Rare and common variants analysis of the EMB gene in patients with schizophrenia

BACKGROUND: Recent genome-wide association study showed rs10940346 locus near EMB gene was significantly associated with schizophrenia and suggested that EMB gene is one of the potentially causal genes for schizophrenia, but no causal variant has been identified. Our study aims to further verify EMB gene is a susceptibility gene for schizophrenia and to identify potentially causal variants in EMB gene that lead to schizophrenia. METHODS: Targeted sequencing for the un-translated region and all exons of EMB gene was performed among 1803 patients with schizophrenia and 997 healthy controls recruited from Chinese Han population. RESULTS: A total of 58 high-quality variants were identified in case and control groups. Seven of them are nonsynonymous rare variations, EMB: p.(Ala52Thr), p.(Glu66Gly), p.(Ser93Cys), p.(Ala118Val), p.(Ile131Met), p.(Gly163Arg) and p.(Arg238Tyr), but none of them reached statistical significance. Among them, p.(Ile131Met), p.(Gly163Arg) and p.(Arg238Tyr), were predicted to be deleterious variants. In addition, a common variant, rs3933097 located in 3′-UTR of EMB gene, achieved allelic and genotypic significance with schizophrenia (P(allele) = 3.82 × 10(− 6), P(genotype) = 3.18 × 10(− 5)). CONCLUSIONS: Our research first presented a comprehensive mutation spectrum of exons and un-translated region in EMB gene for schizophrenia and provided additional evidence of EMB gene being a susceptibility gene for schizophrenia. However, further functional validations are necessary to reveal its role in the etiology of schizophrenia.