Integrative functional analysis of super enhancer SNPs for coronary artery disease

J Hum Genet. 2018 May;63(5):627-638. doi: 10.1038/s10038-018-0422-2. Epub 2018 Feb 28.

Abstract

Clinical research in coronary artery disease (CAD) primarily focused on genetic variants located in protein-coding regions. Recently, mutations fall within non-coding regions have been suggested to be essential to the pathogenesis of human complex disease. Super enhancer is a densely spaced cluster of transcriptional enhancers located in non-coding regions, which is critical for regulating cell-type specific gene expression. However, the underlying mechanism of the super enhancer single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) affecting the risk of CAD remains unclear. By integrating genome-wide association study (GWAS) meta-analysis of CAD and cell/tissue-specific histone modification data set, we identified 366 potential CAD-associated super enhancer SNPs in 67 loci, including 94 SNPs that are involved in regulating chromatin interactive and/or affecting the transcription factors binding affinity. Interestingly, we found 7 novel functional loci (CBFA2T3, ZMIZ1, DIP2B, SCNN1D/ACAP3, TMEM105, CAMK2G, and MAPK1) that CAD-associated super enhancer SNPs were clustered into the same or neighboring super enhancers. Pathway analysis showed a significant enrichment in several well-known signaling and regulatory processes, e.g., cAMP signaling pathway and ErbB signaling pathway, which play a key role in CAD metabolism. Our results highlight the potential functional importance of CAD-associated super enhancer SNPs and provide the targets for further insights on the pathogenesis of CAD.

Publication types

  • Meta-Analysis

MeSH terms

  • Chromosome Mapping
  • Computational Biology / methods
  • Coronary Artery Disease / diagnosis
  • Coronary Artery Disease / genetics*
  • Coronary Artery Disease / metabolism
  • Enhancer Elements, Genetic*
  • Gene Expression
  • Gene Expression Profiling
  • Genetic Predisposition to Disease*
  • Genome-Wide Association Study*
  • Histones / metabolism
  • Humans
  • Molecular Sequence Annotation
  • Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide*
  • Protein Interaction Mapping
  • Protein Interaction Maps
  • Transcriptome

Substances

  • Histones