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[Preprint]. 2024 Aug 15:2024.08.13.24311922.
doi: 10.1101/2024.08.13.24311922.

Genomic analysis of intracranial and subcortical brain volumes yields polygenic scores accounting for variation across ancestries

Luis M García-Marín  1   2 Adrian I Campos  1   3 Santiago Diaz-Torres  2   4 Jill A Rabinowitz  5 Zuriel Ceja  1   2 Brittany L Mitchell  1   2 Katrina L Grasby  1   2 Jackson G Thorp  1 Ingrid Agartz  6   7   8 Saud Alhusaini  9   10 David Ames  11   12 Philippe Amouyel  13   14   15   16 Ole A Andreassen  6   17   18 Konstantinos Arfanakis  19   20 Alejandro Arias Vasquez  21 Nicola J Armstrong  22 Lavinia Athanasiu  6   23 Mark E Bastin  24 Alexa S Beiser  25   26 David A Bennett  19   27 Joshua C Bis  28 Marco Pm Boks  29 Dorret I Boomsma  30 Henry Brodaty  31 Rachel M Brouwer  32 Jan K Buitelaar  33 Ralph Burkhardt  34   35 Wiepke Cahn  36   37 Vince D Calhoun  38 Owen T Carmichael  39 Mallar Chakravarty  40   41 Qiang Chen  42 Christopher R K Ching  43 Sven Cichon  44   45   46 Benedicto Crespo-Facorro  47 Fabrice Crivello  48 Anders M Dale  49 George Davey Smith  50   51 Eco Jc de Geus  52 Philip L De Jager  53 Greig I de Zubicaray  54 Stéphanie Debette  54   55 Charles DeCarli  56 Chantal Depondt  57 Sylvane Desrivières  58 Srdjan Djurovic  59   60 Stefan Ehrlich  61 Susanne Erk  62 Thomas Espeseth  63   64 Guillén Fernández  65 Irina Filippi  66 Simon E Fisher  67   68 Debra A Fleischman  19   69 Evan Fletcher  70 Myriam Fornage  71 Andreas J Forstner  44   72 Clyde Francks  65   67   73 Barbara Franke  33   74 Tian Ge  75 Aaron L Goldman  42 Hans J Grabe  76 Robert C Green  77 Oliver Grimm  78   79 Nynke A Groenewold  80 Oliver Gruber  81 Vilmundur Gudnason  82   83 Asta K Håberg  84   85 Unn K Haukvik  86   87 Andreas Heinz  87 Derrek P Hibar  88 Saima Hilal  89 Jayandra J Himali  25   26   90   91   92 Beng-Choon Ho  93 David F Hoehn  94 Pieter J Hoekstra  95   96 Edith Hofer  97   98 Wolfgang Hoffmann  99   100 Avram J Holmes  101 Georg Homuth  102 Norbert Hosten  103 M Kamran Ikram  104 Jonathan C Ipser  105 Clifford R Jack Jr  106 Neda Jahanshad  43 Erik G Jönsson  6   107 Rene S Kahn  36 Ryota Kanai  108 Marieke Klein  65   74 Maria J Knol  109 Lenore J Launer  110 Stephen M Lawrie  111 Stephanie Le Hellard  60 Phil H Lee  112   113   114 Hervé Lemaître  115 Shuo Li  25   26 David Cm Liewald  116 Honghuang Lin  117 W T Longstreth Jr  118   119 Oscar L Lopez  120 Michelle Luciano  121 Pauline Maillard  70 Andre F Marquand  65 Nicholas G Martin  1 Jean-Luc Martinot  122 Karen A Mather  31 Venkata S Mattay  42 Katie L McMahon  123 Patrizia Mecocci  124   125 Ingrid Melle  6 Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg  126 Nazanin Mirza-Schreiber  127   128 Yuri Milaneschi  129   130   131   132 Thomas H Mosley  133 Thomas W Mühleisen  44   134   135 Bertram Müller-Myhsok  136 Susana Muñoz Maniega  24 Matthias Nauck  137   138 Kwangsik Nho  139 Wiro J Niessen  140 Markus M Nöthen  72 Paul A Nyquist  141   142 Jaap Oosterlaan  143   144   145 Massimo Pandolfo  146   147 Tomas Paus  148   149 Zdenka Pausova  150   151 Brenda Wjh Penninx  129 G Bruce Pike  152 Bruce M Psaty  28   119   153 Benno Pütz  154 Simone Reppermund  31   155 Marcella D Rietschel  156 Shannon L Risacher  157   158 Nina Romanczuk-Seiferth  159   160 Rafael Romero-Garcia  161   162 Gennady V Roshchupkin  109   163 Jerome I Rotter  164 Perminder S Sachdev  31   165 Philipp G Sämann  94 Arvin Saremi  43 Muralidharan Sargurupremraj  166   90 Andrew J Saykin  157 Lianne Schmaal  167   168 Helena Schmidt  169 Reinhold Schmidt  170 Peter R Schofield  171   172 Markus Scholz  35   173 Gunter Schumann  174   175 Emanuel Schwarz  126 Li Shen  176 Jean Shin  177 Sanjay M Sisodiya  178   179 Albert V Smith  82   180 Jordan W Smoller  75 Hilkka S Soininen  181 Vidar M Steen  60   182 Dan J Stein  183 Jason L Stein  184 Sophia I Thomopoulos  43 Arthur W Toga  43 Diana Tordesillas-Gutiérrez  185   186 Julian N Trollor  31   187 Maria C Valdes-Hernandez  24 Dennis van 't Ent  188 Hans van Bokhoven  33   189 Dennis van der Meer  6   190 Nic Ja van der Wee  191 Javier Vázquez-Bourgon  192   193   194 Dick J Veltman  129 Meike W Vernooij  109   163 Arno Villringer  195   196 Louis N Vinke  197 Henry Völzke  100 Henrik Walter  62 Joanna M Wardlaw  24   198 Daniel R Weinberger  42   141   199   200   201 Michael W Weiner  202   203   204 Wei Wen  31 Lars T Westlye  6   63 Eric Westman  205 Tonya White  206 A Veronica Witte  195   196 Christiane Wolf  94 Jingyun Yang  19   27 Marcel P Zwiers  33 M Arfan Ikram  109 Sudha Seshadri  26   90 Paul M Thompson  43 Claudia L Satizabal  26   207   208 Sarah E Medland  1   2   54   209 Miguel E Rentería  1   2
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Genomic analysis of intracranial and subcortical brain volumes yields polygenic scores accounting for variation across ancestries

Luis M García-Marín et al. medRxiv. .

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  • Genomic analysis of intracranial and subcortical brain volumes yields polygenic scores accounting for variation across ancestries.
    García-Marín LM, Campos AI, Diaz-Torres S, Rabinowitz JA, Ceja Z, Mitchell BL, Grasby KL, Thorp JG, Agartz I, Alhusaini S, Ames D, Amouyel P, Andreassen OA, Arfanakis K, Arias-Vasquez A, Armstrong NJ, Athanasiu L, Bastin ME, Beiser AS, Bennett DA, Bis JC, Boks MPM, Boomsma DI, Brodaty H, Brouwer RM, Buitelaar JK, Burkhardt R, Cahn W, Calhoun VD, Carmichael OT, Chakravarty M, Chen Q, Ching CRK, Cichon S, Crespo-Facorro B, Crivello F, Dale AM, Smith GD, de Geus EJC, De Jager PL, de Zubicaray GI, Debette S, DeCarli C, Depondt C, Desrivières S, Djurovic S, Ehrlich S, Erk S, Espeseth T, Fernández G, Filippi I, Fisher SE, Fleischman DA, Fletcher E, Fornage M, Forstner AJ, Francks C, Franke B, Ge T, Goldman AL, Grabe HJ, Green RC, Grimm O, Groenewold NA, Gruber O, Gudnason V, Håberg AK, Haukvik UK, Heinz A, Hibar DP, Hilal S, Himali JJ, Ho BC, Hoehn DF, Hoekstra PJ, Hofer E, Hoffmann W, Holmes AJ, Homuth G, Hosten N, Ikram MK, Ipser JC, Jack CR Jr, Jahanshad N, Jönsson EG, Kahn RS, Kanai R, Klein M, Knol MJ, Launer LJ, Lawrie SM, Hellard SL, Lee PH, Lemaître H, Li S, Liewald DCM, Lin H, Longstreth WT Jr, Lopez OL, Luciano M, Maillard P, Marquand AF, Martin NG, Martinot JL, Mather KA, Mat… See abstract for full author list ➔ García-Marín LM, et al. Nat Genet. 2024 Nov;56(11):2333-2344. doi: 10.1038/s41588-024-01951-z. Epub 2024 Oct 21. Nat Genet. 2024. PMID: 39433889 Free PMC article.

