tooluniverse-mendelian-randomization
Mendelian randomization (MR) causal inference — does an exposure, risk factor, or biomarker CAUSALLY affect a disease/outcome, using genetic variants as instrumental variables (IEU OpenGWAS / EpiGraphDB MR-EvE). Use this whenever the user asks if X causes Y, whether an observational association is actually causal or just correlation, if a biomarker/trait is a causal risk factor, wants to triangulate epidemiology against genetic evidence, or mentions Mendelian randomization, instrumental-variable analysis, two-sample MR, or genetic causal evidence — even if they never say "MR" (e.g. "is LDL cholesterol actually causal for heart disease?", "does BMI cause type 2 diabetes or just correlate?", "is CRP a causal driver of stroke?"). Covers trait-label resolution, MR effect direction/magnitude, instrument quality (MOE score), method agreement (IVW vs MR-Egger vs weighted median), bidirectional MR for reverse causation, and distinguishing causation from genetic correlation. Not for plain GWAS association lookups (use the GWAS skills) or fitting your own instruments from raw summary statistics.
General1 files