Defining the role of common variation in the genomic and biological architecture of adult human height

Andrew R Wood, Tonu Esko, Jian Yang, Sailaja Vedantam, Tune H Pers, Stefan Gustafsson, Audrey Y Chu, Karol Estrada, Jian'an Luan, Zoltán Kutalik, Najaf Amin, Martin L Buchkovich, Damien C Croteau-Chonka, Felix R Day, Yanan Duan, Tove Fall, Rudolf Fehrmann, Teresa Ferreira, Anne U Jackson, Juha Karjalainen, Ken Sin Lo, Adam E Locke, Reedik Mägi, Evelin Mihailov, Eleonora Porcu, Joshua C Randall, André Scherag, Anna A E Vinkhuyzen, Harm-Jan Westra, Thomas W Winkler, Tsegaselassie Workalemahu, Jing Hua Zhao, Devin Absher, Eva Albrecht, Denise Anderson, Jeffrey Baron, Marian Beekman, Ayse Demirkan, Georg B Ehret, Bjarke Feenstra, Mary F Feitosa, Krista Fischer, Ross M Fraser, Anuj Goel, Jian Gong, Anne E Justice, Stavroula Kanoni, Marcus E Kleber, Kati Kristiansson, Unhee Lim, Vaneet Lotay, Julian C Lui, Massimo Mangino, Irene Mateo Leach, Carolina Medina-Gomez, Michael A Nalls, Dale R Nyholt, Cameron D Palmer, Dorota Pasko, Sonali Pechlivanis, Inga Prokopenko, Janina S Ried, Stephan Ripke, Dmitry Shungin, Alena Stancáková, Rona J Strawbridge, Yun Ju Sung, Toshiko Tanaka, Alexander Teumer, Stella Trompet, Sander W van der Laan, Jessica van Setten, Jana V Van Vliet-Ostaptchouk, Zhaoming Wang, Loïc Yengo, Weihua Zhang, Uzma Afzal, Johan Ärnlöv, Gillian M Arscott, Stefania Bandinelli, Amy Barrett, Claire Bellis, Amanda J Bennett, Christian Berne, Matthias Blüher, Jennifer L Bolton, Yvonne Böttcher, Heather A Boyd, Marcel Bruinenberg, Brendan M Buckley, Steven Buyske, Ida H Caspersen, Peter S Chines, Robert Clarke, Simone Claudi-Boehm, Matthew Cooper, E Warwick Daw, Pim A De Jong, Joris Deelen, Graciela Delgado, Josh C Denny, Rosalie Dhonukshe-Rutten, Maria Dimitriou, Alex S F Doney, Marcus Dörr, Niina Eklund, Elodie Eury, Lasse Folkersen, Melissa E Garcia, Frank Geller, Vilmantas Giedraitis, Alan S Go, Harald Grallert, Tanja B Grammer, Jürgen Gräßler, Henrik Grönberg, Lisette C P G M de Groot, Christopher J Groves, Jeffrey Haessler, Per Hall, Toomas Haller, Goran Hallmans, Anke Hannemann, Catharina A Hartman, Maija Hassinen, Caroline Hayward, Nancy L Heard-Costa, Quinta Helmer, Gibran Hemani, Anjali K Henders, Hans L Hillege, Mark A Hlatky, Wolfgang Hoffmann, Per Hoffmann, Oddgeir Holmen, Jeanine J Houwing-Duistermaat, Thomas Illig, Aaron Isaacs, Alan L James, Janina Jeff, Berit Johansen, Åsa Johansson, Jennifer Jolley, Thorhildur Juliusdottir, Juhani Junttila, Abel N Kho, Leena Kinnunen, Norman Klopp, Thomas Kocher, Wolfgang Kratzer, Peter Lichtner, Lars Lind, Jaana Lindström, Stéphane Lobbens, Mattias Lorentzon, Yingchang Lu, Valeriya Lyssenko, Patrik K E Magnusson, Anubha Mahajan, Marc Maillard, Wendy L McArdle, Colin A McKenzie, Stela McLachlan, Paul J McLaren, Cristina Menni, Sigrun Merger, Lili Milani, Alireza Moayyeri, Keri L Monda, Mario A Morken, Gabriele Müller, Martina Müller-Nurasyid, Arthur W Musk, Narisu Narisu, Matthias Nauck, Ilja M Nolte, Markus M Nöthen, Laticia Oozageer, Stefan Pilz, Nigel W Rayner, Frida Renstrom, Neil R Robertson, Lynda M Rose, Ronan Roussel, Serena Sanna, Hubert Scharnagl, Salome Scholtens, Fredrick R Schumacher, Heribert Schunkert, Robert A Scott, Joban Sehmi, Thomas Seufferlein, Jianxin Shi, Karri Silventoinen, Johannes H Smit, Albert Vernon Smith, Joanna Smolonska, Alice V Stanton, Kathleen Stirrups, David J Stott, Heather M Stringham, Johan Sundström, Morris A Swertz, Ann-Christine Syvänen, Bamidele O Tayo, Gudmar Thorleifsson, Jonathan P Tyrer, Suzanne van Dijk, Natasja M van Schoor, Nathalie van der Velde, Diana van Heemst, Floor V A van Oort, Sita H Vermeulen, Niek Verweij, Judith M Vonk, Lindsay L Waite, Melanie Waldenberger, Roman Wennauer, Lynne R Wilkens, Christina Willenborg, Tom Wilsgaard, Mary K Wojczynski, Andrew Wong, Alan F Wright, Qunyuan Zhang, Dominique Arveiler, Stephan J L Bakker, John Beilby, Richard N Bergman, Sven Bergmann, Reiner Biffar, John Blangero, Dorret I Boomsma, Stefan R Bornstein, Pascal Bovet, Paolo Brambilla, Morris J Brown, Harry Campbell, Mark J Caulfield, Aravinda Chakravarti, Rory Collins, Francis S Collins, Dana C Crawford, L Adrienne Cupples, John Danesh, Ulf de Faire, Hester M den Ruijter, Raimund Erbel, Jeanette Erdmann, Johan G Eriksson, Martin Farrall, Ele Ferrannini, Jean Ferrières, Ian Ford, Nita G Forouhi, Terrence Forrester, Ron T Gansevoort, Pablo V Gejman, Christian Gieger, Alain Golay, Omri Gottesman, Vilmundur Gudnason, Ulf Gyllensten, David W Haas, Alistair S Hall, Tamara B Harris, Andrew T Hattersley, Andrew C Heath, Christian Hengstenberg, Andrew A Hicks, Lucia A Hindorff, Aroon D Hingorani, Albert Hofman, G Kees Hovingh, Steve E Humphries, Steven C Hunt, Elina Hypponen, Kevin B Jacobs, Marjo-Riitta Jarvelin, Pekka Jousilahti, Antti M Jula, Jaakko Kaprio, John J P Kastelein, Manfred Kayser, Frank Kee, Sirkka M Keinanen-Kiukaanniemi, Lambertus A Kiemeney, Jaspal S Kooner, Charles Kooperberg, Seppo Koskinen, Peter Kovacs, Aldi T Kraja, Meena Kumari, Johanna Kuusisto, Timo A Lakka, Claudia Langenberg, Loic Le Marchand, Terho Lehtimäki, Sara Lupoli, Pamela A F Madden, Satu Männistö, Paolo Manunta, André Marette, Tara C Matise, Barbara McKnight, Thomas Meitinger, Frans L Moll, Grant W Montgomery, Andrew D Morris, Andrew P Morris, Jeffrey C Murray, Mari Nelis, Claes Ohlsson, Albertine J Oldehinkel, Ken K Ong, Willem H Ouwehand, Gerard Pasterkamp, Annette Peters, Peter P Pramstaller, Jackie F Price, Lu Qi, Olli T Raitakari, Tuomo Rankinen, D C Rao, Treva K Rice, Marylyn Ritchie, Igor Rudan, Veikko Salomaa, Nilesh J Samani, Jouko Saramies, Mark A Sarzynski, Peter E H Schwarz, Sylvain Sebert, Peter Sever, Alan R Shuldiner, Juha Sinisalo, Valgerdur Steinthorsdottir, Ronald