Keefe JA, et al. - In view of the given association of genetic variants at SH2B3 with blood pressure and circulating β2M (β-2 microglobulin), a well-characterized kidney filtration biomarker, researchers performed a community-based study of healthy individuals to investigate if circulating β2M is an independent risk predictor of hypertension and may causally contribute to its development. They studied 7,065 Framingham Heart Study participants with measurements of plasma β2M, identifying 2,145 (30%) cases of prevalent hypertension at baseline and 886 (21%) cases of incident hypertension during 6 years of follow-up. As per observations, there appeared an association of higher plasma β2M levels with increased risk of prevalent and incident hypertension independent of chronic kidney disease status. Overlapping genetic signals for hypertension and β2M, in conjunction with mouse knockout experiments, suggest a causal role of the SH2B3-β2M axis in hypertension.