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Common variants for atrial fibrillation: results from genome-wide association studies

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Abstract

Atrial fibrillation (AF) affects more than 5 million people worldwide; however, none of the anti-arrhythmic drugs available now are entirely optimal in terms of efficacy and safety. A better understanding of the molecular mechanism of AF will facilitate the process of finding new strategies to prevent AF. As the non-familial AF is the major form of AF, identifying common variants for AF in these populations by genome-wide association studies will definitely accelerate this process. This review summarizes the recently identified common AF variants on 4q25, 16q22, and 1q21 and discusses their implications for the clinic.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Shanghai Municipal Natural Science Foundation (10ZR1433100, to Xingyuan Liu).

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Correspondence to Jiangmin Zhao or Junjie Xiao.

Additional information

X. Liu, F. Wang, J. Xiao and J. Zhao contributed equally to this work.

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Liu, X., Wang, F., Knight, A.C. et al. Common variants for atrial fibrillation: results from genome-wide association studies. Hum Genet 131, 33–39 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00439-011-1052-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00439-011-1052-3

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