Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have been used to establish thousands of genetic associations across numerous phenotypes. To improve the power of GWAS and generalize associations across ethnic groups, transethnic meta-analysis methods are used to combine the results of several GWAS from diverse ancestries. The goal of this study is to identify genetic associations for eight quantitative metabolic syndrome (MetS) traits through a meta-analysis across four ethnic groups. Traits were measured in the GENetics of Noninsulin dependent Diabetes Mellitus (GENNID) Study which consists of African-American (families = 73, individuals = 288), European-American (families = 79, individuals = 519), Japanese-American (families = 17, individuals = 132), and Mexican-American (families = 113, individuals = 610) samples. Genome-wide association results from these four ethnic groups were combined using four meta-analysis methods: fixed effects, random effects, TransMeta, and MR-MEGA. We provide an empirical comparison of the four meta-analysis methods from the GENNID results, discuss which types of loci (characterized by allelic heterogeneity) appear to be better detected by each of the four meta-analysis methods in the GENNID Study, and validate our results using previous genetic discoveries. We specifically compare the two transethnic methods, TransMeta and MR-MEGA, and discuss how each transethnic method's framework relates to the types of loci best detected by each method.

中文翻译：

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跨种族代谢综合征的跨种族荟萃分析。

全基因组关联研究（GWAS）已用于建立跨越众多表型的数千种遗传关联。为了提高GWAS的功能并扩大各族群之间的关联，使用了跨种族的荟萃分析方法来组合来自不同祖先的几种GWAS的结果。这项研究的目的是通过对四个族裔群体的荟萃分析，确定八个定量代谢综合征（MetS）性状的遗传关联。在非胰岛素依赖型糖尿病的遗传学（GENNID）研究中测量了性状，该研究包括非洲裔美国人（家庭= 73，个人= 288），欧美人（家庭= 79，个人= 519），日裔美国人（家庭= 17，个人= 132）和墨西哥裔美国人（家庭= 113，个人= 610）样本。来自这四个种族的全基因组关联结果使用四种荟萃分析方法进行了合并：固定效应，随机效应，TransMeta和MR-MEGA。我们提供了来自GENNID结果的四种荟萃分析方法的经验比较，讨论了GENNID研究中的四种荟萃分析方法中每种基因座（由等位基因异质性表征）似乎可以更好地检测出哪种类型的基因座，并验证了我们使用以前的遗传发现得出的结果。我们专门比较了两种跨种族方法TransMeta和MR-MEGA，并讨论了每种跨种族方法的框架如何与每种方法最好检测到的基因座类型相关。我们提供了来自GENNID结果的四种荟萃分析方法的经验比较，讨论了GENNID研究中的四种荟萃分析方法中每种基因座（由等位基因异质性表征）似乎可以更好地检测出哪种类型的基因座，并验证了我们使用以前的遗传发现得出的结果。我们专门比较了两种跨种族方法TransMeta和MR-MEGA，并讨论了每种跨种族方法的框架如何与每种方法最好检测到的基因座类型相关。我们提供了来自GENNID结果的四种荟萃分析方法的经验比较，讨论了GENNID研究中的四种荟萃分析方法中每种基因座（由等位基因异质性表征）似乎可以更好地检测出哪种类型的基因座，并验证了我们使用以前的遗传发现得出的结果。我们专门比较了两种跨种族方法TransMeta和MR-MEGA，并讨论了每种跨种族方法的框架如何与每种方法最好检测到的基因座类型相关。