Browsing by Author "Strohmaier, Jana"

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    Bipolar multiplex families have an increased burden of common risk variants for psychiatric disorders
    (Springer Nature, 2021) Andlauer, Till F. M.; Guzman-Parra, Jose; Streit, Fabian; Strohmaier, Jana; González, Maria José; Flores, Susana Gil; Cabaleiro Fabeiro, Francisco J.; del Río Noriega, Francisco; Perez, Fermin Perez; González, Jesus Haro; Diaz, Guillermo Orozco; de Diego-Otero, Yolanda; Moreno-Küstner, Berta; Auburger, Georg; Degenhardt, Franziska; Heilmann-Heimbach, Stefanie; Herms, Stefan; Hoffmann, Per; Frank, Josef; Foo, Jerome C.; Treutlein, Jens; Witt, Stephanie H.; Cichon, Sven; Kogevinas, Manolis; Bipolar Disorder Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium; Major Depressive Disorder Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium; Rivas, Fabio; Mayoral, Fermín; Müller-Myhsok, Bertram; Forstner, Andreas J.; Nöthen, Markus M.; Rietschel, Marcella; Medical and Molecular Genetics, School of Medicine
    Multiplex families with a high prevalence of a psychiatric disorder are often examined to identify rare genetic variants with large effect sizes. In the present study, we analysed whether the risk for bipolar disorder (BD) in BD multiplex families is influenced by common genetic variants. Furthermore, we investigated whether this risk is conferred mainly by BD-specific risk variants or by variants also associated with the susceptibility to schizophrenia or major depression. In total, 395 individuals from 33 Andalusian BD multiplex families (166 BD, 78 major depressive disorder, 151 unaffected) as well as 438 subjects from an independent, BD case/control cohort (161 unrelated BD, 277 unrelated controls) were analysed. Polygenic risk scores (PRS) for BD, schizophrenia (SCZ), and major depression were calculated and compared between the cohorts. Both the familial BD cases and unaffected family members had higher PRS for all three psychiatric disorders than the independent controls, with BD and SCZ being significant after correction for multiple testing, suggesting a high baseline risk for several psychiatric disorders in the families. Moreover, familial BD cases showed significantly higher BD PRS than unaffected family members and unrelated BD cases. A plausible hypothesis is that, in multiplex families with a general increase in risk for psychiatric disease, BD development is attributable to a high burden of common variants that confer a specific risk for BD. The present analyses demonstrated that common genetic risk variants for psychiatric disorders are likely to contribute to the high incidence of affective psychiatric disorders in the multiplex families. However, the PRS explained only part of the observed phenotypic variance, and rare variants might have also contributed to disease development.
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    Detecting significant genotype-phenotype association rules in bipolar disorder: market research meets complex genetics
    (SpringerOpen, 2018-11-11) Breuer, René; Mattheisen, Manuel; Frank, Josef; Krumm, Bertram; Treutlein, Jens; Kassem, Layla; Strohmaier, Jana; Herms, Stefan; Mühleisen, Thomas W.; Degenhardt, Franziska; Cichon, Sven; Nöthen, Markus M.; Karypis, George; Kelsoe, John; Greenwood, Tiffany; Nievergelt, Caroline; Shilling, Paul; Shekhtman, Tatyana; Edenberg, Howard; Craig, David; Szelinger, Szabolcs; Nurnberger, John; Gershon, Elliot; Alliey‑Rodriguez, Ney; Zandi, Peter; Goes, Fernando; Schork, Nicholas; Smith, Erin; Koller, Daniel; Zhang, Peng; Badner, Judith; Berrettini, Wade; Bloss, Cinnamon; Byerley, William; Coryell, William; Foroud, Tatiana; Guo, Yirin; Hipolito, Maria; Keating, Brendan; Lawson, William; Liu, Chunyu; Mahon, Pamela; McInnis, Melvin; Murray, Sarah; Nwulia, Evaristus; Potash, James; Rice, John; Scheftner, William; Zöllner, Sebastian; McMahon, Francis J.; Rietschel, Marcella; Schulze, Thomas G.; Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Medicine
    BACKGROUND: Disentangling the etiology of common, complex diseases is a major challenge in genetic research. For bipolar disorder (BD), several genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have been performed. Similar to other complex disorders, major breakthroughs in explaining the high heritability of BD through GWAS have remained elusive. To overcome this dilemma, genetic research into BD, has embraced a variety of strategies such as the formation of large consortia to increase sample size and sequencing approaches. Here we advocate a complementary approach making use of already existing GWAS data: a novel data mining procedure to identify yet undetected genotype-phenotype relationships. We adapted association rule mining, a data mining technique traditionally used in retail market research, to identify frequent and characteristic genotype patterns showing strong associations to phenotype clusters. We applied this strategy to three independent GWAS datasets from 2835 phenotypically characterized patients with BD. In a discovery step, 20,882 candidate association rules were extracted. RESULTS: Two of these rules-one associated with eating disorder and the other with anxiety-remained significant in an independent dataset after robust correction for multiple testing. Both showed considerable effect sizes (odds ratio ~ 3.4 and 3.0, respectively) and support previously reported molecular biological findings. CONCLUSION: Our approach detected novel specific genotype-phenotype relationships in BD that were missed by standard analyses like GWAS. While we developed and applied our method within the context of BD gene discovery, it may facilitate identifying highly specific genotype-phenotype relationships in subsets of genome-wide data sets of other complex phenotype with similar epidemiological properties and challenges to gene discovery efforts.