Abstract

Subcortical brain structures are involved in developmental, psychiatric and neurological disorders. We performed GWAS meta-analyses of intracranial and nine subcortical brain volumes (brainstem, caudate nucleus, putamen, hippocampus, globus pallidus, thalamus, nucleus accumbens, amygdala and, for the first time, the ventral diencephalon) in 74,898 participants of European ancestry. We identified 254 independent loci associated with these brain volumes, explaining up to 35% of phenotypic variance. We observed gene expression in specific neural cell types across differentiation time points, including genes involved in intracellular signalling and brain ageing-related processes. Polygenic scores for brain volumes showed predictive ability when applied to individuals of diverse ancestries. We observed causal genetic effects of brain volumes with Parkinson's disease and ADHD. Findings implicate specific gene expression patterns in brain development and genetic variants in comorbid neuropsychiatric disorders, which could point to a brain substrate and region of action for risk genes implicated in brain diseases.

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Conflict of interest statement

IA received speaker’s honorarium Lundbeck; OAA is a consultant to Cortechs.ai and Precision Health, speaker’s honorarium from Lundbeck, Janssen, Otsuka, Sunovion; HB is an Advisory Board Member or Consultant to Biogen, Eisai, Eli Lilly, Roche, Skin2Neuron, Cranbrook Care and Montefiore Homes; CRKC has received past partial research support from Biogen, Inc. (Boston, USA) for work unrelated to the topic of this manuscript; AMD is the Principal Investigator of a research agreement between General Electric Healthcare and the University of California, San Diego (UCSD); he is a Founder of and hold equity in CorTechs Labs, Inc. I am a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Human Longevity, Inc., and the Mohn Medical Imaging and Visualization Center in Bergen, Norway. The terms of these arrangements have been reviewed and approved by UCSD in accordance with its conflict-of-interest policies; BF has received educational speaking fees from Medice; HJG has received travel grants and speakers honoraria from Fresenius Medical Care, Neuraxpharm, Servier and Janssen Cilag as well as research funding from Fresenius Medical Care; DPH is a full time employee of Genentech, Inc; NH is a shareholder various manufacturers of medical technology; AM-L has received consultant fees from Daimler und Benz Stiftung, EPFL Brain Mind Institute, Fondation FondaMental, Hector Stiftung II, Invisio, Janssen-Cilag GmbH, Lundbeck A/S, Lundbeckfonden, Lundbeck Int. Neuroscience Foundation, Neurotorium, MedinCell, The LOOP Zürich, University Medical Center Utrecht, University of Washington, Verein für Mentales Wohlbefinden, von Behring-Röntgen-Stiftung; speaker fees from Ärztekammer Nordrhein, Caritas, Clarivate, Dt. Gesellschaft für Neurowissenschaftliche Begutachtung, Gentner Verlag, Landesärztekammer Baden-Württemberg, LWL Bochum, Northwell Health, Ruhr University Bochum, Penn State University, Society of Biological Psychiatry, University Prague, Vitos Klinik Rheingau and editorial and/or author fees fromAmerican Association for the Advancement of Science, ECNP, Servier Int., Thieme Verlag; WN is founder of Quantib BV and was scientific lead of Quantib BV until Jan 31, 2023; MMN has received fees for membership in an advisory board from HMG Systems Engineering GmbH (Fürth, Germany), for membership in the Medical-Scientific Editorial Office of the Deutsches Ärzteblatt, and for serving as a consultant for EVERIS Belgique SPRL in a project of the European Commission (REFORM/SC2020/029). MMN receives salary payments from Life & Brain GmbH and holds shares in Life & Brain GmbH. All these concerned activities outside the submitted work; BMP serves on the Steering Committee of the Yale Open Data Access Project funded by Johnson & Johnson; AJS receives support from multiple NIH grants (P30 AG010133, P30 AG072976, R01 AG019771, R01 AG057739, U19 AG024904, R01 LM013463, R01 AG068193, T32 AG071444, U01 AG068057, U01 AG072177, and U19 AG074879). He has also received support from Avid Radiopharmaceuticals, a subsidiary of Eli Lilly (in kind contribution of PET tracer precursor); Bayer Oncology (Scientific Advisory Board); Eisai (Scientific Advisory Board); Siemens Medical Solutions USA, Inc. (Dementia Advisory Board); NIH NHLBI (MESA Observational Study Monitoring Board); Springer-Nature Publishing (Editorial Office Support as Editor-in-Chief, Brain Imaging and Behavior); MSreceived funding