P Stolk, Jean-Claude Tardif, Anke Tönjes, Angelo Tremblay, Elena Tremoli, Jarmo Virtamo, Marie-Claude Vohl, Philippe Amouyel, Folkert W Asselbergs, Themistocles L Assimes, Murielle Bochud, Bernhard O Boehm, Eric Boerwinkle, Erwin P Bottinger, Claude Bouchard, Stéphane Cauchi, John C Chambers, Stephen J Chanock, Richard S Cooper, Paul I W de Bakker, George Dedoussis, Luigi Ferrucci, Paul W Franks, Philippe Froguel, Leif C Groop, Christopher A Haiman, Anders Hamsten, M Geoffrey Hayes, Jennie Hui, David J Hunter, Kristian Hveem, J Wouter Jukema, Robert C Kaplan, Mika Kivimaki, Diana Kuh, Markku Laakso, Yongmei Liu, Nicholas G Martin, Winfried März, Mads Melbye, Susanne Moebus, Patricia B Munroe, Inger Njølstad, Ben A Oostra, Colin N A Palmer, Nancy L Pedersen, Markus Perola, Louis Pérusse, Ulrike Peters, Joseph E Powell, Chris Power, Thomas Quertermous, Rainer Rauramaa, Eva Reinmaa, Paul M Ridker, Fernando Rivadeneira, Jerome I Rotter, Timo E Saaristo, Danish Saleheen, David Schlessinger, P Eline Slagboom, Harold Snieder, Tim D Spector, Konstantin Strauch, Michael Stumvoll, Jaakko Tuomilehto, Matti Uusitupa, Pim van der Harst, Henry Völzke, Mark Walker, Nicholas J Wareham, Hugh Watkins, H-Erich Wichmann, James F Wilson, Pieter Zanen, Panos Deloukas, Iris M Heid, Cecilia M Lindgren, Karen L Mohlke, Elizabeth K Speliotes, Unnur Thorsteinsdottir, Inês Barroso, Caroline S Fox, Kari E North, David P Strachan, Jacques S Beckmann, Sonja I Berndt, Michael Boehnke, Ingrid B Borecki, Mark I McCarthy, Andres Metspalu, Kari Stefansson, André G Uitterlinden, Cornelia M van Duijn, Lude Franke, Cristen J Willer, Alkes L Price, Guillaume Lettre, Ruth J F Loos, Michael N Weedon, Erik Ingelsson, Jeffrey R O'Connell, Goncalo R Abecasis, Daniel I Chasman, Michael E Goddard, Peter M Visscher, Joel N Hirschhorn, Timothy M Frayling

Using genome-wide data from 253,288 individuals, we identified 697 variants at genome-wide significance that together explained one-fifth of the heritability for adult height. By testing different numbers of variants in independent studies, we show that the most strongly associated ∼2,000, ∼3,700 and ∼9,500 SNPs explained ∼21%, ∼24% and ∼29% of phenotypic variance. Furthermore, all common variants together captured 60% of heritability. The 697 variants clustered in 423 loci were enriched for genes, pathways and tissue types known to be involved in growth and together implicated genes and pathways not highlighted in earlier efforts, such as signaling by fibroblast growth factors, WNT/β-catenin and chondroitin sulfate-related genes. We identified several genes and pathways not previously connected with human skeletal growth, including mTOR, osteoglycin and binding of hyaluronic acid. Our results indicate a genetic architecture for human height that is characterized by a very large but finite number (thousands) of causal variants.