Startup of Framingham Heart Study. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death and serious illness ...
... and has led to the development of effective treatment and preventive strategies in clinical practice.

In addition to research studies focused on risk factors, subclinical CVD and clinically apparent CVD, Framingham investigators have also collaborated with leading researchers from around the country and throughout the world on projects involving some of the major chronic illnesses in men and women, including dementia, osteoporosis and arthritis, nutritional deficiencies, eye diseases, hearing disorders, and chronic obstructive lung diseases.

Genetic Research in the Framingham Heart Study. While pursuing the Study's established research goals, the NHLBI and the Framingham investigators has expanded its research mission into the study of genetic factors underlying CVD and other disorders. Over the past two decades, DNA has been collected from blood samples and from immortalized cell lines obtained from Original Cohort participants, members of the Offspring Cohort and the Third Generation Cohort. Several large-scale genotyping projects have been conducted in the past decade. Genome-wide linkage analysis has been conducted using genotypes of approximately 400 microsatellite markers that have been completed in over 9,300 subjects in all three generations. Analyses using microsatellite markers completed in the original cohort and offspring cohorts have resulted in over 100 publications, including many publications from the Genetics Analysis Workshop 13. Several other recent collaborative projects have completed thousands of SNP genotypes for candidate gene regions in subsets of FHS subjects with available DNA. These projects include the Cardiogenomics Program of the NHLBI's Programs for Genomics Applications, the genotyping of ~3000 SNPs in inflammation genes, and the completion of a genome-wide scan of 100,000 SNPs using the Affymetrix 100K Genechip.

Framingham Cohort Phenotype Data. The phenotype database contains a vast array of phenotype information available in all three generations. These will include the quantitative measures of the major risk factors such as systolic blood pressure, total and HDL cholesterol, fasting glucose, and cigarette use, as well as anthropomorphic measures such as body mass index, biomarkers such as fibrinogen and CRP, and electrocardiography measures such as the QT interval. Many of these measures have been collected repeatedly in the original and offspring cohorts. Also included in the SHARe database will be an array of recently collected biomarkers, subclinical disease imaging measures, clinical CVD outcomes as well as an array of ancillary studies. The phenotype data is located here in the top-level study phs000007 Framingham Cohort. To view the phenotype variables collected from the Framingham Cohort, please click on the "Variables" tab above.

The Framingham Cohort is utilized in the following dbGaP substudies. To view genotypes, analysis, expression data, other molecular data, and derived variables collected in these substudies, please click on the following substudies below or in the "Substudies" box located on the right hand side of this top-level study page phs000007 Framingham Cohort.

• phs000342 Framingham SHARe
• phs000282 Framingham CARe
• phs000363 Framingham SABRe
• phs000307 Framingham Medical Resequencing

The unflagging commitment of the research participants in the NHLBI FHS has made more than a half century of research success possible. For decades, the FHS has made its data and DNA widely available to qualified in...

MESA
The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) is a study of the characteristics of subclinical cardiovas...
...D), stroke, and congestive heart failure; for cardiovascular disease interventions; and for mortality.

In addition to the six Field Centers, MESA involves a Coordinating Center, a Central Laboratory, and Central Reading Centers for Computed Tomography (CT), Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Ultrasound, and Electrocardiography (ECG). Protocol development, staff training, and pilot testing were performed in the first 18 months of the study. The first examination took place over two years, from July 2000 - July 2002. It was followed by four examination periods that were 17-20 months in length. Participants have been contacted every 9 to 12 months throughout the study to assess clinical morbidity and mortality.

MESA Family
The general goal of the MESA Family Study, an ancillary study to MESA funded by a grant from NHLBI, is to apply modern genetic analysis and genotyping methodologies to delineate the genetic determinants of early atherosclerosis. This is being accomplished by utilizing all the current organizational structures of the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) and Genetic Centers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and University of Virginia.

In the MESA Family Study, the goal is to locate and identify genes contributing to the genetic risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD), by looking at the early changes of atherosclerosis within families (mainly siblings). 2128 individuals from 594 families, yielding 3,026 sibpairs divided between African Americans and Hispanic-Americans, were recruited by utilizing the existing framework of MESA. MESA Family studied siblings of index subjects from the MESA study and from new sibpair families (with the same demographic characteristics) and is determining the extent of genetic contribution to th...