Dr. Bailey-Wilson is collaborating with Drs. Barbara and Ronald Klein on analyses of existing family data from the Beaver Dam Eye Study. In this study, a private census of the town and township of Beaver Dam, Wisconsin was performed and all individuals between the ages of 43-84 were asked to enroll, were given extensive eye examinations and asked to fill out a questionnaire that measures environmental risk factor exposures. Of the 5925 eligible people, 4926 (83.1%) participated. Within this dataset, there are 1,247 people from 564 sibships with at least 2 members in each sibship having complete age, sex and examination results. These families represent an outstanding data resource for examining major genetic components to various eye diseases. In the past, we have examined familial correlations of many of the quantitative eye measurements. We have performed power analyses of the nuclear cataract and cortical cataract traits to determine whether adequate power for linkage studies of these traits exists in this data set. In this fiscal year we have 3 papers submitted presenting results of segregation and preliminary linkage analyses of several vision traits. We are currently analyzing genome-wide scan data on the entire Beaver Dam cohort of families. In the future, we plan to continue segregation analyses of other traits available in these data and to perform linkage studies using the CIDR markers and eventually fine-mapping studies in regions that show initial evidence of linkage.
