The BMI and height GWAS evaluated functional enrichment at identified loci, and we performed similar analyses for the novel genes that we identified. We tested the 10 novel BMI genes and 33 novel height genes for tissue-specific enrichment using DEPICT42, a method based on large-scale gene co-expression analyses, following the protocol of the original GWAS studies6,7. Analysis of BMI identified significant enrichment for hypothalamus and neurosecretory systems (P=2.6×10−4, significant at FDR<5%). This enrichment is consistent with the landmark finding in the original study6 showing enrichment in these and other central nervous system tissues. Notably, we recapitulated this result using only novel genes that did not overlap any genome-wide significant SNPs. In analysis of height, DEPICT did not identify any tissue-specific enrichment.
