Dissection of a complex disease susceptibility region using a Bayesian stochastic search approach to fine mapping

Identification of candidate causal variants in regions associated with risk of common diseases is complicated by linkage disequilibrium (LD) and multiple association signals. Nonetheless, accurate maps of these variants are needed, both to fully exploit detailed cell specific chromatin annotation data to highlight disease causal mechanisms and cells, and for design of the functional studies that will ultimately be required to confirm causal mechanisms. We adapted a Bayesian evolutionary stochastic search algorithm to the fine mapping problem, and demonstrated its improved performance over conventional stepwise and regularised regression through simulation studies. We then applied it to fine map the established multiple sclerosis (MS) and type 1 diabetes (T1D) associations in the IL-2RA (CD25) gene region. For T1D, both stepwise and stochastic search approaches identified four T1D association signals, with the major effect tagged by the single nucleotide polymorphism, rs12722496. In contrast, for MS, the stochastic search found two distinct competing models: a single candidate causal variant, tagged by rs2104286 and reported previously using stepwise analysis; and a more complex model with two association signals, one of which was tagged by the major T1D associated rs12722496 and the other by rs56382813. There is low to moderate LD between rs2104286 and both rs12722496 and rs56382813 (r2 ≃ 0:3) and our two SNP model could not be recovered through a forward stepwise search after conditioning on rs2104286. Both signals in the two variant model for MS affect CD25 expression on distinct subpopulations of CD4+ T cells, which are key cells in the autoimmune process. The results support a shared causal variant for T1D and MS. Our study illustrates the benefit of using a purposely designed model search strategy for fine mapping and the advantage of combining disease and protein expression data.
Author Summary Genetic association studies have identified many DNA sequence variants that associate with disease risk. By exploiting the known correlation that exists between neighbouring variants in the genome, inference can be extended beyond those individual variants tested to identify sets within which a causal variant is likely to reside. However, this correlation, particularly in the presence of multiple disease causing variants in relative proximity, makes disentangling the specific causal variants difficult. Statistical approaches to this fine mapping problem have traditionally taken a stepwise search approach, beginning with the most associated variant in a region, then iteratively attempting to find additional associated variants. We adapted a stochastic search approach that avoids this stepwise process and is explicitly designed for dealing with highly correlated predictors to the fine mapping problem. We showed in simulated data that it outperforms its stepwise counterpart and other variable selection strategies such as the lasso. We applied our approach to understand the association of two immune-mediated diseases to a region on chromosome 10p15. We identified a model for multiple sclerosis containing two variants, neither of which was found through a stepwise search, and functionally linked both of these to the neighbouring candidate gene, IL2RA, in independent data. Our approach can be used to aid fine mapping of other disease-associated regions, which is critical for design of functional follow-up studies required to understand the mechanisms through which genetic variants influence disease.