Identifying shared polygenic risk across cancers.

Shared genetic risk across cancers is concentrated in 82 specific regions and five cancer clusters, with significant functional enrichment in immune-related pathways.

• Why it matters: Understanding the genetic overlap among cancers can reveal common biological mechanisms and improve risk prediction, addressing the limited insight from genome-wide analyses alone.
• What they did: The study integrated local genetic correlation analyses of 16 cancers and one pan-cancer phenotype with cross-cancer polygenic risk score (PRS) assessments, identifying shared regions and pathways.
• The result: Findings show that structured patterns of shared genetic susceptibility exist at regional and pathway levels, highlighting immune functions and pleiotropy, which can inform targeted research and risk stratification.