Anorexia Nervosa Genetics Initiative

The Anorexia Nervosa Genetics Initiative (ANGI), an initiative of The Klarman Family Foundation: (https://www.klarmanfoundation.org/medical-scientific-research/) , is the largest and most rigorous genetic investigation of eating disorders ever conducted.

Dr Cynthia Bulik at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is the lead investigator of ANGI. Professor Nick Martin, Head of QIMR Berghofer’s Genetic Epidemiology group, led the data collection team in Australia and with assistance from the University of Otago, Christchurch, New Zealand (Drs Martin Kennedy and Jenny Jordan).

Other participating universities included Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden (Professor Mikael Landén) and Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark (Dr. Preben Bo Mortensen).

ANGI represents a global effort to detect genetic variation that contributes to this potentially life-threatening illness. In total, ANGI collected biological samples and clinical information from 13,363 individuals with anorexia nervosa as well as healthy controls who were matched by ancestry and geography. The Australian (and New Zealand) site contributed samples from 2691 individuals with anorexia nervosa. In addition, we worked with Professor David Whiteman to identify individuals from the QSkin study without eating disorders to participate as healthy controls.

If you are a researcher interested in accessing data or biological samples from ANGI, click here (PDF) for details. Genome-wide association study (GWAS) summary statistics will be available after publication on the Downloads page of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium website: https://pgc.unc.edu/

The ANGI team is grateful to all participants worldwide, to the research teams in the USA, Europe, and Australasia who helped create this unprecedented resource, and to all of the clinicians, researchers, bloggers, journalists, family members, advocates, and individuals with lived experienced who joined us in our collaborative effort to make ANGI a reality.

The aim of the ANGI study is to identify genes that predispose people to anorexia nervosa. Cracking the genetic code will enable us to develop new, and more effective, personalised treatments that target the problem directly.

QIMR Berghofer is appealing for Australians over 18 years of age who have ever had anorexia nervosa to volunteer for the ANGI Study.