scholarly journals Inference of causal relationships between sleep-related traits and 1,527 phenotypes using genetic data

SLEEP ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis M García-Marín ◽  
Adrián I Campos ◽  
Nicholas G Martin ◽  
Gabriel Cuéllar-Partida ◽  
Miguel E Rentería

Abstract Study Objective Sleep is essential for both physical and mental health, and there is a growing interest in understanding how different factors shape individual variation in sleep duration, quality and patterns, or confer risk for sleep disorders. The present study aimed to identify novel inferred causal relationships between sleep-related traits and other phenotypes, using a genetics-driven hypothesis-free approach not requiring longitudinal data. Methods We used summary-level statistics from genome-wide association studies and the latent causal variable (LCV) method to screen the phenome and infer causal relationships between seven sleep-related traits (insomnia, daytime dozing, easiness of getting up in the morning, snoring, sleep duration, napping, and morningness) and 1,527 other phenotypes. Results We identify 84 inferred causal relationships. Among other findings, connective tissue disorders increase insomnia risk and reduce sleep duration; depression-related traits increase insomnia and daytime dozing; insomnia, napping and snoring are affected by obesity and cardiometabolic traits and diseases; and working with asbestos, thinner, or glues may increase insomnia risk, possibly through an increased risk of respiratory disease or socio-economic related factors. Conclusion Overall, our results indicate that changes in sleep variables are predominantly the consequence, rather than the cause, of other underlying phenotypes and diseases. These insights could inform the design of future epidemiological and interventional studies in sleep medicine and research.

Author(s):  
Luis M. García-Marín ◽  
Adrián I. Campos ◽  
Nicholas G. Martin ◽  
Gabriel Cuéllar-Partida ◽  
Miguel E. Rentería

AbstractStudy ObjectiveSleep is essential for both physical and mental health. There is an increasing interest in understanding how different factors shape individual variation in sleep duration, quality and patterns, or confer risk for sleep disorders. The present study aimed to identify novel causal relationships between sleep-related traits and other phenotypes, using a genetics-driven hypothesis-free approach not requiring longitudinal data.MethodsWe used genetic data and the latent causal variable (LCV) method to screen the phenome and infer causal relationships between seven sleep-related traits (insomnia, daytime dozing, easiness of getting up in the morning, snoring, sleep duration, napping, and morningness) and 1,527 different phenotypes.ResultsWe identify 84 significant causal relationships. Among other findings, poor health of musculoskeletal and connective tissue disorders increase insomnia risk and reduce sleep duration; depression-related traits increase insomnia and daytime dozing; insomnia, napping and snoring are affected by obesity and cardiometabolic traits and diseases; and working with asbestos, thinner, or glues increases insomnia, potentially through an increased risk of respiratory disease.ConclusionOverall, our results indicate that changes in sleep variables are predominantly the consequence, rather than the cause, of other underlying phenotypes and diseases. These insights could inform the design of future epidemiological and interventional studies in sleep medicine and research.


SLEEP ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 43 (7) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiao Wang ◽  
Man Ki Kwok ◽  
Shiu Lun Au Yeung ◽  
Albert Martin Li ◽  
Simon Lam ◽  
...  

Abstract Study Objective Observationally sleep duration is positively associated with hemoglobin (Hgb), whether this association is causal and consistent by sex remains unclear. Here, we assessed the association of sleep duration with Hgb and hematocrit (Hct) observationally in late adolescence in a population-representative Chinese birth cohort “Children of 1997” with validation using Mendelian randomization (MR) in adults. Methods In the “Children of 1997” birth cohort (recruited = 8327, included = 3144), we used multivariable linear regression to assess the adjusted associations of sleep duration (measured as time in bed) with Hgb and Hct at 17.5 years and any sex differences. Using two-sample MR, we assessed the effect of sleep duration on Hgb and Hct, based on 61 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) applied to genome-wide association studies of Hgb and Hct in adults (n = 361 194). Results Observationally, self-reported sleep duration was positively associated with Hct (0.034 standard deviations [SDs] per hour, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.019 to 0.049), but not with Hgb. Using MR longer sleep increased Hct (0.077 SD per hour, 95% CI 0.035 to 0.119) and Hgb (0.065 SD per hour, 95% CI 0.020 to 0.109) using Mendelian randomization pleiotropy residual sum and outlier (MR PRESSO), with more pronounced associations in men. Conclusions Our novel findings indicate sleep increases both Hgb and Hct, particularly in men, perhaps contributing to its restorative qualities. Potential difference by sex and the implications of these findings warrant investigation.


