ELAVL4, PARK10, and the Celts.

Genetic variability in ELAVL4 located in the PARK10 locus was recently associated with age-at-onset (AAO) in a series of Parkinson's disease (PD) patients originating from the United States. We examined five markers spanning ELAVL4 in Norwegian, United States, and Irish PD case-control samples. No association was found between the examined markers and AAO or PD in Norwegian or US samples. However, ELAVL4 markers (rs967582 and rs3902720) were significantly associated with susceptibility to PD in our Irish series. Our data suggest that the association between ELAVL4 and PD previously observed might be explained by a Celtic-founder effect. (c) 2006 Movement Disorder Society.