Relationship of type 1 diabetes to ancestral proportions and HLA DR/DQ alleles in a sample of the admixed Cuban population.

Background: Incidence of type 1 diabetes varies widely around the world, probably due to ethnic differences across populations among other factors.Aims: To determine whether there is an association between disease and ancestry proportions; and to control disease–HLA associations for possible confounding by admixture or population stratification.Subjects and methods: 100 cases and 129 controls participated in the study. Ancestry informative markers, which have considerable differences in frequency between European, West African and Native American populations were used. Type 1 diabetes associated HLA susceptibility/protection alleles were ascertained by PCR using specific primers. Statistical analyses were conducted using STRUCTURE 2.1, ADMIXMAP 3.7, SPSS 16.0 and STRAT 1.0 packages.Results: The results of logistic regression implemented in ADMIXMAP 3.7 indicated that European ancestry was associated with type 1 diabetes mellitus with an odds ratio of 5.7 corresponding to one unit change in European admixt...