[Evaluation of inheritable character in essential hypertension through reconstruction of neighbor-joining tree]

To explore the inheritable character in essential hypertension and to evaluate the role of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) variations of the D-loop region in the pathogenesis of hypertension, the entire genome of the D-loop region from the hypertensive and the normotensive (20 cases, each) was amplified using 3 pairs of overlapping primers and followed by sequencing. We reconstructed the Neighbor-Joining tree and analyzed the mtDNA variations in the D-loop region. The results exhibited that one clustering branch harbored some hypertensive, who had significantly higher frequency and density of mtDNA variations (both P<0.01), especially the polymorphisms of np152T->C, np182C->T, np189A->G, np247G->A, np16187C->T, np16189T->C, np16264C->T, np16270C->T and np16311T->C. This study suggested that there was an aggregative phenomenon in some hypertensive. The genotypes of np152C, np182T, np247A, np16187T, np16189C, np16264T, np16270T and np16311C may be potential genetic markers for susceptibility to hypertension.