A genome-wide association study on meat consumption in a Japanese population: the Japan Multi-Institutional Collaborative Cohort study.

Yasuyuki Nakamura,Haruo Mikami,Yoichi Sutoh,Yuichiro Nishida,Asahi Hishida,Hidemi Ito,Katsuyuki Miura,Kokichi Arisawa,Megumi Hara,Rie Ibusuki,Michiaki Kubo,Miho Kusakabe,Hiroaki Ikezaki,Nagato Kuriyama,Sadao Suzuki,Kenji Matsui,Chiho Goto,Aya Kadota,Isao Oze,Hiroko Nakagawa-Senda,Masahiro Nakatochi,Nahomi Imaeda,Naoyuki Takashima,Kiyonori Kuriki,Toshiro Takezaki,Takashi Tamura,Kenji Wakai,Kenji Takeuchi,Ryoko Nakashima,Yoshikuni Kita,Yukihide Momozawa,Etsuko Ozaki,Akira Narita ,Sakurako Katsuura‐Kamano

doi:10.1017/jns.2021.49

Abstract

Recent genome-wide association studies (GWAS) on the dietary habits of the Japanese population have shown that an effect rs671 allele was inversely associated with fish consumption, whereas it was directly associated with coffee consumption. Although meat is a major source of protein and fat in the diet, whether genetic factors that influence meat-eating habits in healthy populations are unknown. This study aimed to conduct a GWAS to find genetic variations that affect meat consumption in a Japanese population. We analysed GWAS data using 14 076 participants from the Japan Multi-Institutional Collaborative Cohort (J-MICC) study. We used a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire to estimate food intake that was validated previously. Association of the imputed variants with total meat consumption per 1000 kcal energy was performed by linear regression analysis with adjustments for age, sex, and principal component analysis components 1-10. We found that no genetic variant, including rs671, was associated with meat consumption. The previously reported single nucleotide polymorphisms that were associated with meat consumption in samples of European ancestry could not be replicated in our J-MICC data. In conclusion, significant genetic factors that affect meat consumption were not observed in a Japanese population.

Highlights

A wealth of information shows that higher consumption of meat, especially red meat and processed red meat, is associated with a higher risk of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, certain types of cancers and all-cause mortality[1,2,3,4,5,6]
A recent cohort study by Saito et al showed that total meat intake was associated with a lower risk of stroke mortality in women, heavy intake of total meat, and red meat was associated with an increase in all-cause and heart disease mortality in men[6]
We and others found that an effect rs671 allele was inversely associated with fish consumption[14,15], whereas it was directly associated with coffee consumption[16]

Summary

Introduction

A wealth of information shows that higher consumption of meat, especially red meat and processed red meat, is associated with a higher risk of type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, certain types of cancers and all-cause mortality[1,2,3,4,5,6]. Researches with the candidate gene approach suggested that genetic variants of the sweet taste receptor gene family were associated with sweet taste perception and the intake of sweet foods[8,9,10]. These variants suggested by candidate gene studies could not be replicated by subsequent genome-wide association study (GWAS) in both samples of European ancestry and Japanese, probably because the previous candidate gene studies did not consider population stratification[11,12]. They identified twentynine independent SNPs associated with diet component 1, obtained by a principal component analysis (PCA) that represented a meat-related diet

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Conclusion