# Studying the Genetics of Aging, Behavioral, and Social Phenotypes in Diverse Populations

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA · 2024 · $685,039

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract
For this application, “Studying the Genetics of Aging, Behavioral, and Social Phenotypes in Diverse Populations,”
we propose to develop tools to promote genetic research of aging, behavioral, and social phenotypes in
diverse populations. These phenotypes have a number of unique characteristics (e.g., polygenicity,
environmental mechanisms, and small effect sizes) which require special consideration when developing
research tools. In brief, we propose to:
 • Develop the Genetic-Related-Matrix-Matched Association study (GRMMA) tool for performing
 genome-wide association studies (GWASs) in large, diverse data sets. Current GWAS methods require
 restricting samples into approximately homogeneous-ancestry samples, which is wasteful and has
 resulted in Eurocentric bias in genetics research. Using matching methods, GRMMA can use more of the
 available data in a way that both reduces bias and increases statistical power. We will employ
 computationally efficient strategies that allow us to implement GRMMA in large diverse sample such as
 the UK Biobank. We will make the GRMMA tool and tutorials publicly available through the online
 repository, Github.
 • Develop SBayes-Universal (SBayesU), an efficient new tool for producing polygenic scores (PGSs) by
 optimally combining GWAS summary statistics estimated in different populations. The key feature of
 SBayesU is that it uses a low-dimensional eigen decomposition of the linkage disequilibrium matrix.
 This permits SBayesU to model a much larger set of SNPs, to model SNP annotations, to account for
 imperfect cross-ancestry genetic correlation, to produce PGSs for populations that are not included
 among the sets of GWAS summary statistics, and to allow our algorithms to converge much more
 quickly and reliably. We will also make the SBayesU tool and tutorials publicly available.
 • We will apply the best available method for producing diverse-population PGSs (which we anticipate
 will be SBayesU) to a wide range of aging, behavioral, and social phenotypes, using existing cohorts and
 new genotyped data that becomes available during the grant period. We will make the polygenic scores
 we produce publicly available as part of the Social Science Genetic Association Consortium’s Polygenic
 Index Repository, which currently creates polygenic scores for 11 widely used datasets (but currently
 only for the European-ancestry individuals in those datasets). Each release of the Repository will be
 accompanied by documentation that clearly describes methods used and the underlying data.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10838477
- **Project number:** 5R01AG081518-02
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
- **Principal Investigator:** Patrick Ansel Turley
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $685,039
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2023-05-15 → 2028-04-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10838477

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10838477, Studying the Genetics of Aging, Behavioral, and Social Phenotypes in Diverse Populations (5R01AG081518-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-26 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10838477. Licensed CC0.

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