Abstract

resting metabolic rate and obesity among women. Obes Res. 2003;11:904–911. Objective: To investigate the role of genetic admixture in explaining phenotypic variation in obesity-related traits in a sample of African-American women (n 145) and to determine significant associations between obesity traits and admixture genetic markers. Research Methods and Procedures: Associations between genetic admixture and BMI, resting metabolic rate, fat mass, fat-free mass, and bone mineral density were tested using linear regression considering the estimation of admixture by 1) a maximum-likelihood approach (MLA) and 2) a Bayes-ian analysis. Results: Both the conservative MLA and the Bayesian approach support an association between African genetic admixture and BMI. Evidence for the associations of Afri-can genetic admixture with fat mass and fat-free mass was supported by the Bayesian analysis; the MLA supported an association with bone mineral density. When the individual ancestry informative markers that were used to estimate admixture were tested for associations with BMI, signifi-cant associations were identified in chromosomes 1, 11, and 12. Discussion: These results provide evidence supporting the application of admixture mapping methods to the identifi-cation of genes that result in higher levels of obesity among African-American women. Further research is needed to replicate and further explore these findings