Telomere Attrition and Diabetes Risk in American Indians

This project was funded by NIDDK (R01DK091369, 9/1/2011-5/31/2016, PI: Jinying Zhao). The objectives of this study are to delineate the prospective impact of telomere attrition on diabetes risk, and to determine genetic, behavioral and psychosocial predictors for accelerated telomere loss. Leukocyte telomere length will be measured by quantitative PCR in 4,565 DNA samples collected by the Strong Heart Family Study at two clinical visits (900 subjects examined at both visits, 2,765 examined at the second visit only). All DNA samples, well-characterized clinical data including follow-up data through December 2009 and data from a 10cM genome scan are already available for the proposed analyses. Specific aims: 1) To determine whether telomere attrition is associated with diabetes and its related phenotypes; 2) To identify genetic loci related to telomeric variation by a genome-wide linkage scan; 3) To determine behavioral, socioeconomic and psychosomatic predictors for accelerated telomere shortening in relation to diabetes risk. This is the first study to investigate prospectively the associations of telomere length and of telomere attrition rate with diabetes risk, and is also the first study to determine genetic, behavioral and psychosocial predictors for accelerated telomere erosion in this underserved population.