Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Aug;129(3):511-520.
doi: 10.1038/s41416-023-02312-z. Epub 2023 Jun 26.

Probing the diabetes and colorectal cancer relationship using gene - environment interaction analyses

Niki Dimou  1 Andre E Kim  2 Orlagh Flanagan  3 Neil Murphy  3 Virginia Diez-Obrero  4   5   6   7 Anna Shcherbina  8   9 Elom K Aglago  10 Emmanouil Bouras  11 Peter T Campbell  12 Graham Casey  13 Steven Gallinger  14 Stephen B Gruber  15 Mark A Jenkins  16 Yi Lin  17 Victor Moreno  7   18   19   20 Edward Ruiz-Narvaez  21 Mariana C Stern  22 Yu Tian  23   24 Kostas K Tsilidis  10   11 Volker Arndt  25 Elizabeth L Barry  26 James W Baurley  27   28 Sonja I Berndt  29 Stéphane Bézieau  30 Stephanie A Bien  17 D Timothy Bishop  31 Hermann Brenner  25   32   33 Arif Budiarto  27   34 Robert Carreras-Torres  35 Tjeng Wawan Cenggoro  27 Andrew T Chan  36   37   38   39   40   41 Jenny Chang-Claude  23   42 Stephen J Chanock  29 Xuechen Chen  25   43 David V Conti  2 Christopher H Dampier  13   44 Matthew Devall  45 David A Drew  46 Jane C Figueiredo  47 Graham G Giles  16   48   49 Andrea Gsur  50 Tabitha A Harrison  17 Akihisa Hidaka  17 Michael Hoffmeister  25 Jeroen R Huyghe  17 Kristina Jordahl  17 Eric Kawaguchi  2 Temitope O Keku  51 Susanna C Larsson  52 Loic Le Marchand  53 Juan Pablo Lewinger  2 Li Li  45 Bharuno Mahesworo  27 John Morrison  2 Polly A Newcomb  17   54 Christina C Newton  55 Mireia Obon-Santacana  56 Jennifer Ose  57   58 Rish K Pai  59 Julie R Palmer  60 Nikos Papadimitriou  3 Bens Pardamean  27 Anita R Peoples  57   58 Paul D P Pharoah  61 Elizabeth A Platz  62 John D Potter  17   63   64 Gad Rennert  65   66   67 Peter C Scacheri  68 Robert E Schoen  69 Yu-Ru Su  70 Catherine M Tangen  71 Stephen N Thibodeau  72 Duncan C Thomas  22 Cornelia M Ulrich  57   58 Caroline Y Um  55 Franzel J B van Duijnhoven  73 Kala Visvanathan  63 Pavel Vodicka  74   75   76 Ludmila Vodickova  74   75   76 Emily White  17   63 Alicja Wolk  52 Michael O Woods  77 Conghui Qu  17 Anshul Kundaje #  8   9 Li Hsu #  17   78 W James Gauderman #  2 Marc J Gunter #  3   10 Ulrike Peters #  17   63
Affiliations

Probing the diabetes and colorectal cancer relationship using gene - environment interaction analyses

Niki Dimou et al. Br J Cancer. 2023 Aug.

Abstract

Background: Diabetes is an established risk factor for colorectal cancer. However, the mechanisms underlying this relationship still require investigation and it is not known if the association is modified by genetic variants. To address these questions, we undertook a genome-wide gene-environment interaction analysis.

Methods: We used data from 3 genetic consortia (CCFR, CORECT, GECCO; 31,318 colorectal cancer cases/41,499 controls) and undertook genome-wide gene-environment interaction analyses with colorectal cancer risk, including interaction tests of genetics(G)xdiabetes (1-degree of freedom; d.f.) and joint testing of Gxdiabetes, G-colorectal cancer association (2-d.f. joint test) and G-diabetes correlation (3-d.f. joint test).

Results: Based on the joint tests, we found that the association of diabetes with colorectal cancer risk is modified by loci on chromosomes 8q24.11 (rs3802177, SLC30A8 - ORAA: 1.62, 95% CI: 1.34-1.96; ORAG: 1.41, 95% CI: 1.30-1.54; ORGG: 1.22, 95% CI: 1.13-1.31; p-value3-d.f.: 5.46 × 10-11) and 13q14.13 (rs9526201, LRCH1 - ORGG: 2.11, 95% CI: 1.56-2.83; ORGA: 1.52, 95% CI: 1.38-1.68; ORAA: 1.13, 95% CI: 1.06-1.21; p-value2-d.f.: 7.84 × 10-09).

Discussion: These results suggest that variation in genes related to insulin signaling (SLC30A8) and immune function (LRCH1) may modify the association of diabetes with colorectal cancer risk and provide novel insights into the biology underlying the diabetes and colorectal cancer relationship.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

References

    1. Sung H, Ferlay J, Siegel RL, Laversanne M, Soerjomataram I, Jemal A, et al. Global cancer statistics 2020: GLOBOCAN estimates of incidence and mortality worldwide for 36 cancers in 185 countries. CA Cancer J Clin. 2021;71:209–49. doi: 10.3322/caac.21660. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Huyghe JR, Bien SA, Harrison TA, Kang HM, Chen S, Schmit SL, et al. Discovery of common and rare genetic risk variants for colorectal cancer. Nat Genet. 2019;51:76–87. doi: 10.1038/s41588-018-0286-6. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Schmit SL, Edlund CK, Schumacher FR, Gong J, Harrison TA, Huyghe JR, et al. Novel common genetic susceptibility loci for colorectal cancer. J Natl Cancer Inst. 2019;111:146–57.. doi: 10.1093/jnci/djy099. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Pearson-Stuttard J, Papadimitriou N, Markozannes G, Cividini S, Kakourou A, Gill D, et al. Type 2 diabetes and cancer: an umbrella review of observational and Mendelian randomisation studies. Cancer Epidemiol. Biomarkers Prev. 2021;30:1218–28. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Chang CK, Ulrich CM. Hyperinsulinaemia and hyperglycaemia: possible risk factors of colorectal cancer among diabetic patients. Diabetologia. 2003;46:595–607. doi: 10.1007/s00125-003-1109-5. - DOI - PubMed

Publication types

MeSH terms

Substances

Grants and funding