certain of seeing only 2, with an expectation of about 6; for subsamples of 1,500 cases and 1,500 controls, we could expect to have seen about 9. These figures provide stark evidence that the larger the study sample, the more loci can be expected to reach threshold significance values. Indeed, given the likely distribution of effect sizes for most complex traits (see above), there are strong grounds for the prosecution of GWA studies on an even larger scale than ours, and, wherever possible, combining the results from existing GWA scans performed for the same trait. To assist such efforts, individual level data from this study will be widely available through the Consortium’s Data Access Committee (follow links from http://www.wtccc.org.uk).
