Atlas of glomerular disease-specific genetic effects on blood transcriptome

The study analyzed genetic and transcriptomic data from 1,822 patients with primary glomerulonephritis (kidney filter inflammation) from the CureGN cohort study. Researchers examined five disease types: IgA nephropathy, IgA vasculitis, focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, membranous nephropathy, and minimal change disease. They identified 16,068 genes affected by genetic variants, with approximately 90 percent of these genetic signals shared between multiple disease types and only 5-10 percent specific to individual diseases. The analysis showed that approximately 80 percent of shared genes between diseases have the same causal variants. The research also identified genetic loci modified by age and disease severity and nominated new candidate genes for each type of glomerulonephritis.