from Pfizer Inc. for a project not related to this research; ES received speaker fees from bfd buchholz fachinformationsdienst gmbh; PMT receives partial research support from Biogen, Inc., for research unrelated to this manuscript; MWW serves on Editorial Boards for Alzheimer’s & Dementia, and the Journal for Prevention of Alzheimer’s disease. He has served on Advisory Boards for Acumen Pharmaceutical, Alzheon, Inc., Cerecin, Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., and NC Registry for Brain Health. He also serves on the USC ACTC grant which receives funding from Eisai for the AHEAD study. MWW has provided consulting to Boxer Capital, LLC, Cerecin, Inc., Clario, Dementia Society of Japan, Eisai, Guidepoint, Health and Wellness Partners, Indiana University, LCN Consulting, Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., NC Registry for Brain Health, Prova Education, T3D Therapeutics, University of Southern California (USC), and WebMD. MWW has acted as a speaker/lecturer for China Association for Alzheimer’s Disease (CAAD) and Taipei Medical University, as well as a speaker/lecturer with academic travel funding provided by: AD/PD Congress, Cleveland Clinic, CTAD Congress, Foundation of Learning; Health Society (Japan), INSPIRE Project; U. Toulouse, Japan Society for Dementia Research, and Korean Dementia Society, Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., National Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology (NCGG; Japan), University of Southern California (USC). MWW holds stock options with Alzeca, Alzheon, Inc., ALZPath, Inc., and Anven. MWW received support for his research from the following funding sources: National Institutes of Health (NIH)/NINDS/National Institute on Aging (NIA), Department of Defense (DOD), California Department of Public Health (CDPH), University of Michigan, Siemens, Biogen, Hillblom Foundation, Alzheimer’s Association, Johnson & Johnson, Kevin and Connie Shanahan, GE, VUmc, Australian Catholic University (HBI-BHR), The Stroke Foundation, and the Veterans Administration; AIC is currently employed by the Regeneron Genetics Center, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and may hold Regeneron stock or stock options. All other authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. Meta-analyses results overview.
Phenogram illustrating loci associated with each of the brain volumes under study at the common genome-wide significance threshold (p-value < 5×10−8). ICV = Intracranial volume, A = Left Hemisphere interior, B = Left Hemisphere exterior, C = Right hemisphere interior, D = Right hemisphere exterior, E = Both hemispheres upper. The p-values referenced here correspond to a two-tailed Z-test test as implemented in MTAG.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. Polygenic prediction in the ABCD cohort.
Barplots show the variance explained by intracranial and subcortical brain volume polygenic scores using the SBayesR approach with a linear mixed effects model implemented in GCTA for the whole sample (N = 10,440), and individuals of European (N = 5,267), Non-European (N = 5,173), African-only (N = 1,833), and Asian-only (N = 152) ancestry. The p-value of the association is shown at the top of each bar; those with an asterisk (*) were significant after Bonferroni multiple testing correction [0.05 / 50 [total number of tests] = 1×10−3]. Non-European ancestry individuals include, but are not limited to, African-only and Asian-only ancestries as individuals with admixed ancestry were also included. P-values in this figure correspond to wald-tests (2-sided) derived from the linear mixed model results.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.. Genetic overlap with neuropsychiatric traits and disorders
Heatmap depicting genetic correlations (rG) of intracranial and subcortical brain volumes with complex human phenotypes. *p-value < 0.05; **p-value significant after Bonferroni multiple testing correction (0.05 / 320 [total number of genetic correlation tests] = 1.56×10−4). Genetic correlations were estimated using LD score regression. P-values correspond to chi-squared tests with one degree of freedom as implemented in LD score regression.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.. Genetic structure of subcortical brain volumes
Path diagram of a three-factor model estimated with genomic structural equation modelling. Blue rectangles represent the genetic component of each subcortical brain volume. Green circles represent latent factors. Standardised path coefficients are presented.

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