 2 genes ( and ) associated with carotid intima-media thickness and carotid plaque, respectively, through gene-based rare variant set analysis. Both and also had significantly different associations for CAC in T2D cases versus controls. No significant interaction tests were identified through the candidate single-variant analysis.

CONCLUSIONS: These results highlight T2D as an important modifier of rare variant associations in CAD loci with CAC.

}, issn = {2574-8300}, doi = {10.1161/CIRCGEN.123.004176}, author = {Hasbani, Natalie R and Westerman, Kenneth E and Heon Kwak, Soo and Chen, Han and Li, Xihao and DiCorpo, Daniel and Wessel, Jennifer and Bis, Joshua C and Sarnowski, Chloe and Wu, Peitao and Bielak, Lawrence F and Guo, Xiuqing and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Kinney, Gregory and Mahaney, Michael C and Montasser, May E and Palmer, Nicholette D and Raffield, Laura M and Terry, James G and Yanek, Lisa R and Bon, Jessica and Bowden, Donald W and Brody, Jennifer A and Duggirala, Ravindranath and Jacobs, David R and Kalyani, Rita R and Lange, Leslie A and Mitchell, Braxton D and Smith, Jennifer A and Taylor, Kent D and Carson, April and Curran, Joanne E and Fornage, Myriam and Freedman, Barry I and Gabriel, Stacey and Gibbs, Richard A and Gupta, Namrata and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kral, Brian G and Momin, Zeineen and Newman, Anne B and Post, Wendy S and Viaud-Martinez, Karine A and Young, Kendra A and Becker, Lewis C and Bertoni, Alain and Blangero, John and Carr, John J and Pratte, Katherine and Psaty, Bruce M and Rich, Stephen S and Wu, Joseph C and Malhotra, Rajeev and Peyser, Patricia A and Morrison, Alanna C and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Lin, Xihong and Rotter, Jerome I and Meigs, James B and Manning, Alisa K and de Vries, Paul S} } @article {9449, title = {Whole genome analysis of plasma fibrinogen reveals population-differentiated genetic regulators with putative liver roles.}, journal = {medRxiv}, year = {2023}, month = {2023 Jun 12}, abstract = {

UNLABELLED: Genetic studies have identified numerous regions associated with plasma fibrinogen levels in Europeans, yet missing heritability and limited inclusion of non-Europeans necessitates further studies with improved power and sensitivity. Compared with array-based genotyping, whole genome sequencing (WGS) data provides better coverage of the genome and better representation of non-European variants. To better understand the genetic landscape regulating plasma fibrinogen levels, we meta-analyzed WGS data from the NHLBI{\textquoteright}s Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine (TOPMed) program (n=32,572), with array-based genotype data from the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology (CHARGE) Consortium (n=131,340) imputed to the TOPMed or Haplotype Reference Consortium panel. We identified 18 loci that have not been identified in prior genetic studies of fibrinogen. Of these, four are driven by common variants of small effect with reported MAF at least 10\% higher in African populations. Three ( , and signals contain predicted deleterious missense variants. Two loci, and , each harbor two conditionally distinct, non-coding variants. The gene region encoding the protein chain subunits ( ), contains 7 distinct signals, including one novel signal driven by rs28577061, a variant common (MAF=0.180) in African reference panels but extremely rare (MAF=0.008) in Europeans. Through phenome-wide association studies in the VA Million Veteran Program, we found associations between fibrinogen polygenic risk scores and thrombotic and inflammatory disease phenotypes, including an association with gout. Our findings demonstrate the utility of WGS to augment genetic discovery in diverse populations and offer new insights for putative mechanisms of fibrinogen regulation.

KEY POINTS: Largest and most diverse genetic study of plasma fibrinogen identifies 54 regions (18 novel), housing 69 conditionally distinct variants (20 novel).Sufficient power achieved to identify signal driven by African population variant.Links to (1) liver enzyme, blood cell and lipid genetic signals, (2) liver regulatory elements, and (3) thrombotic and inflammatory disease.

