Table 1. Basic characteristics of the discovery and replication data sets.

	Discovery KORA F4 (n=2090)						Replication KORA F3 (n=261)						Replication TwinsUK (n=277)
	Male (n=1144)			Female (n=946)			Male (n=154)			Female (n=107)			Female (n=277)a
	LDb	MHDc	P-value	LD	MHD	P-value	LD	MHD	P-value	LD	MHD	P-value	LD	MHD	P-value
Participants, n (%)	859 (75)	285 (25)	—	712 (75)	234 (25)	—	106 (69)	48 (31)	—	84 (78)	23 (22)	—	250 (90)	27 (10)	—
Age (years) mean±s.d.	56.2±13.7	57.1±11.6	2.8E−01d	54.5±13.2	55.7±11.5	1.8E−01d	67.9±7.6	64.5±6.8	1.3E−02d	65.5±7.4	64.6±7.7	5.3E−01d	48.4±10.2	43.5±9.0	1.6E−02d
BMI(kg m−2) mean±s.d.	27.6±3.8	28.4±4.2	3.4E−03d	26.6±4.9	26.3±4.7	3.6E−01d	28.1±3.1	29.1±3.6	1.2E−01d	27.6±3.7	27.5±4.0	9.5E−01d	25.1±4.6	24.7±4.1	8.1E−01d
Smoker, n (%)	153 (18)	66 (23)	1.0E−04e	103 (14)	44 (19)	1.2E−01e	8 (7)	8 (17)	9.5E−02e	4 (5)	3 (13)	1.7E−01e	67 (27)	14 (52)	1.3E−02e
HDL (mg dl−1) mean±s.d.	49.9±11.3	55.8±13.5	7.1E−12d	62.7±13.6	66.0±15.0	4.4E−03d	49.2±13.2	59.3±15.3	1.5E−04d	65.7±16.7	71.10±16.2	1.4E−01d	58.9±14.5	66.2±13.9	1.3E−02d
Triglyceride (mg dl−1) mean±s.d.	134.5±82.0	154.0±104.9	3.4E−02e	103.9±71.4	100.9±53.6	9.7E−01e	188.0±106.7	192.3±130.2	9.6E−01e	156.2±74.1	146.4±85.0	3.0E−01e	99.6±47.3	94.1±71.4	1.1E−01d

Abbreviations: BMI, body mass index; HDL, high-density lipoprotein; LD, light drinkers; MHD, moderate-to-heavy drinkers.

Significant P-values are in bold.

^a629 participants were available for replication analysis; for 277 participants HDL-C and triglyceride data were available.

^bAlcohol consumption<40g day⁻¹ males,<20g day⁻¹ females.

^cAlcohol consumption⩾40 g day⁻¹ males,⩾20 g day⁻¹ females.

^dMann–Whitney test (two-sided).

^eFisher's exact test (two-sided), significance level α=0.05.