%0 Journal Article %J Nature %D 2016 %T Genome-wide association study identifies 74 loci associated with educational attainment. %A Okbay, Aysu %A Beauchamp, Jonathan P %A Fontana, Mark Alan %A Lee, James J %A Pers, Tune H %A Rietveld, Cornelius A %A Turley, Patrick %A Chen, Guo-Bo %A Emilsson, Valur %A Meddens, S Fleur W %A Oskarsson, Sven %A Pickrell, Joseph K %A Thom, Kevin %A Timshel, Pascal %A de Vlaming, Ronald %A Abdellaoui, Abdel %A Ahluwalia, Tarunveer S %A Bacelis, Jonas %A Baumbach, Clemens %A Bjornsdottir, Gyda %A Brandsma, Johannes H %A Pina Concas, Maria %A Derringer, Jaime %A Furlotte, Nicholas A %A Galesloot, Tessel E %A Girotto, Giorgia %A Gupta, Richa %A Hall, Leanne M %A Harris, Sarah E %A Hofer, Edith %A Horikoshi, Momoko %A Huffman, Jennifer E %A Kaasik, Kadri %A Kalafati, Ioanna P %A Karlsson, Robert %A Kong, Augustine %A Lahti, Jari %A van der Lee, Sven J %A deLeeuw, Christiaan %A Lind, Penelope A %A Lindgren, Karl-Oskar %A Liu, Tian %A Mangino, Massimo %A Marten, Jonathan %A Mihailov, Evelin %A Miller, Michael B %A van der Most, Peter J %A Oldmeadow, Christopher %A Payton, Antony %A Pervjakova, Natalia %A Peyrot, Wouter J %A Qian, Yong %A Raitakari, Olli %A Rueedi, Rico %A Salvi, Erika %A Schmidt, Börge %A Schraut, Katharina E %A Shi, Jianxin %A Smith, Albert V %A Poot, Raymond A %A St Pourcain, Beate %A Teumer, Alexander %A Thorleifsson, Gudmar %A Verweij, Niek %A Vuckovic, Dragana %A Wellmann, Juergen %A Westra, Harm-Jan %A Yang, Jingyun %A Zhao, Wei %A Zhu, Zhihong %A Alizadeh, Behrooz Z %A Amin, Najaf %A Bakshi, Andrew %A Baumeister, Sebastian E %A Biino, Ginevra %A Bønnelykke, Klaus %A Boyle, Patricia A %A Campbell, Harry %A Cappuccio, Francesco P %A Davies, Gail %A De Neve, Jan-Emmanuel %A Deloukas, Panos %A Demuth, Ilja %A Ding, Jun %A Eibich, Peter %A Eisele, Lewin %A Eklund, Niina %A Evans, David M %A Faul, Jessica D %A Feitosa, Mary F %A Forstner, Andreas J %A Gandin, Ilaria %A Gunnarsson, Bjarni %A Halldórsson, Bjarni V %A Harris, Tamara B %A Heath, Andrew C %A Hocking, Lynne J %A Holliday, Elizabeth G %A Homuth, Georg %A Horan, Michael A %A Hottenga, Jouke-Jan %A de Jager, Philip L %A Joshi, Peter K %A Jugessur, Astanand %A Kaakinen, Marika A %A Kähönen, Mika %A Kanoni, Stavroula %A Keltigangas-Järvinen, Liisa %A Kiemeney, Lambertus A L M %A Kolcic, Ivana %A Koskinen, Seppo %A Kraja, Aldi T %A Kroh, Martin %A Kutalik, Zoltán %A Latvala, Antti %A Launer, Lenore J %A Lebreton, Maël P %A Levinson, Douglas F %A Lichtenstein, Paul %A Lichtner, Peter %A Liewald, David C M %A Loukola, Anu %A Madden, Pamela A %A Mägi, Reedik %A Mäki-Opas, Tomi %A Marioni, Riccardo E %A Marques-Vidal, Pedro %A Meddens, Gerardus A %A McMahon, George %A Meisinger, Christa %A Meitinger, Thomas %A Milaneschi, Yusplitri %A Milani, Lili %A Montgomery, Grant W %A Myhre, Ronny %A Nelson, Christopher P %A Nyholt, Dale R %A Ollier, William E R %A Palotie, Aarno %A Paternoster, Lavinia %A Pedersen, Nancy L %A Petrovic, Katja E %A Porteous, David J %A Räikkönen, Katri %A Ring, Susan M %A Robino, Antonietta %A Rostapshova, Olga %A Rudan, Igor %A Rustichini, Aldo %A Salomaa, Veikko %A Sanders, Alan R %A Sarin, Antti-Pekka %A Schmidt, Helena %A Scott, Rodney J %A Smith, Blair H %A Smith, Jennifer A %A Staessen, Jan A %A Steinhagen-Thiessen, Elisabeth %A Strauch, Konstantin %A Terracciano, Antonio %A Tobin, Martin D %A Ulivi, Sheila %A Vaccargiu, Simona %A Quaye, Lydia %A van Rooij, Frank J A %A Venturini, Cristina %A Vinkhuyzen, Anna A E %A