scholarly journals Investigating the contributions of circadian pathway and insomnia risk genes to autism and sleep disturbances

Author(s):  
Rackeb Tesfaye ◽  
Guillaume Huguet ◽  
Zoe Schmilovich ◽  
Mor Absa Loum ◽  
Elise Douard ◽  
...  

Sleep disturbance is prevalent in youth with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Researchers have posited that circadian dysfunction may contribute to sleep problems or exacerbate ASD symptomatology. However, there is limited genetic evidence of this. It is also unclear how insomnia risk genes identified through GWAS in a general population are related to ASD risk and common sleep problems like insomnia in ASD. We investigated the contribution of copy number variants (CNVs) encompassing circadian pathway genes and insomnia risk genes to ASD risk as well as parent reported sleep disturbances in children diagnosed with ASD. We studied 5860 ASD probands and 2092 unaffected siblings from the Simons Simplex Collection and MSSNG database, as well as 7463 individuals from two unselected populations (IMAGEN and Generation Scotland). We identified 320 and 626 rare CNVs encompassing circadian genes and insomnia risk genes respectively. Deletions and duplications with circadian genes were overrepresented in ASD probands compared to siblings and unselected controls. For insomnia-risk genes, deletions (but not duplications) were also associated with ASD. Results remained significant after adjusting for cognitive ability. CNVs containing circadian pathway and insomnia risk genes showed a stronger association with ASD, compared to CNVs containing other genes. Duplications containing circadian genes were associated with shorter sleep duration(22 minutes). Only insomnia risk genes intolerant to haploinsufficiency increased insomnia traits when duplicated. Overall, CNVs encompassing circadian and insomnia risk genes increase ASD risk despite small impacts on sleep disturbances.

Author(s):  
Maxwell A. Sherman ◽  
Rachel E. Rodin ◽  
Giulio Genovese ◽  
Caroline Dias ◽  
Alison R. Barton ◽  
...  

AbstractAlthough germline de novo copy number variants are a known cause of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), the contribution of mosaic (early-developmental) copy number variants (mCNVs) has not been explored. Here, we assessed the contribution of mCNVs to ASD by ascertaining mCNVs in genotype array intensity data from 12,077 ASD probands and 5,500 unaffected siblings in the Simons Simplex Collection (SSC) and Simons Powering Autism Research for Knowledge (SPARK) cohorts. We detected 46 mCNVs in probands and 19 mCNVs in siblings ranging from 49 kb to 249 Mb and affecting 2.8-73.8% of cells. In both cohorts, probands carried a significant burden of large (>4 Mb) mCNVs (P = 0.043 and P = 6.6 × 10−3 in SSC and SPARK, respectively), which were present in a total of 25 probands but only 1 sibling (OR=11.4, 95% CI=1.5-84.2). Surprisingly, we did not observe mosaic analogues of the short de novo CNVs recurrently observed in ASD. Event size positively correlated with severity of ASD symptoms (P = 0.016), and four probands exhibited clinical symptoms consistent with syndromes previously associated with genes or regions disrupted by their respective mosaic mutations. In analyses of post-mortem brain tissue from 60 additional probands, we further detected and experimentally validated two mCNVs including a complex 10.3 Mb duplication on chromosome 2. These results indicate that mosaic CNVs contribute a previously unexplained component of ASD risk.


2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janani Iyer ◽  
Santhosh Girirajan

Rare copy-number variants (CNVs) are a significant cause of neurodevelopmental disorders. The sequence architecture of the human genome predisposes certain individuals to deletions and duplications within specific genomic regions. While assessment of individuals with different breakpoints has identified causal genes for certain rare CNVs, deriving gene-phenotype correlations for rare CNVs with similar breakpoints has been challenging. We present a comprehensive review of the literature related to genetic architecture that is predisposed to recurrent rearrangements, and functional evaluation of deletions, duplications, and candidate genes within rare CNV intervals using mouse, zebrafish, and fruit fly models. It is clear that phenotypic assessment and complete genetic evaluation of large cohorts of individuals carrying specific CNVs and functional evaluation using multiple animal models are necessary to understand the molecular genetic basis of neurodevelopmental disorders.


2018 ◽  
pp. 84-95
Author(s):  
Elliott Rees ◽  
George Kirov

Copy number variants (CNVs) are deletions, duplications, inversions, or translocations of large DNA segments. They can play a significant role in human disease. Thirteen CNVs have received strong statistical support for involvement in schizophrenia. They are all rare in cases (<1%), much rarer among controls, and have high odds ratios (ORs) for causing disease. The same CNVs also increase risk for autism spectrum disorders, developmental delay, and medical/physical comorbidities. The penetrance of these CNVs for any disorder is relatively high, ranging from 10% for 15q11.2 deletions to nearly 100% for deletions at 22q11.2. Strong selection pressure operates against carriers of these CNVs. Most of these are formed by non-allelic homologous recombination (NAHR), which leads to high mutation rates, thus maintaining the rates of these CNVs in the general population, despite the strong selection forces.


2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehdi Zarrei ◽  
Christie L. Burton ◽  
Worrawat Engchuan ◽  
Edwin J. Young ◽  
Edward J. Higginbotham ◽  
...  

