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Nature Research, Nature Communications, 1(8), 2017

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms16015

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Large-scale GWAS identifies multiple loci for hand grip strength providing biological insights into muscular fitness

Journal article published in 2017 by Nathalie van der Velde, Joyce B. J. van Meurs, Lisette C. P. G. M. de Groot, Cornelia M. van Duijn, Sara M. Willems, Daniel J. Wright ORCID, Felix R. Day ORCID, Katerina Trajanoska, Peter K. Joshi ORCID, John A. Morris ORCID, Amy M. Matteini, Fleur C. Garton, Willems Sm, Ayse Demirkan, Liwen Xu and other authors.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Abstract

AbstractHand grip strength is a widely used proxy of muscular fitness, a marker of frailty, and predictor of a range of morbidities and all-cause mortality. To investigate the genetic determinants of variation in grip strength, we perform a large-scale genetic discovery analysis in a combined sample of 195,180 individuals and identify 16 loci associated with grip strength (P<5 × 10−8) in combined analyses. A number of these loci contain genes implicated in structure and function of skeletal muscle fibres (ACTG1), neuronal maintenance and signal transduction (PEX14, TGFA, SYT1), or monogenic syndromes with involvement of psychomotor impairment (PEX14, LRPPRC and KANSL1). Mendelian randomization analyses are consistent with a causal effect of higher genetically predicted grip strength on lower fracture risk. In conclusion, our findings provide new biological insight into the mechanistic underpinnings of grip strength and the causal role of muscular strength in age-related morbidities and mortality.