}, doi = {10.1101/2023.06.07.23291095}, author = {Huffman, Jennifer E and Nicolas, Jayna and Hahn, Julie and Heath, Adam S and Raffield, Laura M and Yanek, Lisa R and Brody, Jennifer A and Thibord, Florian and Almasy, Laura and Bartz, Traci M and Bielak, Lawrence F and Bowler, Russell P and Carrasquilla, Germ{\'a}n D and Chasman, Daniel I and Chen, Ming-Huei and Emmert, David B and Ghanbari, Mohsen and Haessle, Jeffery and Hottenga, Jouke-Jan and Kleber, Marcus E and Le, Ngoc-Quynh and Lee, Jiwon and Lewis, Joshua P and Li-Gao, Ruifang and Luan, Jian{\textquoteright}an and Malmberg, Anni and Mangino, Massimo and Marioni, Riccardo E and Martinez-Perez, Angel and Pankratz, Nathan and Polasek, Ozren and Richmond, Anne and Rodriguez, Benjamin At and Rotter, Jerome I and Steri, Maristella and Suchon, Pierre and Trompet, Stella and Weiss, Stefan and Zare, Marjan and Auer, Paul and Cho, Michael H and Christofidou, Paraskevi and Davies, Gail and de Geus, Eco and Deleuze, Jean-Francois and Delgado, Graciela E and Ekunwe, Lynette and Faraday, Nauder and G{\"o}gele, Martin and Greinacher, Andreas and He, Gao and Howard, Tom and Joshi, Peter K and Kilpel{\"a}inen, Tuomas O and Lahti, Jari and Linneberg, Allan and Naitza, Silvia and Noordam, Raymond and Pa{\"u}ls-Verg{\'e}s, Ferran and Rich, Stephen S and Rosendaal, Frits R and Rudan, Igor and Ryan, Kathleen A and Souto, Juan Carlos and van Rooij, Frank Ja and Wang, Heming and Zhao, Wei and Becker, Lewis C and Beswick, Andrew and Brown, Michael R and Cade, Brian E and Campbell, Harry and Cho, Kelly and Crapo, James D and Curran, Joanne E and de Maat, Moniek Pm and Doyle, Margaret and Elliott, Paul and Floyd, James S and Fuchsberger, Christian and Grarup, Niels and Guo, Xiuqing and Harris, Sarah E and Hou, Lifang and Kolcic, Ivana and Kooperberg, Charles and Menni, Cristina and Nauck, Matthias and O{\textquoteright}Connell, Jeffrey R and Orr{\`u}, Valeria and Psaty, Bruce M and R{\"a}ikk{\"o}nen, Katri and Smith, Jennifer A and Soria, Jos{\'e} Manuel and Stott, David J and van Hylckama Vlieg, Astrid and Watkins, Hugh and Willemsen, Gonneke and Wilson, Peter and Ben-Shlomo, Yoav and Blangero, John and Boomsma, Dorret and Cox, Simon R and Dehghan, Abbas and Eriksson, Johan G and Fiorillo, Edoardo and Fornage, Myriam and Hansen, Torben and Hayward, Caroline and Ikram, M Arfan and Jukema, J Wouter and Kardia, Sharon Lr and Lange, Leslie A and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and Mathias, Rasika A and Mitchell, Braxton D and Mook-Kanamori, Dennis O and Morange, Pierre-Emmanuel and Pedersen, Oluf and Pramstaller, Peter P and Redline, Susan and Reiner, Alexander and Ridker, Paul M and Silverman, Edwin K and Spector, Tim D and V{\"o}lker, Uwe and Wareham, Nick and Wilson, James F and Yao, Jie and Tr{\'e}gou{\"e}t, David-Alexandre and Johnson, Andrew D and Wolberg, Alisa S and de Vries, Paul S and Sabater-Lleal, Maria and Morrison, Alanna C and Smith, Nicholas L} } @article {9707, title = {Whole-genome sequencing uncovers two loci for coronary artery calcification and identifies ARSE as a regulator of vascular calcification.}, journal = {Nat Cardiovasc Res}, volume = {2}, year = {2023}, month = {2023 Dec}, pages = {1159-1172}, abstract = {

Coronary artery calcification (CAC) is a measure of atherosclerosis and a well-established predictor of coronary artery disease (CAD) events. Here we describe a genome-wide association study (GWAS) of CAC in 22,400 participants from multiple ancestral groups. We confirmed associations with four known loci and identified two additional loci associated with CAC ( and ), with evidence of significant associations in replication analyses for both novel loci. Functional assays of and in human vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) demonstrate that is a promoter of VSMC calcification and VSMC phenotype switching from a contractile to a calcifying or osteogenic phenotype. Furthermore, we show that the association of variants near with reduced CAC is likely explained by reduced expression with the G allele of enhancer variant rs5982944. Our study highlights ARSE as an important contributor to atherosclerotic vascular calcification, and a potential drug target for vascular calcific disease.

