The gene c11orf30/EMSY (EMSY), is known to have a hand in other allergy conditions, such as asthma and eczema. This new study from researchers at the University of British Columbia and Queens University associates the EMSY locus with a food allergy, suggesting that it might actually play a role in general allergic predisposition. The work was published earlier this week in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.
In this study, the researchers focused on peanut allergies and analyzed DNA from 850 individuals with a peanut allergy and approximately 1,000 individuals without a peanut allergy. They looked and scanned through 7.5 million markers across the DNA through a genome-wide association study (GWAS) in search for clues to which genes may contribute to the risk of developing food allergies. In addition, they also looked at six other genetic studies' data from other populations around the world. They found that EMSY was associated with an increased risk of both peanut allergy and food allergy, and five other gene locations are also suspected to be involved.
"Our team had previously published findings that a defect in the filaggrin gene can increase the risk of a child developing an allergy to peanuts," said co-first author Yuka Asai, M.D., an assistant professor at Queen's University. Yet, mutations in the filaggrin gene were only present in 20 percent of the allergic cases, she points out, which means that "this GWAS study was critical to shedding more light on the specific gene mechanisms at play."
"One of the hurdles in developing new treatments for food allergies is identifying the specific genes and pathways we need to target," said co-first author Aida Eslami, Ph.D., a postdoctoral fellow at The University of British Columbia. "These results suggest that EMSY could be a useful target for predicting and managing food allergy treatments in the future."
Image: Peanut leaves and freshly dug pods in Stuckey, South Carolina. Image courtesy of: Pollinator [CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons.