A shooting at a university fraternity party in Ohio left one student dead and 11 others wounded, officials said.

Coroners identified the dead victim as 25-year-old Youngstown State University senior Jamail Johnson and local media said the shooting occurred in the early hours yesterday at an off-campus house where members of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity lived.

Johnson was shot once in the back of the head and several times in the lower body, Rick Jamrozik, an investigator with the coroner's office, told AFP. No immediate arrests were made.

Tina Creighton, a spokeswoman for Saint Elizabeth Health Centre in Youngstown, told AFP that eight of the wounded had been treated and released.

Three are still in the facility's care, though she could not confirm their identities or their current conditions.

University police stepped up their presence on campus after the incident, but YSU police chief John Gocala said there was no threat to the school.

"I want to express my deepest sympathies to the family of the student who died in this tragic act of violence, and to ask everyone to keep him and the other students in their thoughts and prayers," YSU president Cynthia Anderson said in a statement.

"It is a sad day for the YSU family." Anderson visited the hospital earlier to meet with wounded students and their families. Counselors and clergy offered their services to students and others seeking to cope with the incident.

"The Youngstown police department is actively pursuing leads in this case," mayor Jay Williams said. "As mayor of Youngstown, I am fully confident that they will identify, apprehend and bring to justice the individuals who are responsible."