Automated Assay of Telomere Length Measurement and Informatics for 100,000 Subjects in the Genetic Epidemiology Research on Adult Health and Aging (GERA) Cohort |
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Authors: | Kyle Lapham Mark N Kvale Jue Lin Sheryl Connell Lisa A Croen Brad P Dispensa Lynn Fang Stephanie Hesselson Thomas J Hoffmann Carlos Iribarren Eric Jorgenson Lawrence H Kushi Dana Ludwig Tetsuya Matsuguchi William B McGuire Sunita Miles Charles P Quesenberry Jr Sarah Rowell Marianne Sadler Lori C Sakoda David Smethurst Carol P Somkin Stephen K Van Den Eeden Lawrence Walter Rachel A Whitmer Pui-Yan Kwok Neil Risch Catherine Schaefer Elizabeth H Blackburn |
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Institution: | *Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, University of California, San Francisco, California 94158-2517;§Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of California, San Francisco, California 94158-2517;†Institute for Human Genetics, University of California, San Francisco, California 94143-0794;‡Division of Research, Kaiser Permanente Northern California, Oakland, California 94612-2304 |
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Abstract: | The Kaiser Permanente Research Program on Genes, Environment, and Health (RPGEH) Genetic Epidemiology Research on Adult Health and Aging (GERA) cohort includes DNA specimens extracted from saliva samples of 110,266 individuals. Because of its relationship to aging, telomere length measurement was considered an important biomarker to develop on these subjects. To assay relative telomere length (TL) on this large cohort over a short time period, we created a novel high throughput robotic system for TL analysis and informatics. Samples were run in triplicate, along with control samples, in a randomized design. As part of quality control, we determined the within-sample variability and employed thresholds for the elimination of outlying measurements. Of 106,902 samples assayed, 105,539 (98.7%) passed all quality control (QC) measures. As expected, TL in general showed a decline with age and a sex difference. While telomeres showed a negative correlation with age up to 75 years, in those older than 75 years, age positively correlated with longer telomeres, indicative of an association of longer telomeres with more years of survival in those older than 75. Furthermore, while females in general had longer telomeres than males, this difference was significant only for those older than age 50. An additional novel finding was that the variance of TL between individuals increased with age. This study establishes reliable assay and analysis methodologies for measurement of TL in large, population-based human studies. The GERA cohort represents the largest currently available such resource, linked to comprehensive electronic health and genotype data for analysis. |
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Keywords: | relative telomere length GERA cohort saliva DNA robotic assay quantitative PCR |
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