Mapping Genetic Variants Associated with Beta-adrenergic Responses in Inbred Mice

β-blockers and β-agonists are primarily used to treat cardiovascular diseases. Inter-individual variability in response to both drug classes is well recognized, yet the identity and relative contribution of the genetic players involved are poorly understood. This work is the first genome-wide association study (GWAS) addressing the values and susceptibility of cardiovascular-related traits to a selective β(1)-blocker, Atenolol (ate), and a β-agonist, Isoproterenol (iso). The phenotypic dataset consisted of 27 highly heritable traits, each measured across 22 inbred mouse strains and four pharmacological conditions. The genotypic panel comprised 79922 informative SNPs of the mouse HapMap resource. Associations were mapped by Efficient Mixed Model Association (EMMA), a method that corrects for the population structure and genetic relatedness of the various strains. A total of 205 separate genome-wide scans were analyzed. The most significant hits include three candidate loci related to cardiac and body weight, three loci for electrocardiographic (ECG) values, two loci for the susceptibility of atrial weight index to iso, four loci for the susceptibility of systolic blood pressure (SBP) to perturbations of the β-adrenergic system, and one locus for the responsiveness of QTc (p<10(-8)). An additional 60 loci were suggestive for one or the other of the 27 traits, while 46 others were suggestive for one or the other drug effects (p<10(-6)). Most hits tagged unexpected regions, yet at least two loci for the susceptibility of SBP to β-adrenergic drugs pointed at members of the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid axis. Loci for cardiac-related traits were preferentially enriched in genes expressed in the heart, while 23% of the testable loci were replicated with datasets of the Mouse Phenome Database (MPD). Altogether these data and validation tests indicate that the mapped loci are relevant to the traits and responses studied.