With financial support from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA, RC2 AG036495-01), the HRS is now conducting genotyping on approximately 13,000 respondents who provided DNA samples and signed consent forms in 2006 and 2008. The genotyping will be done by the NIH Center for Inherited Disease Research (CIDR, X01HG005770-01, http://www.cidr.jhmi.edu/ ), using the Illumina Human Omni-2.5 Quad beadchip, with coverage of approximately 2.5 million single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs).

Statistical imputation methods directed by co-investigator Sharon Kardia (Chair of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, The University of Michigan) will increase the number of available markers and will make possible comparisons across platforms that do not assay the same genome-wide SNP panel. Specifically, we will impute up to the 3 million SNPs included in the HAPMAP project (http://hapmap.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) and approximately 17 million DNA variants from the 1000Genomes Project (http://www.1000genomes.org/). The result will be a publicly-available resource of linkable genotype, phenotype, and environmental conditioning variables that can be used widely in the scientific community.

The initial data product is expected to be available through dbGaP on March 15, 2012.

How to Apply

The genotype data and a limited set of phenotype measures will be deposited in the NIH GWAS repository (dbGaP), which provides a convenient method of distribution to researchers who meet NIH requirements for access. Researchers wishing to use the HRS genetic data must first apply to dbGaP for access to the genotyped data. Once dbGaP has authorized access, researchers who wish to link to other HRS measures not in dbGaP can apply for access from HRS by submitting a Genetic Data Access Use Agreement along with a copy of their dbGaP approval. Users linking to the HRS public data must be registered HRS data users. Users wishing to link to HRS restricted data products must submit a restricted data application. Researchers who wish to link to other HRS measures not in dbGaP will be able to apply for access from HRS.

For more information about the specific SNPs included on the Illumina Human Omni-2.5 Quad beadchip, please refer to/download the files in the links below.

Additional Information: