A nationally representative set of EBV-transformed lymphocyte cultures has been established from 44-45-year-old participants in the biomedical examination of the British 1958 birth cohort. These have been used to create a renewable DNA collection for use as a reference series in genetic case-control studies. This has proved a popular resource.

There are currently 20 active users of this DNA collection, many of them funded by the Wellcome Trust. 1500 samples are currently being genotyped as a control group for the WT-funded Genetic Case-Control Consortium. Results for 1 million SNPs, on sample sizes between 1500 and 8000 DNAs, are expected during 2006.

This application requests continuity of support for the Bristol laboratory to maintain the cell line resource and to continue providing DNA arrays at no charge to users. It also proposes extension of the data management and website development activity at St George's, so that incoming genotypes can be processed in a timely and user-friendly fashion into a publicly accessible on-line reference library of genotype and allele frequencies, already piloted with over 9000 SNPs deposited to date.

Our key goal is to maximise scientific value for money from this large population-based cell line collection (WT programme grant068545/Z/02).