High heritability of ascending aortic diameter and trans-ancestry prediction of thoracic aortic disease

FinnGen Project, Regeneron Genetics Center, Research Program Management & Strategic Initiatives, Analytical Genomics and Data Science, Genome Informatics, Clinical Informatics, Sequencing and Lab Operations, RGC Management and Leadership Team, VA Million Veterans Program

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

26 Scopus citations

Abstract

Enlargement of the aorta is an important risk factor for aortic aneurysm and dissection, a leading cause of morbidity in the developed world. Here we performed automated extraction of ascending aortic diameter from cardiac magnetic resonance images of 36,021 individuals from the UK Biobank, followed by genome-wide association. We identified lead variants across 41 loci, including genes related to cardiovascular development (HAND2, TBX20) and Mendelian forms of thoracic aortic disease (ELN, FBN1). A polygenic score significantly predicted prevalent risk of thoracic aortic aneurysm and the need for surgical intervention for patients with thoracic aneurysm across multiple ancestries within the UK Biobank, FinnGen, the Penn Medicine Biobank and the Million Veterans Program (MVP). Additionally, we highlight the primary causal role of blood pressure in reducing aortic dilation using Mendelian randomization. Overall, our findings provide a roadmap for using genetic determinants of human anatomy to understand cardiovascular development while improving prediction of diseases of the thoracic aorta.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)772-782
Number of pages11
JournalNature Genetics
Volume54
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Jun 2022
Externally publishedYes

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