Shared Genetic Architecture Of Asthma With Allergic Diseases: A Genome-wide Cross Trait Analysis Of 112,000 Individuals From UK Biobank

Clinical and epidemiological data suggest that asthma and allergic diseases are associated. And may share a common genetic etiology. We analyzed genome-wide single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) data for asthma and allergic diseases in 35,783 cases and 76,768 controls of European ancestry from the UK Biobank. Two publicly available independent genome wide association studies (GWAS) were used for replication. We have found a strong genome-wide genetic correlation between asthma and allergic diseases (rg = 0.75, P = 6.84x10-62). Cross trait analysis identified 38 genome-wide significant loci, including novel loci such as D2HGDH and GAL2ST2. Computational analysis showed that shared genetic loci are enriched in immune/inflammatory systems and tissues with epithelium cells. Our work identifies common genetic architectures shared between asthma and allergy and will help to advance our understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying co-morbid asthma and allergic diseases.