ArticleInternational journal of epidemiology2018
Using structural equation modelling to jointly estimate maternal and fetal effects on birthweight in the UK Biobank.
Article in International journal of epidemiology, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 51 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
51 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Methodological approaches, challenges, and opportunities in the application of Mendelian randomisation to lifecourse epidemiology: A systematic literature review.European journal of epidemiology · 2024Pooled it
- Investigating the causal effect of maternal vitamin B12 and folate levels on offspring birthweight.International journal of epidemiology · 2021Pooled it
- Mendelian randomisation approaches to the study of prenatal exposures: A systematic review.Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology · 2021Pooled it
- Maternal and fetal genetic effects on birth weight and their relevance to cardio-metabolic risk factors.Nature genetics · 2019Pooled it
- Multivariate GWAS framework for family trios with parental phenotypes to control dynastic effects.BMC bioinformatics · 2026Article
- Maternal and fetal genetic predispositions to insulin deficiency and resistance affect fetal growth through distinct pathways.Diabetologia · 2026Article
- Examining the association between fetal HLA-C, maternal KIR haplotypes and birth weight.PLoS genetics · 2026Article
- Genomic approaches to understanding pregnancy phenotypes and birth outcomes and their links with long-term maternal and offspring health-the value of distinguishing maternal and fetal genetic effects.Frontiers in genetics · 2026Review
- Improving estimation efficiencies for family-based GWAS by integrating large external data.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2025Article
- Flexible read-aware genotype imputation from sequence using biobank sized reference panels.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Woolf et al's "GWAS by subtraction" is not useful for cross-generational Mendelian randomization studies.BMC research notes · 2025Article
- A robust and powerful GWAS method for family trios supporting within-family Mendelian randomization analysis.Research square · 2025Article
- Haplotype-based analysis distinguishes maternal-fetal genetic contribution to pregnancy-related outcomes.PLoS genetics · 2025Article
- DINGO: increasing the power of locus discovery in maternal and fetal genome-wide association studies of perinatal traits.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Recent Advances in Genomic Studies of Gestational Duration and Preterm Birth.Clinics in perinatology · 2024Review
- Evaluating causal influence of maternal educational attainment on offspring birthweight via observational study and Mendelian randomization analyses.SSM - population health · 2024Article
- Birth weight influences cardiac structure, function, and disease risk: evidence of a causal association.European heart journal · 2024Article
- Partitioning genetic effects on birthweight at classical human leukocyte antigen loci into maternal and fetal components, using structural equation modelling.International journal of epidemiology · 2024Article
- Maternal plasma cortisol's effect on offspring birth weight: a Mendelian Randomisation study.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2024Article
- Investigating a possible causal relationship between maternal serum urate concentrations and offspring birthweight: a Mendelian randomization study.International journal of epidemiology · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Background: To date, 60 genetic variants have been robustly associated with birthweight. It is unclear whether these associations represent the effect of an individual's own genotype on their birthweight, their mother's genotype, or both. Methods: We demonstrate how structural equation modelling (SEM) can be used to estimate both maternal and fetal effects when phenotype information is present for individuals in two generations and genotype information is available on the older individual. We conduct an extensive simulation study to assess the bias, power and type 1 error rates of the SEM and also apply the SEM to birthweight data in the UK Biobank study. Results: Unlike simple regression models, our approach is unbiased when there is both a maternal and a fetal effect. The method can be used when either the individual's own phenotype or the phenotype of their offspring is not available, and allows the inclusion of summary statistics from additional cohorts where raw data cannot be shared. We show that the type 1 error rate of the method is appropriate, and that there is substantial statistical power to detect a genetic variant that has a moderate effect on the phenotype and reasonable power to detect whether it is a fetal and/or a maternal effect. We also identify a subset of birthweight-associated single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) that have opposing maternal and fetal effects in the UK Biobank. Conclusions: Our results show that SEM can be used to estimate parameters that would be difficult to quantify using simple statistical methods alone.
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