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    Efficient region-based test strategy uncovers genetic risk factors for functional outcome in bipolar disorder
    (Elsevier, 2019-01-01) Budde, Monika; Friedrichs, Stefanie; Alliey-Rodriguez, Ney; Ament, Seth; Badner, Judith A.; Berrettini, Wade H.; Bloss, Cinnamon S.; Byerley, William; Cichon, Sven; Comes, Ashley L.; Coryell, William; Craig, David W.; Degenhardt, Franziska; Edenberg, Howard J.; Foroud, Tatiana; Forstner, Andreas J.; Frank, Josef; Gershon, Elliot S.; Goes, Fernando S.; Greenwood, Tiffany A.; Guo, Yiran; Hipolito, Maria; Hood, Leroy; Keating, Brendan J.; Koller, Daniel L.; Lawson, William B.; Liu, Chunyu; Mahon, Pamela B.; McInnis, Melvin G.; McMahon, Francis J.; Meier, Sandra M.; Mühleisen, Thomas W.; Murray, Sarah S.; Nievergelt, Caroline M.; Nurnberger, John I.; Nwulia, Evaristus A.; Potash, James B.; Quarless, Danjuma; Rice, John; Roach, Jared C.; Scheftner, William A.; Schork, Nicholas J.; Shekhtman, Tatyana; Shilling, Paul D.; Smith, Erin N.; Streit, Fabian; Strohmaier, Jana; Szelinger, Szabolcs; Treutlein, Jens; Witt, Stephanie H.; Zandi, Peter P.; Zhang, Peng; Zöllner, Sebastian; Bickeböller, Heike; Falkai, Peter G.; Kelsoe, John R.; Nöthen, Markus M.; Rietschel, Marcella; Schulze, Thomas G.; Malzahn, Dörthe; Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Medicine
    Genome-wide association studies of case-control status have advanced the understanding of the genetic basis of psychiatric disorders. Further progress may be gained by increasing sample size but also by new analysis strategies that advance the exploitation of existing data, especially for clinically important quantitative phenotypes. The functionally-informed efficient region-based test strategy (FIERS) introduced herein uses prior knowledge on biological function and dependence of genotypes within a powerful statistical framework with improved sensitivity and specificity for detecting consistent genetic effects across studies. As proof of concept, FIERS was used for the first genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP)-based investigation on bipolar disorder (BD) that focuses on an important aspect of disease course, the functional outcome. FIERS identified a significantly associated locus on chromosome 15 (hg38: chr15:48965004 – 49464789 bp) with consistent effect strength between two independent studies (GAIN/TGen: European Americans, BOMA: Germans; n = 1592 BD patients in total). Protective and risk haplotypes were found on the most strongly associated SNPs. They contain a CTCF binding site (rs586758); CTCF sites are known to regulate sets of genes within a chromatin domain. The rs586758 – rs2086256 – rs1904317 haplotype is located in the promoter flanking region of the COPS2 gene, close to microRNA4716, and the EID1, SHC4, DTWD1 genes as plausible biological candidates. While implication with BD is novel, COPS2, EID1, and SHC4 are known to be relevant for neuronal differentiation and function and DTWD1 for psychopharmacological side effects. The test strategy FIERS that enabled this discovery is equally applicable for tag SNPs and sequence data.
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    Shared Genetic Risk between Eating Disorder and Substance Use-Related Phenotypes: Evidence from Genome-Wide Association Studies
    (Wiley, 2021) Munn-Chernoff, Melissa A.; Johnson, Emma C.; Chou, Yi-Ling; Coleman, Jonathan R.I.; Thornton, Laura M.; Walters, Raymond K.; Yilmaz, Zeynep; Baker, Jessica H.; Hübel, Christopher; Gordon, Scott; Medland, Sarah E.; Watson, Hunna J.; Gaspar, Héléna A.; Bryois, Julien; Hinney, Anke; Leppä, Virpi M.; Mattheisen, Manuel; Ripke, Stephan; Yao, Shuyang; Giusti-Rodríguez, Paola; Hanscombe, Ken B.; Adan, Roger A.H.; Alfredsson, Lars; Ando, Tetsuya; Andreassen, Ole A.; Berrettini, Wade H.; Boehm, Ilka; Boni, Claudette; Perica, Vesna Boraska; Buehren, Katharina; Burghardt, Roland; Cassina, Matgteo; Cichon, Sven; Clementi, Maurizio; Cone, Roger D.; Courtet, Philippe; Crow, Scott; Crowley, James J.; Danner, Unna N.; Davis, Oliver S.P.; de Zwaan, Martina; Dedoussis, George; Degortes, Daniela; DeSocio, Janiece E.; Dick, Danielle M.; Dikeos, Dimitris; Dina, Christian; Dmitrzak-Weglarz, Monika; Docampo, Elisa; Duncan, Laramie E.; Egberts, Karin; Ehrlich, Stefan; Escaramís, Geòrgia; Esko, Tõnu; Estivill, Xavier; Farmer, Anne; Favaro, Angela; Fernández-Aranda, Fernando; Fichter, Manfred M.; Fischer, Krista; Föcker, Manuel; Foretova, Lenka; Forstner, Andreas J.; Forzan, Monica; Franklin, Christopher S.; Gallinger, Steven; Giegling, Ina; Giuranna, Johanna; Gonidakis, Fragiskos; Gorwood, Philip; Gratacos Mayora, Monica; Guillaume, Sébastien; Guo, Yiran; Hakonarson, Hakon; Hatzikotoulas, Konstantinos; Hauser, Joanna; Hebebrand, Johannes; Helder, Sietske G.; Herms, Stefan; Herpertz-Dahlmann, Beate; Herzog, Wolfgang; Huckins, Laura M.; Hudson, James I.; Imgart, Hartmut; Inoko, Hidetoshi; Janout, Vladimir; Jiménez-Murcia, Susana; Julià, Antonio; Kalsi, Gursharan; Kaminská, Deborah; Karhunen, Leila; Karwautz, Andreas; Kas, Martien J.H.; Kennedy, James L.; Keski-Rahkonen, Anna; Kiezebrink, Kirsty; Kim, Youl-Ri; Klump, Kelly L.; Knudsen, Gun Peggy S.; La Via, Maria C.; Le Hellard, Stephanie; Levitan, Robert D.; Li, Dong; Lilenfeld, Lisa; Lin, Bochao Danae; Lissowska, Jolanta; Luykx, Jurjen; Magistretti, Pierre J.; Maj, Mario; Mannik, Katrin; Marsal, Sara; Marshall, Christian R.; Mattingsdal, Morten; McDevitt, Sara; McGuffin, Peter; Metspalu, Andres; Meulenbelt, Ingrid; Micali, Nadia; Mitchell, Karen; Monteleone, Alessio Maria; Monteleone, Palmiero; Nacmias, Benedetta; Navratilova, Marie; Ntalla, Ioanna; O’Toole, Julie K.; Ophoff, Roel A.; Padyukov, Leonid; Palotie, Aarno; Pantel, Jacques; Papezova, Hana; Pinto, Dalila; Rabionet, Raquel; Raevuori, Anu; Ramoz, Nicolas; Reichborn-Kjennerud, Ted; Ricca, Valdo; Ripatti, Samuli; Ritschel, Franziska; Roberts, Marion; Rotondo, Alessandro; Rujescu, Dan; Rybakowski, Filip; Santonastaso, Paolo; Scherag, André; Scherer, Stephen W.; Schmidt, Ulrike; Schork, Nicholas J.; Schosser, Alexandra; Seitz, Jochen; Slachtova, Lenka; Slagboom, P. Eline; Slof-Op’t Landt, Margarita C.T.; Slopien, Agnieszka; Sorbi, Sandro; Świątkowska, Beata; Szatkiewicz, Jin P.; Tachmazidou, Ioanna; Tenconi, Elena; Tortorella, Alfonso; Tozzi, Federica; Treasure, Janet; Tsitsika, Artemis; Tyszkiewicz-Nwafor, Marta; Tziouvas, Konstantinos; van Elburg, Annemarie A.; van Furth, Eric