Data for: Genetic architecture modulates diet induced hepatic mRNA and miRNA expression profiles

Genetic approaches in model organisms have consistently demonstrated that molecular traits such as gene expression are under genetic regulation, similar to clinical traits. The resulting expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) have revolutionized our understanding of genetic regulation and identified numerous candidate genes for clinically-relevant traits. More recently, these analyses have been extended to other molecular traits such as protein abundance, metabolite levels, and miRNA expression. Here we performed global hepatic eQTL and miRNA expression quantitative trait loci (mirQTL) analysis in a population of Diversity Outbred (DO) mice fed two different diets. We identified several key features of eQTL and mirQTL, namely differences in the mode of genetic regulation (cis or trans) between mRNA and miRNA. Approximately 50% of mirQTL are regulated by a trans-acting factor compared to ~25% of eQTL. We note differences in the heritability of mRNA and miRNA expression and variance ex...