@article {1383, title = {Meta-analysis identifies six new susceptibility loci for atrial fibrillation.}, journal = {Nat Genet}, volume = {44}, year = {2012}, month = {2012 Apr 29}, pages = {670-5}, abstract = {

Atrial fibrillation is a highly prevalent arrhythmia and a major risk factor for stroke, heart failure and death. We conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) in individuals of European ancestry, including 6,707 with and 52,426 without atrial fibrillation. Six new atrial fibrillation susceptibility loci were identified and replicated in an additional sample of individuals of European ancestry, including 5,381 subjects with and 10,030 subjects without atrial fibrillation (P < 5 {\texttimes} 10(-8)). Four of the loci identified in Europeans were further replicated in silico in a GWAS of Japanese individuals, including 843 individuals with and 3,350 individuals without atrial fibrillation. The identified loci implicate candidate genes that encode transcription factors related to cardiopulmonary development, cardiac-expressed ion channels and cell signaling molecules.

}, keywords = {Adolescent, Adult, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Asian Continental Ancestry Group, Atrial Fibrillation, Child, Child, Preschool, European Continental Ancestry Group, Female, Genetic Loci, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Infant, Infant, Newborn, Male, Middle Aged, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Risk Factors, Young Adult}, issn = {1546-1718}, doi = {10.1038/ng.2261}, author = {Ellinor, Patrick T and Lunetta, Kathryn L and Albert, Christine M and Glazer, Nicole L and Ritchie, Marylyn D and Smith, Albert V and Arking, Dan E and M{\"u}ller-Nurasyid, Martina and Krijthe, Bouwe P and Lubitz, Steven A and Bis, Joshua C and Chung, Mina K and D{\"o}rr, Marcus and Ozaki, Kouichi and Roberts, Jason D and Smith, J Gustav and Pfeufer, Arne and Sinner, Moritz F and Lohman, Kurt and Ding, Jingzhong and Smith, Nicholas L and Smith, Jonathan D and Rienstra, Michiel and Rice, Kenneth M and Van Wagoner, David R and Magnani, Jared W and Wakili, Reza and Clauss, Sebastian and Rotter, Jerome I and Steinbeck, Gerhard and Launer, Lenore J and Davies, Robert W and Borkovich, Matthew and Harris, Tamara B and Lin, Honghuang and V{\"o}lker, Uwe and V{\"o}lzke, Henry and Milan, David J and Hofman, Albert and Boerwinkle, Eric and Chen, Lin Y and Soliman, Elsayed Z and Voight, Benjamin F and Li, Guo and Chakravarti, Aravinda and Kubo, Michiaki and Tedrow, Usha B and Rose, Lynda M and Ridker, Paul M and Conen, David and Tsunoda, Tatsuhiko and Furukawa, Tetsushi and Sotoodehnia, Nona and Xu, Siyan and Kamatani, Naoyuki and Levy, Daniel and Nakamura, Yusuke and Parvez, Babar and Mahida, Saagar and Furie, Karen L and Rosand, Jonathan and Muhammad, Raafia and Psaty, Bruce M and Meitinger, Thomas and Perz, Siegfried and Wichmann, H-Erich and Witteman, Jacqueline C M and Kao, W H Linda and Kathiresan, Sekar and Roden, Dan M and Uitterlinden, Andr{\'e} G and Rivadeneira, Fernando and McKnight, Barbara and Sj{\"o}gren, Marketa and Newman, Anne B and Liu, Yongmei and Gollob, Michael H and Melander, Olle and Tanaka, Toshihiro and Stricker, Bruno H Ch and Felix, Stephan B and Alonso, Alvaro and Darbar, Dawood and Barnard, John and Chasman, Daniel I and Heckbert, Susan R and Benjamin, Emelia J and Gudnason, Vilmundur and K{\"a}{\"a}b, Stefan} } @article {6149, title = {Targeted sequencing in candidate genes for atrial fibrillation: the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology (CHARGE) Targeted Sequencing Study.}, journal = {Heart Rhythm}, volume = {11}, year = {2014}, month = {2014 Mar}, pages = {452-7}, abstract = {

BACKGROUND: Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified common genetic variants that predispose to atrial fibrillation (AF). It is unclear whether rare and low-frequency variants in genes implicated by such GWAS confer additional risk of AF.

