Ten Years of the International Parkinson Disease Genomics Consortium: Progress and Next Steps

Abstract

In June 2009 a small group of investigators met at the annual Movement Disorders Society meeting in Paris. The explicit goal of this meeting was to discuss a potential research alliance focused on the genetics of Parkinson disease (PD). The outcome of this informal meeting was the creation of the International Parkinson Disease Genomics Consortium (IPDGC), a group focused on collaborative genetics research, enabled by trust, sharing, and as little paperwork as possible. The IPDGC has grown considerably since its inception, including over 100 scientists from around the World. The focus has also grown, to include clinical and functional investigation of PD at scale. Most recently, the IPDGC has expanded to initiate major research efforts in East Asia and Africa, and has prioritized collaborations with ongoing major efforts in India and South America. Here we summarize the efforts of the IPDGC thus far and place these in the context of a decade of progress in PD genomics. We also discuss the future direction of IPDGC and our stated research priorities for the next decade.

Keywords: IPDGC; Parkinson disease; genetics; genomics.

Fig.1

Overview of the currently included countries in the IPDGC and IPDGC-affiliated efforts. IPDGC, International Parkinson Disease Genomics Consortium; LARGE-PD, Latin American Research Consortium on the Genetics of Parkinson Disease; Lux GIANT, Luxembourg-German-Indian Alliance on Neurodegenerative diseases and Therapeutics.

Fig.2

Overview of the past and future work of the IPDGC. WGS, whole-genome sequencing; MR, Mendelian Randomization.