[Genetic aspects of rheumatic diseases]

The paper presents the results of the long-term studies of the pattern of hereditary predisposition to rheumatism, rheumatoid arthritis (RA), ankylosing spondyloarthritis (AS), osteoarthrosis which have been conducted at the Institute of Rheumatology, Russian Academy of Medical Sciences. It gives data on the type of inheritance of these diseases, the affliction heritability ratio, the penetrance of three genotypes within the model of an autosomal one-allele locus (SAL-2) for rheumatism and RA. The contribution of additive and dominant components in the determination of rheumatism and RA, the results of tests of their genetic heterogeneity, associations with HLA antigens are assessed. The paper outlines the results of tests of the candidate genes COLIA2, TCRB, TCRD as major RA predisposition genes via analysis of adherence and DNA polymorphism.