Single-nucleotide polymorphism at CYP27B1-1260, but not VDR Taq I, is possibly associated with persistent hepatitis B virus infection.

BACKGROUND: Vitamin D, beyond its role in calcium and bone metabolism, exhibits immunomodulatory effects on innate and adaptive immune pathways and is suggestively related to liver diseases.
OBJECTIVE: This study investigated the association of single-nucleotide polymorphisms in genes involved in vitamin D functions with hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection.
METHODS: Five hundred Chinese Han subjects, including 274 chronic HBV patients, 68 HBV infection resolvers, and 158 healthy controls without HBV infection, were studied. The CYP27B1-1260 promoter and the VDR Taq I polymorphisms were genotyped by polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism.
RESULTS: Although there was no difference between HBV patients and healthy controls, HBV patients and healthy controls had a higher frequency of the CYP27B1-1260 genotype CC (15.0% vs. 2.9%, p=0.004 and 13.3% vs. 2.9%, p=0.006, respectively) and allele C (38.3% vs. 25.7%, p=0.006 and 39.2% vs. 25.7%, p=0.006, respectively) compared with resolvers. The genotype and allele frequencies of the VDR Taq I polymorphism had no difference between patients, resolvers, and healthy controls.
CONCLUSION: These results suggest that the CYP27B1-1260 promoter polymorphism is possibly associated with the persistence, but not susceptibility to HBV infection in Chinese HBV patients, and that the VDR Taq I polymorphism is not suggested to be related to chronic HBV infection.