B3363 - Large-Scale Evaluation of the Effect of Rare Genetic Variants on Psychiatric Symptoms and Cognitive Ability - 02/09/2019

B number: 
B3363
Principal applicant name: 
David Glahn | Boston Children's Hospital
Co-applicants: 
Dr. Sebastien Jacquemont, Dr. Laura Almasy, Dr. Josephine Mollon, Dr. Emma Knowles, Dr. Sam Mathias, Dr. Amanda Rodrigue, Dr. Catherine Brownstein, Dr. Richard Smith, Dr. Guillaume Huguet, Dr. Laura Schultz​
Title of project: 
Large-Scale Evaluation of the Effect of Rare Genetic Variants on Psychiatric Symptoms and Cognitive Ability
Proposal summary: 

Rare copy number variants (CNVs) are strongly associated with neuropsychiatric disorders, suggesting that they might serve as a magnifying glass to study general mechanisms of psychopathology as otherwise subtle perturbations to neuropsychiatric functions may be more clearly discerned through the major ‘hit’ of the CNV. However, our understanding of the impact of CNVs on psychiatric symptomatology, RDoC domains and neurocognitive ability (termed ‘dimensional neuropsychiatric phenotypes’) is limited in at least three ways. First, the effects sizes of the vast majority of CNVs on neuropsychiatric phenotypes remain poorly understood and their rarity will likely to prevent individual association studies. Prior studies concentrated on the most recurrent CNVs, leaving more than 90% of these variants undocumented. Second, for CNVs frequent enough to be studied individually, the full spectrum of phenotypic variation is unknown because ascertainment has been performed through neurodevelopmental and specialty clinics, which presumably represent the severe end of the phenotypic spectrum. Only a few studies have been conducted in unselected populations. Finally, many CNVs seem to impact the same neuropsychiatric domains, suggesting a poly/omnigenic model for psychiatric symptomatology, RDoC domains and neurocognitive ability. Based on this hypothesis, our previous work has shown that genetic scores and functional annotations can accurately predict the effect of any CNV on IQ but these approaches have not yet been extended beyond IQ to other dimensional neuropsychiatric phenotypes. We will fill these knowledge gaps with a novel, multidisciplinary, collaborative project that leverages existing archival data (n=255,303) to estimate and predict the effect sizes of CNVs (duplications and deletions) on dimensional neuropsychiatric phenotypes. Our aims include 1) phenotypic harmonization; 2) characterizing previously identified risk CNVs for mental illness in a large in general population cohorts and in samples ascertained for mental illnesses; 3) examine the contribution of common variants to variable expressivity of rare CNVs via polygenic risk scores (PRS) in the domains of mood, psychosis, developmental disability, and general cognitive ability; and 4) develop novel models to explain the effect size of any rare CNVs on dimensional neuropsychiatric phenotypes. Finally, we will develop tools for data sharing.

Impact of research: 
The scientific premise of our application is that rare CNVs, which are strongly associated with neuropsychiatric disorders, provide a unique window into the genetic architecture of mental disorders that can be exploited to better understand idiopathic neuropsychiatric disorders. There are currently several knowledge gaps that limit the insights that CNVs provide for understanding the pathobiology of mental illness. Our application is designed to address three of these gaps. As we are using only existing data and previously collected DNA samples, there are no direct therapeutic benefits for subjects in this study. However, increased knowledge about genetic architecture of mental illness provides significant potential benefits to society in general, and to patients with mental illnesses and their families in particular. Since the risks of participating in this study only minimally exceed those of routine clinical review, we believe the potential benefits, though primarily indirect, exceed the minimal risks. Characterizing the effect of rare CNVs on a host of neuropsychiatric phenotypes should provide invaluable clues to the elusive pathophysiology of mental illnesses, which are common, debilitating, and costly diseases. Furthermore, if we detect the means to identify individuals with genotypes that predispose to such disorders, either with genetic signatures or with neurocognitive measures, this information could be used for a primary prevention strategy and possibly suggesting new approaches to treatment. Any novel insights into biological mechanisms that predispose individuals to mental illnesses could contribute to the development of novel diagnostic and therapeutic strategies.
Date proposal received: 
Thursday, 29 August, 2019
Date proposal approved: 
Monday, 2 September, 2019
Keywords: 
Mental health - Psychology, Psychiatry, Cognition, Developmental disorders - autism, Cognitive impairment, Mental health, Obesity, Computer simulations/modelling/algorithms, Cohort studies - attrition, bias, participant engagement, ethics