Author/Editor     Medica, Igor; Teran, Nataša; Volk, Marija; Pfeifer, Vladimir; Ladavac, Edi; Peterlin, Borut
Title     Patients with primary cataract as a genetic pool of DMPK protomutation
Type     članek
Source     J Hum Genet
Vol. and No.     Letnik 52, št. 2
Publication year     2007
Volume     str. 123-8
Language     eng
Abstract     Myotonic dystrophy 1 (DM1) is known to diminish reproductive fitness in its severe form. Since no de novo mutations are known for this disease, it has the tendency to become extinct from a population. To explain the preservation of DM1 in a population, a hypothesis that a pool of subjects for the mutated gene exists in the apparently healthy (non-DM1) population was tested. In order to determine the (CTG) repeat number, PCR was performed in 274 patients found to have primary cataract of adult onset who showed no DM1 symptoms, and were not related to DM1 patients. In four cataract patients (1.46%; 95% CI 0.5-3.7), a protomutation in the myotonin protein kinase gene was found which might lead to a complete mutation after transmission through the next generations. The number of (CTG) repeats in the remaining 270 cataract patients did not differ significantly from the control subjects in terms of the distribution of larger [(CTG)n > or = 19] versus smaller [(CTG)n < 19] alleles. We consider the primary cataract patients to be the pool of DMPK protomutation from which DM1 mutation is maintained in the population.
Descriptors     ADULT
AGED
AGED, 80 AND OVER
CASE-CONTROL STUDIES
CATARACT
GENOTYPE
MUTATION
PHENOTYPE
PROTEIN-SERINE-THREONINE KINASES