Genome-Wide Association Studies Identify Multiple Genetic Loci Influencing Eyebrow Color Variation in Europeans

Eyebrow color shows a high degree of variation in Europeans. Although no heritability estimate has yet been reported, eyebrow color may share a large genetic component with scalp hair color, which has an estimated heritability of up to 90% (Lin et al., 2015). Although a phenotypic relationship between eyebrow and scalp hair color clearly exists, such a correlation is not perfect, suggesting the existence of overlapping and unique genetic components for both traits. Although previous genome-wide association studies (GWASs) on human eye (Kayser et al., 2008; Liu et al., 2010; Sulem et al., 2007, 2008), scalp hair (Han et al., 2008; Hysi et al., 2018; Sulem et al., 2007), and skin color (Han et al., 2008; Liu et al., 2015; Sulem et al., 2007; Visconti et al., 2018) have identified multiple DNA variants, no GWAS for eyebrow color has been reported as of yet.