Völker, Uwe %A Völzke, Henry %A Vonk, Judith M %A Vozzi, Diego %A Waage, Johannes %A Ware, Erin B %A Willemsen, Gonneke %A Attia, John R %A Bennett, David A %A Berger, Klaus %A Bertram, Lars %A Bisgaard, Hans %A Boomsma, Dorret I %A Borecki, Ingrid B %A Bültmann, Ute %A Chabris, Christopher F %A Cucca, Francesco %A Cusi, Daniele %A Deary, Ian J %A Dedoussis, George V %A van Duijn, Cornelia M %A Eriksson, Johan G %A Franke, Barbara %A Franke, Lude %A Gasparini, Paolo %A Gejman, Pablo V %A Gieger, Christian %A Grabe, Hans-Jörgen %A Gratten, Jacob %A Groenen, Patrick J F %A Gudnason, Vilmundur %A van der Harst, Pim %A Hayward, Caroline %A Hinds, David A %A Hoffmann, Wolfgang %A Hyppönen, Elina %A Iacono, William G %A Jacobsson, Bo %A Järvelin, Marjo-Riitta %A Jöckel, Karl-Heinz %A Kaprio, Jaakko %A Kardia, Sharon L R %A Lehtimäki, Terho %A Lehrer, Steven F %A Magnusson, Patrik K E %A Martin, Nicholas G %A McGue, Matt %A Metspalu, Andres %A Pendleton, Neil %A Penninx, Brenda W J H %A Perola, Markus %A Pirastu, Nicola %A Pirastu, Mario %A Polasek, Ozren %A Posthuma, Danielle %A Power, Christine %A Province, Michael A %A Samani, Nilesh J %A Schlessinger, David %A Schmidt, Reinhold %A Sørensen, Thorkild I A %A Spector, Tim D %A Stefansson, Kari %A Thorsteinsdottir, Unnur %A Thurik, A Roy %A Timpson, Nicholas J %A Tiemeier, Henning %A Tung, Joyce Y %A Uitterlinden, André G %A Vitart, Veronique %A Vollenweider, Peter %A Weir, David R %A Wilson, James F %A Wright, Alan F %A Conley, Dalton C %A Krueger, Robert F %A Davey Smith, George %A Hofman, Albert %A Laibson, David I %A Medland, Sarah E %A Meyer, Michelle N %A Yang, Jian %A Johannesson, Magnus %A Visscher, Peter M %A Esko, Tõnu %A Koellinger, Philipp D %A Cesarini, David %A Benjamin, Daniel J %K Alzheimer Disease %K Bipolar Disorder %K Brain %K Cognition %K Computational Biology %K Educational Status %K Fetus %K Gene Expression Regulation %K Gene-Environment Interaction %K Genome-Wide Association Study %K Great Britain %K Humans %K Molecular Sequence Annotation %K Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide %K Schizophrenia %X

Educational attainment is strongly influenced by social and other environmental factors, but genetic factors are estimated to account for at least 20% of the variation across individuals. Here we report the results of a genome-wide association study (GWAS) for educational attainment that extends our earlier discovery sample of 101,069 individuals to 293,723 individuals, and a replication study in an independent sample of 111,349 individuals from the UK Biobank. We identify 74 genome-wide significant loci associated with the number of years of schooling completed. Single-nucleotide polymorphisms associated with educational attainment are disproportionately found in genomic regions regulating gene expression in the fetal brain. Candidate genes are preferentially expressed in neural tissue, especially during the prenatal period, and enriched for biological pathways involved in neural development. Our findings demonstrate that, even for a behavioural phenotype that is mostly environmentally determined, a well-powered GWAS identifies replicable associated genetic variants that suggest biologically relevant pathways. Because educational attainment is measured in large numbers of individuals, it will continue to be useful as a proxy phenotype in efforts to characterize the genetic influences of related phenotypes, including cognition and neuropsychiatric diseases.

