Abstract

Parkinson's disease (PD) is an incurable, progressive and common movement disorder that is increasing in incidence globally because of population aging. We hypothesized that the landscape of rare, protein-altering variants could provide further insights into disease pathogenesis. Here we performed whole-exome sequencing followed by gene-based tests on 4,298 PD cases and 5,512 controls of Asian ancestry. We showed that GBA1 and SMPD1 were significantly associated with PD risk, with replication in a further 5,585 PD cases and 5,642 controls. We further refined variant classification using in vitro assays and showed that SMPD1 variants with reduced enzymatic activity display the strongest association (<44% activity, odds ratio (OR) = 2.24, P = 1.25 × 10−15) with PD risk. Moreover, 80.5% of SMPD1 carriers harbored the Asian-specific p.Pro332Arg variant (OR = 2.16; P = 4.47 × 10−8). Our findings highlight the utility of performing exome sequencing in diverse ancestry groups to identify rare protein-altering variants in genes previously unassociated with disease. Using whole-exome sequencing followed by in vitro enzymatic assays, Chew, Liu, Li, Chung et al. identified rare protein-coding variants in GBA1 and SMPD1 that significantly associate with risk of Parkinson's disease across cohorts of Asian descent.