# MHC and KIR Sequencing and Association Analyses in the iGeneTRAiN Studies

> **NIH NIH U01** · UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA · 2022 · $434,827

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
HLA donor-recipient (D-R) matching is critical for graft outcomes following Kidney, Heart, Lung
and hematopoietic cell transplantation. Genetic association studies in large well-characterized
transplant cohorts are lacking and there is a clear need to characterize how MHC and KIR
genetic variants underpin transplantation outcomes. The International Genetics & Translational
Research in Transplantation Network (iGeneTRAiN) was formed to increase the understanding
of the genetic architecture of transplant outcomes, by bringing together transplantation studies
with genome-wide association study (GWAS) datasets from >52,600 recipients/donors across
well-curated heart, kidney, liver and lung transplant phenotype datasets. This constitutes the
largest solid-organ transplant consortium ever assembled. A strategic Pharma collaboration
where we sequence key HLA Class I and II in the majority of iGeneTRAiN studies, and
additional MHC/KIR regions in subsets of studies, is facilitating ample statistical power to
assess association studies of HLA and KIR with key transplant-related outcomes. A large
portion of the iGeneTRAiN database is derived from non-European ancestry samples, which
greatly addresses the lack of adequate MHC/KIR genetic data in these populations.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10438855
- **Project number:** 5U01AI152960-03
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA
- **Principal Investigator:** Malek Kamoun
- **Activity code:** U01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $434,827
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2020-09-02 → 2025-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10438855

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10438855, MHC and KIR Sequencing and Association Analyses in the iGeneTRAiN Studies (5U01AI152960-03). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10438855. Licensed CC0.

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