Diverse DNA signatures linked to heart disease

Date:
August 26, 2021
Source:
Texas Biomedical Research Institute
Summary:
Risk for heart disease does not look the same on the genetic
level for different population groups, report an international
team of researchers.

The studY begins to outline gene activity patterns that could
serve as early warning indicators for cardiovascular disease.



FULL STORY ==========================================================================
Risk for heart disease does not look the same on the genetic level for different population groups, report an international team of researchers
this month in the journal JAMA Cardiology. The study, led by Texas
Biomedical Research Institute (Texas Biomed) and Columbia University
Mailman School of Public Health, begins to outline gene activity patterns
that could serve as early warning indicators for cardiovascular disease.


==========================================================================
"We shouldn't expect it to be same for every population group," said
Associate Professor Shelley Cole, Ph.D., senior author and co-lead
of the Population Health Program at Texas Biomed. "There are some
universal factors affecting risk for heart disease, where you live in
the world, your environment, your lifestyle, your access to health
care, those all influence disease risk and progression. Advances in
querying the entire genome or DNA of an individual, and statistical
analyses, coupled with large, long-term studies are enabling us to
see those influences on the genetic level for different populations."
External influences that leave a mark on DNA are part of the growing field called epigenetics. Essentially, modifications occur that affect how
DNA is expressed, without changing the basic genetic code. Identifying epigenetic patterns associated with particular diseases could one day
help screen for illness years or even decades before symptoms develop.

"In this study, we harness the country's best clinical data on heart
disease from diverse populations to begin to unlock the specific
epigenetic changes involved the complex biology that leads to disease,"
said Ana Navas-Acien, M.D., Ph.D., the study's first author and professor
of environmental health sciences at Columbia University Mailman School
of Public Health.

Navas-Acien, Cole and their collaborators compiled data from nearly 9,400 participants in four long-term health studies: the Strong Heart Study,
which has studied cardiovascular disease among American Indians since the 1980s; the Women's Health Initiative, which follows African-American,
Hispanic and white women across the U.S.; the Framingham Heart Study,
which follows men and women in Massachusetts; and Atherosclerosis
Risk in Communities Study (ARIC), which follows men and women in four
U.S. communities. (For this study, the ARIC data was split into two
cohorts: Black and white.) Researchers analyzed the entire genome of
each person for DNA methylation, which causes changes to DNA activity
without altering the genetic sequence, and compared that with individuals
known to have developed coronary heart disease.

Among the Strong Heart Study volunteers, there were about 505 methylation points associated with heart disease.

Those sites were compared with the other cohorts. Only 33 were also found
in three additional groups with mixed results -- sometimes a common site
was associated with heart disease, while other times, it was actually associated with a lower risk of heart disease.

"This underscores the need to tailor indicators of risk and resilience,
as well as interventions and treatments, for subpopulations as we move
away from a one- size-fits-all approach and towards precision medicine,"
said Cole, who chairs the Strong Heart Study Steering Committee and
directs the Strong Heart Study Genetics Center.

By incorporating data from the Strong Heart Study, which involves
12 tribes in Arizona, Oklahoma, and North and South Dakota, this
paper successfully brings advanced genetic analyses to traditionally underserved, rural populations.

"It can be challenging to do field research with remote population groups
that don't have easy access to hospitals and clinics, so they are often
left out of research projects like this," Cole said. "The Strong Heart
Study is providing extremely valuable insights for the participating
tribes as well as for the broader global community about how environmental factors influence our health." The Strong Heart Study is funded by the National Institutes of Health National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
(NHLBI) contract #HHSN26818HV00001R.

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by
Texas_Biomedical_Research_Institute. Note: Content may be edited for
style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Ana Navas-Acien, Arce Domingo-Relloso, Pooja Subedi, Angela
L. Riffo-
Campos, Rui Xia, Lizbeth Gomez, Karin Haack, Jeff Goldsmith,
Barbara V.

Howard, Lyle G. Best, Richard Devereux, Ali Tauqeer, Ying Zhang,
Amanda M. Fretts, Gernot Pichler, Daniel Levy, Ramachandran
S. Vasan, Andrea A.

Baccarelli, Miguel Herreros-Martinez, Wan-yee Tang, Jan Bressler,
Myriam Fornage, Jason G. Umans, Maria Tellez-Plaza, M. Daniele
Fallin, Jinying Zhao, Shelley A. Cole. Blood DNA Methylation
and Incident Coronary Heart Disease. JAMA Cardiology, 2021; DOI:
10.1001/jamacardio.2021.2704 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/08/210826111721.htm

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