Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Article
  • Published:

Identification of common genetic risk variants for autism spectrum disorder

Abstract

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a highly heritable and heterogeneous group of neurodevelopmental phenotypes diagnosed in more than 1% of children. Common genetic variants contribute substantially to ASD susceptibility, but to date no individual variants have been robustly associated with ASD. With a marked sample-size increase from a unique Danish population resource, we report a genome-wide association meta-analysis of 18,381 individuals with ASD and 27,969 controls that identified five genome-wide-significant loci. Leveraging GWAS results from three phenotypes with significantly overlapping genetic architectures (schizophrenia, major depression, and educational attainment), we identified seven additional loci shared with other traits at equally strict significance levels. Dissecting the polygenic architecture, we found both quantitative and qualitative polygenic heterogeneity across ASD subtypes. These results highlight biological insights, particularly relating to neuronal function and corticogenesis, and establish that GWAS performed at scale will be much more productive in the near term in ASD.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Manhattan plots.
Fig. 2: Genetic correlation with other traits.
Fig. 3: Profiling PRS load across distinct ASD subgroups.
Fig. 4: Decile plots (OR) by PRS within each decile for 13,076 cases and 22,664 controls.
Fig. 5: Chromatin interactions identify putative target genes of ASD loci.

Similar content being viewed by others

Data availability

The summary statistics are available for download the iPSYCH and at the PGC download sites (see URLs). For access to genotype data from the PGC samples and the iPSYCH sample, researchers should contact the lead principal investigators M.J.D. and A.D.B. for PGC-ASD and iPSYCH-ASD, respectively.

References

  1. De Rubeis, S. et al. Synaptic, transcriptional and chromatin genes disrupted in autism. Nature 515, 209–215 (2014).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  2. Gaugler, T. et al. Most genetic risk for autism resides with common variation. Nat. Genet. 46, 881–885 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  3. Iossifov, I. et al. The contribution of de novo coding mutations to autism spectrum disorder. Nature 515, 216–221 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  4. Krumm, N. et al. Excess of rare, inherited truncating mutations in autism. Nat. Genet. 47, 582–588 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  5. Autism Spectrum Disorders Working Group of The Psychiatric Genomics Consortium. Meta-analysis of GWAS of over 16,000 individuals with autism spectrum disorder highlights a novel locus at 10q24.32 and a significant overlap with schizophrenia. Mol. Autism 8, 21 (2017).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Ma, D. et al. A genome-wide association study of autism reveals a common novel risk locus at 5p14.1. Ann. Hum. Genet. 73, 263–273 (2009).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  7. Devlin, B., Melhem, N. & Roeder, K. Do common variants play a role in risk for autism? Evidence and theoretical musings. Brain Res. 1380, 78–84 (2011).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Anney, R. et al. Individual common variants exert weak effects on the risk for autism spectrum disorders. Hum. Mol. Genet. 21, 4781–4792 (2012).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  9. Turley, P. et al. Multi-trait analysis of genome-wide association summary statistics using MTAG. Nat. Genet. 50, 229–237 (2018).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  10. Pedersen, C. B. et al. The iPSYCH2012 case-cohort sample: new directions for unravelling genetic and environmental architectures of severe mental disorders. Mol. Psychiatry 23, 6–14 (2018).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  11. Lauritsen, M. B. et al. Validity of childhood autism in the Danish Psychiatric Central Register: findings from a cohort sample born 1990–1999. J. Autism Dev. Disord. 40, 139–148 (2010).

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  12. Mors, O., Perto, G. P. & Mortensen, P. B. The Danish Psychiatric Central Research Register. Scand. J. Public Health 39 (Suppl.), 54–57 (2011).

  13. Hollegaard, M. V. et al. Robustness of genome-wide scanning using archived dried blood spot samples as a DNA source. BMC Genet. 12, 58 (2011).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  14. Hollegaard, M. V. et al. Genome-wide scans using archived neonatal dried blood spot samples. BMC Genomics 10, 297 (2009).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  15. Schizophrenia Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium. Biological insights from 108 schizophrenia-associated genetic loci. Nature 511, 421–427 (2014).

    PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  16. Cross-Disorder Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium. et al. Genetic relationship between five psychiatric disorders estimated from genome-wide SNPs. Nat. Genet. 45, 984–994 (2013).

    PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  17. Gratten, J., Wray, N. R., Keller, M. C. & Visscher, P. M. Large-scale genomics unveils the genetic architecture of psychiatric disorders. Nat. Neurosci. 17, 782–790 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  18. Hansen, S. N., Overgaard, M., Andersen, P. K. & Parner, E. T. Estimating a population cumulative incidence under calendar time trends. BMC Med. Res. Methodol. 17, 7 (2017).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  19. Bulik-Sullivan, B. K. et al. LD Score regression distinguishes confounding from polygenicity in genome-wide association studies. Nat. Genet. 47, 291–295 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  20. Zheng, J. et al. LD Hub: a centralized database and web interface to perform LD score regression that maximizes the potential of summary level GWAS data for SNP heritability and genetic correlation analysis. Bioinformatics 33, 272–279 (2017).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. Okbay, A. et al. Genome-wide association study identifies 74 loci associated with educational attainment. Nature 533, 539–542 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  22. Bulik-Sullivan, B. et al. An atlas of genetic correlations across human diseases and traits. Nat. Genet. 47, 1236–1241 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  23. Okbay, A. et al. Genetic variants associated with subjective well-being, depressive symptoms, and neuroticism identified through genome-wide analyses. Nat. Genet. 48, 624–633 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  24. Clarke, T.-K. et al. Common polygenic risk for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is associated with cognitive ability in the general population. Mol. Psychiatry 21, 419–425 (2016).

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  25. Wray, N. R. et al. Genome-wide association analyses identify 44 risk variants and refine the genetic architecture of major depression. Nat. Genet. 50, 668–681 (2018).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  26. Demontis, D. et al. Discovery of the first genome-wide significant risk loci for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Nat. Genet. 51, 63–75 (2019).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  27. St Pourcain, B. et al. ASD and schizophrenia show distinct developmental profiles in common genetic overlap with population-based social communication difficulties. Mol. Psychiatry 23, 263–270 (2018).

    Google Scholar 

  28. Wood, A. R. et al. Defining the role of common variation in the genomic and biological architecture of adult human height. Nat. Genet. 46, 1173–1186 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  29. Locke, A. E. et al. Genetic studies of body mass index yield new insights for obesity biology. Nature 518, 197–206 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  30. de Leeuw, C. A., Mooij, J. M., Heskes, T. & Posthuma, D. MAGMA: generalized gene-set analysis of GWAS data. PLoS Comput. Biol. 11, e1004219 (2015).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  31. Parikshak, N. N. et al. Integrative functional genomic analyses implicate specific molecular pathways and circuits in autism. Cell 155, 1008–1021 (2013).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  32. Samocha, K. E. et al. A framework for the interpretation of de novo mutation in human disease. Nat. Genet. 46, 944–950 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  33. Lek, M. et al. Analysis of protein-coding genetic variation in 60,706 humans. Nature 536, 285–291 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  34. Pardiñas, A. F. et al. Common schizophrenia alleles are enriched in mutation-intolerant genes and in regions under strong background selection. Nat. Genet. 50, 381–389 (2018).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  35. Sanders, S. J. et al. Insights into autism spectrum disorder genomic architecture and biology from 71 risk loci. Neuron 87, 1215–1233 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  36. SPARK Consortium. SPARK: a US cohort of 50,000 families to accelerate autism research. Neuron 97, 488–493 (2018).

    Google Scholar 

  37. Ashburner, M. et al. Gene ontology: tool for the unification of biology. Nat. Genet. 25, 25–29 (2000).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  38. Gene Ontology Consortium. Gene Ontology Consortium: going forward. Nucleic Acids Res. 43, D1049–D1056 (2015).

    Google Scholar 

  39. Subramanian, A. et al. Gene set enrichment analysis: a knowledge-based approach for interpreting genome-wide expression profiles. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 102, 15545–15550 (2005).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  40. Yang, J., Lee, S. H., Goddard, M. E. & Visscher, P. M. GCTA: a tool for genome-wide complex trait analysis. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 88, 76–82 (2011).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  41. Sniekers, S. et al. Genome-wide association meta-analysis of 78,308 individuals identifies new loci and genes influencing human intelligence. Nat. Genet. 49, 1107–1112 (2017).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  42. Jones, S. E. et al. Genome-wide association analyses in 128,266 individuals identifies new morningness and sleep duration loci. PLoS Genet. 12, e1006125 (2016).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  43. Robinson, E. B. et al. Genetic risk for autism spectrum disorders and neuropsychiatric variation in the general population. Nat. Genet. 48, 552–555 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  44. Weiner, D. J. et al. Polygenic transmission disequilibrium confirms that common and rare variation act additively to create risk for autism spectrum disorders. Nat. Genet. 49, 978–985 (2017).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  45. Finucane, H. K. et al. Partitioning heritability by functional annotation using genome-wide association summary statistics. Nat. Genet. 47, 1228–1235 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  46. Shlyueva, D., Stampfel, G. & Stark, A. Transcriptional enhancers: from properties to genome-wide predictions. Nat. Rev. Genet. 15, 272–286 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  47. Won, H. et al. Chromosome conformation elucidates regulatory relationships in developing human brain. Nature 538, 523–527 (2016).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  48. Hormozdiari, F., Kostem, E., Kang, E. Y., Pasaniuc, B. & Eskin, E. Identifying causal variants at loci with multiple signals of association. Genetics 198, 497–508 (2014).

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  49. Kosmicki, J. A. et al. Refining the role of de novo protein-truncating variants in neurodevelopmental disorders by using population reference samples. Nat. Genet. 49, 504–510 (2017).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  50. Robinson, E. B. et al. Autism spectrum disorder severity reflects the average contribution of de novo and familial influences. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 111, 15161–15165 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  51. Reichenberg, A. et al. Discontinuity in the genetic and environmental causes of the intellectual disability spectrum. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 113, 1098–1103 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  52. Polderman, T. J. C. et al. Meta-analysis of the heritability of human traits based on fifty years of twin studies. Nat. Genet. 47, 702–709 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  53. Sadakata, T. et al. Autistic-like phenotypes in Cadps2-knockout mice and aberrant CADPS2 splicing in autistic patients. J. Clin. Invest. 117, 931–943 (2007).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  54. Parikshak, N. N. et al. Genome-wide changes in lncRNA, splicing, and regional gene expression patterns in autism. Nature 540, 423–427 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  55. Davies, G. et al. Genome-wide association study of cognitive functions and educational attainment in UK Biobank (N=112 151). Mol. Psychiatry 21, 758–767 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  56. Deary, V. et al. Genetic contributions to self-reported tiredness. Mol. Psychiatry 23, 609–620 (2017).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  57. Hyde, C. L. et al. Identification of 15 genetic loci associated with risk of major depression in individuals of European descent. Nat. Genet. 48, 1031–1036 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  58. Thorleifsson, G. et al. Genome-wide association yields new sequence variants at seven loci that associate with measures of obesity. Nat. Genet. 41, 18–24 (2009).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  59. Willer, C. J. et al. Six new loci associated with body mass index highlight a neuronal influence on body weight regulation. Nat. Genet. 41, 25–34 (2009).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  60. Speliotes, E. K. et al. Association analyses of 249,796 individuals reveal 18 new loci associated with body mass index. Nat. Genet. 42, 937–948 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  61. Berndt, S. I. et al. Genome-wide meta-analysis identifies 11 new loci for anthropometric traits and provides insights into genetic architecture. Nat. Genet. 45, 501–512 (2013).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  62. Hashimoto, T., Yamada, M., Maekawa, S., Nakashima, T. & Miyata, S. IgLON cell adhesion molecule Kilon is a crucial modulator for synapse number in hippocampal neurons. Brain Res. 1224, 1–11 (2008).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  63. Hashimoto, T., Maekawa, S. & Miyata, S. IgLON cell adhesion molecules regulate synaptogenesis in hippocampal neurons. Cell Biochem. Funct. 27, 496–498 (2009).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  64. Pischedda, F. et al. A cell surface biotinylation assay to reveal membrane-associated neuronal cues: Negr1 regulates dendritic arborization. Mol. Cell. Proteomics 13, 733–748 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  65. Pischedda, F. & Piccoli, G. The IgLON family member Negr1 promotes neuronal arborization acting as soluble factor via FGFR2. Front. Mol. Neurosci. 8, 89 (2016).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  66. Marg, A. et al. Neurotractin, a novel neurite outgrowth-promoting Ig-like protein that interacts with CEPU-1 and LAMP. J. Cell Biol. 145, 865–876 (1999).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  67. Funatsu, N. et al. Characterization of a novel rat brain glycosylphosphatidylinositol-anchored protein (Kilon), a member of the IgLON cell adhesion molecule family. J. Biol. Chem. 274, 8224–8230 (1999).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  68. Sanz, R., Ferraro, G. B. & Fournier, A. E. IgLON cell adhesion molecules are shed from the cell surface of cortical neurons to promote neuronal growth. J. Biol. Chem. 290, 4330–4342 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  69. Schäfer, M., Bräuer, A. U., Savaskan, N. E., Rathjen, F. G. & Brümmendorf, T. Neurotractin/kilon promotes neurite outgrowth and is expressed on reactive astrocytes after entorhinal cortex lesion. Mol. Cell. Neurosci. 29, 580–590 (2005).

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  70. Lee, A. W. S. et al. Functional inactivation of the genome-wide association study obesity gene neuronal growth regulator 1 in mice causes a body mass phenotype. PLoS One 7, e41537 (2012).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  71. Doan, R. N. et al. Mutations in human accelerated regions disrupt cognition and social behavior. Cell 167, 341–354.e12 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  72. Vuong, J. K. et al. PTBP1 and PTBP2 serve both specific and redundant functions in neuronal pre-mRNA splicing. Cell Rep. 17, 2766–2775 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  73. Boutz, P. L. et al. A post-transcriptional regulatory switch in polypyrimidine tract-binding proteins reprograms alternative splicing in developing neurons. Genes Dev. 21, 1636–1652 (2007).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  74. Makeyev, E. V., Zhang, J., Carrasco, M. A. & Maniatis, T. The microRNA miR-124 promotes neuronal differentiation by triggering brain-specific alternative pre-mRNA splicing. Mol. Cell 27, 435–448 (2007).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  75. Spellman, R., Llorian, M. & Smith, C. W. J. Crossregulation and functional redundancy between the splicing regulator PTB and its paralogs nPTB and ROD1. Mol. Cell 27, 420–434 (2007).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  76. Zheng, S. et al. Psd-95 is post-transcriptionally repressed during early neural development by PTBP1 and PTBP2. Nat. Neurosci. 15, 381–388 (2012).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  77. Li, Q. S., Parrado, A. R., Samtani, M. N. & Narayan, V. A. & Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative. Variations in the fra10ac1 fragile site and 15q21 are associated with cerebrospinal fluid aβ1–42 level. PLoS One 10, e0134000 (2015).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  78. Wassenberg, J. J. & Martin, T. F. J. Role of CAPS in dense-core vesicle exocytosis. Ann. NY Acad. Sci. 971, 201–209 (2002).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  79. Shinoda, Y. et al. CAPS1 stabilizes the state of readily releasable synaptic vesicles to fusion competence at CA3-CA1 synapses in adult hippocampus. Sci. Rep. 6, 31540 (2016).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  80. Farina, M. et al. Caps-1 promotes fusion competence of stationary dense-core vesicles in presynaptic terminals of mammalian neurons. eLife 4, e05438 (2015).

    PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  81. Rietveld, C. A. et al. Common genetic variants associated with cognitive performance identified using the proxy-phenotype method. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 111, 13790–13794 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  82. Sun, J. et al. Ube3a regulates synaptic plasticity and learning and memory by controlling sk2 channel endocytosis. Cell Rep. 12, 449–461 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  83. Cook, E. H. Jr. et al. Autism or atypical autism in maternally but not paternally derived proximal 15q duplication. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 60, 928–934 (1997).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  84. Lin, M. T., Luján, R., Watanabe, M., Adelman, J. P. & Maylie, J. SK2 channel plasticity contributes to LTP at Schaffer collateral-CA1 synapses. Nat. Neurosci. 11, 170–177 (2008).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  85. Hammond, R. S. et al. Small-conductance Ca2+-activated K+ channel type 2 (SK2) modulates hippocampal learning, memory, and synaptic plasticity. J. Neurosci. 26, 1844–1853 (2006).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  86. Murthy, S. R. K. et al. Small-conductance Ca2+-activated potassium type 2 channels regulate the formation of contextual fear memory. PLoS One 10, e0127264 (2015).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  87. Fakira, A. K., Portugal, G. S., Carusillo, B., Melyan, Z. & Morón, J. A. Increased small conductance calcium-activated potassium type 2 channel-mediated negative feedback on N-methyl-d-aspartate receptors impairs synaptic plasticity following context-dependent sensitization to morphine. Biol. Psychiatry 75, 105–114 (2014).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  88. Goes, F. S. et al. Genome-wide association study of schizophrenia in Ashkenazi Jews. Am. J. Med. Genet. B. Neuropsychiatr. Genet. 168, 649–659 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  89. Mas-Y-Mas, S. et al. The human mixed lineage leukemia 5 (mll5), a sequentially and structurally divergent set domain-containing protein with no intrinsic catalytic activity. PLoS One 11, e0165139 (2016).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  90. Sun, X.-J. et al. Genome-wide survey and developmental expression mapping of zebrafish SET domain-containing genes. PLoS One 3, e1499 (2008).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  91. Ali, M. et al. Molecular basis for chromatin binding and regulation of MLL5. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 110, 11296–11301 (2013).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  92. Lemak, A. et al. Solution NMR structure and histone binding of the PHD domain of human MLL5. PLoS One 8, e77020 (2013).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  93. Zhang, X., Novera, W., Zhang, Y. & Deng, L.-W. MLL5 (KMT2E): structure, function, and clinical relevance. Cell. Mol. Life Sci. 74, 2333–2344 (2017).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  94. Anney, R. et al. A genome-wide scan for common alleles affecting risk for autism. Hum. Mol. Genet. 19, 4072–4082 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  95. Torrico, B. et al. Lack of replication of previous autism spectrum disorder GWAS hits in European populations. Autism Res. 10, 202–211 (2017).

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  96. Feijs, K. L. H., Forst, A. H., Verheugd, P. & Lüscher, B. Macrodomain-containing proteins: regulating new intracellular functions of mono(ADP-ribosyl)ation. Nat. Rev. Mol. Cell Biol. 14, 443–451 (2013).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  97. Børglum, A. D. et al. Genome-wide study of association and interaction with maternal cytomegalovirus infection suggests new schizophrenia loci. Mol. Psychiatry 19, 325–333 (2014).

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  98. Illumina, Inc. Illumina Gencall Data Analysis Software. (Illumina, Inc., San Diego, 2005).

    Google Scholar 

  99. Korn, J. M. et al. Integrated genotype calling and association analysis of SNPs, common copy number polymorphisms and rare CNVs. Nat. Genet. 40, 1253–1260 (2008).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  100. Goldstein, J. I. et al. zCall: a rare variant caller for array-based genotyping: genetics and population analysis. Bioinformatics 28, 2543–2545 (2012).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  101. Lajonchere, C. M., AGRE Consortium. Changing the landscape of autism research: the autism genetic resource exchange. Neuron 68, 187–191 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  102. Geschwind, D. H. et al. The autism genetic resource exchange: a resource for the study of autism and related neuropsychiatric conditions. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 69, 463–466 (2001).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  103. Gauthier, J. et al. Autism spectrum disorders associated with X chromosome markers in French-Canadian males. Mol. Psychiatry 11, 206–213 (2006).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  104. Fischbach, G. D. & Lord, C. The Simons Simplex Collection: a resource for identification of autism genetic risk factors. Neuron 68, 192–195 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  105. Chaste, P. et al. A genome-wide association study of autism using the Simons Simplex Collection: does reducing phenotypic heterogeneity in autism increase genetic homogeneity? Biol. Psychiatry 77, 775–784 (2015).

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  106. Delaneau, O., Marchini, J. & Zagury, J.-F. A linear complexity phasing method for thousands of genomes. Nat. Methods 9, 179–181 (2011).

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  107. Howie, B., Fuchsberger, C., Stephens, M., Marchini, J. & Abecasis, G. R. Fast and accurate genotype imputation in genome-wide association studies through pre-phasing. Nat. Genet. 44, 955–959 (2012).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  108. Howie, B. N., Donnelly, P. & Marchini, J. A flexible and accurate genotype imputation method for the next generation of genome-wide association studies. PLoS Genet. 5, e1000529 (2009).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  109. 1000 Genomes Project Consortium. et al. A global reference for human genetic variation. Nature 526, 68–74 (2015).

    Google Scholar 

  110. Price, A. L. et al. Long-range LD can confound genome scans in admixed populations. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 83, 132–135 (2008). author reply 135–139.

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  111. Chang, C. C. et al. Second-generation plink: rising to the challenge of larger and richer datasets. GigaScience 4, 7 (2015).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  112. Patterson, N., Price, A. L. & Reich, D. Population structure and eigenanalysis. PLoS Genet. 2, e190 (2006).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  113. Price, A. L. et al. Principal components analysis corrects for stratification in genome-wide association studies. Nat. Genet. 38, 904–909 (2006).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  114. Willer, C. J., Li, Y. & Abecasis, G. R. METAL: fast and efficient meta-analysis of genomewide association scans. Bioinformatics 26, 2190–2191 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  115. Begum, F., Ghosh, D., Tseng, G. C. & Feingold, E. Comprehensive literature review and statistical considerations for GWAS meta-analysis. Nucleic Acids Res. 40, 3777–3784 (2012).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  116. Lee, S. H., Wray, N. R., Goddard, M. E. & Visscher, P. M. Estimating missing heritability for disease from genome-wide association studies. Am. J. Hum. Genet. 88, 294–305 (2011).

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  117. Yang, J. et al. Common SNPs explain a large proportion of the heritability for human height. Nat. Genet. 42, 565–569 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  118. 1000 Genomes Project Consortium. et al. An integrated map of genetic variation from 1,092 human genomes. Nature 491, 56–65 (2012).

    Google Scholar 

  119. Altshuler, D. M. et al. Integrating common and rare genetic variation in diverse human populations. Nature 467, 52–58 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  120. Kundaje, A. et al. Integrative analysis of 111 reference human epigenomes. Nature 518, 317–330 (2015).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  121. McLean, C. Y. et al. GREAT improves functional interpretation of cis-regulatory regions. Nat. Biotechnol. 28, 495–501 (2010).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  122. Kang, H. J. et al. Spatio-temporal transcriptome of the human brain. Nature 478, 483–489 (2011).

    CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The iPSYCH project is funded by the Lundbeck Foundation (R102-A9118 and R155-2014-1724) and the universities and university hospitals of Aarhus and Copenhagen. Genotyping of iPSYCH and PGC samples was supported by grants from the Lundbeck Foundation, the Stanley Foundation, the Simons Foundation (SFARI 311789 to M.J.D.), and NIMH (5U01MH094432-02 to M.J.D.). The Danish National Biobank resource was supported by the Novo Nordisk Foundation. Data handling and analysis on the GenomeDK HPC facility was supported by NIMH (1U01MH109514-01 to M.C.O.D and A.D.B.). High-performance computer capacity for handling and statistical analysis of iPSYCH data on the GenomeDK HPC facility was provided by the Centre for Integrative Sequencing, iSEQ, Aarhus University, Denmark (grant to A.D.B.). S.D.R. and J.D.B. were supported by NIH grants MH097849 (to J.D.B.) and MH111661 (to J.D.B.), and by the Seaver Foundation (to S.D.R. and J.D.B.). J. Martine was supported by the Wellcome Trust (grant 106047). O.A.A. received funding from the Research Council of Norway (213694, 223273, 248980, and 248778), Stiftelsen KG Jebsen, and South-East Norway Health Authority. We thank the research participants and employees of 23andMe for making this work possible.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Consortia

Contributions

Analysis: J.G., S.R., T.D.A., M.M., R.K.W., H.W., J.P., S.A., F.B., J.H.C., C.C., K.D., S.D.R., B.D., S.D., M.E.H., S.H., D.P.H., H.H., L.K., J. Maller, J. Martin, A.R.M., M. Nyegaard, T.N., D.S.P., T.P., B.S.P., P.Q., J.R., E.B.R., K. Roeder, P.R., S. Sandin, F.K.S., S. Steinberg, P.F.S., P.T., G.B.W., X.X., D.H.G., B.M.N., M.J.D., A.D.B. J.G., B.M.N., M.J.D., and A.D.B. supervised and coordinated the analyses. Sample and/or data provider and processing: J.G., S.R., M.M., R.K.W., E.A., O.A.A., R.A., R.B., J.D.B., J.B.-G., M.B.-H., F.C., K.C., D.D., A.L.D., J.I.G., C.S.H., M.V.H., C.M.H., J.L.M., A.P., C.B.P., M.G.P., J.B.P., K. Rehnström, A.R., E.S., G.D.S., H.S., C.R.S., Autism Spectrum Disorder Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium, BUPGEN, Major Depressive Disorder Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium, 23andMe Research Team, K.S., D.M.H., O.M., P.B.M., B.M.N., M.J.D., and A.D.B. Core PI group: K.S., D.H.G., M. Nordentoft, D.M.H., T.W., O.M., P.B.M., B.M.N., M.J.D., and A.D.B. Core writing group: J.G., M.J.D., and A.D.B. Direction of study: M.J.D. and A.D.B.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Mark J. Daly or Anders D. Børglum.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

H.S., K.S., S. Steinberg, and G.B.W. are employees of deCODE genetics/Amgen. The 23andMe Research Team members are employed by 23andMe. D.H.G. is a scientific advisor for Ovid Therapeutic, Falcon Computing, and Axial Biotherapeutics. T.W. has acted as scientific advisor and lecturer for H. Lundbeck A/S.

Additional information

Publisher’s note: Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Text and Figures

Supplementary Note, Supplementary Tables 1–16 and Supplementary Figures 1–98

Reporting Summary

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Grove, J., Ripke, S., Als, T.D. et al. Identification of common genetic risk variants for autism spectrum disorder. Nat Genet 51, 431–444 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41588-019-0344-8

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41588-019-0344-8

This article is cited by

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing