Cited by 1,097Genetic Associations and EpidemiologyBioinformatics and Genomic NetworksGenetic Mapping and Diversity in Plants and Animals

Heritability enrichment of specifically expressed genes identifies disease-relevant tissues and cell types

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Finucane, Hilary K., Reshef, Yakir A., Anttila, Verneri, Slowikowski, Kamil, Gusev, Alexander, Byrnes, Andrea, Gazal, Steven, Loh, Po-Ru +14 more·2018·Nature Genetics

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Abstract

We introduce an approach to identify disease-relevant tissues and cell types by analyzing gene expression data together with genome-wide association study (GWAS) summary statistics. Our approach uses stratified linkage disequilibrium (LD) score regression to test whether disease heritability is enriched in regions surrounding genes with the highest specific expression in a given tissue. We applied our approach to gene expression data from several sources together with GWAS summary statistics for 48 diseases and traits (average N = 169,331) and found significant tissue-specific enrichments (false discovery rate (FDR) < 5%) for 34 traits. In our analysis of multiple tissues, we detected a broad range of enrichments that recapitulated known biology. In our brain-specific analysis, significant enrichments included an enrichment of inhibitory over excitatory neurons for bipolar disorder, and excitatory over inhibitory neurons for schizophrenia and body mass index. Our results demonstrate that our polygenic approach is a powerful way to leverage gene expression data for interpreting GWAS signals. A new method tests whether disease heritability is enriched near genes with high tissue-specific expression. The authors use gene expression data together with GWAS summary statistics for 48 diseases and traits to identify disease-relevant tissues.

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  • Partitioned heritability and LDSC-SEG analyses showed similar results for both EAS and EUR populations.

    “our partitioned heritability and LDSC-SEG analyses24,25 showed similar results for both populations.”
  • Genes with the highest specific expression in brain regions showed the strongest enrichment of risk URVs, most significantly in the human frontal cortex (P = 1.63 x 10 -8 ) and with limited signal in the other tissue types.

    “Following earlier reports studying heritability enrichment in GTEx tissues 5,30 , we found that genes with the highest specific expression in brain regions showed the strongest enrichment of risk URVs, most significantly in the human frontal cortex (P = 1.63 x 10 -8 ) and with limited signal in the other tissue types (Figure S19, Table S8, S9).”
  • Pathway analyses of common variants have prioritized disease-relevant tissues and cell types and sometimes recapitulated known biology.

    “Pathway analyses of common variants have prioritized disease-relevant tissues and cell types, and in some cases, independently recapitulating known biology8,30,31.”

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  1. [71]Backenroth D Tissue-specific functional effect prediction of genetic variation and applications to complex trait genetics bioRxiv 2016

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Authors
Finucane, H. K., Reshef, Y. A., Anttila, V., Slowikowski, K., Gusev, A., Byrnes, A., Gazal, S., Loh, P.-R., Lareau, C., Shoresh, N., Genovese, G., Saunders, A., Macosko, E., Pollack, S., The Brainstorm Consortium, Perry, J. R. B., Buenrostro, J. D., Bernstein, B. E., Raychaudhuri, S., McCarroll, S., Neale, B. M., & Price, A. L.
Affiliations
  • Broad Institute (US)
  • Harvard University (US)
  • University of Cambridge (GB)
Corresponding author
  • Finucane, Hilary K.
  • Price, Alkes L.
Venue
Nature Genetics
Published
2018-04
Volume
50
Issue
4
Pages
621-629
ISSN
  • 1061-4036 (ISSN-L)
  • 1546-1718
OpenAlex
W2953357410
Cited by
1,097
References
97
Citations by year
2026: 117 · 2025: 156 · 2024: 150 · 2023: 152 · 2022: 138 · 2021: 149 · 2020: 110 · 2019: 80 · 2018: 35 · 2017: 8 · 2016: 1
FWCI
62.11
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Nature Genetics (publishedVersion)
  • bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) (acceptedVersion, cc-by-nd)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • Apollo (University of Cambridge) (submittedVersion)
  • Apollo
Funders
  • Yale University
  • Hertz Foundation
  • Lieber Institute for Brain Development
  • Novo Nordisk Fonden (NNF 16OC0022018)
  • National Institutes of Health (5r01ar063759-07, 16549, 5r01mh094714-04, CA194393, MH107649)
  • Medical Research Council (MC_UU_12015/2)
  • National Institute of Mental Health (R01MH107649, U01MH103339, R01-MH094714, R21MH105881, U01MH103365, R01MH109978, U01MH103340, R21MH102791, R01MH105472, P50MH106934, U01MH103392, R01MH105898, R21MH103877, U01MH103346)
  • National Human Genome Research Institute (U01HG009379, T32HG002295)
  • National Cancer Institute (U01CA194393, R01CA194393)
  • National Institute of General Medical Sciences (T32GM007753)
  • National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (UH2AR067677, R01-AR063759)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic Associations and Epidemiology
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Bioinformatics and Genomic Networks
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic Mapping and Diversity in Plants and Animals
Keywords
tissue-specific gene expression, disease heritability, linkage disequilibrium score regression, polygenic risk, GWAS summary statistics, gene expression data, brain cell types, excitatory and inhibitory neurons, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, body mass index
MeSH terms
Bipolar Disorder, Brain, Chromatin, Humans, Immune System Diseases, Models, Genetic, Neurons, Schizophrenia, Tissue Distribution, Linkage Disequilibrium, Gene Expression, Body Mass Index, Genetic Predisposition to Disease, Multifactorial Inheritance, Gene Expression Profiling, Epigenesis, Genetic, Genome-Wide Association Study

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