Genetic investigation of syndromic forms of obesity

Abstract

Background: Syndromic obesity (SO) refers to obesity with additional phenotypes, including intellectual disability (ID)/developmental delay (DD), dysmorphic features, or organ-specific abnormalities. SO is rare, has high phenotypic variability, and frequently follows a monogenic pattern of inheritance. However, the genetic etiology of most cases of SO has not been elucidated.

Subjects and methods: In this study, we investigated 20 SO patients by whole-exome sequencing (WES) trios to identify causal genetic variants.

Results: 4/20 patients had negative results for array comparative genomic hybridization (aCGH) analyses. In the remaining 15 patients, in addition to SNVs and indels, CNVs were also evaluated. Pathogenic/likely pathogenic (P/LP) SNVs/indels were detected in 6/20 patients (involving MED13L, AHDC1, EHMT1, MYT1L, GRIA3, and SETD1A), while two patients carried an inherited VUS. In addition, P/LP CNVs were observed in 3/15 patients (involving SATG2, KIAA0442, and MEIS2).

Conclusions: All nine detected P/LP variants involved genes already known to lead to syndromic ID/DD; however, for only two genes (EHMT1 and MYT1L) is the link with obesity well established. This is the first study applying a comprehensive genomic investigation of an SO cohort, showing a high diagnostic yield (~47%). Additionally, our findings suggested that several known ID/DD genes may also predispose individuals to SO.