Research on the genetics of Parkinson’s disease has taken a step forward with the identification of five new genetic risk factors.
Dr Andrew Singleton of the National Institute on Aging at the National Institutes of Health, Maryland, USA, and his team set out to find genetic variations linked to the disease.
They analysed findings from five genome-wide association studies from the USA and Europe. A total of 5,333 patients and 12,019 unaffected people donated DNA samples to the studies.
After indentifying 11 genetic variants or "loci" linked to Parkinson’s disease, the researchers aimed to verify them using 7,053 patient and 9,007 non-patient samples. Six of the loci had previously been described in research. The remaining five were identified for the first time.
Full details are published in the Lancet. The authors explain that, until recently, Parkinson’s disease was believed to be caused entirely by environmental factors.
One in five patients carries the highest possible number of risk variants at the 11 loci. These patients are two-and-a-half times more likely to develop the disease than the one in five who have the least number of risk variants.
"This study provides evidence that common genetic variation plays an important part in the cause of Parkinson’s disease," the researchers write. "These data could provide future targets for therapies."
Commenting on the study, Dr Christine Klein and Dr Andreas Ziegler of the University of Lubeck, Germany, say: "With this confluence of new research leads and impressive technical advances there is good reason for optimism that these advances will be translated into direct benefits for our patients."
The International Parkinson Disease Genomics Consortium. Imputation of sequence variants for identification of genetic risks for Parkinson’s disease: a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies. The Lancet, published online February 2, 2011.
Leave a Reply