Maternal inheritance of atopy at the Fc epsilon RI beta locus in Japanese sibs.

Twenty-four Japanese atopic sibs with asthma and/or rhinitis were tested for polymorphic microsatellite repeats of Fc epsilon RI beta on chromosome 11q13. Significantly increased sharing of maternal alleles was found chi 2 = 5.86, p < 0.025) while no significant sharing was found for paternal alleles. These findings confirm maternal inheritance of atopy at this locus in a non-Caucasian population.