Association of Lymphotoxin Alpha Polymorphism with Type 1 Diabetes in a Tunisian Population

We investigated the association of the lymphotoxin (LT)-alpha gene polymorphism +249A/G with type 1 diabetes. The distribution of genotypes of the LT-alpha +249A/G single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) was assessed in 115 diabetic patients and 123 normoglycemic control subjects, using PCR-restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis. Among unselected patients, the SNP was significantly associated with increased risk of diabetes (chi(2) = 8.44, p = 0.014) and was found to be more pronounced among female (chi(2) = 8.37, p = 0.02) than male (chi(2) = 6.11, p = 0.047) patients. A significant association was detected between LT-alpha +249A/G and increased risk of diabetes, in particular for young-onset patients (chi(2) = 6.92, p = 0.031). Moreover, we reported significant differences in levels of HbA1c, triglycerides, alanine transaminase, and anti-glutamic acid decarboxylase-65 among alleles. Additional studies with extended patient age groups and different ethnicities are needed to confirm our findings.