A genome-wide association study of alcohol dependence

摘要: Excessive alcohol consumption is one of the leading causes preventable death in United States. Approximately 14% those who use meet criteria during their lifetime for dependence, which characterized by tolerance, withdrawal, inability to stop drinking, and continued drinking despite serious psychological or physiological problems. We explored genetic influences on dependence among 1,897 European-American African-American subjects with compared 1,932 unrelated, alcohol-exposed, nondependent controls. Constitutional DNA each subject was genotyped using Illumina 1M beadchip. Fifteen SNPs yielded P < 10−5, but two independent replication series, no SNP passed a threshold 0.05. Candidate gene GABRA2, encodes GABA receptor α2 subunit, evaluated independently. Five at GABRA2 nominal (uncorrected) 0.05, odds ratios between 1.11 1.16. Further dissection alcoholism phenotype, disentangle influence comorbid substance-use disorders, will be next step identifying variants associated dependence.