Association of ulcerative colitis with TNF-related apoptosis inducing ligand (TRAIL) gene polymorphisms and plasma soluble TRAIL levels in Chinese Han population.

OBJECTIVE : The precise etiolo - gy of inflammatory bowel diseases (IBDs) is still unknown although dysregulation of apop - tosis likely plays an important role in this pathogenesis. However, the significance of mu - cosal T-cell apoptosis in ulcerative colitis (UC) is unclear. In the present work we investigated the role of TNF-related apoptosis-inducing lig - and ( TRAIL ), which is implicated in various hu - man disorders. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Results from a to - tal of 393 UC patients and 1292 healthy individu - als were analyzed in this study. We determined the three single nucleotide polymorphisms of TRAIL in 3' untranslated regions (UTR), and ex - amined the plasma soluble TRAIL (sTRAIL) lev - els by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. RESULTS: We found that the mutant genotypes of TRAIL (G1525A/G1588A/C1595T and G1525A and G1588A) were much lower in UC patients compared to the controls. Furthermore, mutant allele and genotype of TRAIL C1595T were more prevalent in severe UC patients than in other pa - tients ( p < 0.001; p = 0.005, respectively). The three polymorphic sites in 3'UTR were in a per - fect linkage disequilibrium in our study. In con - trast to controls, the GAT haplotype was in - creased ( p < 0.001), while the AAT haplotype was decreased in UC patients ( p < 0.001). Besides, the plasma levels of sTRAIL were significantly higher in UC patients than in controls ( p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggested that increased occurrence of the genetic mutations of TRAIL in 3'UTR and possibly decreased plas - ma levels of sTRAIL might lead to a lower risk of UC attack in Chinese patients.