SHARe: SNP Health Association Resource

Program Description

The NHLBI SHARe (SNP Health Association Resource) Project conducted genome wide association studies and analyses in several large, multi-ethnic NHLBI Cohort studies of men and women to identify genes underlying cardiovascular and lung disease and other disorders like osteoporosis and diabetes. In total, genotype and phenotype data are available from over 32,000 research participants. While the initial genome wide SNP genotyping has been completed, new phenotype datasets are being contributed on a regular basis to several of the cohorts contributing to the SHARe Project.

Framingham SHARe, with genotyping of 550,000 SNPS in over 9,200 participants, was the first cohort released in this initiative in October 2007. The Framingham Heart Study was selected for this initial release due to its depth of available phenotypes (over 20,000) and uniqueness in including three generations of participants with comparable data obtained from each generation at the same age.

Framingham Heart Study data was also used in two additional SHARe GWAS projects: a) The Framingham SHARe Social Network Study, which compiled a network of family and social ties stemming from participants in the Framingham Heart Study offspring cohort; and b) GAW16 Framingham and Simulated Data, created for the Genetic Analysis Workshop.

The second cohort, the SHARe Asthma Resource Project (SHARP), includes genotyping data from adults and children who have participated in NHLBI clinical research trials on asthma: 1041 children with asthma who participated in the Childhood Asthma Management Program (CAMP), 994 children who participated in one of five clinical trials conducted by the Childhood Asthma Research and Education (CARE) network, and 701 adults who participated in one of six clinical trials conducted by the Asthma Clinical Research Network (ACRN).

WHI SHARe includes genotyping data from 8421 African-American and 3587 Hispanic women from the Women's Health Initiative (WHI), a long-term national health study that has focused on strategies for preventing heart disease, breast and colorectal cancer, and osteoporotic fractures in postmenopausal women.

MESA SHARe includes genotyping data on 6625 participants from the MESA, MESA Family and MESA Air Studies of the characteristics of subclinical cardiovascular disease and the risk factors that predict progression to clinically overt cardiovascular disease or progression of the subclinical disease.

The resulting genotyping data along with the cohort phenotypic data are made available to the scientific community through the NIH National Center for Biotechnology Information Database for Genotype and Phenotype (dbGaP). Data are available at no cost to all qualified investigators via an application process involving an NHLBI Data Access Committee. Further details as well as the application can be found at the related website below.

The NHLBI Program Officers for SHARE are Christopher O'Donnell, MD, MPH (Scientific Director) and Phyliss Sholinsky, M.S.P.H.

Related Websites:

Accessing NHLBI Whole Genome Association Studies via NCBI dbGaP

NCBI BioProject Page: NHLBI SNP Health Association Resource (SHARe)

Last Updated September 2011