Impact of disease-associated chromatin accessibility QTLs across immune cell types and contexts

Only one-third of immune-associated genome-wide association study (GWAS) loci colocalize with expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs), leaving most mechanisms unresolved. To address this, we created a unified single-cell chromatin accessibility (scATAC) map of ∼280,000 peripheral immune cells from 48 individuals, including 20 COVID-19 patients. Topic modeling of scATAC data identified continuous cell states and revealed disease-relevant cellular contexts. We identified 37,390 chromatin accessibility QTLs (caQTLs) at 10% false discovery rate and observed extensive sharing of caQTLs, with <20% confined to a single context. Notably, caQTLs explained ∼50% more GWAS loci compared to eQTLs, nominating putative causal genes for some unexplained loci. Yet most GWAS-colocalizing caQTLs lacked eQTL support, limiting causal inference from chromatin data alone. Thus, while caQTLs can improve GWAS interpretation, robust mechanistic insights require integration with gene expression and other functional evidence. Our work underscores that cellular context is critical for regulatory variant interpretation and emphasizes the need to map genetic effects in disease-relevant cell states.