OBJECTIVE: To study the association of genetic variants with AF at GWAS top loci.

METHODS: In the Cohorts for Heart and Aging Research in Genomic Epidemiology (CHARGE) Targeted Sequencing Study, we selected and sequenced 77 target gene regions from GWAS loci of complex diseases or traits, including 4 genes hypothesized to be related to AF (PRRX1, CAV1, CAV2, and ZFHX3). Sequencing was performed in participants with (n = 948) and without (n = 3330) AF from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study, the Cardiovascular Health Study, the Framingham Heart Study, and the Massachusetts General Hospital.

RESULTS: One common variant (rs11265611; P = 1.70 {\texttimes} 10(-6)) intronic to IL6R (interleukin-6 receptor gene) was significantly associated with AF after Bonferroni correction (odds ratio 0.70; 95\% confidence interval 0.58-0.85). The variant was not genotyped or imputed by prior GWAS, but it is in linkage disequilibrium (r(2) = .69) with the single-nucleotide polymorphism, with the strongest association with AF so far at this locus (rs4845625). In the rare variant joint analysis, damaging variants within the PRRX1 region showed significant association with AF after Bonferroni correction (P = .01).

CONCLUSIONS: We identified 1 common single-nucleotide polymorphism and 1 gene region that were significantly associated with AF. Future sequencing efforts with larger sample sizes and more comprehensive genome coverage are anticipated to identify additional AF-related variants.

}, keywords = {Aged, Atrial Fibrillation, Female, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genetic Variation, Genome-Wide Association Study, Homeodomain Proteins, Humans, Linkage Disequilibrium, Male, Middle Aged, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Receptors, Interleukin-6}, issn = {1556-3871}, doi = {10.1016/j.hrthm.2013.11.012}, author = {Lin, Honghuang and Sinner, Moritz F and Brody, Jennifer A and Arking, Dan E and Lunetta, Kathryn L and Rienstra, Michiel and Lubitz, Steven A and Magnani, Jared W and Sotoodehnia, Nona and McKnight, Barbara and McManus, David D and Boerwinkle, Eric and Psaty, Bruce M and Rotter, Jerome I and Bis, Joshua C and Gibbs, Richard A and Muzny, Donna and Kovar, Christie L and Morrison, Alanna C and Gupta, Mayetri and Folsom, Aaron R and K{\"a}{\"a}b, Stefan and Heckbert, Susan R and Alonso, Alvaro and Ellinor, Patrick T and Benjamin, Emelia J} } @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 {9914, title = {Meta-analysis of genome-wide associations and polygenic risk prediction for atrial fibrillation in more than 180,000 cases.}, journal = {Nat Genet}, volume = {57}, year = {2025}, month = {2025 Mar}, pages = {539-547}, abstract = {

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common heart rhythm abnormality and is a leading cause of heart failure and stroke. This large-scale meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies increased the power to detect single-nucleotide variant associations and found more than 350 AF-associated genetic loci. We identified candidate genes related to muscle contractility, cardiac muscle development and cell-cell communication at 139 loci. Furthermore, we assayed chromatin accessibility using assay for transposase-accessible chromatin with sequencing and histone H3 lysine 4 trimethylation in stem cell-derived atrial cardiomyocytes. We observed a marked increase in chromatin accessibility for our sentinel variants and prioritized genes in atrial cardiomyocytes. Finally, a polygenic risk score (PRS) based on our updated effect estimates improved AF risk prediction compared to the CHARGE-AF clinical risk score and a previously reported PRS for AF. The doubling of known risk loci will facilitate a greater understanding of the pathways underlying AF.

