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Chiñas M, Fernandez-Salinas D, Aguiar VRC, Nieto-Caballero VE, Lefton M, Nigrovic PA, Ermann J, Gutierrez-Arcelus M. Functional genomics implicates natural killer cells as potential key drivers in the pathogenesis of ankylosing spondylitis. medRxiv 2023:2023.09.21.23295912. [PMID: 37808698 PMCID: PMC10557806 DOI: 10.1101/2023.09.21.23295912] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/10/2023]
Abstract
Objective Multiple lines of evidence indicate that ankylosing spondylitis (AS) is a lymphocyte-driven disease. However, which lymphocyte populations are critical in AS pathogenesis is not known. In this study, we aimed to identify the key cell types mediating the genetic risk in AS using an unbiased integrative functional genomics approach. Methods We integrated GWAS data with epigenomic and transcriptomic datasets of immune cells in healthy humans. To quantify enrichment of cell type-specific open chromatin regions or gene expression in AS risk loci, we used three published methods which have identified cell types for other diseases. Additionally, we performed co-localization analyses between GWAS risk loci and genetic variants associated with gene expression (eQTL) to find putative target genes of AS risk variants. Results Natural killer (NK) cell-specific open chromatin regions are significantly enriched in heritability for AS, compared to other immune cell types such as T cells, B cells, and monocytes. This finding was consistent between two AS GWAS. Using RNA-seq data, we validated that genes in AS risk loci are enriched in NK cell-specific gene expression. Expression levels of AS-associated genes, such as RUNX3, TBX21, TNFRSF1A, and NPEPPS, were found to be highest in NK cells compared to five T cell subsets. Using the human Space-Time Gut Cell Atlas we found significant upregulation of AS-associated genes predominantly in NK cells. Co-localization analysis revealed four AS risk loci affecting regulation of candidate target genes in NK cells: two known loci, ERAP1 and TNFRSF1A, and two under-studied loci, ENTR1 (aka SDCCAG3) and B3GNT2. Conclusion Our results point to NK cells as potential key drivers in the development of AS and highlight four putative target genes for functional follow-up in NK cells.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marcos Chiñas
- Division of Immunology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Program in Medical and Population Genetics, Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Daniela Fernandez-Salinas
- Division of Immunology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Program in Medical and Population Genetics, Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Licenciatura en Ciencias Genomicas, Centro de Ciencias Genomicas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), Morelos 62210, Mexico
| | - Vitor R. C. Aguiar
- Division of Immunology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Program in Medical and Population Genetics, Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Victor E. Nieto-Caballero
- Division of Immunology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Program in Medical and Population Genetics, Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Licenciatura en Ciencias Genomicas, Centro de Ciencias Genomicas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), Morelos 62210, Mexico
| | - Micah Lefton
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Peter A. Nigrovic
- Division of Immunology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Joerg Ermann
- Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Maria Gutierrez-Arcelus
- Division of Immunology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA
- Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Program in Medical and Population Genetics, Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, USA
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Suliman S, Nieto-Caballero VE, Asgari S, Lopez K, Iwany SK, Luo Y, Nathan A, Fernandez-Salinas D, Chiñas M, Huang CC, Zhang Z, León SR, Calderon RI, Lecca L, Murray M, Van Rhijn I, Raychaudhuri S, Moody DB, Gutierrez-Arcelus M. History of tuberculosis disease is associated with genetic regulatory variation in Peruvians. medRxiv 2023:2023.06.20.23291558. [PMID: 37425785 PMCID: PMC10327177 DOI: 10.1101/2023.06.20.23291558] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 07/11/2023]
Abstract
A quarter of humanity is estimated to be latently infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) with a 5-10% risk of developing tuberculosis (TB) disease. Variability in responses to Mtb infection could be due to host or pathogen heterogeneity. Here, we focused on host genetic variation in a Peruvian population and its associations with gene regulation in monocyte-derived macrophages and dendritic cells (DCs). We recruited former household contacts of TB patients who previously progressed to TB (cases, n=63) or did not progress to TB (controls, n=63). Transcriptomic profiling of monocyte-derived dendritic cells (DCs) and macrophages measured the impact of genetic variants on gene expression by identifying expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL). We identified 330 and 257 eQTL genes in DCs and macrophages (False Discovery Rate (FDR) < 0.05), respectively. Five genes in DCs showed interaction between eQTL variants and TB progression status. The top eQTL interaction for a protein-coding gene was with FAH, the gene encoding fumarylacetoacetate hydrolase, which mediates the last step in mammalian tyrosine catabolism. FAH expression was associated with genetic regulatory variation in cases but not controls. Using public transcriptomic and epigenomic data of Mtb-infected monocyte-derived dendritic cells, we found that Mtb infection results in FAH downregulation and DNA methylation changes in the locus. Overall, this study demonstrates effects of genetic variation on gene expression levels that are dependent on history of infectious disease and highlights a candidate pathogenic mechanism through pathogen-response genes. Furthermore, our results point to tyrosine metabolism and related candidate TB progression pathways for further investigation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sara Suliman
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, Division of Experimental Medicine, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA
- Gladstone-UCSF Institute of Genomic Immunology, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA
- Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Biohub, San Francisco, CA, USA
| | - Victor E. Nieto-Caballero
- Division of Immunology, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Undergraduate Program in Genomic Sciences, Center for Genomic Sciences, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), Morelos 62210, Mexico
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Samira Asgari
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Division of Genetics, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Center for Data Sciences, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Institute for Genomic Health, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY, USA
| | - Kattya Lopez
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Socios En Salud Sucursal Peru, Lima, Peru
| | - Sarah K. Iwany
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Yang Luo
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Division of Genetics, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Center for Data Sciences, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology, Nuffield Department of Orthopaedics, Rheumatology and Musculoskeletal Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
| | - Aparna Nathan
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Division of Genetics, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Center for Data Sciences, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Daniela Fernandez-Salinas
- Division of Immunology, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Marcos Chiñas
- Division of Immunology, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Chuan-Chin Huang
- Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, and Division of Global Health Equity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Zibiao Zhang
- Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, and Division of Global Health Equity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Segundo R León
- Socios En Salud Sucursal Peru, Lima, Peru
- Medical Technology School and Global Health Research Institute, San Juan Bautista Private University, Lima, Perú
| | | | | | - Megan Murray
- Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, and Division of Global Health Equity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Ildiko Van Rhijn
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - Soumya Raychaudhuri
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Division of Genetics, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Center for Data Sciences, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - D. Branch Moody
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Maria Gutierrez-Arcelus
- Division of Rheumatology, Inflammation and Immunity, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Division of Immunology, Department of Pediatrics, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
- Division of Genetics, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
- Center for Data Sciences, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
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