Blood group antigen loci demonstrate multivariate genetic associations with circulating cellular adhesion protein levels in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis.

ABSTRACT: The cellular adhesion pathway is critical in the pathophysiology of atherosclerosis, and genetic factors contributing to regulation of circulating levels of related proteins may be relevant to risk prediction of cardiovascular disease. In contrast to conducting separate genome-wide protein quantitative trait loci (pQTL) mapping analyses of each individual protein, joint genetic association analyses of multiple quantitative traits can leverage cross-trait co-variation and identify simultaneous regulatory effects on protein levels across the pathway. We conducted a multi-pQTL (mpQTL) analysis of 15 proteins related to cellular adhesion assayed on 2313 participants from the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA). We applied the MQFAM multivariate association analysis method in PLINK on

SUBMITTER: Larson NB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4795966 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature