RESEARCH ARTICLE Genome-Wide Association Study for Autism Spectrum Disorder in Taiwanese Han Population

Background Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder with strong genetic com-ponents. Several recent genome-wide association (GWA) studies in Caucasian samples have reported a number of gene regions and loci correlated with the risk of ASD—albeit with very little consensus across studies. Methods A two-stage GWA study was employed to identify common genetic variants for ASD in the Taiwanese Han population. The discovery stage included 315 patients with ASD and 1,115 healthy controls, using the Affymetrix SNP array 6.0 platform for genotyping. Several gene regions were then selected for fine-mapping and top markers were examined in extended samples. Single marker, haplotype, gene-based, and pathway analyses were conducted for associations. Results Seven SNPs had p-values ranging from 3.4~9.9*10−6, but none reached the genome-wid