B3636 - Identification of genetic determinants of dietary intakes by prioritizing obesity-related variants highly expressed in the brain - 19/10/2020
B number:
B3636
Principal applicant name:
Ming Ding | Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health (United States)
Co-applicants:
Title of project:
Identification of genetic determinants of dietary intakes by prioritizing obesity-related variants highly expressed in the brain
Proposal summary:
Dietary intakes have important genetic determinants, however, the genetic variants affect dietary intake is unclear. A large GWAS with body mass index (BMI) identified 97 variants and found that nearly half of them has expression in the brain, the key site of central appetite regulation. We hypothesize that these brain variants contain important genetic information associated with dietary intakes, and will explore this hypothesis using data from ALSPAC and Harvard cohorts. We will further assess whether the associations of these variants with dietary intakes change with age and explore the mechanism using ALSPAC DNA methylation data.
Impact of research:
Our proposal will provide critical preliminary data for a planned proposal to the NIH. By focusing on obesity-related variants highly expressed in the brain, we will identify genetic variants significantly associated with dietary intakes. In the near future, we will investigate how these variants, together with family environment, play a role in development of childhood obesity in the Grown-up Today Study (GUTS). The GUTS have sibling design within families and collection of biological samples are going on. It is also of our high interest to investigate how these variants affect emotion and eating behaviors using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).
Date proposal received:
Thursday, 15 October, 2020
Date proposal approved:
Monday, 19 October, 2020
Keywords:
Genetic epidemiology (including association studies and mendelian randomisation), Eating disorders - anorexia, bulimia, GWAS, Epigenetics