The association between GAD1 gene polymorphisms and cerebral palsy in Chinese infants

Studies suggest that GAD1 gene was a functional candidate susceptibility gene for cerebral palsy (CP). In order to investigate the contribution of GAD1 gene to the etiology of CP in Chinese infants, we carried out a case-control association study between GAD1 gene and CP. In this study, 374 health controls and 392 infants with CP were recruited. Genomic DNA was extracted from venous blood and all three single nucleotide polymorphisms in GAD1 (rs3791874, rs3791862 and rs16858977) were genotyped by Sequenom's MassARRAY system. There were no significant differences in allele or genotype frequencies between CP or mixed CP patients and controls at any of the three genetic polymorphisms. Through haplotype analysis we found that haplotype GG (rs3791862, rs16858977) frequency demonstrated significantly statistical difference between mixed CP patients and controls (p = 0.0371). Our positive findings of haplotype GG suggested that variation of GAD1 gene was an important risk factor for mixed CP.