Protein-Protein interactions uncover candidate 'core genes' within omnigenic disease networks.

ABSTRACT: Genome wide association studies (GWAS) of human diseases have generally identified many loci associated with risk with relatively small effect sizes. The omnigenic model attempts to explain this observation by suggesting that diseases can be thought of as networks, where genes with direct involvement in disease-relevant biological pathways are named 'core genes', while peripheral genes influence disease risk via their interactions or regulatory effects on core genes. Here, we demonstrate a method for identifying candidate core genes solely from genes in or near disease-associated SNPs (GWAS hits) in conjunction with protein-protein interaction network data. Applied to 1,381 GWAS studies from 5 ancestries, we identify a total of 1,865 candidate core genes in 343 GWAS studies. Our analysis i

SUBMITTER: Ratnakumar A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7390454 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature