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Genome sequencing elucidates Sardinian genetic architecture and augments association analyses for lipid and blood inflammatory markers

Abstract

We report 17.6 million genetic variants from whole-genome sequencing of 2,120 Sardinians; 22% are absent from previous sequencing-based compilations and are enriched for predicted functional consequences. Furthermore, 76,000 variants common in our sample (frequency >5%) are rare elsewhere (<0.5% in the 1000 Genomes Project). We assessed the impact of these variants on circulating lipid levels and five inflammatory biomarkers. We observe 14 signals, including 2 major new loci, for lipid levels and 19 signals, including 2 new loci, for inflammatory markers. The new associations would have been missed in analyses based on 1000 Genomes Project data, underlining the advantages of large-scale sequencing in this founder population.

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Figure 1: Geographical differentiation based on common and rare sites.
Figure 2: Lengths of the shared haplotypes surrounding f2 variants within Sardinians and populations in the 1000 Genomes Project.
Figure 3: Regional association plots for new lipid-associated loci.
Figure 4: Regional association plots at chromosome 12 for hSCRP and ESR.

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Acknowledgements

We thank all the volunteers who generously participated in this study and made this research possible. This research was supported by National Human Genome Research Institute grants HG005581, HG005552, HG006513, HG007022 and HG007089; by National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute grant HL117626; by the Intramural Research Program of the US National Institutes of Health, National Institute on Aging, contracts N01-AG-1-2109 and HHSN271201100005C; by Sardinian Autonomous Region (L.R. 7/2009) grant cRP3-154; by the PB05 InterOmics MIUR Flagship Project; by grant FaReBio2011 'Farmaci e Reti Biotecnologiche di Qualità'; by a US National Institutes of Health National Research Service Award (NRSA) postdoctoral fellowship (F32GM106656) to C.W.K.C.; and by the UC MEXUS/CONOCYT fellowship to V.D.O.d.V. The replication cohorts acknowledge the use of data generated by the UK10K Consortium, supported by Wellcome Trust award WT091310. The UK10K research was specifically funded by a Wellcome Trust award, '10,000 UK Genome Sequences: Accessing the Role of Rare Genetic Variants in Health and Disease' (WT091310/C/10/Z). The research of N.S. is supported by the Wellcome Trust (grants WT098051 and WT091310), the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (EPIGENESYS grant 257082 and BLUEPRINT grant HEALTH-F5-2011-282510) and the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) British Research Council (BRC). The ING-FVG cohort was supported by grant Ministero della Salute—Ricerca Finalizzata PE-2011-02347500 (to P.G.); the ING-VB study thanks the inhabitants of Val Borbera for participating in the study, M. Traglia, C. Sala and C. Masciullo for data management, and the funding sources Fondazione Cariplo (Italy), the Ministry of Health, Ricerca Finalizzata (Italy) 2008, 2011-2012, and the Public Health Genomics Project 2010. The HELIC cohorts are thankful to the residents of the Pomak villages and the Mylopotamos villages for participating and to their funding sources, including the Wellcome Trust (098051) and the European Research Council (ERC-2011-StG 280559-SEPI).

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D.S., F.C. and G.R.A. conceived and supervised the study. C.S., S.N., S.S., D.S., F.C. and G.R.A. drafted the manuscript. E.P., M.Z., C.W.K.C. and J.N. revised the manuscript and wrote specific sections of it. F.B., A. Maschio, A.A., C.J. and R.L. supervised sequencing experiments. F.B., A. Maschio, B.T. and C.B. performed sequencing experiments. C.S., E.P., G.P., M.S., F.D. and S.S. carried out genetic association analyses. C.S., A.K., R.A., F.R., R.B., C.J., R.L. and H.M.K. were responsible for sequencing data processing. C.S., E.P. and G.P. analyzed DNA sequence data. M.Z., A. Mulas, F.B., S.U. and R.N. carried out SNP array genotyping. M.Z. designed the validation strategy, and M.Z., F.B. and A. Mulas verified genotypes by Sanger sequencing and TaqMan genotyping. C.S., J.B.-G., M.P., C.F. and S.S. were responsible for selection of samples for sequencing, J.N., C.W.K.C. and V.D.O.d.V. performed the allele-sharing, principal-component and FST analyses. J.H., P.G., G.M., N.J.T., E.Z., D.T., G.D. and N.S. provided replication results. All authors reviewed and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Francesco Cucca or Gonçalo R Abecasis.

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Sidore, C., Busonero, F., Maschio, A. et al. Genome sequencing elucidates Sardinian genetic architecture and augments association analyses for lipid and blood inflammatory markers. Nat Genet 47, 1272–1281 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/ng.3368

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