Association between exonic polymorphisms of human leukocyte antigen-G gene and non-segmental vitiligo in the Korean population

Major histocompatibility complex (MHC) gene frequency in acquired dermal macular hyperpigmentation: a case control study

BACKGROUND

Human leukocyte antigen (HLA) allele frequencies have a known association with the pathogenesis of various autoimmune diseases.

METHODS

We recruited 31 Indian patients of acquired dermal macular hyperpigmentation (ADMH) and 60 unrelated, age-and-gender-matched healthy controls. After history and clinical examination, 5 ml of blood in EDTA vials was collected. These samples were subjected to DNA extraction and the expression of HLA A, B, C, DR, DQ-A, and DQ-B was studied.

RESULTS

There was a predominance of females with a gender ratio of 23 : 8 and the most common phototype was Fitzpatrick type IV (83.9%). There was a significant association of HLA A*03:01 (OR: 5.8, CI: 1.7-17.0, P = 0.005), HLA B*07:02 (OR: 5.3, CI: 1.9-14.6, P = 0.003), HLA C*07:02 (OR: 4.3, CI: 1.8-9.6, P = 0.001), HLA DRB1*10:01 (OR: 7.6, CI: 1.7-38.00, P = 0.022), and HLA DRB1*15:02 (OR: 31.0, CI: 4.4-341.8, P < 0.001) with patients compared to controls, whereas HLA DQB*03:01 was less associated with patients compared to controls (OR: 0.2, CI: 0.0-0.6, P = 0.009).

CONCLUSION

Patients with ADMH are more likely to have the HLA A*03:01, HLA B 07*02, HLA C*07:02, HLA DRB1*10:01, HLA DRB1*15:02 and less likely to have the HLA DQB*03:01 allele. Larger cohort studies may thus be conducted studying these specific alleles.

Association between miR-202, miR-211, and miR-1238 gene polymorphisms and risk of vitiligo

Vitiligo, as a common pigment defect in the skin, hair, and mucous membranes, results from the destruction of melanocytes. Recent investigations have shown that miRNA dysregulation contributes in the pathogenesis of vitiligo. Therefore, in this research, our aim is to explore the relationship between miR-202 rs12355840, miR-211 rs8039189, and miR-1238 rs12973308 polymorphisms and susceptibility to vitiligo. A total number of 136 vitiligo patients and 129 healthy individuals as a control group were included in this research. The salting out approach was implemented to extraction genomic DNA. The genetic polymorphisms of miR-202 rs12355840, miR-211 rs8039189, and miR-1238 rs12973308 were determined using PCR-RFLP approach. The findings revealed that miR-202 rs12355840 polymorphism under codominant (CT and TT genotypes), dominant, recessive, overdominant, and also allelic models is correlated with increased risk of vitiligo. In addition, codominant, dominant, overdominant, as well as allelic models of miR-211 rs8039189 polymorphism decrease risk of vitiligo. No significant relationship was observed between the miR-1238 rs12973308 polymorphism and susceptibility to vitiligo. The miR-211 rs8039189 polymorphism may serve a protective effect on vitiligo development and miR-202 rs12355840 polymorphism may act as a risk factor for vitiligo susceptibility.

A comprehensive meta-analysis and prioritization study to identify vitiligo associated coding and non-coding SNV candidates using web-based bioinformatics tools

Vitiligo is a prevalent depigmentation disorder affecting around 1% of the general population. So far, various Genome Wide Association Studies (GWAS) and Candidate Gene Association Studies (CGAS) have identified several single nucleotide variants (SNVs) as a risk factor for vitiligo. Nonetheless, little has been discerned regarding their direct functional significance to the disease pathogenesis. In this study, we did extensive data mining and downstream analysis using several experimentally validated datasets like GTEx Portal and web tools like rSNPBase, RegulomeDB, HaploReg and STRING to prioritize 13 SNVs from a set of 291SNVs that have been previously reported to be associated with vitiligo. We also prioritized their underlying/target genes and tried annotating their functional contribution to vitiligo pathogenesis. Our analysis revealed genes like FGFR10P, SUOX, CDK5RAP1 and RERE that have never been implicated in vitiligo previously to have strong potentials to contribute to the disease pathogenesis. The study is the first of its kind to prioritize and functionally annotate vitiligo-associated GWAS and CGAS SNVs and their underlying/target genes, based on functional data available in the public domain database.