Abstract Copy number variations (CNVs) are implicated across many neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs) and contribute to their shared genetic etiology. Multiple studies have attempted to identify shared etiology among NDDs, but this is the first genome-wide CNV analysis across autism spectrum disorder (ASD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), schizophrenia (SCZ), and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) at once. Using microarray (Affymetrix CytoScan HD), we genotyped 2,691 subjects diagnosed with an NDD (204 SCZ, 1,838 ASD, 427 ADHD and 222 OCD) and 1,769 family members, mainly parents. We identified rare CNVs, defined as those found in <0.1% of 10,851 population control samples. We found clinically relevant CNVs (broadly defined) in 284 (10.5%) of total subjects, including 22 (10.8%) among subjects with SCZ, 209 (11.4%) with ASD, 40 (9.4%) with ADHD, and 13 (5.6%) with OCD. Among all NDD subjects, we identified 17 (0.63%) with aneuploidies and 115 (4.3%) with known genomic disorder variants. We searched further for genes impacted by different CNVs in multiple disorders. Examples of NDD-associated genes linked across more than one disorder (listed in order of occurrence frequency) are NRXN1, SEH1L, LDLRAD4, GNAL, GNG13, MKRN1, DCTN2, KNDC1, PCMTD2, KIF5A, SYNM, and long non-coding RNAs: AK127244 and PTCHD1-AS. We demonstrated that CNVs impacting the same genes could potentially contribute to the etiology of multiple NDDs. The CNVs identified will serve as a useful resource for both research and diagnostic laboratories for prioritization of variants.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 6 (10) ◽  
pp. e26049 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daria Salyakina ◽  
Holly N. Cukier ◽  
Joycelyn M. Lee ◽  
Stephanie Sacharow ◽  
Laura D. Nations ◽  
...  

Neurogenetics ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald Egger ◽  
Katharina M. Roetzer ◽  
Abdul Noor ◽  
Anath C. Lionel ◽  
Huda Mahmood ◽  
...  

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Underwood Jack F G ◽  
Kendall Kimberley M ◽  
Berrett Jennifer ◽  
Anney Richard ◽  
Van den Bree Marianne B.M. ◽  
...  

AbstractBackgroundThe last decade has seen the development of services for adults presenting with symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in the UK. Compared to children, little is known about the phenotypic and genetic characteristics of these patients.AimsThis e-cohort study aimed to examine the phenotypic and genetic characteristics of a clinically-presenting sample of adults diagnosed with ASD by specialist services.MethodsIndividuals diagnosed with ASD as adults were recruited by the National Centre for Mental Health and completed self-report questionnaires, interviews and provided DNA. 105 eligible individuals were matched to 76 healthy controls. We investigated the demographics, social history, comorbid psychiatric and physical disorders. Samples were genotyped, copy number variants (CNVs) were called and polygenic risk scores calculated.Results89.5% of individuals with ASD had at least one comorbid psychiatric diagnosis with comorbid depression (62.9%) and anxiety (55.2%) the most common. The ASD group experienced more neurological comorbidities than healthy controls, particularly migraine headache. They were less likely to have married or be in work and had more alcohol-related problems. There was a significantly higher load of autism common genetic variants in the adult ASD group compared to controls, but there was no difference in the rate of rare CNVs.ConclusionsThis study provides important information about psychiatric comorbidity in adult ASD which may be used to inform clinical practice and patient counselling. It also suggests that the polygenic load of common ASD-associated variants may be important in conferring risk within non-intellectually disabled population of adults with ASD.


2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Hoi Kin Chau ◽  
Jicheng Qian ◽  
Zihan Chen ◽  
Ying Li ◽  
Yu Zheng ◽  
...  

Background: Low-pass genome sequencing (GS) detects clinically significant copy number variants (CNVs) in prenatal diagnosis. However, detection at improved resolutions leads to an increase in the number of CNVs identified, increasing the difficulty of clinical interpretation and management.Methods: Trio-based low-pass GS was performed in 315 pregnancies undergoing invasive testing. Rare CNVs detected in the fetuses were investigated. The characteristics of rare CNVs were described and compared to curated CNVs in other studies.Results: A total of 603 rare CNVs, namely, 597 constitutional and 6 mosaic CNVs, were detected in 272 fetuses (272/315, 86.3%), providing 1.9 rare CNVs per fetus (603/315). Most CNVs were smaller than 1 Mb (562/603, 93.2%), while 1% (6/603) were mosaic. Forty-six de novo (7.6%, 46/603) CNVs were detected in 11.4% (36/315) of the cases. Eighty-four CNVs (74 fetuses, 23.5%) involved disease-causing genes of which the mode of inheritance was crucial for interpretation and assessment of recurrence risk. Overall, 31 pathogenic/likely pathogenic CNVs were detected, among which 25.8% (8/31) were small (&lt;100 kb; n = 3) or mosaic CNVs (n = 5).Conclusion: We examined the landscape of rare CNVs with parental inheritance assignment and demonstrated that they occur frequently in prenatal diagnosis. This information has clinical implications regarding genetic counseling and consideration for trio-based CNV analysis.


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