}, keywords = {Atrial Fibrillation, Chromatin, Female, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Male, Multifactorial Inheritance, Myocytes, Cardiac, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Risk Factors}, issn = {1546-1718}, doi = {10.1038/s41588-024-02072-3}, author = {Roselli, Carolina and Surakka, Ida and Olesen, Morten S and Sveinbjornsson, Gardar and Marston, Nicholas A and Choi, Seung Hoan and Holm, Hilma and Chaffin, Mark and Gudbjartsson, Daniel and Hill, Matthew C and Aegisdottir, Hildur and Albert, Christine M and Alonso, Alvaro and Anderson, Christopher D and Arking, Dan E and Arnar, David O and Barnard, John and Benjamin, Emelia J and Braunwald, Eugene and Brumpton, Ben and Campbell, Archie and Chami, Nathalie and Chasman, Daniel I and Cho, Kelly and Choi, Eue-Keun and Christophersen, Ingrid E and Chung, Mina K and Conen, David and Crijns, Harry J and Cutler, Michael J and Czuba, Tomasz and Damrauer, Scott M and Dichgans, Martin and D{\"o}rr, Marcus and Dudink, Elton and Duong, ThuyVy and Erikstrup, Christian and Esko, T{\~o}nu and Fatkin, Diane and Faul, Jessica D and Ferreira, Manuel and Freitag, Daniel F and Ganesh, Santhi K and Gaziano, J Michael and Geelhoed, Bastiaan and Ghouse, Jonas and Gieger, Christian and Giulianini, Franco and Graham, Sarah E and Gudnason, Vilmundur and Guo, Xiuqing and Haggerty, Christopher and Hayward, Caroline and Heckbert, Susan R and Hveem, Kristian and Ito, Kaoru and Johnson, Renee and Jukema, J Wouter and Jurgens, Sean J and K{\"a}{\"a}b, Stefan and Kane, John P and Kany, Shinwan and Kardia, Sharon L R and Kavousi, Maryam and Khurshid, Shaan and Kamanu, Frederick K and Kirchhof, Paulus and Kleber, Marcus E and Knight, Stacey and Komuro, Issei and Krieger, Jose E and Launer, Lenore J and Li, Dadong and Lin, Honghuang and Lin, Henry J and Loos, Ruth J F and Lotta, Luca and Lubitz, Steven A and Lunetta, Kathryn L and Macfarlane, Peter W and Magnusson, Patrik K E and Malik, Rainer and Mantineo, Helene and Marcus, Gregory M and M{\"a}rz, Winfried and McManus, David D and Melander, Olle and Melloni, Giorgio E M and Meyre, Pascal B and Miyazawa, Kazuo and Mohanty, Sanghamitra and Monfort, Laia M and M{\"u}ller-Nurasyid, Martina and Nafissi, Navid A and Natale, Andrea and Nazarian, Saman and Ostrowski, Sisse R and Pak, Hui-Nam and Pang, Shichao and Pedersen, Ole B and Pedersen, Nancy L and Pereira, Alexandre C and Pirruccello, James P and Preuss, Michael and Psaty, Bruce M and Pullinger, Clive R and Rader, Daniel J and R{\"a}m{\"o}, Joel T and Ridker, Paul M and Rienstra, Michiel and Risch, Lorenz and Roden, Dan M and Rotter, Jerome I and Sabatine, Marc S and Schunkert, Heribert and Shah, Svati H and Shim, Jaemin and Shoemaker, M Benjamin and Simonson, Bridget and Sinner, Moritz F and Smit, Roelof A J and Smith, Jennifer A and Smith, Nicholas L and Smith, J Gustav and Soliman, Elsayed Z and S{\o}rensen, Erik and Sotoodehnia, Nona and Strbian, Daniel and Stricker, Bruno H and Teder-Laving, Maris and Sun, Yan V and Th{\'e}riault, S{\'e}bastien and Thorolfsdottir, Rosa B and Thorsteinsdottir, Unnur and Tveit, Arnljot and van der Harst, Pim and van Meurs, Joyce and Wang, Biqi and Weiss, Stefan and Wells, Quinn S and Weng, Lu-Chen and Wilson, Peter W and Xiao, Ling and Yang, Pil-Sung and Yao, Jie and Yoneda, Zachary T and Zeller, Tanja and Zeng, Lingyao and Zhao, Wei and Zhou, Xiang and Z{\"o}llner, Sebastian and Ruff, Christian T and Bundgaard, Henning and Willer, Cristen and Stefansson, Kari and Ellinor, Patrick T} } @article {9907, title = {Sequencing in over 50,000 cases identifies coding and structural variation underlying atrial fibrillation risk.}, journal = {Nat Genet}, volume = {57}, year = {2025}, month = {2025 Mar}, pages = {548-562}, abstract = {

