Association of an apolipoprotein B gene marker with essential hypertension

We designed an association (retrospective, case control) study aimed at eva luating associations between genetic variations of the human apolipoprotein B (apoB) gene and clinical diagnosis of essential hypertension. Our approa ch was to compare the distribution of the alleles of a highly polymorphic v ariable number of tandem repeats localized 3' to the human apoB gene, the a poB 3' hypervariable region (HVR), in a group of normotensive and a group o f hypertensive individuals. We collected DNA samples from 437 unrelated nat ionals (215 normotensives and 222 hypertensives) from the United Arab Emira tes (UAEs), and we determined their apoB 3' HVR allele and genotype status with a polymerase chain reaction-based assay. In the UAE population, we fou nd 18 alleles underlying a total of 51 genotypes. The distribution of these alleles was significantly different between normotensive and hypertensive UAE nationals, The main peak of the distributions occurred at 35 repeats am ong hypertensives (with a relative frequency of 25.7% versus 19.6% in normo tensives) and at 37 repeats among normotensives (28.8% versus 20.3% in hype rtensives). Alleles with 21, 23, 25, 49, and 55 repeats were found in hyper tensives only (with a combined relative frequency of 7.6%). We conclude tha t variations of the apoB gene, or of a nearby gene, that may be in linkage disequilibrium with these alleles play a role in the development of essenti al hypertension in the UAEs.