Is NAT2 Gene Polymorphism Associated with Vitiligo?

N-acetyltransferase-2 (NAT2) is a phase II xenobiotic enzyme that plays an important role against oxidative stress-mediated reactive oxygen species protection. Polymorphism in specific genotypes of NAT2 may lead to increase an imbalance in antioxidant systems and may influence the pathogenesis of vitiligo. We conducted this study to see the association between NAT2 gene polymorphism and risk of vitiligo. We looked into whether single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) at positions 857, 481 and 590 of the coding region of the NAT2 gene play as a risk factor for vitiligo among north Indian people.

In this study, we assessed 100 patients with vitiligo and 160 healthy individuals as controls. Genomic DNA was extracted from human peripheral blood and polymerase chain reaction-restricted fragment length polymorphism was done to identify the single nucleotide polymorphism at positions 857, 481, and 590 of the coding region of the NAT2 gene.

In this study, we observed a significant higher risk with slow acetylator genotypes of NAT2 (OR = 2.85; 95% CI = 1.68-4.84, P value < 0.001) for the vitiligo. Furthermore, in the association between NAT2 acetylator genotypes with percentage of body surface area (BSA) of disease, we observed that slow acetylator genotypes of NAT2 has significant higher risk with low grade of disease (1%-10% >11%-30% >30% of BSA).

A major limitation of this study was the small sample size and warrants further investigation on a large epidemiological study to confirm these findings.

Our preliminary data indicate that NAT2 slow acetylator genotype exhibits significant association for the risk of vitiligo, especially in disease predisposition and initiation.