340.731.01 PRINCIPLES OF GENETIC EPIDEMIOLOGY 1

Presents fundamental concepts and methods in genetic epidemiology. Reviews terminology of genetics, introduces principles of population genetics, and provides an overview of various genetic epidemiology study designs, covering fundamental analyses, inferences, plus their strengths and limitations. Presents methods for assessing familial aggregation/correlation and genetic linkage and association analyses will be presented with an emphasis on how these are used in genetic epidemiology. Covers statistical techniques for modeling inheritance of complex phenotypes in family data. Explains various study designs commonly used in genetic epidemiology to identify the genetic basis of Mendelian as well as common, complex diseases. Discusses the role of high throughput genomics technologies within the context of genetic epidemiology studies.

Presents fundamental concepts and methods in genetic epidemiology. It will review basic terminology in genetics and introduce various genetic epidemiology study designs, covering basic analysis, inferences, plus their strengths and limitations. At the end of the course, students should: understand and give examples of different types of study designs used in the field of genetic epidemiology; be familiar with basic terminology in the field of human genetics; understand the basic principles behind major molecular biology techniques, such as PCR, and their applications in genetic epidemiology studies; understand various exposures, or markers, used in genetic epidemiology studies; understand principles of Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium and be able to estimate allele and genotype frequencies; understand and calculate simple statistics, such as odds ratios and LOD scores; understand the difference between linkage and association studies; understand the difference between family-based and population-based studies; understand the difference between direct and indirect association studies; interpret results of a linkage study; interpret results of an association study; select an appropriate study design for addressing a particular question; understand the inferences drawn from the different genetic epidemiology studies.