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a prevalent and morbid abnormality of the heart rhythm with a strong genetic component. Here, we meta-analyzed genome and exome sequencing data from 36 studies that included 52,416 AF cases and 277,762 controls. In burden tests of rare coding variation, we identified novel associations between AF and the genes MYBPC3, LMNA, PKP2, FAM189A2 and KDM5B. We further identified associations between AF and rare structural variants owing to deletions in CTNNA3 and duplications of GATA4. We broadly replicated our findings in independent samples from MyCode, deCODE and UK Biobank. Finally, we found that CRISPR knockout of KDM5B in stem-cell-derived atrial cardiomyocytes led to a shortening of the action potential duration and widespread transcriptomic dysregulation of genes relevant to atrial homeostasis and conduction. Our results highlight the contribution of rare coding and structural variants to AF, including genetic links between AF and cardiomyopathies, and expand our understanding of the rare variant architecture for this common arrhythmia.

}, keywords = {Atrial Fibrillation, Case-Control Studies, Exome Sequencing, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Genetic Variation, Genome-Wide Association Study, Humans, Myocytes, Cardiac, Risk Factors}, issn = {1546-1718}, doi = {10.1038/s41588-025-02074-9}, author = {Choi, Seung Hoan and Jurgens, Sean J and Xiao, Ling and Hill, Matthew C and Haggerty, Christopher M and Sveinbj{\"o}rnsson, Gar{\dh}ar and Morrill, Valerie N and Marston, Nicholas A and Weng, Lu-Chen and Pirruccello, James P and Arnar, David O and Gudbjartsson, Daniel Fannar and Mantineo, Helene and von Falkenhausen, Aenne S and Natale, Andrea and Tveit, Arnljot and Geelhoed, Bastiaan and Roselli, Carolina and Van Wagoner, David R and Darbar, Dawood and Haase, Doreen and Soliman, Elsayed Z and Davogustto, Giovanni E and Jun, Goo and Calkins, Hugh and Anderson, Jeffrey L and Brody, Jennifer A and Halford, Jennifer L and Barnard, John and Hokanson, John E and Smith, Jonathan D and Bis, Joshua C and Young, Kendra and Johnson, Linda S B and Risch, Lorenz and Gula, Lorne J and Kwee, Lydia Coulter and Chaffin, Mark D and K{\"u}hne, Michael and Preuss, Michael and Gupta, Namrata and Nafissi, Navid A and Smith, Nicholas L and Nilsson, Peter M and van der Harst, Pim and Wells, Quinn S and Judy, Renae L and Schnabel, Renate B and Johnson, Renee and Smit, Roelof A J and Gabriel, Stacey and Knight, Stacey and Furukawa, Tetsushi and Blackwell, Thomas W and Nauffal, Victor and Wang, Xin and Min, Yuan-I and Yoneda, Zachary T and Laksman, Zachary W M and Bezzina, Connie R and Alonso, Alvaro and Psaty, Bruce M and Albert, Christine M and Arking, Dan E and Roden, Dan M and Chasman, Daniel I and Rader, Daniel J and Conen, David and McManus, David D and Fatkin, Diane and Benjamin, Emelia J and Boerwinkle, Eric and Marcus, Gregory M and Christophersen, Ingrid E and Smith, J Gustav and Roberts, Jason D and Raffield, Laura M and Shoemaker, M Benjamin and Cho, Michael H and Cutler, Michael J and Rienstra, Michiel and Chung, Mina K and S Olesen, Morten and Sinner, Moritz F and Sotoodehnia, Nona and Kirchhof, Paulus and Loos, Ruth J F and Nazarian, Saman and Mohanty, Sanghamitra and Damrauer, Scott M and K{\"a}{\"a}b, Stefan and Heckbert, Susan R and Redline, Susan and Shah, Svati H and Tanaka, Toshihiro and Ebana, Yusuke and Holm, Hilma and Stefansson, Kari and Ruff, Christian T and Sabatine, Marc S and Lunetta, Kathryn L and Lubitz, Steven A and Ellinor, Patrick T} }