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Biology subjects

Franzen, O.

Publications and source records attributed to Franzen, O..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

Shared and distinct pathways and networks genetically linked to coronary artery disease between human and mouse

Mouse models have been used extensively to study human coronary artery disease (CAD) or atherosclerosis and to test therapeutic targets. However, whether mouse and human share similar genetic factors and pathogenic mechanisms of atherosclerosis has not been thoroughly investigated in a data-driven manner. We conducted a cross-species comparison study to better understand atherosclerosis pathogenesis between species by leveraging multiomics data. Specifically, we compared genetically driven and thus CAD-causal gene networks and pathways, by using human GWAS of CAD from the CARDIoGRAMplusC4D consortium and mouse GWAS of atherosclerosis from the Hybrid Mouse Diversity Panel (HMDP) followed by integration with functional multiomics human (STARNET and GTEx) and mouse (HMDP) databases. We found that mouse and human shared >75% of CAD causal pathways. Based on network topology, we then predicted key regulatory genes for both the shared pathways and species-specific pathways, which were further validated through the use of single cell data and the latest CAD GWAS. In sum, our results should serve as a much-needed guidance for which human CAD-causal pathways can or cannot be further evaluated for novel CAD therapies using mouse models.

systems biology↗

Cis-epistasis at the LPA locus and risk of coronary artery disease

Identification of epistasis affecting complex human traits has been challenging. Focusing on known coronary artery disease (CAD) risk loci, we explore pairwise statistical interactions between 8,068 SNPs from ten CAD genome-wide association studies (n=30,180). We discovered rs1800769 and rs9458001 in the vicinity of the LPA locus to interact in modulating CAD risk (P=1.75x10-13). Specific genotypes (e.g., rs1800769 CT) displayed either significantly decreased or increased risk for CAD in the context of genotypes of the respective other SNP (e.g., rs9458001 GG vs. AA). In the UK Biobank (n=450,112) significant interaction of this SNP pair was replicated for CAD (P=3.09x10-22), and was also found for aortic valve stenosis (P=6.95x10-7) and peripheral arterial disease (P=2.32x10-4). Identical interaction patterns affected circulating lipoprotein(a) (n=5,953; P=8.7x10-32) and hepatic apolipoprotein(a) (apo(a)) expression (n=522, P=2.6x10-11). We further interrogated potential biological implications of the variants and propose a mechanism explaining epistasis that ultimately may translate to substantial cardiovascular risks.

genetics↗

EnsembleCNV: An ensemble machine learning algorithm to identify and genotype copy number variation using SNP array data

The associations between diseases/traits and copy number variants (CNVs) have not been systematically investigated in genome-wide association studies (GWASs), primarily due to a lack of robust and accurate tools for CNV genotyping. Herein, we propose a novel ensemble learning framework, ensembleCNV, to detect and genotype CNVs using single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) array data. EnsembleCNV a) identifies and eliminates batch effects at raw data level; b) assembles individual CNV calls into CNV regions (CNVRs) from multiple existing callers with complementary strengths by a heuristic algorithm; c) re-genotypes each CNVR with local likelihood model adjusted by global information across multiple CNVRs; d) refines CNVR boundaries by local correlation structure in copy number intensities; e) provides direct CNV genotyping accompanied with confidence score, directly accessible for downstream quality control and association analysis. Benchmarked on two large datasets, ensembleCNV outperformed competing methods and achieved a high call rate (93.3%) and reproducibility (98.6%), while concurrently achieving high sensitivity by capturing 85% of common CNVs documented in the 1000 Genomes Project. Given this CNV call rate and accuracy, which are comparable to SNP genotyping, we suggest ensembleCNV holds significant promise for performing genome-wide CNV association studies and investigating how CNVs predispose to human diseases.

bioinformatics↗