Browsing by Author "Chesler, Elissa J."

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    Genes identified in rodent studies of alcohol intake are enriched for heritability of human substance use
    (Wiley, 2021) Huggett, Spencer B.; Johnson, Emma C.; Hatoum, Alexander S.; Lai, Dongbing; Srijeyanthan, Jenani; Bubier, Jason A.; Chesler, Elissa J.; Agrawal, Arpana; Palmer, Abraham A.; Edenberg, Howard J.; Palmer, Rohan H. C.; Medical and Molecular Genetics, School of Medicine
    Background: Rodent paradigms and human genome-wide association studies (GWAS) on drug use have the potential to provide biological insight into the pathophysiology of addiction. Methods: Using GeneWeaver, we created rodent alcohol and nicotine gene-sets derived from 19 gene expression studies on alcohol and nicotine outcomes. We partitioned the SNP heritability of these gene-sets using four large human GWAS: (1) alcoholic drinks per week, (2) problematic alcohol use, (3) cigarettes per day, and (4) smoking cessation. We benchmarked our findings with curated human alcohol and nicotine addiction gene-sets and performed specificity analyses using other rodent gene-sets (e.g., locomotor behavior) and other human GWAS (e.g., height). Results: The rodent alcohol gene-set was enriched for heritability of drinks per week, cigarettes per day, and smoking cessation, but not problematic alcohol use. However, the rodent nicotine gene-set was not significantly associated with any of these traits. Both rodent gene-sets showed enrichment for several non-substance-use GWAS, and the extent of this relationship tended to increase as a function of trait heritability. In general, larger gene-sets demonstrated more significant enrichment. Finally, when evaluating human traits with similar heritabilities, both rodent gene-sets showed greater enrichment for substance use traits. Conclusion: Our results suggest that rodent gene expression studies can help to identify genes that contribute to the heritability of some substance use traits in humans, yet there was less specificity than expected. We outline various limitations, interpretations, and considerations for future research.
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    Integration of evidence across human and model organism studies: A meeting report
    (Wiley, 2021-04-23) Palmer, Rohan H.C.; Johnson, Emma C.; Won, Hyejung; Polimanti, Renato; Kapoor, Manav; Chitre, Apurva; Bogue, Molly A.; Benca-Bachman, Chelsie E.; Parker, Clarissa C.; Verm, Anurag; Reynolds, Timothy; Ernst, Jason; Bray, Michael; Kwon, Soo Bin; Lai, Dongbing; Quach, Bryan C.; Gaddis, Nathan C.; Saba, Laura; Chen, Hao; Hawrylycz, Michael; Zhang, Shan; Zhou, Yuan; Mahaffey, Spencer; Fischer, Christian; Sanchez-Roige, Sandra; Bandrowski, Anita; Lu, Qing; Shen, Li; Philip, Vivek; Gelernter, Joel; Bierut, Laura J.; Hancock, Dana B.; Edenberg, Howard J.; Johnson, Eric O.; Nestler, Eric J.; Barr, Peter B.; Prins, Pjotr; Smith, Desmond J.; Akbarian, Schahram; Thorgeirsson, Thorgeir; Walton, Dave; Baker, Erich; Jacobson, Daniel; Palmer, Abraham A.; Miles, Michael; Chesler, Elissa J.; Emerson, Jake; Agrawal, Arpana; Martone, Maryann; Williams, Robert W.; Medical and Molecular Genetics, School of Medicine
    The National Institute on Drug Abuse and Joint Institute for Biological Sciences at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory hosted a meeting attended by a diverse group of scientists with expertise in substance use disorders (SUDs), computational biology, and FAIR (Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reusability) data sharing. The meeting's objective was to discuss and evaluate better strategies to integrate genetic, epigenetic, and 'omics data across human and model organisms to achieve deeper mechanistic insight into SUDs. Specific topics were to (a) evaluate the current state of substance use genetics and genomics research and fundamental gaps, (b) identify opportunities and challenges of integration and sharing across species and data types, (c) identify current tools and resources for integration of genetic, epigenetic, and phenotypic data, (d) discuss steps and impediment related to data integration, and (e) outline future steps to support more effective collaboration-particularly between animal model research communities and human genetics and clinical research teams. This review summarizes key facets of this catalytic discussion with a focus on new opportunities and gaps in resources and knowledge on SUDs.