}, issn = {2731-0590}, doi = {10.1038/s44161-023-00375-y}, author = {de Vries, Paul S and Conomos, Matthew P and Singh, Kuldeep and Nicholson, Christopher J and Jain, Deepti and Hasbani, Natalie R and Jiang, Wanlin and Lee, Sujin and Lino Cardenas, Christian L and Lutz, Sharon M and Wong, Doris and Guo, Xiuqing and Yao, Jie and Young, Erica P and Tcheandjieu, Catherine and Hilliard, Austin T and Bis, Joshua C and Bielak, Lawrence F and Brown, Michael R and Musharoff, Shaila and Clarke, Shoa L and Terry, James G and Palmer, Nicholette D and Yanek, Lisa R and Xu, Huichun and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Wessel, Jennifer and Selvaraj, Margaret Sunitha and Li, Rebecca H and Sun, Xiao and Turner, Adam W and Stilp, Adrienne M and Khan, Alyna and Newman, Anne B and Rasheed, Asif and Freedman, Barry I and Kral, Brian G and McHugh, Caitlin P and Hodonsky, Chani and Saleheen, Danish and Herrington, David M and Jacobs, David R and Nickerson, Deborah A and Boerwinkle, Eric and Wang, Fei Fei and Heiss, Gerardo and Jun, Goo and Kinney, Greg L and Sigurslid, Haakon H and Doddapaneni, Harshavardhan and Hall, Ira M and Bensenor, Isabela M and Broome, Jai and Crapo, James D and Wilson, James G and Smith, Jennifer A and Blangero, John and Vargas, Jose D and Mosquera, Jose Verdezoto and Smith, Joshua D and Viaud-Martinez, Karine A and Ryan, Kathleen A and Young, Kendra A and Taylor, Kent D and Lange, Leslie A and Emery, Leslie S and Bittencourt, Marcio S and Budoff, Matthew J and Montasser, May E and Yu, Miao and Mahaney, Michael C and Mahamdeh, Mohammed S and Fornage, Myriam and Franceschini, Nora and Lotufo, Paulo A and Natarajan, Pradeep and Wong, Quenna and Mathias, Rasika A and Gibbs, Richard A and Do, Ron and Mehran, Roxana and Tracy, Russell P and Kim, Ryan W and Nelson, Sarah C and Damrauer, Scott M and Kardia, Sharon L R and Rich, Stephen S and Fuster, Valentin and Napolioni, Valerio and Zhao, Wei and Tian, Wenjie and Yin, Xianyong and Min, Yuan-I and Manning, Alisa K and Peloso, Gina and Kelly, Tanika N and O{\textquoteright}Donnell, Christopher J and Morrison, Alanna C and Curran, Joanne E and Zapol, Warren M and Bowden, Donald W and Becker, Lewis C and Correa, Adolfo and Mitchell, Braxton D and Psaty, Bruce M and Carr, John Jeffrey and Pereira, Alexandre C and Assimes, Themistocles L and Stitziel, Nathan O and Hokanson, John E and Laurie, Cecelia A and Rotter, Jerome I and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Post, Wendy S and Peyser, Patricia A and Miller, Clint L and Malhotra, Rajeev} } @article {9787, title = {Rare variant contribution to the heritability of coronary artery disease.}, journal = {Nat Commun}, volume = {15}, year = {2024}, month = {2024 Oct 09}, pages = {8741}, abstract = {

Whole genome sequences (WGS) enable discovery of rare variants which may contribute to missing heritability of coronary artery disease (CAD). To measure their contribution, we apply the GREML-LDMS-I approach to WGS of 4949 cases and 17,494 controls of European ancestry from the NHLBI TOPMed program. We estimate CAD heritability at 34.3\% assuming a prevalence of 8.2\%. Ultra-rare (minor allele frequency <= 0.1\%) variants with low linkage disequilibrium (LD) score contribute ~50\% of the heritability. We also investigate CAD heritability enrichment using a diverse set of functional annotations: i) constraint; ii) predicted protein-altering impact; iii) cis-regulatory elements from a cell-specific chromatin atlas of the human coronary; and iv) annotation principal components representing a wide range of functional processes. We observe marked enrichment of CAD heritability for most functional annotations. These results reveal the predominant role of ultra-rare variants in low LD on the heritability of CAD. Moreover, they highlight several functional processes including cell type-specific regulatory mechanisms as key drivers of CAD genetic risk.