F.; Wagner, Gudrun; Walton, Esther; Widen, Elisabeth; Zeggini, Eleftheria; Zerwas, Stephanie; Zipfel, Stephan; Bergen, Andrew W.; Boden, Joseph M.; Brandt, Harry; Crawford, Steven; Halmi, Katherine A.; Horwood, L. John; Johnson, Craig; Kaplan, Allan S.; Kaye, Walter H.; Mitchell, James; Olsen, Catherine M.; Pearson, John F.; Pedersen, Nancy L.; Strober, Michael; Werge, Thomas; Whiteman, David C.; Woodside, D. Blake; Stuber, Garret D.; Grove, Jakob; Henders, Anjali K.; Larsen, Janne T.; Parker, Richard; Petersen, Liselotte V.; Jordan, Jennifer; Kennedy, Martin A.; Birgegård, Andreas; Lichtenstein, Paul; Norring, Claes; Landén, Mikael; Mortensen, Preben Bo; Polimanti, Renato; McClintick, Jeanette N.; Adams, Mark J.; Adkins, Amy E.; Aliev, Fazil; Bacanu, Silviu-Alin; Batzler, Anthony; Bertelsen, Sarah; Biernacka, Joanna M.; Bigdeli, Tim B.; Chen, Li-Shiun; Clarke, Toni-Kim; Degenhardt, Franziska; Docherty, Anna R.; Edwards, Alexis C.; Foo, Jerome C.; Fox, Louis; Frank, Josef; Hack, Laura M.; Hartmann, Annette M.; Hartz, Sarah M.; Heilmann-Heimbach, Stefanie; Hodgkinson, Colin; Hoffmann, Per; Hottenga, Jouke-Jan; Konte, Bettina; Lahti, Jari; Lahti-Pulkkinen, Marius; Lai, Dongbing; Ligthart, Lannie; Loukola, Anu; Maher, Marion S.; Mbarek, Hamdi; McIntosh, Andrew M.; McQueen, Matthew B.; Meyers, Jacquelyn L.; Milaneschi, Yuri; Palviainen, Teemu; Peterson, Roseann E.; Ryu, Euijung; Saccone, Nancy L.; Salvatore, Jessica E.; Sanchez-Roige, Sandra; Schwandt, Melanie; Sherva, Richard; Streit, Fabian; Strohmaier, Jana; Thomas, Nathaniel; Wang, Jen-Chyong; Webb, Bradley T.; Wedow, Robbee; Wetherill, Leah; Wills, Amanda G.; Zhou, Hang; Boardman, Jason D.; Chen, Danfeng; Choi, Doo-Sup; Copeland, William E.; Culverhouse, Robert C.; Dahmen, Norbert; Degenhardt, Louisa; Domingue, Benjamin W.; Frye, Mark A.; Gäbel, Wolfgang; Hayward, Caroline; Ising, Marcus; Keyes, Margaret; Kiefer, Falk; Koller, Gabrielle; Kramer, John; Kuperman, Samuel; Lucae, Susanne; Lynskey, Michael T.; Maier, Wolfgang; Mann, Karl; Männistö, Satu; Müller-Myhsok, Bertram; Murray, Alison D.; Nurnberger, John I.; Preuss, Ulrich; Räikkönen, Katri; Reynolds, Maureen D.; Ridinger, Monika; Scherbaum, Norbert; Schuckit, Marc A.; Soyka, Michael; Treutlein, Jens; Witt, Stephanie H.; Wodarz, Norbert; Zill, Peter; Adkins, Daniel E.; Boomsma, Dorret I.; Bierut, Laura J.; Brown, Sandra A.; Bucholz, Kathleen K.; Costello, E. Jane; de Wit, Harriet; Diazgranados, Nancy; Eriksson, Johan G.; Farrer, Lindsay A.; Foroud, Tatiana M.; Gillespie, Nathan A.; Goate, Alison M.; Goldman, David; Grucza, Richard A.; Hancock, Dana B.; Mullan Harris, Kathleen; Hesselbrock, Victor; Hewitt, John K.; Hopfer, Christian; Iacono, William G.; Johnson, Eric O.; Karpyak, Victor M.; Kendler, Kenneth S.; Kranzler, Henry R.; Krauter, Kenneth; Lind, Penelope A.; McGue, Matt; MacKillop, James; Madden, Pamela A.F.; Maes, Hermine H.; Magnusson, Patrik K.E.; Nelson, Elliot C.; Nöthen, Markus M.; Palmer, Abraham A.; Penninx, Brenda W.J.H.; Porjesz, Bernice; Rice, John P.; Rietschel, Marcella; Riley, Brien P.; Rose, Richard J.; Shen, Pei-Hong; Silberg, Judy; Stallings, Michael C.; Tarter, Ralph E.; Vanyukov, Michael M.; Vrieze, Scott; Wall, Tamara L.; Whitfield, John B.; Zhao, Hongyu; Neale, Benjamin M.; Wade, Tracey D.; Heath, Andrew C.; Montgomery, Grant W.; Martin, Nicholas G.; Sullivan, Patrick F.; Kaprio, Jaakko; Breen, Gerome; Gelernter, Joel; Edenberg, Howard J.; Bulik, Cynthia M.; Agrawal, Arpana; Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Medicine
