Related Experiment Videos
HLA-DRw15 is increased in frequency in Japanese scleroderma patients
E C Jazwinska1, C Olive, H Dunckley
1Human Genetics Group, John Curtin School of Medical Research, Australian National University, Canberra.
Abstract:
HLA-DRB allogenotypes were compared in 18 Japanese scleroderma patients and healthy Japanese controls. HLA-DRw15 was found to be significantly increased in frequency in the patient series compared to controls (chi 2 = 4.25, p less than 0.05, Yates' corrected); in DRw15 positive individuals the relative risk of developing scleroderma was 4.0. In Caucasoids DRw11 is significantly associated with scleroderma (Dunckley et al., 1989) and sequence data shows that DRw11 and DRw15 DRB molecules (together with DRw8 where the relative risk of developing scleroderma in Caucasoids is 2.1) share the same amino acid sequence at position 67-70 in the first domain. This would suggest that the DRB1 locus may well be the primary disease promoting locus in scleroderma.