}, keywords = {Case-Control Studies, Coronary Artery Disease, Female, Gene Frequency, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genetic Variation, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Linkage Disequilibrium, Male, Middle Aged, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, White People, Whole Genome Sequencing}, issn = {2041-1723}, doi = {10.1038/s41467-024-52939-6}, author = {Rocheleau, Ghislain and Clarke, Shoa L and Auguste, Ga{\"e}lle and Hasbani, Natalie R and Morrison, Alanna C and Heath, Adam S and Bielak, Lawrence F and Iyer, Kruthika R and Young, Erica P and Stitziel, Nathan O and Jun, Goo and Laurie, Cecelia and Broome, Jai G and Khan, Alyna T and Arnett, Donna K and Becker, Lewis C and Bis, Joshua C and Boerwinkle, Eric and Bowden, Donald W and Carson, April P and Ellinor, Patrick T and Fornage, Myriam and Franceschini, Nora and Freedman, Barry I and Heard-Costa, Nancy L and Hou, Lifang and Chen, Yii-Der Ida and Kenny, Eimear E and Kooperberg, Charles and Kral, Brian G and Loos, Ruth J F and Lutz, Sharon M and Manson, JoAnn E and Martin, Lisa W and Mitchell, Braxton D and Nassir, Rami and Palmer, Nicholette D and Post, Wendy S and Preuss, Michael H and Psaty, Bruce M and Raffield, Laura M and Regan, Elizabeth A and Rich, Stephen S and Smith, Jennifer A and Taylor, Kent D and Yanek, Lisa R and Young, Kendra A and Hilliard, Austin T and Tcheandjieu, Catherine and Peyser, Patricia A and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Rotter, Jerome I and Miller, Clint L and Assimes, Themistocles L and de Vries, Paul S and Do, Ron} } @article {9866, title = {Genomic and phenotypic correlates of mosaic loss of chromosome Y in blood.}, journal = {Am J Hum Genet}, volume = {112}, year = {2025}, month = {2025 Feb 06}, pages = {276-290}, abstract = {

Mosaic loss of Y (mLOY) is the most common somatic chromosomal alteration detected in human blood. The presence of mLOY is associated with altered blood cell counts and increased risk of Alzheimer disease, solid tumors, and other age-related diseases. We sought to gain a better understanding of genetic drivers and associated phenotypes of mLOY through analyses of whole-genome sequencing (WGS) of a large set of genetically diverse males from the Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine (TOPMed) program. We show that haplotype-based calling methods can be used with WGS data to successfully identify mLOY events. This approach enabled us to identify differences in mLOY frequencies across populations defined by genetic similarity, revealing a higher frequency of mLOY in the European (EUR) ancestry group compared to other ancestries. We identify multiple loci associated with mLOY susceptibility and show that subsets of human hematopoietic stem cells are enriched for the activity of mLOY susceptibility variants. Finally, we found that certain alleles on chromosome Y are more likely to be lost than others in detectable mLOY clones.

}, keywords = {Alleles, Chromosome Deletion, Chromosomes, Human, Y, Genomics, Haplotypes, Humans, Male, Mosaicism, Phenotype, Whole Genome Sequencing}, issn = {1537-6605}, doi = {10.1016/j.ajhg.2024.12.014}, author = {Jakubek, Yasminka A and Ma, Xiaolong and Stilp, Adrienne M and Yu, Fulong and Bacon, Jason and Wong, Justin W and Aguet, Francois and Ardlie, Kristin and Arnett, Donna K and Barnes, Kathleen and Bis, Joshua C and Blackwell, Tom and Becker, Lewis C and Boerwinkle, Eric and Bowler, Russell P and Budoff, Matthew J and Carson, April P and Chen, Jiawen and Cho, Michael H and Coresh, Josef and Cox, Nancy J and de Vries, Paul S and DeMeo, Dawn L and Fardo, David W and Fornage, Myriam and Guo, Xiuqing and Hall, Michael E and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Hidalgo, Bertha and Irvin, Marguerite Ryan and Johnson, Andrew D and Jorgenson, Eric and Kenny, Eimear E and Kessler, Michael D and Levy, Daniel and Li, Yun and Lima, Jo{\~a}o A C and Liu, Yongmei and Locke, Adam E and Loos, Ruth J F and Machiela, Mitchell J and Mathias, Rasika A and Mitchell, Braxton D and Murabito, Joanne M and Mychaleckyj, Josyf C and North, Kari E and Orchard, Peter and Parker, Stephen C J and Pershad, Yash and Peyser, Patricia A and Pratte, Katherine A and Psaty, Bruce M and Raffield, Laura M and Redline, Susan and Rich, Stephen S and Rotter, Jerome I and Shah, Sanjiv J and Smith, Jennifer A and Smith, Aaron P and Smith, Albert and Taub, Margaret A and Tiwari, Hemant K and Tracy, Russell and Tuftin, Bjoernar and Bick, Alexander G and Sankaran, Vijay G and Reiner, Alexander P and Scheet, Paul and Auer, Paul L} } @article {9898, title = {Rare damaging CCR2 variants are associated with lower lifetime cardiovascular risk.}, journal = {Genome Med}, volume = {17}, year = {2025}, month = {2025 Mar 21}, pages = {27}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Previous work has shown a role of CCL2, a key chemokine governing monocyte trafficking, in atherosclerosis. However, it remains unknown whether targeting CCR2, the cognate receptor of CCL2, provides protection against human atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease.

