Genome-wide association study of Lp-PLA2 activity and mass in the framingham heart study

Abstract

Lipoprotein-associated phospholipase A2 (Lp-PLA2) is an emerging risk factor and therapeutic target for cardiovascular disease. The activity and mass of this enzyme are heritable traits, but major genetic determinants have not been explored in a systematic, genome-wide fashion. We carried out a genome-wide association study of Lp-PLA2 activity and mass in 6,668 Caucasian subjects from the population-based Framingham Heart Study. Clinical data and genotypes from the Affymetrix 550K SNP array were obtained from the open-access Framingham SHARe project. Each polymorphism that passed quality control was tested for associations with Lp-PLA2 activity and mass using linear mixed models implemented in the R statistical package, accounting for familial correlations, and controlling for age, sex, smoking, lipid-lowering-medication use, and cohort. For Lp-PLA2 activity, polymorphisms at four independent loci reached genome-wide significance, including the APOE/APOC1 region on chromosome 19 (p=6×10-24); CELSR2/PSRC1 on chromosome 1 (p = 3×10-15); SCARB1 on chromosome 12 (p = 1×10-8) and ZNF259/BUD13 in the APOA5/APOA1 gene region on chromosome 11 (p = 4×10-8). All of these remained significant after accounting for associations with LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, or triglycerides. For Lp- PLA2 mass, 12 SNPs achieved genome-wide significance, all clustering in a region on chromosome 6p12.3 near the PLA2G7 gene. Our analyses demonstrate that genetic polymorphisms may contribute to inter-individual variation in Lp-PLA2 activity and mass. © 2010 Suchindran et al.