2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (8) ◽  
Author(s):  
Germán D. Carrasquilla ◽  
Malene Revsbech Christiansen ◽  
Tuomas O. Kilpeläinen

Abstract Purpose of Review Hypertriglyceridemia is a common dyslipidemia associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and pancreatitis. Severe hypertriglyceridemia may sometimes be a monogenic condition. However, in the vast majority of patients, hypertriglyceridemia is due to the cumulative effect of multiple genetic risk variants along with lifestyle factors, medications, and disease conditions that elevate triglyceride levels. In this review, we will summarize recent progress in the understanding of the genetic basis of hypertriglyceridemia. Recent Findings More than 300 genetic loci have been identified for association with triglyceride levels in large genome-wide association studies. Studies combining the loci into polygenic scores have demonstrated that some hypertriglyceridemia phenotypes previously attributed to monogenic inheritance have a polygenic basis. The new genetic discoveries have opened avenues for the development of more effective triglyceride-lowering treatments and raised interest towards genetic screening and tailored treatments against hypertriglyceridemia. Summary The discovery of multiple genetic loci associated with elevated triglyceride levels has led to improved understanding of the genetic basis of hypertriglyceridemia and opened new translational opportunities.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gan Zhang ◽  
Linjing Zhang ◽  
Tao Huang ◽  
Dongsheng Fan

Abstract Background Observational studies have indicated that there is a high prevalence of daytime sleepiness and night sleep changes in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). However, the actual relation between these symptoms and ALS remains unclear. We aimed to determine whether daytime sleepiness and night sleep changes have an effect on ALS. Methods We used 2-sample mendelian randomization to estimate the effects of daytime sleepiness, sleep efficiency, number of sleep episodes and sleep duration on ALS. Summary statistics we used was from resent and large genome-wide association studies on the traits we chosen (n = 85,670–452,071) and ALS (cases n = 20,806, controls n = 59,804). Inverse variance weighted method was used as the main method for assessing causality. Results A genetically predicted 1-point increase in the assessment of daytime sleepiness was significantly associated with an increased risk of ALS (inverse-variance-weighted (IVW) odds ratio = 2.70, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.27–5.76; P = 0.010). ALS was not associated with a genetically predicted 1-SD increase in sleep efficiency (IVW 1.01, 0.64–1.58; P = 0.973), Number of sleep episodes (IVW 1.02, 0.80–1.30; P = 0.859) or sleep duration (IVW 1.00, 1.00–1.01; P = 0.250). Conclusions Our results provide novel evidence that daytime sleepiness causes an increase in the risk of ALS and indicate that daytime sleepiness may be inherent in preclinical and clinical ALS patients, rather than simply affected by potential influencing factors.


2020 ◽  
Vol 127 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolina Roselli ◽  
Michiel Rienstra ◽  
Patrick T. Ellinor

Atrial fibrillation is a common heart rhythm disorder that leads to an increased risk for stroke and heart failure. Atrial fibrillation is a complex disease with both environmental and genetic risk factors that contribute to the arrhythmia. Over the last decade, rapid progress has been made in identifying the genetic basis for this common condition. In this review, we provide an overview of the primary types of genetic analyses performed for atrial fibrillation, including linkage studies, genome-wide association studies, and studies of rare coding variation. With these results in mind, we aim to highlighting the existing knowledge gaps and future directions for atrial fibrillation genetics research.