%B Nature %V 533 %P 539-42 %8 2016 May 26 %G eng %N 7604 %1 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27225129?dopt=Abstract %R 10.1038/nature17671 %0 Journal Article %J Hum Mol Genet %D 2014 %T Trans-ethnic meta-analysis of white blood cell phenotypes. %A Keller, Margaux F %A Reiner, Alexander P %A Okada, Yukinori %A van Rooij, Frank J A %A Johnson, Andrew D %A Chen, Ming-Huei %A Smith, Albert V %A Morris, Andrew P %A Tanaka, Toshiko %A Ferrucci, Luigi %A Zonderman, Alan B %A Lettre, Guillaume %A Harris, Tamara %A Garcia, Melissa %A Bandinelli, Stefania %A Qayyum, Rehan %A Yanek, Lisa R %A Becker, Diane M %A Becker, Lewis C %A Kooperberg, Charles %A Keating, Brendan %A Reis, Jared %A Tang, Hua %A Boerwinkle, Eric %A Kamatani, Yoichiro %A Matsuda, Koichi %A Kamatani, Naoyuki %A Nakamura, Yusuke %A Kubo, Michiaki %A Liu, Simin %A Dehghan, Abbas %A Felix, Janine F %A Hofman, Albert %A Uitterlinden, André G %A van Duijn, Cornelia M %A Franco, Oscar H %A Longo, Dan L %A Singleton, Andrew B %A Psaty, Bruce M %A Evans, Michelle K %A Cupples, L Adrienne %A Rotter, Jerome I %A O'Donnell, Christopher J %A Takahashi, Atsushi %A Wilson, James G %A Ganesh, Santhi K %A Nalls, Mike A %K African Americans %K Asian Continental Ancestry Group %K Bayes Theorem %K European Continental Ancestry Group %K Genome, Human %K Genome-Wide Association Study %K Genotype %K Humans %K Leukocyte Count %K Leukocytes %K Linkage Disequilibrium %K Phenotype %K Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide %K Quantitative Trait Loci %X

White blood cell (WBC) count is a common clinical measure used as a predictor of certain aspects of human health, including immunity and infection status. WBC count is also a complex trait that varies among individuals and ancestry groups. Differences in linkage disequilibrium structure and heterogeneity in allelic effects are expected to play a role in the associations observed between populations. Prior genome-wide association study (GWAS) meta-analyses have identified genomic loci associated with WBC and its subtypes, but much of the heritability of these phenotypes remains unexplained. Using GWAS summary statistics for over 50 000 individuals from three diverse populations (Japanese, African-American and European ancestry), a Bayesian model methodology was employed to account for heterogeneity between ancestry groups. This approach was used to perform a trans-ethnic meta-analysis of total WBC, neutrophil and monocyte counts. Ten previously known associations were replicated and six new loci were identified, including several regions harboring genes related to inflammation and immune cell function. Ninety-five percent credible interval regions were calculated to narrow the association signals and fine-map the putatively causal variants within loci. Finally, a conditional analysis was performed on the most significant SNPs identified by the trans-ethnic meta-analysis (MA), and nine secondary signals within loci previously associated with WBC or its subtypes were identified. This work illustrates the potential of trans-ethnic analysis and ascribes a critical role to multi-ethnic cohorts and consortia in exploring complex phenotypes with respect to variants that lie outside the European-biased GWAS pool.

