Genome wide association study of response to interval and continuous exercise training: the Predict-HIIT study
Creators: name: Williams, Camilla J
name: Li, Zhixiu
name: Harvey, Nicholas
name: Lea, Rodney A
name: Gurd, Brendon J
name: Bonafiglia, Jacob T
name: Papadimitriou, Ioannis
name: Jacques, Macsue
name: Croci, Ilaria
name: Stensvold, Dorthe
name: Wisloff, Ulrik
name: Taylor, Jenna L
name: Gajanand, Trishan
name: Cox, Emily R
name: Ramos, Joyce S
name: Fassett, Robert G
name: Little, Jonathan P.
name: Francois, Monique E.
name: Hearon, Christopher M
name: Sarma, Satyam
name: Janssen, Sylvan L J E
name: Van Craenenbroeck, Emeline M
name: Beckers, Paul
name: Cornelissen, Véronique A
name: Howden, Erin J
name: Keating, Shelley E
name: Yan, Xu
name: Bishop, David J
name: Bye, Anja
name: Haupt, Larisa M
name: Griffiths, Lyn R
name: Ashton, Kevin J
name: Brown, Matthew A
name: Torquati, Luciana
name: Eynon, Nir
name: Coombes, Jeff S
Publisher: name: BioMed Central
Year: 2021

description: Background: Low cardiorespiratory fitness (V̇O₂peak) is highly associated with chronic disease and mortality from all causes. Whilst exercise training is recommended in health guidelines to improve V̇O2peak, there is considerable inter-individual variability in the V̇O₂peak response to the same dose of exercise. Understanding how genetic factors contribute to V̇O₂peak training response may improve personalisation of exercise programs. The aim of this study was to identify genetic variants that are associated with the magnitude of V̇O₂peak response following exercise training. Methods: Participant change in objectively measured V̇O₂peak from 18 different interventions was obtained from a multi-centre study (Predict-HIIT). A genome-wide association study was completed (n = 507), and a polygenic predictor score (PPS) was developed using alleles from single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) significantly associated (P &lt; 1 × 10⁻⁵) with the magnitude of V̇O₂peak response. Findings were tested in an independent validation study (n = 39) and compared to previous research. Results: No variants at the genome-wide significance level were found after adjusting for key covariates (baseline V̇O₂peak, individual study, principal components which were significantly associated with the trait). A Quantile–Quantile plot indicates there was minor inflation in the study. Twelve novel loci showed a trend of association with V̇O₂peak response that reached suggestive significance (P &lt; 1 × 10⁻⁵). The strongest association was found near the membrane associated guanylate kinase, WW and PDZ domain containing 2 (MAGI2) gene (rs6959961, P = 2.61 × 10⁻⁷). A PPS created from the 12 lead SNPs was unable to predict V̇O2peak response in a tenfold cross validation, or in an independent (n = 39) validation study (P &gt; 0.1). Significant correlations were found for beta coefficients of variants in the Predict-HIIT (P &lt; 1 × 10⁻⁴) and the validation study (P &lt;  × 10⁻⁶), indicating that general effects of the loci exist, and that with a higher statistical power, more significant genetic associations may become apparent. Conclusions: Ongoing research and validation of current and previous findings is needed to determine if genetics does play a large role in V̇O₂peak response variance, and whether genomic predictors for V̇O2peak response trainability can inform evidence-based clinical practice. Trial registration Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (ANZCTR), Trial Id: ACTRN12618000501246, Date Registered: 06/04/2018, http://www.anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=374601&amp;isReview=true .