Epistatic interactions of genetic loci associated with age-related macular degeneration.
Sci Rep
; 11(1): 13114, 2021 06 23.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-34162900
ABSTRACT
The currently largest genome-wide association study (GWAS) for age-related macular degeneration (AMD) defines disease association with genome-wide significance for 52 independent common and rare genetic variants across 34 chromosomal loci. Overall, these loci contain over 7200 variants and are enriched for genes with functions indicating several shared cellular processes. Still, the precise mechanisms leading to AMD pathology are largely unknown. Here, we exploit the phenomenon of epistatic interaction to identify seemingly independent AMD-associated variants that reveal joint effects on gene expression. We focus on genetic variants associated with lipid metabolism, organization of extracellular structures, and innate immunity, specifically the complement cascade. Multiple combinations of independent variants were used to generate genetic risk scores allowing gene expression in liver to be compared between low and high-risk AMD. We identified genetic variant combinations correlating significantly with expression of 26 genes, of which 19 have not been associated with AMD before. This study defines novel targets and allows prioritizing further functional work into AMD pathobiology.
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Epistasis, Genetic
/
Genetic Loci
/
Macular Degeneration
Type of study:
Prognostic_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Limits:
Humans
Language:
En
Journal:
Sci Rep
Year:
2021
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Germany