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Klei L, McClain LL, Mahjani B, Panayidou K, De Rubeis S, Grahnat ACS, Karlsson G, Lu Y, Melhem N, Xu X, Reichenberg A, Sandin S, Hultman CM, Buxbaum JD, Roeder K, Devlin B. How rare and common risk variation jointly affect liability for autism spectrum disorder. Mol Autism 2021; 12:66. [PMID: 34615521 PMCID: PMC8495987 DOI: 10.1186/s13229-021-00466-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/22/2020] [Accepted: 09/02/2021] [Indexed: 12/26/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Genetic studies have implicated rare and common variations in liability for autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Of the discovered risk variants, those rare in the population invariably have large impact on liability, while common variants have small effects. Yet, collectively, common risk variants account for the majority of population-level variability. How these rare and common risk variants jointly affect liability for individuals requires further study. METHODS To explore how common and rare variants jointly affect liability, we assessed two cohorts of ASD families characterized for rare and common genetic variations (Simons Simplex Collection and Population-Based Autism Genetics and Environment Study). We analyzed data from 3011 affected subjects, as well as two cohorts of unaffected individuals characterized for common genetic variation: 3011 subjects matched for ancestry to ASD subjects and 11,950 subjects for estimating allele frequencies. We used genetic scores, which assessed the relative burden of common genetic variation affecting risk of ASD (henceforth "burden"), and determined how this burden was distributed among three subpopulations: ASD subjects who carry a potentially damaging variant implicated in risk of ASD ("PDV carriers"); ASD subjects who do not ("non-carriers"); and unaffected subjects who are assumed to be non-carriers. RESULTS Burden harbored by ASD subjects is stochastically greater than that harbored by control subjects. For PDV carriers, their average burden is intermediate between non-carrier ASD and control subjects. Both carrier and non-carrier ASD subjects have greater burden, on average, than control subjects. The effects of common and rare variants likely combine additively to determine individual-level liability. LIMITATIONS Only 305 ASD subjects were known PDV carriers. This relatively small subpopulation limits this study to characterizing general patterns of burden, as opposed to effects of specific PDVs or genes. Also, a small fraction of subjects that are categorized as non-carriers could be PDV carriers. CONCLUSIONS Liability arising from common and rare risk variations likely combines additively to determine risk of any individual diagnosed with ASD. On average, ASD subjects carry a substantial burden of common risk variation, even if they also carry a rare PDV affecting risk.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lambertus Klei
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
| | - Lora Lee McClain
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
| | - Behrang Mahjani
- Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
| | - Klea Panayidou
- Department of Health Sciences Department, School of Sciences, European University Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus
| | - Silvia De Rubeis
- Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- The Mindich Child Health and Development Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Friedman Brain Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
| | - Anna-Carin Säll Grahnat
- Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Gun Karlsson
- Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Yangyi Lu
- Department of Statistics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA
| | - Nadine Melhem
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
| | - Xinyi Xu
- Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Genebox, Beijing, China
| | - Abraham Reichenberg
- Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- The Mindich Child Health and Development Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
| | - Sven Sandin
- Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Christina M Hultman
- Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Joseph D Buxbaum
- Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- The Mindich Child Health and Development Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Friedman Brain Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Genetics and Genomic Sciences, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Neuroscience, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
| | - Kathryn Roeder
- Department of Statistics, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
- Computational Biology Department, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
| | - Bernie Devlin
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
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