This collaborative project will collect arteries and risk factor data from 1400 young persons 15-34 years of age who die from trauma an dare autopsied in medical examiners' laboratories. The data will be analyzed to determine the associations of the risk factors for adult atherosclerotic disease with the various lesions of atherosclerosis which appear during this age period. These cases will supplement the 1800 cases that are being collected in the ongoing study Pathobiological Determinants of Atherosclerosis in Youth. The major purposes of the additional cases are to (1) obtain an adequate number of cases of women; (2) increase the power of the study to detect associations of risk factors with raised lesions which begin to appear in this age group; and (3) increase the power to detect genetic effects on atherosclerosis. Aortic and coronary artery lesions are measured by visual estimation and by gross and histologic morphometry using computerized image analysis. Risk factor measurements include cholesterol and lipoprotein cholesterol concentration in postmortem serum, thiocyanate in postmortem serum as a marker by analysis of liver DNA. Collection of cases is performed by participating centers in cooperation with local medical examiners; processing of arteries, blood, liver, and other tissue is carried out in central laboratories; and data are managed by a statistical center. This application is for the statistical center component of the project. The Statistical Center will participate in protocol design, receive data from the participating centers, enter the data to computer data files, check the data for errors, monitor the data for protocol violations, and perform intermediate and final statistical analyses.