    Eating disorders and substance use disorders frequently co-occur. Twin studies reveal shared genetic risk between eating disorders and substance use, with the strongest associations between symptoms of bulimia nervosa (BN) and problem alcohol use, mainly abuse and dependence (twin-based genetic correlation [rg]=0.23–0.53). Analytic advances facilitate the computation of genetic correlations using summary statistics from existing genome-wide association studies (GWAS). We investigated shared genetic risk between eating disorder and substance use and disorder phenotypes using GWAS data. Four eating disorder phenotypes (anorexia nervosa [AN], AN with binge-eating, AN without binge-eating, and a BN factor score), and eight substance use-related phenotypes (drinks per week, alcohol use disorder [AUD], smoking initiation, current smoking, cigarettes per day, nicotine dependence, cannabis initiation, and cannabis use disorder) from eight studies were included. Total sample sizes per phenotype ranged from ~2,400 to ~537,000 individuals. We used linkage disequilibrium score regression to calculate single nucleotide polymorphism-based genetic correlations between eating disorder and substance use-related phenotypes. Significant positive genetic associations emerged between AUD and AN (rg=0.18; false discovery rate q=0.0006), cannabis initiation and AN (rg=0.23; q<0.0001), and cannabis initiation and AN with binge-eating (rg=0.27; q=0.0016). Conversely, significant negative genetic correlations were observed between three non-diagnostic smoking phenotypes (smoking initiation, smoking cessation, and cigarettes per day) and AN without binge-eating (rgs=−0.19 to −0.23; qs<0.04). The observed patterns of association between different eating disorder and substance use-related phenotypes highlights the potentially complex and substance-specific relationships between these behaviors associated with significant public health burden.
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    Transancestral GWAS of alcohol dependence reveals common genetic underpinnings with psychiatric disorders
    (Springer Nature, 2018-12) Walters, Raymond K.; Polimanti, Renato; Johnson, Emma C.; McClintick, Jeanette N.; Adams, Mark J.; Adkins, Amy E.; Aliev, Fazil; Bacanu, Silviu-Alin; Batzler, Anthony; Bertelsen, Sarah; Biernacka, Joanna M.; Bigdeli, Tim B.; Chen, Li-Shiun; Clarke, Toni-Kim; Chou, Yi-Ling; Degenhardt, Franziska; Docherty, Anna R.; Edwards, Alexis C.; Fontanillas, Pierre; Foo, Jerome C.; Fox, Louis; Frank, Josef; Giegling, Ina; Gordon, Scott; Hack, Laura M.; Hartmann, Annette M.; Hartz, Sarah M.; Heilmann-Heimbach, Stefanie; Herms, Stefan; Hodgkinson, Colin; Hoffmann, Per; Hottenga, Jouke Jan; Kennedy, Martin A.; Alanne-Kinnunen, Mervi; Konte, Bettina; Lahti, Jari; Lahti-Pulkkinen, Marius; Lai, Dongbing; Ligthart, Lannie; Loukola, Anu; Maher, Brion S.; Mbarek, Hamdi; McIntosh, Andrew M.; McQueen, Matthew B.; Meyers, Jacquelyn L.; Milaneschi, Yuri; Palviainen, Teemu; Pearson, John F.; Peterson, Roseann E.; Ripatti, Samuli; Ryu, Euijung; Saccone, Nancy L.; Salvatore, Jessica E.; Sanchez-Roige, Sandra; Schwandt, Melanie; Sherva, Richard; Streit, Fabian; Strohmaier, Jana; Thomas, Nathaniel; Wang, Jen-Chyong; Webb, Bradley T.; Wedow, Robbee; Wetherill, Leah; Wills, Amanda G.; Boardman, Jason D.; Chen, Danfeng; Choi, Doo-Sup; Copeland, William E.; Culverhouse, Robert C.; Dahmen, Norbert; Degenhardt, Louisa; Domingue, Benjamin W.; Elson, Sarah L.; Frye, Mark A.; Gäbel, Wolfgang; Hayward, Caroline; Ising, Marcus; Keyes, Margaret; Kiefer, Falk; Kramer, John; Kuperman, Samuel; Lucae, Susanne; Lynskey, Michael T.; Maier, Wolfgang; Mann, Karl; Männistö, Satu; Müller-Myhsok, Bertram; Murray, Alison D.; Nurnberger, John I.; Palotie, Aarno; Preuss, Ulrich; Räikkönen, Katri; Reynolds, Maureen D.; Ridinger, Monika; Scherbaum, Norbert; Schuckit, Marc A.; Soyka, Michael; Treutlein, Jens; Witt, Stephanie; Wodarz, Norbert; Zill, Peter; Adkins, Daniel E.; Boden, Joseph M.; Boomsma, Dorret I.; Bierut, Laura J.; Brown, Sandra A.; Bucholz, Kathleen K.; Cichon, Sven; Costello, E. Jane; de Wit, Harriet; Diazgranados, Nancy; Dick, Danielle M.; Eriksson, Johan G.; Farrer, Lindsay A.; Foroud, Tatiana M.; Gillespie, Nathan A.; Goate, Alison M.; Goldman, David; Grucza, Richard A.; Hancock, Dana B.; Harris, Kathleen Mullan; Heath, Andrew C.; Hesselbrock, Victor; Hewitt, John K.; Hopfer, Christian J.; Horwood, John; Iacono, William; Johnson, Eric O.; Kaprio, Jaakko A.; Karpyak, Victor M.; Kendler, Kenneth S.; Kranzler, Henry R.; Krauter, Kenneth; Lichtenstein, Paul; Lind, Penelope A.; McGue, Matt; MacKillop, James; Madden, Pamela A. F.; Maes, Hermine H.; Magnusson, Patrik; Martin, Nicholas G.; Medland, Sarah E.; Montgomery, Grant W.; Nelson, Elliot C.; Nöthen, Markus M.; Palmer, Abraham A.; Pedersen, Nancy L.; Penninx, Brenda W.J.H.; Porjesz, Bernice; Rice, John P.; Rietschel, Marcella; Riley, Brien P.; Rose, Richard; Rujescu, Dan; Shen, Pei-Hong; Silberg, Judy; Stallings, Michael C.; Tarter, Ralph E.; Vanyukov, Michael M.; Vrieze, Scott; Wall, Tamara L.; Whitfield, John B.; Zhao, Hongyu; Neale, Benjamin M.; Gelernter, Joel; Edenberg, Howard J.; Agrawal, Arpana; Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Medicine
    Liability to alcohol dependence (AD) is heritable, but little is known about its complex polygenic architecture or its genetic relationship with other disorders. To discover loci associated with AD and characterize the relationship between AD and other psychiatric and behavioral outcomes, we carried out the largest genome-wide association study to date of DSM-IV-diagnosed AD. Genome-wide data on 14,904 individuals with AD and 37,944 controls from 28 case-control and family-based studies were meta-analyzed, stratified by genetic ancestry (European, n = 46,568; African, n = 6,280). Independent, genome-wide significant effects of different ADH1B variants were identified in European (rs1229984; P = 9.8 × 10-13) and African ancestries (rs2066702; P = 2.2 × 10-9). Significant genetic correlations were observed with 17 phenotypes, including schizophrenia, attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder, depression, and use of cigarettes and cannabis. The genetic underpinnings of AD only partially overlap with those for alcohol consumption, underscoring the genetic distinction between pathological and nonpathological drinking behaviors.