ENDOMETRIOSIS (P STRATTON, SECTION EDITOR) Insights into Assessing the Genetics of Endometriosis

# The Author(s) 2012. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract Endometriosis is a complex disease arising from the interplay between multiple genetic and environmental factors. The genetic variants potentially underlying the hered-itary component of endometriosis have been widely investi-gated through hypothesis-driven candidate gene studies, an approach that generally has proven to be inherently difficult and problematic for a number of reasons. Recently, through major collaborative efforts in the endometriosis research field, hypothesis-free genome-wide approaches have started to provide new insights into potential pathways leading to devel-opment of endometriosis, as well as highlighting the pheno-typic heterogeneity of the condition. This review summarizes the most recent studies investigating the genetic variation contributing to endometriosis, with a particular focus on genome-wide approaches, and discusses promising future directions of genetic research.