By reviewing the genome-wide association studies of alcohol dependence and exploring the potential biological functions of the reported risk variants and genes, we concluded that the ADH cluster, SERINC2, KIAA0040, NRD1 and HTR7 were likely to play important roles in risk for alcohol dependence, but PKNOX2, MREG, PECR, GPD1L, CMTM8, MAP3K9, PCNX and OPA3 might play less important roles in this disease risk. The ADH cluster is majorly expressed in the liver and SERINC2, NRD1 and HTR7 are majorly expressed in the brain, which is consistent with the hypotheses for alcohol dependence introduced above.
