Genome-wide association study of alcohol dependence implicates KIAA0040 on chromosome 1q

Previous studies using SAGE (the Study of Addiction: Genetics and Environment) and COGA (the Collaborative Study on the Genetics of Alcoholism) genome-wide association study (GWAS) data sets reported several risk loci for alcohol dependence (AD), which have not yet been well replicated independently or confirmed by functional studies. We combined these two data sets, now publicly available, to increase the study power, in order to identify replicable, functional, and significant risk regions for AD. A total of 4116 subjects (1409 European-American (EA) cases with AD, 1518 EA controls, 681 African-American (AA) cases, and 508 AA controls) underwent association analysis. An additional 443 subjects underwent expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) analysis. Genome-wide association analysis was performed in EAs to identify significant risk genes. All available markers in the genome-wide significant risk genes were tested in AAs for associations with AD, and in six HapMap populations and two European samples for associations with gene expression levels. We identified a unique genome-wide significant gene--KIAA0040--that was enriched with many replicable risk SNPs for AD, all of which had significant cis-acting regulatory effects. The distributions of -log(p) values for SNP-disease and SNP-expression associations for all markers in the TNN-KIAA0040 region were consistent across EAs, AAs, and five HapMap populations (0.369 ≤ r ≤ 0.824; 2.8 × 10⁻⁹ ≤ p ≤ 0.032). The most significant SNPs in these populations were in high LD, concentrating in KIAA0040. Finally, expression of KIAA0040 was significantly (1.2 × 10⁻¹¹ ≤ p ≤1 .5 × 10⁻⁶) associated with the expression of numerous genes in the neurotransmitter systems or metabolic pathways previously associated with AD. We concluded that KIAA0040 might harbor a causal variant for AD and thus might directly contribute to risk for this disorder. KIAA0040 might also contribute to the risk of AD via neurotransmitter systems or metabolic pathways that have previously been implicated in the pathophysiology of AD. Alternatively, KIAA0040 might regulate the risk via some interactions with flanking genes TNN and TNR. TNN is involved in neurite outgrowth and cell migration in hippocampal explants, and TNR is an extracellular matrix protein expressed primarily in the central nervous system.