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Genetics of Pigmentation in Eastern and Southern African Populations Study

The goal of this study was to identify genes and loci associated with pigmentation in African populations. It comprises 1,593 participants from Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Botswana. Sexes are evenly represented (768 males and 825 females) and self reported ages ranged from 18 to 103. Mean age was used for individuals without ages. For each participant, a DSM II color meter was used to measure underarm skin reflectance in triplicate. These measures averaged and converted to a melanin index (MI = 100 x log10(1/(x/255)). All individuals were included in a genome wide scan that accounted for age, sex, and genetic relatedness.