Fine-mapping of Parkinson’s disease susceptibility loci identifies putative causal variants

Abstract

AbstractRecent genome-wide association studies have identified 78 loci associated with Parkinson’s Disease susceptibility but the underlying mechanisms remain largely unclear. To identify variants likely causal for disease risk, we fine-mapped these Parkinson’s-associated loci using four different statistical and functional fine-mapping methods. We then integrated multi-assay cell-type-specific epigenomic profiles to pinpoint the likely mechanism of action of each variant, allowing us to identify Consensus SNPs that disrupt LRRK2 and FCGR2A regulatory elements in microglia, MBNL2 enhancers in oligodendrocytes, and DYRK1A enhancers in neurons. Finally, we confirmed the functional relevance of fine-mapped SNPs using a suite of in silico validation approaches. Together, these results provide a robust list of likely causal variants underlying Parkinson’s Disease risk for further mechanistic studies.