%B Hum Mol Genet %V 23 %P 6944-60 %8 2014 Dec 20 %G eng %N 25 %1 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25096241?dopt=Abstract %R 10.1093/hmg/ddu401 %0 Journal Article %J PLoS Genet %D 2011 %T Multiple loci are associated with white blood cell phenotypes. %A Nalls, Michael A %A Couper, David J %A Tanaka, Toshiko %A van Rooij, Frank J A %A Chen, Ming-Huei %A Smith, Albert V %A Toniolo, Daniela %A Zakai, Neil A %A Yang, Qiong %A Greinacher, Andreas %A Wood, Andrew R %A Garcia, Melissa %A Gasparini, Paolo %A Liu, Yongmei %A Lumley, Thomas %A Folsom, Aaron R %A Reiner, Alex P %A Gieger, Christian %A Lagou, Vasiliki %A Felix, Janine F %A Völzke, Henry %A Gouskova, Natalia A %A Biffi, Alessandro %A Döring, Angela %A Völker, Uwe %A Chong, Sean %A Wiggins, Kerri L %A Rendon, Augusto %A Dehghan, Abbas %A Moore, Matt %A Taylor, Kent %A Wilson, James G %A Lettre, Guillaume %A Hofman, Albert %A Bis, Joshua C %A Pirastu, Nicola %A Fox, Caroline S %A Meisinger, Christa %A Sambrook, Jennifer %A Arepalli, Sampath %A Nauck, Matthias %A Prokisch, Holger %A Stephens, Jonathan %A Glazer, Nicole L %A Cupples, L Adrienne %A Okada, Yukinori %A Takahashi, Atsushi %A Kamatani, Yoichiro %A Matsuda, Koichi %A Tsunoda, Tatsuhiko %A Tanaka, Toshihiro %A Kubo, Michiaki %A Nakamura, Yusuke %A Yamamoto, Kazuhiko %A Kamatani, Naoyuki %A Stumvoll, Michael %A Tönjes, Anke %A Prokopenko, Inga %A Illig, Thomas %A Patel, Kushang V %A Garner, Stephen F %A Kuhnel, Brigitte %A Mangino, Massimo %A Oostra, Ben A %A Thein, Swee Lay %A Coresh, Josef %A Wichmann, H-Erich %A Menzel, Stephan %A Lin, JingPing %A Pistis, Giorgio %A Uitterlinden, André G %A Spector, Tim D %A Teumer, Alexander %A Eiriksdottir, Gudny %A Gudnason, Vilmundur %A Bandinelli, Stefania %A Frayling, Timothy M %A Chakravarti, Aravinda %A van Duijn, Cornelia M %A Melzer, David %A Ouwehand, Willem H %A Levy, Daniel %A Boerwinkle, Eric %A Singleton, Andrew B %A Hernandez, Dena G %A Longo, Dan L %A Soranzo, Nicole %A Witteman, Jacqueline C M %A Psaty, Bruce M %A Ferrucci, Luigi %A Harris, Tamara B %A O'Donnell, Christopher J %A Ganesh, Santhi K %K Genetic Loci %K Genome-Wide Association Study %K Humans %K Leukocyte Count %K Leukocytes %K Molecular Epidemiology %K Multigene Family %K Phenotype %K Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide %K Ubiquitin-Protein Ligases %X

White blood cell (WBC) count is a common clinical measure from complete blood count assays, and it varies widely among healthy individuals. Total WBC count and its constituent subtypes have been shown to be moderately heritable, with the heritability estimates varying across cell types. We studied 19,509 subjects from seven cohorts in a discovery analysis, and 11,823 subjects from ten cohorts for replication analyses, to determine genetic factors influencing variability within the normal hematological range for total WBC count and five WBC subtype measures. Cohort specific data was supplied by the CHARGE, HeamGen, and INGI consortia, as well as independent collaborative studies. We identified and replicated ten associations with total WBC count and five WBC subtypes at seven different genomic loci (total WBC count-6p21 in the HLA region, 17q21 near ORMDL3, and CSF3; neutrophil count-17q21; basophil count- 3p21 near RPN1 and C3orf27; lymphocyte count-6p21, 19p13 at EPS15L1; monocyte count-2q31 at ITGA4, 3q21, 8q24 an intergenic region, 9q31 near EDG2), including three previously reported associations and seven novel associations. To investigate functional relationships among variants contributing to variability in the six WBC traits, we utilized gene expression- and pathways-based analyses. We implemented gene-clustering algorithms to evaluate functional connectivity among implicated loci and showed functional relationships across cell types. Gene expression data from whole blood was utilized to show that significant biological consequences can be extracted from our genome-wide analyses, with effect estimates for significant loci from the meta-analyses being highly corellated with the proximal gene expression. In addition, collaborative efforts between the groups contributing to this study and related studies conducted by the COGENT and RIKEN groups allowed for the examination of effect homogeneity for genome-wide significant associations across populations of diverse ancestral backgrounds.

%B PLoS Genet %V 7 %P e1002113 %8 2011 Jun %G eng %N 6 %1 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21738480?dopt=Abstract %R 10.1371/journal.pgen.1002113