Cited 1161 times since 2015 (110 per year) source: EuropePMC Nature, Volume 518, Issue 7538, 1 1 2015, Pages 187-196 New genetic loci link adipose and insulin biology to body fat distribution. Shungin D, Winkler TW, Croteau-Chonka DC, Ferreira T, Locke AE, Mägi R, Strawbridge RJ, Pers TH, Fischer K, Justice AE, Workalemahu T, Wu JMW, Buchkovich ML, Heard-Costa NL, Roman TS, Drong AW, Song C, Gustafsson S, Day FR, Esko T, Fall T, Kutalik Z, Luan J, Randall JC, Scherag A, Vedantam S, Wood AR, Chen J, Fehrmann R, Karjalainen J, Kahali B, Liu CT, Schmidt EM, Absher D, Amin N, Anderson D, Beekman M, Bragg-Gresham JL, Buyske S, Demirkan A, Ehret GB, Feitosa MF, Goel A, Jackson AU, Johnson T, Kleber ME, Kristiansson K, Mangino M, Leach IM, Medina-Gomez C, Palmer CD, Pasko D, Pechlivanis S, Peters MJ, Prokopenko I, Stančáková A, Sung YJ, Tanaka T, Teumer A, Van Vliet-Ostaptchouk JV, Yengo L, Zhang W, Albrecht E, Ärnlöv J, Arscott GM, Bandinelli S, Barrett A, Bellis C, Bennett AJ, Berne C, Blüher M, Böhringer S, Bonnet F, Böttcher Y, Bruinenberg M, Carba DB, Caspersen IH, Clarke R, Daw EW, Deelen J, Deelman E, Delgado G, Doney AS, Eklund N, Erdos MR, Estrada K, Eury E, Friedrich N, Garcia ME, Giedraitis V,
Body fat distribution is a heritable trait and a well-established predictor of adverse metabolic outcomes, independent of overall adiposity. To increase our understanding of the genetic basis of body fat distribution and its molecular links to cardiometabolic traits, here we conduct genome-wide association meta-analyses of traits related to waist and hip circumferences in up to 224,459 individuals. We identify 49 loci (33 new) associated with waist-to-hip ratio adjusted for body mass index (BMI), and an additional 19 loci newly associated with related waist and hip circumference measures (P < 5 × 10(-8)). In total, 20 of the 49 waist-to-hip ratio adjusted for BMI loci show significant sexual dimorphism, 19 of which display a stronger effect in women. The identified loci were enriched for genes expressed in adipose tissue and for putative regulatory elements in adipocytes. Pathway analyses implicated adipogenesis, angiogenesis, transcriptional regulation and insulin resistance as processes affecting fat distribution, providing insight into potential pathophysiological mechanisms.
