Dietary Intake Mendelian Randomization: Assessment and Development of Methods for Instrument Selection and Robust Inference.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Mendelian randomization (MR) uses genetic instruments (GI) to infer causality between exposures, like dietary intake, and health outcomes. Almost all MR of dietary intake use the full set of genome-wide significant (GWS) variants in the GI, and therefore, causal estimates are likely biased by variants that act indirectly on diet.

Objective

First, we performed an assessment of the diet MR literature to evaluate the applications and approaches common in the field. Second, using conventional two-sample MR techniques with GWS variants, we evaluated whether MR could detect expected associations between six diet-health relationships supported by existing nutrition science literature. Third, we developed and tested methods for refining the GI using filtering and mediatio

SUBMITTER: Sutton KJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12262755 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature