Multi-omic insight into the molecular networks of mitochondrial dysfunction in the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease

BackgroundMitochondrial dysfunction has been linked to the development of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), but the genetic pathophysiology was not fully elucidated. We employed Mendelian randomization and colocalization analyses to investigate the associations between mitochondrial-related genes and IBD via integrating multi-omics.MethodsSummary-level data of mitochondrial gene methylation, expression and protein abundance levels were obtained from corresponding methylation, expression and protein quantitative trait loci studies, respectively. We obtained genetic associations with IBD and its two subtypes from the Inflammatory Bowel Disease Genetics Consortium (discovery), the UK Biobank (replication), and the FinnGen study (replication). We performed summary-data-based Mendelian randomization analysis to assess the associations of mitochondrial gene-related molecular features with IBD. Colocalization analysis was further conducted to assess whether the identified signal pairs shared a causal genetic variant.FindingsAfter integrating the multi-omics data between mQTL-eQTL and eQTL-pQTL, we identified two mitochondrial genes, i.e., PARK7 and ACADM, with tier 1 evidence for their associations with IBD and ulcerative colitis (UC). PDK1 and FISI genes were associated with UC risk with tier 2 and tier 3 evidence, respectively. The methylation of cg05467918 in ACADM was associated with lower expression of ACADM, which fits with the positive effect of cg05467918 methylation on UC risk. Consistently, the inverse associations between gene methylation and gene expression were also observed in PARK7 (cg10385390) and PDK1 (cg17679246), which were corroborated with the protective role in UC. At circulating protein level, genetically predicted higher levels of PARK7 (OR 0.36, 95% CI 0.25–0.52) and HINT1 (OR 0.47, 95% CI 0.30–0.74) were inversely associated with IBD risk; genetically predicted higher level of HINT1 was associated with a decreased risk of Crohn's disease (CD) (OR 0.26, 95% CI 0.14–0.49) and a higher level of ACADM (OR 0.67, 95% CI 0.55–0.83), PDK1 (OR 0.63, 95% CI 0.49–0.81), FIS1 (OR 0.63, 95% CI 0.47–0.83) was associated with a decreased risk of UC.InterpretationWe found that the mitochondrial PARK7 gene was putatively associated with IBD risk, and mitochondrial FIS1, PDK1, and ACADM genes were associated with UC risk with evidence from multi-omics levels. This study identified mitochondrial genes in relation to IBD, which may enhance the understanding of the pathogenic mechanisms of IBD development.FundingXL is supported by the Natural Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars of Zhejiang Province (LR22H260001) and Healthy Zhejiang One Million People Cohort (K-20230085).