Publications by authors named "Charles C Chung"

Vertical transmission of () become a globalized health problem accounting for 22% of new cases of Chagas disease (CD). Congenital infection is now considered the main route of CD spread in non-endemic countries where no routine disease testing of pregnant women is implemented. The main mechanisms that lead to fetal infection by remain poorly understood.

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  • * The study analyzed data from over 10,000 NHL cases and used advanced statistical methods to find 17 significant genetic loci linked to NHL subtypes, including a new one at HHEX.
  • * Results show that while there is some shared genetic heritability among NHL subtypes, each subtype has unique genetic characteristics, with varying degrees of genetic correlation between them.
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Expression QTL (eQTL) analyses have suggested many genes mediating genome-wide association study (GWAS) signals but most GWAS signals still lack compelling explanatory genes. We have leveraged an adipose-specific gene regulatory network to infer expression regulator activities and phenotypic master regulators (MRs), which were used to detect activity QTLs (aQTLs) at cardiometabolic trait GWAS loci. Regulator activities were inferred with the VIPER algorithm that integrates enrichment of expected expression changes among a regulator's target genes with confidence in their regulator-target network interactions and target overlap between different regulators (i.

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  • This study looked at how certain genes that control iron in the body might be linked to a type of cancer called pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC).
  • Researchers analyzed data from a large group of people, both those with PDAC and healthy individuals, to see if genetics played a role.
  • They found that specific genes related to iron regulation were more common in people with PDAC, suggesting that how our bodies handle iron could affect the risk of this cancer.
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Purpose: Mutations in hereditary breast cancer genes play an important role in the risk for cancer.

Methods: Cancer susceptibility genes were sequenced in 664 unselected breast cancer cases from Guatemala. Variants were annotated with ClinVar and VarSome.

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  • Researchers identified 25 genes linked to pancreatic cancer risk in Europeans, revealing 14 new candidate genes at 11 novel loci and 11 genes at six known risk loci.
  • The study used transcriptome-wide association methods, combining genetic data from 9,040 cancer cases and 12,496 controls with gene expression models from healthy pancreatic tissue.
  • Findings suggest potential new targets for understanding pancreatic cancer genetics and urge further exploration of these identified genes.
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We investigated whether genetic susceptibility to tuberculosis (TB) influences lung adenocarcinoma development among never-smokers using TB genome-wide association study (GWAS) results within the Female Lung Cancer Consortium in Asia. Pathway analysis with the adaptive rank truncated product method was used to assess the association between a TB-related gene-set and lung adenocarcinoma using GWAS data from 5512 lung adenocarcinoma cases and 6277 controls. The gene-set consisted of 31 genes containing known/suggestive associations with genetic variants from previous TB-GWAS.

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Waldenström macroglobulinemia (WM)/lymphoplasmacytic lymphoma (LPL) is a rare, chronic B-cell lymphoma with high heritability. We conduct a two-stage genome-wide association study of WM/LPL in 530 unrelated cases and 4362 controls of European ancestry and identify two high-risk loci associated with WM/LPL at 6p25.3 (rs116446171, near EXOC2 and IRF4; OR = 21.

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In 2020, 146,063 deaths due to pancreatic cancer are estimated to occur in Europe and the United States combined. To identify common susceptibility alleles, we performed the largest pancreatic cancer GWAS to date, including 9040 patients and 12,496 controls of European ancestry from the Pancreatic Cancer Cohort Consortium (PanScan) and the Pancreatic Cancer Case-Control Consortium (PanC4). Here, we find significant evidence of a novel association at rs78417682 (7p12/TNS3, P = 4.

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Objective: To elucidate the genetic architecture of gene expression in pancreatic tissues.

Design: We performed expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) analysis in histologically normal pancreatic tissue samples (n=95) using RNA sequencing and the corresponding 1000 genomes imputed germline genotypes. Data from pancreatic tumour-derived tissue samples (n=115) from The Cancer Genome Atlas were included for comparison.

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The international Testicular Cancer Consortium (TECAC) combined five published genome-wide association studies of testicular germ cell tumor (TGCT; 3,558 cases and 13,970 controls) to identify new susceptibility loci. We conducted a fixed-effects meta-analysis, including, to our knowledge, the first analysis of the X chromosome. Eight new loci mapping to 2q14.

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Background: Gallbladder cancer is highly lethal, with notable differences in incidence by geography and ethnic background. The aim of this study was to identify common genetic susceptibility alleles for gallbladder cancer.

Methods: In this case-control genome-wide association study (GWAS), we did a genome-wide scan of gallbladder cancer cases and hospital visitor controls, both of Indian descent, followed by imputation across the genome.

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To evaluate associations by EGFR mutation status for lung adenocarcinoma risk among never-smoking Asian women, we conducted a meta-analysis of 11 loci previously identified in genome-wide association studies (GWAS). Genotyping in an additional 10,780 never-smoking cases and 10,938 never-smoking controls from Asia confirmed associations with eight known single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Two new signals were observed at genome-wide significance (P < 5 × 10-8), namely, rs7216064 (17q24.

