Mitochondrial influence PD in the Cypriot population

 

Inconsistent findings concerning mitochondrial haplogroups and their association to PD.

Mitochondrial haplogroup U was associated with a reduced PD risk in the Cypriot population. PD cases belonging to UKJT and R (xH, xUKJT) haplogroup, the odds of having a later age of onset of PD were 13 and 15 times respectively higher than the odds for cases with an H haplogroup. Midbrain dopaminergic neurons have a high rate of metabolic activity and are therefore dependent on the energy (ATP) released by oxidative phosphorylation in mitochondria. Mitochondrial dysfunction caused by genetic variants in both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA, can adversely affect neuronal function and lead to neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and PD. Mitochondrial haplogroup K, which has been previously linked to lower PD risk, is particularly common in the Cypriot.

 Polymerase chain reaction was used to amplify the entire mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) Hypervariable Region 1 (HVR 1).

The frequency of the independent variable was increased and accordingly the study power. The clusters created were L (xM, xN), M, N (including N, W, X and I) (xR), R (R*, R0), HV (HV, V), JT and U (including K) and the superclusters were LMN (including L, M, N, W, X and I), UKJT (including U, K, J and T) and R (including R*, R0, HV and V) (xH, xUKJT).