Thursday, April 18, 2019

Genetic analyses of aplastic anemia and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients with short telomeres, possible implication of DNA-repair genes | Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases | Full Text

Genetic analyses of aplastic anemia and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients with short telomeres, possible implication of DNA-repair genes | Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases | Full Text

Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases

Genetic analyses of aplastic anemia and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients with short telomeres, possible implication of DNA-repair genes

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Contributed equally
Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases201914:82
  • Received: 31 October 2018
  • Accepted: 12 March 2019
  • Published: 

Abstract

Background

Telomeres are nucleoprotein structures present at the terminal region of the chromosomes. Mutations in genes coding for proteins involved in telomere maintenance are causative of a number of disorders known as telomeropathies. The genetic origin of these diseases is heterogeneous and has not been determined for a significant proportion of patients.

Methods

This article describes the genetic characterization of a cohort of patients. Telomere length was determined by Southern blot and quantitative PCR. Nucleotide variants were analyzed either by high-resolution melting analysis and Sanger sequencing of selected exons or by massive sequencing of a panel of genes.

Results

Forty-seven patients with telomere length below the 10% of normal population, affected with three telomeropathies: dyskeratosis congenita (4), aplastic anemia (22) or pulmonary fibrosis (21) were analyzed. Eighteen of these patients presented known pathogenic or novel possibly pathogenic variants in the telomere-related genes TERTTERCRTEL1CTC1 and ACD. In addition, the analyses of a panel of 188 genes related to haematological disorders indicated that a relevant proportion of the patients (up to 35%) presented rare variants in genes related to DNA repair or in genes coding for proteins involved in the resolution of complex DNA structures, that participate in telomere replication. Mutations in some of these genes are causative of several syndromes previously associated to telomere shortening.

Conclusion

Novel variants in telomere, DNA repair and replication genes are described that might indicate the contribution of variants in these genes to the development of telomeropathies. Patients carrying variants in telomere-related genes presented worse evolution after diagnosis than the rest of patients analyzed.

Keywords

  • Telomere
  • Dyskeratosis congenita
  • Pulmonary fibrosis
  • Aplastic anemia
  • DNA repair
  • Telomeropathies

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