Analysis of rare coding variants in 470,000 exome-sequenced subjects characterises contributions to risk of type 2 diabetes

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 19; no. 12; p. e0311827
• Main Author: Curtis, David
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 12.12.2024; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Biobanks; Biology and Life Sciences; Data analysis; Diabetes; Diabetes mellitus (non-insulin dependent); Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 - genetics; Exome; Genes; Genetic aspects; Genetic engineering; Genetic Predisposition to Disease; Genomics; Glucokinase - genetics; Health aspects; Hepatocyte nuclear factor 4; Humans; Loss of Function Mutation; Medical research; Medicine and Health Sciences; Medicine, Experimental; Phenotypes; Physical Sciences; Regression analysis; Research and Analysis Methods; Research ethics; Risk factors; Type 2 diabetes; UK Biobank - statistics & numerical data; United Kingdom; United Kingdom > UK
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0311827

To follow up results from an earlier study using an extended sample of 470,000 exome-sequenced subjects to identify genes associated with type 2 diabetes (T2D) and to characterise the distribution of rare variants in these genes. Exome sequence data for 470,000 UK Biobank participants was analysed using a combined phenotype for T2D obtained from diagnostic and prescription data. Gene-wise weighted burden analysis of rare coding variants in the new cohort of 270,000 samples was carried out for the 32 genes previously significant with uncorrected p < 0.001 along with 7 other genes previously implicated in T2D. Follow-up studies of GCK, GIGYF1, HNF1A and HNF4A used the full sample of 470,000 to investigate the effects of different categories of variant. No novel genes were identified as exome wide significant. Rare loss of function (LOF) variants in GCK exerted a very large effect on T2D risk but more common (though still very rare) nonsynonymous variants classified as probably damaging by PolyPhen on average approximately doubled risk. Rare variants in the other three genes also had large effects on risk. In spite of the very large sample size, no novel genes are implicated. Coding variants with an identifiable effect are collectively too rare be generally useful for guiding treatment choices for most patients. The finding that some nonsynonymous variants in GCK affect T2D risk is novel but not unexpected and does not have obvious practical implications. This research has been conducted using the UK Biobank Resource.