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  • Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have pinpointed 13 chromosomal locations linked to pancreatic cancer susceptibility in European individuals, and additional research has uncovered three new risk variants through extensive genetic analysis.
  • The new single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) identified are rs2816938, rs10094872, and rs35226131, associated with increased or decreased risk of pancreatic cancer, with significant odds ratios and p-values.
  • Investigation of gene expression from these risk loci in both normal and cancerous pancreatic tissue revealed a significant reduction of NR5A2 expression in tumors, suggesting a potential target for further research into pancreatic cancer biology.
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The Cancer Genetic Markers of Susceptibility genome-wide association study (GWAS) originally identified a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) rs11249433 at 1p11.2 associated with breast cancer risk. To fine-map this locus, we genotyped 92 SNPs in a 900kb region (120,505,799-121,481,132) flanking rs11249433 in 45,276 breast cancer cases and 48,998 controls of European, Asian and African ancestry from 50 studies in the Breast Cancer Association Consortium.

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Objectives: Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of lung cancer have identified regions of common genetic variation with lung cancer risk in Europeans who smoke and never-smoking Asian women. This study aimed to conduct a GWAS in African Americans, who have higher rates of lung cancer despite smoking fewer cigarettes per day when compared with Caucasians. This population provides a different genetic architecture based on underlying African ancestry allowing the identification of new regions and exploration of known regions for finer mapping.

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To investigate large structural clonal mosaicism of chromosome X, we analysed the SNP microarray intensity data of 38,303 women from cancer genome-wide association studies (20,878 cases and 17,425 controls) and detected 124 mosaic X events >2 Mb in 97 (0.25%) women. Here we show rates for X-chromosome mosaicism are four times higher than mean autosomal rates; X mosaic events more often include the entire chromosome and participants with X events more likely harbour autosomal mosaic events.

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  • Evidence from previous studies hints that longer telomeres in blood cells could raise the risk of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), but these studies may have biases and miss key timing for measuring telomere length.
  • Researchers analyzed data from over 10,000 NHL cases and 9,562 controls, using a genetic risk score based on telomere-related gene variants to estimate telomere lengths.
  • Their findings showed a notable association between longer telomeres and NHL risk, especially for chronic lymphocytic leukemia/small lymphocytic lymphoma, suggesting genetic factors tied to longer telomeres could increase the risk of developing NHL.
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  • Previous studies found six genetic loci linked to lung cancer risk in Asian women who don't smoke.
  • Researchers analyzed data from four GWAS, involving nearly 13,000 cases and controls, and added more samples for validation.
  • They discovered three new significant loci associated with lung cancer risk, highlighting the need for further investigation into their biological roles.
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Candidate gene and genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified 15 independent genomic regions associated with bladder cancer risk. In search for additional susceptibility variants, we followed up on four promising single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) that had not achieved genome-wide significance in 6911 cases and 11 814 controls (rs6104690, rs4510656, rs5003154 and rs4907479, P < 1 × 10(-6)), using additional data from existing GWAS datasets and targeted genotyping for studies that did not have GWAS data. In a combined analysis, which included data on up to 15 058 cases and 286 270 controls, two SNPs achieved genome-wide statistical significance: rs6104690 in a gene desert at 20p12.

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Objective: Although several genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of non-cardia gastric cancer have been published, more novel association signals could be exploited by combining individual studies together, which will further elucidate the genetic susceptibility of non-cardia gastric cancer.

Design: We conducted a meta-analysis of two published Chinese GWAS studies (2031 non-cardia gastric cancer cases and 4970 cancer-free controls) and followed by genotyping of additional 3564 cases and 4637 controls in two stages.

Results: The overall meta-analysis revealed two new association signals.

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Background: Studies of related individuals have consistently demonstrated notable familial aggregation of cancer. We aim to estimate the heritability and genetic correlation attributable to the additive effects of common single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) for cancer at 13 anatomical sites.

Methods: Between 2007 and 2014, the US National Cancer Institute has generated data from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) for 49 492 cancer case patients and 34 131 control patients.

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Interpretation of biological mechanisms underlying genetic risk associations for prostate cancer is complicated by the relatively large number of risk variants (n = 100) and the thousands of surrogate SNPs in linkage disequilibrium. Here, we combined three distinct approaches: multiethnic fine-mapping, putative functional annotation (based upon epigenetic data and genome-encoded features), and expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) analyses, in an attempt to reduce this complexity. We examined 67 risk regions using genotyping and imputation-based fine-mapping in populations of European (cases/controls: 8600/6946), African (cases/controls: 5327/5136), Japanese (cases/controls: 2563/4391) and Latino (cases/controls: 1034/1046) ancestry.

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