Many obesity-associated SNPs strongly associate with DNA methylation changes at proximal promoters and enhancers.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The mechanisms by which genetic variants, such as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), identified in genome-wide association studies act to influence body mass remain unknown for most of these SNPs, which continue to puzzle the scientific community. Recent evidence points to the epigenetic and chromatin states of the genome as having important roles.

Methods

We genotyped 355 healthy young individuals for 52 known obesity-associated SNPs and obtained DNA methylation levels in their blood using the Illumina 450 K BeadChip. Associations between alleles and methylation at proximal cytosine residues were tested using a linear model adjusted for age, sex, weight category, and a proxy for blood cell type counts. For replication in other tissues, we used two open-acces

SUBMITTER: Voisin S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4599317 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature