Population-based studies

Coordinator:		Prof. Dr. Kari Hemminki
Institution:		Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum
Homepage:		www.dkfz.de

We use the available data  to design genotyping studies in order to answer questions about the role of intermediary risk genes in CRC and the contribution of gene-environment interactions and gene-gene interaction to CRC risk and clinical presentation of CRC. The work will entail three coordinated approaches: 1) Search of intermediary risk genes for CRC, by identifying all familial cases available for CCN and controls. The aim is to find the niche between high-risk genes and low-risk genes. The analysis requires a large sample size of CCN familial cases which allows interrogation of relatively rare variants typed by Taqman and/or Malfi-Tof genotyping; 2) Gene-environment and gene-gene interactions as risk of CRC and as predictor of clinical presentation of CRC. The whole CCN patient resource will be used for testing of candidate genes and pathways. In addition to the environmental factors, clinical parameters will be assessed in order to test for genetic basis of tumor characteristics; 3) Copy number variation as a risk factor for CRC. The available databases will be search to identify candidates which will be tested in the CCN populations.