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Approved research

The association between sex hormone-related genetic markers and sex hormone-related disorders

Principal Investigator: Professor Claes Ohlsson
Approved Research ID: 26947
Approval date: March 1st 2017

Lay summary

The primary aim of this project is to investigate if sex hormone related genetic markers have an impact on sex hormone related health outcomes (osteoporosis, prostate and breast cancer, cardiovascular disease, osteoarthritis, type2 diabetes, gout, pubertal timing, menopause) and to analyze the possible causal relationships between sex hormones and these outcomes using MR analyses. The secondary aim is to study the interaction effects of different sex steroid related genetic markers on sex hormone related diseases (gene-gene interaction). Moreover to study the interaction effects of sex hormone related genetic markers and environmental factors on these health outcomes (gene-environmental interaction). Our project meets the UK Biobank?s aim of improving the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of common diseases. With increasing age of the population, industrialized european countries are facing a substantial increase in osteoporotic fractures (occuring in 53% of women and 20% of men after 50 years), cancers and cardiovascular diseases that are major causes of mortality. The proposed research project aims to better understand the causal effects of sex hormones on these diseases, with the global aim to improve their prevention and treatment. We will use known sex hormone related genetic markers as tools to evaluate the impact of sex hormones on sex hormone related outcomes. We plan to use the full cohort.