PAX6 mutations may be associated with high myopia

PAX6 is a key regulator of eye development and there are many well recognized ophthalmic sequelae of mutations at this locus. The 14 exon PAX6 gene is well conserved across species and phyla. Coding region mutations manifest in a variety of phenotypes. Predicted premature protein truncations are generally associated with classical aniridia. Missense mutations are often found in cases with variant phenotypes such as ectopia pupillae; isolated foveal hypoplasia; nystagmus and hyaloid vessel proliferation. The locus has also been implicated, through a genome-wide sib-pair scan, to be important in the normal variation of myopia. We investigated the association between identified PAX6 mutations and refractive error in Australian patients from four pedigrees. Two of eight subjects with a 1410delC PAX6 mutation had a mean spherical equivalence < -9D, whilst a mean spherical equivalence < or = -5D was recorded in two from four subjects with an Arg240Stop PAX6 mutation and one of two subjects with a Glu93Stop mutation. One individual identified with a Pro346Ala PAX6 mutation had a mean spherical equivalence of +2.8 D. Thus, our observations generally support other incidental findings, that PAX6 mutation, particularly predicted haploinsufficiency, may be associated with extreme refractive error, although the mechanism by which this occurs is not clear.