Publication
Genetic correlation between amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and schizophrenia
Journal Paper/Review - Mar 21, 2017
McLaughlin Russell L, Project MinE GWAS Consortium, Veldink Jan H, Hardiman Orla, Luykx Jurjen J, van den Berg Leonard H, Al-Chalabi Ammar, Bradley Daniel G, Goris An, Ophoff Roel A, Kahn René S, O'Brien Margaret, van Eijk Kristel R, van Rheenen Wouter, Schijven Dick, Schizophrenia Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium
PubMed
Doi
Citation
Type
Journal
Publication Date
Issn Electronic
Pages
Brief description/objective
We have previously shown higher-than-expected rates of schizophrenia in relatives of patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), suggesting an aetiological relationship between the diseases. Here, we investigate the genetic relationship between ALS and schizophrenia using genome-wide association study data from over 100,000 unique individuals. Using linkage disequilibrium score regression, we estimate the genetic correlation between ALS and schizophrenia to be 14.3% (7.05-21.6; P=1 × 10) with schizophrenia polygenic risk scores explaining up to 0.12% of the variance in ALS (P=8.4 × 10). A modest increase in comorbidity of ALS and schizophrenia is expected given these findings (odds ratio 1.08-1.26) but this would require very large studies to observe epidemiologically. We identify five potential novel ALS-associated loci using conditional false discovery rate analysis. It is likely that shared neurobiological mechanisms between these two disorders will engender novel hypotheses in future preclinical and clinical studies.