Document Type
Article
Publication Date
8-18-2016
Identifier
DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2016.00376; PMCID: PMC4988977
Abstract
© 2016 Riordan, Bittel, Le Pichon, Gazzin, Tiribelli, Watchko, Wennberg and Shapiro.
Genetic-based susceptibility to bilirubin neurotoxicity and chronic bilirubin encephalopathy (kernicterus) is still poorly understood. Neonatal jaundice affects 60-80% of newborns, and considerable effort goes into preventing this relatively benign condition from escalating into the development of kernicterus making the incidence of this potentially devastating condition very rare in more developed countries. The current understanding of the genetic background of kernicterus is largely comprised of mutations related to alterations of bilirubin production, elimination, or both. Less is known about mutations that may predispose or protect against CNS bilirubin neurotoxicity. The lack of a monogenetic source for this risk of bilirubin neurotoxicity suggests that disease progression is dependent upon an overall decrease in the functionality of one or more essential genetically controlled metabolic pathways. In other words, a "load" is placed on key pathways in the form of multiple genetic variants that combine to create a vulnerable phenotype. The idea of epistatic interactions creating a pathway genetic load (PGL) that affects the response to a specific insult has been previously reported as a PGL score. We hypothesize that the PGL score can be used to investigate whether increased susceptibility to bilirubin-induced CNS damage in neonates is due to a mutational load being placed on key genetic pathways important to the central nervous system's response to bilirubin neurotoxicity. We propose a modification of the PGL score method that replaces the use of a canonical pathway with custom gene lists organized into three tiers with descending levels of evidence combined with the utilization of single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) causality prediction methods. The PGL score has the potential to explain the genetic background of complex bilirubin induced neurological disorders (BIND) such as kernicterus and could be the key to understanding ranges of outcome severity in complex diseases. We anticipate that this method could be useful for improving the care of jaundiced newborns through its use as an at-risk screen. Importantly, this method would also be useful in uncovering basic knowledge about this and other polygenetic diseases whose genetic source is difficult to discern through traditional means such as a genome-wide association study.
Journal Title
Frontiers in Neuroscience
Keywords
Bilirubin, Bilirubin encephalopathy, GWAS, Kernicterus, Pathway genetic load score
Recommended Citation
Riordan SM, Bittel DC, Le Pichon JB, et al. A Hypothesis for Using Pathway Genetic Load Analysis for Understanding Complex Outcomes in Bilirubin Encephalopathy. Front Neurosci. 2016;10:376. Published 2016 Aug 18. doi:10.3389/fnins.2016.00376
Included in
Congenital, Hereditary, and Neonatal Diseases and Abnormalities Commons, Medical Genetics Commons, Neurology Commons, Pediatrics Commons
Comments
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
Publisher's Link: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnins.2016.00376/full