Genetic architecture of lipid traits in the Hispanic community health study/study of Latinos

Abstract Background Despite ethnic disparities in lipid profiles, there are few genome-wide association studies investigating genetic variation of lipids in non-European ancestry populations. In this study, we present findings from genetic association analyses for total cholesterol, low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL), high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL), and triglycerides in a large Hispanic/Latino cohort in the U.S., the Hispanic Community Health Study / Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL). Methods We estimated a heritability of approximately 20% for each lipid trait, similar to previous estimates in Europeans. To search for novel lipid loci, we performed conditional association analysis in which the statistical model was adjusted for previously reported SNPs associated with any of the four lipid traits. SNPs that remained genome-wide significant (P