2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Darrell L. Ellsworth ◽  
Clesson E. Turner ◽  
Rachel E. Ellsworth

Triple negative breast cancer (TNBC), representing 10-15% of breast tumors diagnosed each year, is a clinically defined subtype of breast cancer associated with poor prognosis. The higher incidence of TNBC in certain populations such as young women and/or women of African ancestry and a unique pathological phenotype shared between TNBC and BRCA1-deficient tumors suggest that TNBC may be inherited through germline mutations. In this article, we describe genes and genetic elements, beyond BRCA1 and BRCA2, which have been associated with increased risk of TNBC. Multigene panel testing has identified high- and moderate-penetrance cancer predisposition genes associated with increased risk for TNBC. Development of large-scale genome-wide SNP assays coupled with genome-wide association studies (GWAS) has led to the discovery of low-penetrance TNBC-associated loci. Next-generation sequencing has identified variants in noncoding RNAs, viral integration sites, and genes in underexplored regions of the human genome that may contribute to the genetic underpinnings of TNBC. Advances in our understanding of the genetics of TNBC are driving improvements in risk assessment and patient management.


2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriela da Silva Xavier ◽  
Elisa A. Bellomo ◽  
James A. McGinty ◽  
Paul M. French ◽  
Guy A. Rutter

More than 65loci, encoding up to 500 different genes, have been implicated by genome-wide association studies (GWAS) as conferring an increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes (T2D). Whilst mouse models have in the past been central to understanding the mechanisms through which more penetrant risk genes for T2D, for example, those responsible for neonatal or maturity-onset diabetes of the young, only a few of those identified by GWAS, notablyTCF7L2andZnT8/SLC30A8, have to date been examined in mouse models. We discuss here the animal models available for the latter genes and provide perspectives for future, higher throughput approaches towards efficiently mining the information provided by human genetics.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gaëlle Munsch ◽  
Louisa Goumidi ◽  
Astrid van Hylckama Vlieg ◽  
Manal Ibrahim-Kosta ◽  
Maria Bruzelius ◽  
...  

In studies of time-to-events, it is common to collect information about events that occurred before the inclusion in a prospective cohort. In an ambispective design, when the risk factors studied are independent of time, including both pre- and post-inclusion events in the analyses increases the statistical power but may lead to a selection bias. To avoid such a bias, we propose a survival analysis weighted by the inverse of the survival probability at the time of data collection about the events. This method is applied to the study of the association of ABO blood groups with the risk of venous thromboembolism (VT) recurrence in the MARTHA and MEGA cohorts. The former relying on an ambispective design and the latter on a standard prospective one. In the combined sample totalling 2,752 patients including 993 recurrences, compared with the O1 group, A1 has an increased risk (Hazard Ratio (HR) of 1.18, p=4.2x10-3), homogeneously in MARTHA and in MEGA. The same trend (HR=1.19, p=0.06) was observed for the less frequent A2 group. In conclusion, this work clarified the association of ABO blood groups with the risk of VT recurrence. Besides, the methodology proposed here to analyse time-independent risk factors of events in an ambispective design has an immediate field of application in the context of genome wide association studies.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Madison L. Doolittle ◽  
Gina M Calabrese ◽  
Larry D. Mesner ◽  
Dana A. Godfrey ◽  
Robert D. Maynard ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTOsteoporosis is a genetic disease characterized by progressive reductions in bone mineral density (BMD) leading to an increased risk of fracture. Over the last decade, genome-wide association studies (GWASs) have identified over 1000 associations for BMD. However, as a phenotype BMD is challenging as bone is a multicellular tissue affected by both local and systemic physiology. Here, we focused on a single component of BMD, osteoblast-mediated bone formation in mice, and identified associations influencing osteoblast activity on mouse Chromosomes (Chrs) 1, 4, and 17. The locus on Chr. 4 was in an intergenic region between Wnt4 and Zbtb40, homologous to a locus for BMD in humans. We tested both Wnt4 and Zbtb40 for a role in osteoblast activity and BMD. Knockdown of Zbtb40, but not Wnt4, in osteoblasts drastically reduced mineralization. Additionally, loss-of-function mouse models for both genes exhibited reduced BMD. Our results highlight that investigating the genetic basis of in vitro osteoblast mineralization can be used to identify genes impacting bone formation and BMD.


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