Genome-wide association study

Internal medicine

Neuroscience

Organic chemistry

Disease

Biology

Gene

Epistemology

Genotype

Philosophy

Genetic association

Single-nucleotide polymorphism

Chemistry

Brugada syndrome

Sodium channel

Sodium

Computational biology

Mechanism (biology)

Genetics

Medicine

Nature Genetics

Brugada syndrome (BrS) is a cardiac arrhythmia disorder associated with sudden death in young adults. With the exception of SCN5A, encoding the cardiac sodium channel NaV1.5, susceptibility genes remain largely unknown. Here we performed a genome-wide association meta-analysis comprising 2,820 unrelated cases with BrS and 10,001 controls, and identified 21 association signals at 12 loci (10 new). Single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP)-heritability estimates indicate a strong polygenic influence. Polygenic risk score analyses based on the 21 susceptibility variants demonstrate varying cumulative contribution of common risk alleles among different patient subgroups, as well as genetic associations with cardiac electrical traits and disorders in the general population. The predominance of cardiac transcription factor loci indicates that transcriptional regulation is a key feature of BrS pathogenesis. Furthermore, functional studies conducted on MAPRE2, encoding the microtubule plus-end binding protein EB2, point to microtubule-related trafficking effects on NaV1.5 expression as a new underlying molecular mechanism. Taken together, these findings broaden our understanding of the genetic architecture of BrS and provide new insights into its molecular underpinnings. Genome-wide association analyses identify new susceptibility loci for Brugada syndrome. Functional studies implicate microtubule-related trafficking effects on sodium channel expression as an underlying molecular mechanism.

Genome-wide association analyses identify new Brugada syndrome risk loci and highlight a new mechanism of sodium channel regulation in disease susceptibility