METHODS: Computationally predicted damaging or loss-of-function (REVEL > 0.5) variants within CCR2 were detected in whole-exome-sequencing data from 454,775 UK Biobank participants and tested for association with cardiovascular endpoints in gene-burden tests. Given the key role of CCR2 in monocyte mobilization, variants associated with lower monocyte count were prioritized for experimental validation. The response to CCL2 of human cells transfected with these variants was tested in migration and cAMP assays. Validated damaging variants were tested for association with cardiovascular endpoints, atherosclerosis burden, and vascular risk factors. Significant associations were replicated in six independent datasets (n = 1,062,595).

RESULTS: Carriers of 45 predicted damaging or loss-of-function CCR2 variants (n = 787 individuals) were at lower risk of myocardial infarction and coronary artery disease. One of these variants (M249K, n = 585, 0.15\% of European ancestry individuals) was associated with lower monocyte count and with both decreased downstream signaling and chemoattraction in response to CCL2. While M249K showed no association with conventional vascular risk factors, it was consistently associated with a lower risk of myocardial infarction (odds ratio [OR]: 0.66, 95\% confidence interval [CI]: 0.54-0.81, p = 6.1 {\texttimes} 10) and coronary artery disease (OR: 0.74, 95\%CI: 0.63-0.87, p = 2.9 {\texttimes} 10) in the UK Biobank and in six replication cohorts. In a phenome-wide association study, there was no evidence of a higher risk of infections among M249K carriers.

CONCLUSIONS: Carriers of an experimentally confirmed damaging CCR2 variant are at a lower lifetime risk of myocardial infarction and coronary artery disease without carrying a higher risk of infections. Our findings provide genetic support for the translational potential of CCR2-targeting as an atheroprotective approach.

}, keywords = {Aged, Cardiovascular Diseases, Chemokine CCL2, Female, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Monocytes, Receptors, CCR2}, issn = {1756-994X}, doi = {10.1186/s13073-025-01456-2}, author = {Georgakis, Marios K and Malik, Rainer and Bounkari, Omar El and Hasbani, Natalie R and Li, Jiang and Huffman, Jennifer E and Shakt, Gabrielle and Tack, Reinier W P and Kimball, Tamara N and Asare, Yaw and Morrison, Alanna C and Tsao, Noah L and Judy, Renae and Mitchell, Braxton D and Xu, Huichun and Montasser, May E and Do, Ron and Kenny, Eimear E and Loos, Ruth J F and Terry, James G and Carr, John Jeffrey and Bis, Joshua C and Psaty, Bruce M and Longstreth, W T and Young, Kendra A and Lutz, Sharon M and Cho, Michael H and Broome, Jai and Khan, Alyna T and Wang, Fei Fei and Heard-Costa, Nancy and Seshadri, Sudha and Vasan, Ramachandran S and Palmer, Nicholette D and Freedman, Barry I and Bowden, Donald W and Yanek, Lisa R and Kral, Brian G and Becker, Lewis C and Peyser, Patricia A and Bielak, Lawrence F and Ammous, Farah and Carson, April P and Hall, Michael E and Raffield, Laura M and Rich, Stephen S and Post, Wendy S and Tracy, Russel P and Taylor, Kent D and Guo, Xiuqing and Mahaney, Michael C and Curran, Joanne E and Blangero, John and Clarke, Shoa L and Haessler, Jeffrey W and Hu, Yao and Assimes, Themistocles L and Kooperberg, Charles and Bernhagen, J{\"u}rgen and Anderson, Christopher D and Damrauer, Scott M and Zand, Ramin and Rotter, Jerome I and de Vries, Paul S and Dichgans, Martin} }